Is it the end of the world as we know it?

I saw a news article today that reports R.E.M.'s 1987 hit, "It's the End of the World As We Know It" is back on the charts in the new era of the Covid 19 pandemic. For many people, it might as well be the end of the world as their retirement accounts evaporate and they can't buy groceries due to food shortages. Who ever thought that the most precious commodities in a crisis would be toilet paper and hand sanitizer?

The viral outbreak isn't the only major problem facing us now. Utah just experienced a 5.7 magnitude earthquake. East Africa and South Asia are facing a horrifying locust plague that sounds like something straight out of the prophet Amos or John's Apocalypse (also known as the Book of Revelation). With all of these travails, one of my parishioners asked me the other day if perhaps it is the end of the world as we know it.

In Luke 21, one of the synoptic versions of Jesus' so-called "mini-apocalypse," he describes various portends of the end of the world: "There will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and pestilences. And there will be terrors and great signs from heaven" (Luke 21:11).  Jesus' description of the End sounds like something right out of this week's headlines.  Elsewhere in the chapter he mentions wars, persecutions, and wonders in the heavens (sky) as further indications. Maybe we are the last generation on earth.

Yet nearly every generation in the history of the world has feared it was the last.  I am certain that just over 100 years ago during World War I and the outbreak of the Spanish Flu, many Christians thought the end was near.  After the WWII and the Holocaust came the dawn of a terrible Nuclear Era with weapons of mass destruction almost unimaginable.  I remember hearing my parents talk about so-called "duck and cover" drills in grade school. From Paul's letters to the Thessalonians, we realize that even in the 1st century many Christians worried about eschatology, the theological word for matters related to the Last Days.

But predicting the end of the world isn't as easy as reading the newspaper (or an Internet blog) in one hand and the Bible in another and figuring out a date.  In fact, Jesus told his disciples, "Concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only" (Matt. 24:36). If not even Jesus knows when he's coming back, how can we be so certain of our own predictions?

But here's the Good News: even in the midst of Jesus' dire signs of the times, he offers comfort and hope to the baptized people of God. "Now when these things begin to take place, straighten up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near" (Luke 21:28). Jesus tells us not to be afraid of the Last Days, but rather to be encouraged because our redemption draws near.  Our Redeemer draws near. For those who believe and trust in Jesus Christ, the one who died for their sins and rose again to give them eternal life, there is nothing to fear. For us, the Last Day is not the ultimate end, but rather the beginning of a new creation--a new heaven and a new earth.  As Jesus says in Revelation 21:5, "Behold, I make all things new."

So is this the end of the world as we know it? I don't know. But I will not be shaken, even if it is. Because our redemption is drawing near. "Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea, 3 though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble at its swelling" (Psalm 46:2-3).