Will The World End In Twelve Years?

By: Gary L. Hutchens

​   Back in 2009 another movie playing on the theme of global destruction was released.  It was just the latest in a long series of such films dating way, way back.  Based on the focus of that movie I wrote an article titled, “Will The Earth End In 2012?”  Well, here we are nearing the end of 2019, so the answer to the question is obvious.  Now we hear a growing cry among climate change activists that, on our present course, life on earth will be pretty much wiped out within twelve years! 

   I’ve been a science fiction fan as long as I can remember.  I still watch the original War Of The Worlds and the original The Day The Earth Stood Still (in my mind the best versions of those movies yet released) just about every time I’m aware that they’re being re-run on TV.  Classics!
   The destruction of the earth theme, both mankind and the entire planet, has been approached from many different directions.  Everything from nuclear fallout, to man made catastrophes, to alien invasions, to asteroids colliding with the earth, to natural disasters and even to insects taking over the planet has been used as the basis for global cataclysm.  If you like that kind of escapism, such movies can make a box of popcorn disappear like magic!
   While the data being touted by the climate change crowd is sketchy, at best, a growing number of people seem to be buying into it.  Some logical questions should come to mind.  Do we really have the ability to change the climate so severely as to make it uninhabitable?  How do we deal with the fact that earth’s climate has changed rather radically in the past, but humanity‘s numbers continue to grow?  If earth’s population has only twelve years left, because of climate change, what could possibly be done within that short time span to turn things around?  It would be an incredibly massive undertaking.
   The most profound question is, “What does God say about this?”  Our Lord answered that question rather emphatically almost two thousand years ago: “But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but My Father only” (Matt. 24:36). 
   This world will be destroyed, but it won’t be by climate change or natural disaster or nuclear holocaust or alien invasion or any of the other fanciful means that have been put forth.  The apostle Peter made it clear that one day God will destroy this world with fire  (2 Pet. 3:10).  But only God knows when that day will come.  He created this world, and all life thereon, with a purpose and for a purpose.  Its destruction will be at His will, by His design and on His timetable.  The reason will be the overwhelming wickedness of mankind, nothing else (Gen. 6:5-7).
   When Christ said that even He did not know when that day would be, that settled the matter.  If Christ did not know when this world would come to an end, then neither does anybody else.  People have been unsuccessfully predicting the world’s end for generations.  When will we come to realize that it is utter foolishness for mere mortals to try to predict the end of the world when we have already been told that such is only in the mind of God? 
“Indeed, let God be true but every man a liar” (Rom. 3:4).  Our aim should be to live in such a way that we’re ready for the Lord to come again, no matter when that might be…