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The Omega Letter Intelligence Digest
Vol: 39 Issue: 2 - Thursday, December 02, 2004--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sounding the Alarm(s)
For the last couple of decades, being an 'alarmist' has become a major growth industry. Only a couple of decades ago, the global future looked much brighter than it does now.
Ronald Reagan's "bright, shining city on a hill" was beaming brightly. New technology was outpacing our wildest expectations and our old enemies in the Soviet Union were reeling from the effort and expense of keeping up.
Europe had not yet amalgamated into the current European superstate, and the only 'alarmists' around were people like Hal Lindsey who compared the signs of the times to the prophecies of Scripture and began warning of the Lord's impending Return.
In the intervening decades, a growing number of others began sounding alarm for different reasons. Something was going terribly wrong, although they couldn't quite come to a consensus as to what 'it' was.
Kids started killing each other in the classroom. The alarmists on the left insisted guns did the killings. Punishing guns was not enough, they must be eradicated! Only then will we be safe.
Alarmists on the right insisted that bad parenting, a breakdown in the social moral fabric and the idiotic policy of blaming inanimate objects for human actions were to blame.
The simultaneously blaring of the alarmists on both sides became white background noise, effectively canceling each other out.
Environmentalists began sounding the alarm about the exploding global population. The expanding population was using up the earth's resources so fast that soon we would run out unless we found new sources, say those on the right.
Those on the left oppose finding new sources to replace those being depleted for fear it will upset the animal populations. Again, the 'white noise' effect is so confusing nobody knows what to believe, so they believe the last alarmist they heard. Until they hear the alarm sounded by the other side.
In recent decades, the various major governments of the world have set up commissions to study the feasibility of a catastropic meteor strike on the earth and ways to prevent it. In recent years, the 'sky is falling' alarms have become more shrill, with scientists gravely pronouncing it not a matter of 'if' but 'when'.
The recent solar flare phenomenon during a rare, out-of-season solar storm was so intense that commercial aircraft had to alter course, satellites had to be shielded and prompted NASA scientist Richard Wilson to warn;
"Historical records of solar activity indicate that solar radiation has been increasing since the late 19th century. If a trend, comparable to the one found in this study, persisted throughout the 20th century, it would have provided a significant component of the global warming the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports to have occurred over the past 100 years."
The loudest and shrillest alarm is that of global warming. Alarmists are predicting more hurricanes, catastrophic rises in sea levels, and even being on the verge of being plunged into a new Ice Age.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor and global warming skeptic Richard Lindzen gave a speech to about 100 people at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. Lindzen is a professor at MIT's Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences.
According to Lindzen, climate "alarmists" have been trying to push the idea that there is scientific consensus on dire climate change. Recent reports of a melting polar ice cap were dismissed by Lindzen as an example of the media taking advantage of the public's "scientific illiteracy."
"The thing you have to remember about the Arctic is that it is an extremely variable part of the world," Lindzen said. "Although there is melting going [on] now, there has been a lot of melting that went on in the [19]30s and then there was freezing. So by isolating a section ... they are essentially taking people's ignorance of the past," he added.
The climate change debate has become corrupted by politics, the media and money, according to Lindzen.
"It's a sad story, where you have scientists making meaningless or ambiguous statements [about climate change]. They are then taken by advocates to the media who translate the statements into alarmist declarations. You then have politicians who respond to all of this by giving scientists more money," Lindzen said.
"There can be little doubt that the language used to convey alarm has been sloppy at best," Lindzen said, citing Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbles and his famous observation that even a lie will be believed if enough people repeat it. "There is little question that repetition makes people believe things [for] which there may be no basis," Lindzen said.
"Agreement on anything is taken to infer agreement on everything. So if you make a statement that you agree that CO2 (carbon dioxide) is a greenhouse gas, you agree that the world is coming to an end," he added.
Assessment:
Surfing about on HBO is almost like having a 'Disaster of the Month Club' membership. Some of the older movies are about volcanic catastrophes, cataclysmic earthquakes and tidal waves. The newer ones, like 'Armageddon' and 'Deep Impact' deal with the earth's impending doom from above.
Switch over to PayPerView and the newest disaster is "The Day After Tomorrow". In that one, a killer storm plunges the world into a new Ice Age in a single week.
Temperatures plummet in seconds, freezing people to death instantly where they stand. By the end of the movie, what is left of North America is living in refugee camps in central Mexico. A chilling scenario. (Pardon the pun)
Notice anything about the alarmists? They all see the same catastrophe looming on the horizon, expressed from different perspectives, but ultimately resulting in the same conclusion put into words by Professor Lindzen. They "agree that the world is coming to an end."
They believe that by sounding the alarm, passing legislation or developing technology, they can avert the catastrophes they see coming. We believe that what is coming upon the earth are the 'birth pangs' that Jesus said would precede His return.
He spoke of wars and rumors of wars, famines, earthquakes, pestilences and a climate of deception, on an ever increasing scale.
He spoke of Israel as a literal place in the last days, and foretold Jerusalem's rise to global prominence at the appointed time.
He said Jerusalem would remain in Gentile hands until the times of the Gentiles were fulfilled.
All this is the stuff of daily headlines for us. And THEN He said;
"And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; Men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken. And then shall they see the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. And when these things BEGIN to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh." (Luke 21:25-28)
The alarm that needs to be sounded is the spiritual one. What they see as chaos and catastrophe is really evidence that the Lord remains firmly in control of human events. The Divine Plan remains on schedule. If you are His, all these alarms are welcome news. It means He is coming soon for His Church.
But for those who don't know Him, it is a terrifying world, indeed. There is hope, but that hope exists outside of human efforts.
To the lost, that is the most alarming thing of all.
Note on new OL Advertising Project:
Over the past year I have occasionally mentioned our financial needs and asked you to keep us in prayer.
The costs of maintaining the website, and just paying the bills generally, are more than we generate from subscriptions, and this past year, we’ve needed to replace equipment and software to stay on top of our growing ministry.
Some months ago, I mentioned that we were considering the addition of advertising to the Omega Letter website, to help defray the costs of maintaining it, and to help with related expenses. We asked for feedback from our subscribers, and the response was predominantly positive.
With some help from Art Drexler, we have been working toward this goal for the past nine months. At last, despite a few delays and obstacles, we are ready to launch this new feature of our website, and we frankly need your help and continued prayers to make it all come together. Art will be sending out a special, one-time-only letter explaining this in more detail and you will find some new things already posted on the website.
We plan to be discriminating in the location of ads throughout the website, and in the content and appearance of ads, because we are a ministry and not a web store.
The Advertisers Gallery is a way that you can directly support the ministry by supporting each other.
Much love in Christ,
Jack
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