The Sky is Falling

Q: Do you think this is the end of the world? An earthquake, a tsunami and thousands dead, and now a nuclear disaster... It’s too much!

A: “The sky is falling, the sky is falling!” said Chicken Little.

“How do you know?” asked Henny Penny.

“I saw it with my own eyes,” answered Chicken Little.

When we experience something with our own eyes, we tend to universalize the event. It must be true, because I saw it. The recent earthquake and tsunami were experienced and seen by millions of people, either in person or on television. This is why the questioner asks me, “Is it the end of the world?” It feels like the sky is falling; the end must be near. Now add to our reader’s perspective global warming, melting ice caps, terrorist attacks, revolutions, food shortages, economic woes, wild weather patterns, and exploding volcanoes, topped off with a near-meltdown at the nuclear reactors in Japan. Someone I know referred to these events as the Apocalypse, the final catastrophe.

The last book of the Bible is called Apocalypse—a Greek word which when translated into English is Revelation. The book describes the Second Coming of Jesus the Christ, who is to return to Earth to both judge and redeem us and to remake the heavens and the Earth. The Revelation is the appearing of the Lord. Because the Book of Revelation includes descriptions of large, global disasters, disasters of this size tend to trigger in Christians thoughts of the End Times. However, the Bible doesn’t specify when these disasters will occur or when Christ will return.

Is the sky falling now? Disasters, both natural and human made, have been part of the world from the beginnings of time. Since the universe was created, it has been constantly reorganizing its geological make-up through ice ages, glacial melts, volcanic activity, tectonic shifts, floods, etc. This has been going on for hundreds of thousands of years—but now we humans are on the scene to observe, measure, and evaluate these events and judge them as disasters. Yet humanity continues to endure through these monumental shifts. We have seen wars, holocaust, crimes against humanity and all types of natural disasters, always thinking that this must be the end. Yet the world continues to go on.

Modern Christians (and maybe all humans) tend to see the workings of the world only in terms of how it impacts us. Science and philosophy, on the other hand, tries to understand the system of the universe, in which humans are only one part, and how it all works together. In The Good Book, Reverend Dr. Peter Gomes, a recent chaplain of Harvard University, writes, “Rather than place God at the center of our universe, we have placed ourselves at the center of God’s universe and determined that we are the object of his existence rather than the subject.”(p. 316). Gomes calls this “egocentric Christianity.” Thus when disaster strikes, we feel that God owes us an explanation and deliverance.

Asking God to explain disasters and the End Times is a long tradition. Jesus is asked about it the Gospel of Matthew (Chapter 24). He describes wars and false Messiahs, but then says, “The end is not yet.” He says that when the end comes, it will be like flash of lightning, and everyone will see, “the Son of Man coming on the clouds of Heaven.”

This is not the end. How do I know? The Apocalypse—the Revelation of Jesus—has not yet happened. The sky may seem to fall from time to time, but there is no need to ask, “Is this the end?” Because Jesus promises that when it is the end, we will all know it at once. We will see Him coming, and the new Heavens and the new Earth will begin.