Are These the Signs of the Times?

After the rare east coast earthquake, I've already heard several people pondering if this, with all the other recent disasters and economic turmoil, is a sign of the End Times. And for the most part, these ponderings are not rabid doomsday prophesying, but rational contemplation of the reality that there will be that Day one day. Could it be that these are the rumblings of that Day?

Is this earthquake a sign of the End Times?

Yes.

(I am tempted at this point to say, "And you'll have to read next week's article to find out how!")

I say this with confidence only in the following (and somewhat anti-climactic) way: Every earthquake, every tornado (large or small), every tsunami, every war, and every rumor of war is a sign that the End Times are coming. They are constant reminders that our race is fallen, our world is fallen, our universe is fallen, and will continue toward their entropic demise. Every thing that is fallen will either be renewed or will deteriorate into destruction. All these "signs" are evidence that the End Times are coming - that they must come.

They may or may not be harbingers of when the End Times will be irretrievably upon us. Some say yes, others say no. It seems to me that there must be further progress of the Gospel and far more severe persecution before those days are upon us, but the arguments that the days ahead of us are few are worth listening to. The reality is that none of us know, and to claim to know is overstepping revelation.

But ask yourself this: If the Day was indeed right around the corner, what would I do differently? How would I relate to people? What would my priorities be? What would I stop doing? And then consider whether or not we should be living that way no matter when the Day will be.

Overwhelmed!

The images from Japan are overwhelming. Not only the largest earthquake in an earthquake prone country, not only thirty foot walls of water washing in, then washing out, entire neighborhoods, but living on the verge of a catastrophic nuclear disaster. I watched one video clip showing house after house being picked up and carried away like they were made of Styrofoam, and the only sound was that of dozens of people wailing as they watched their material lives float away and then crumble to bits.

It's so overwhelming. It's too much to see, too much to fathom, too much to feel adequately. I can't comprehend four nuclear reactors each in crisis. I can't imagine entire neighborhoods gone in seconds. I can't (and don't want to) envision thousands of casualties, let alone the likely hundreds of thousands. The years it will take to recover are too complex to consider. I feel badly for the victims, but I also feel badly because I can't feel badly enough. What I'm able to feel is far too small compared to what needs to be felt.

My tendency, like so many, is to shut myself off emotionally. Since I can't feel it adequately, my first reaction is to feel nothing. Then I won't feel so inadequate. I know there have been many tragedies of this scale in the past, and there will be more. And that thought makes me shut down all the more, because if just one of these overwhelms me, dozens of them absolutely bury me.

Part of the reason we feel overwhelmed is because we want to be adequate for whatever faces us. We want to have adequate solutions to the problems that arise. We want to provide adequate help - at least enough to make a real difference. We want to be adequate emotionally, that we can feel enough for the magnitude of the tragedies we face. And when we don't feel adequate, we feel overwhelmed. We feel the devastation of the tragedy - and on top of that, we feel the inadequacies - and on top of that, we feel overwhelmed.

But, does God ask us to be adequate? Does He expect us to provide all the adequate solutions? Does He expect us to provide adequate help to make things better? Does He expect us to have adequate enough feelings to match the magnitude of the situation? Or perhaps He expects to just do a little token something so that we can feel like we've done something?

God does not put on us the responsibility to be adequate for monumental tragedy. He does not call us to fix world catastrophes. What He does ask of us is to give ourselves to Him, especially when life situations are too big, especially when we are inadequate. He even asks us to give Him our inadequacies themselves. There are problems He allows that are bigger than we are, and in them, He wants us to give ourselves entirely to Him. So, when we pray and when we find ways to help, our goal should be to give ourselves to Him, not to feel like we've done something, or to presume that we're adequate to solve it.

We should give all of ourselves. We should pray fervently, give generously, and even help selflessly. But not in an effort to feel adequate or to escape being overwhelmed. We pray, give, and help as an act of giving our inadequate selves to the God who is completely, overwhelmingly adequate.