SOMETHING GREAT AND DECISIVE IS ABOUT TO TAKE PLACE

Compiled by Solomon Tweneboah

“The present is a time of overwhelming interest to all living. Rulers and statesmen, men who occupy positions of trust and authority, thinking men and women of all classes, have their attention fixed upon the events taking place about us. They are watching the strained, restless relations that exist among the nations. They observe the intensity that is taking possession of every earthly element, and they recognize that something great and decisive is about to take place—that the world is on the verge of a stupendous crisis.” (Education 179.5)

Approximately 2021 years ago Jesus Christ, The Messiah, was born. This obvious fact is supported by the Bible, history and most religions. Biblical account in Matthew 2:1-11 says that at the time Christ was born in Bethlehem, some wise men (thinking men) in the East were perfectly aware of the event and they came to Jerusalem to worship the new born King. The question could be asked – How did the wise men know that Christ was born at that particular time? These wise men, coming from the East suggests that they might, probably, not be Israelites. But they declared “we have seen His star”. How did they know that the New Born King would have a star on the day He was born?

 Long before Christ was born, about 1500 years earlier, God had told His people that a star shall come out of Jacob. Numbers 24:17 (NKJV)
“I see Him, but not now;
I behold Him, but not near;
A Star shall come out of Jacob;
A Scepter shall rise out of Israel,
And batter the brow of Moab,
And destroy all the sons of tumult.”

 The wise men (thinking men) were men who had spent time and resources in studying the Biblical prophecies. Besides, they had mastered the science of human generations, events, times, and seasons. They understood philosophy and astronomy and they were looking forward to the appearance of the star as prophesied by Balaam the prophet. Indeed, when they saw the star they recognized it and knew that it was time – the prophecy had been fulfilled.

 With so much joy the wise men arose and came to Jerusalem to celebrate the good tidings with Israel, but to their dismay, the Israelites together with Herod the king were "troubled" to hear the news (Matt. 2:3). The Israelites, the people of God, had no idea of the news presented by the wise men. They came to their senses only when Herod had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together and had inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. Then after consultation with the Scriptures, they answered, "The Christ was to be born in Bethlehem of Judea." Obviously, when Herod wanted to know the time of the event, the Israelites – the religious scholars at the time, had no idea. Indeed, the wise men knew what the religious think tanks had no knowledge about. Again, it was the same wise men who confirmed the time they saw His star (Matt. 2:7).

 The question could be asked – Do such wise men (thinking men) exist currently in the world today?

“The present is a time of overwhelming interest to all living. Rulers and statesmen, men who occupy positions of trust and authority, thinking men and women of all classes, have their attention fixed upon the events taking place about us. They are watching the strained, restless relations that exist among the nations. They observe the intensity that is taking possession of every earthly element, and they recognize that something great and decisive is about to take place—that the world is on the verge of a stupendous crisis” (Education 179.5).

 Of course, yes, we have thinking men today too. In every age, God blesses the world with wise men (thinking men). In the days of old the names of devout thinking men such as Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Joshua, Samuel, Daniel, … could be mentioned.  In this generation also we have thinking men and women of all classes who occupy positions of trust and authority. These thinking men are not prophets per se; some of them may not be Christians at all, but they recognize that something great and decisive is about to take place in this world. These thinking men have devoted time to the study of human generations, events, times and seasons. Some of them have mastered philosophy, history, economics, law, political science, sociology, etc. They have gathered information, facts and data from many sources through study and research. They watch the strained, restless relations that exist among the nations and observe the intensity that is taking possession of every earthly element. And they conclude that this world is on the verge of a stupendous crisis.

When, independently, these thinking men of today foresee what the word of God had foretold centuries before, then ‘whosoever reads let him understand’. Let us take a quick look at some of these thinking men of this age and examine their line of thought and conclusions.

 William Strauss and Neil Howe

William Strauss (1947–2007) was a renowned speaker, writer, historian, playwright, theatre director and performer, and an authority on generational change in American history. Strauss graduated from Harvard College, Harvard Law School, and the Kennedy School of Government. Strauss co-authored several books on generations with Neil Howe, all best sellers widely used by businesses, colleges, government agencies, and political leaders. Their first book, Generations (1991), is a history of America told as a sequence of generational biographies.

Neil Howe (1951) is a renowned authority on generations and social change in America. An acclaimed author and speaker, he is the nation’s leading thinker on today’s generations—who they are, what motivates them, and how they will shape America’s future.  He received his B.A. at U.C. Berkeley, studied abroad in France and Germany, and later earned graduate degrees in economics and history from Yale University. A historian, economist, and demographer, Howe is a recognized authority on global aging, long-term fiscal policy, and migration. He is the managing director of demography at Hedgeye, and president of Saeculum Research. Howe is also a senior associate at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and the Global Aging Institute, both in Washington D.C.

Strauss and Howe’s first book, Generations (1991), examine historical generations and describe a theorized cycle of recurring mood eras in American history (now described as the Strauss–Howe generational theory). Generations made a deep impression on former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, who called it the most stimulating book on American history he had ever read. He even sent a copy of the book to each member of Congress at the time.

Their second book, The Fourth Turning (1997), illuminates the past, explains the present, and re-imagines the future. Most remarkably, it offers an utterly persuasive prophecy about how America’s past will predict its future. The authors looked back 500 years and uncovered a distinct pattern: Modern history moves in cycles, each one lasting about the length of a long human life (±80 years). Each cycle is composed of four eras or "turnings" – with each “turning” lasting for about 20 years, and the sequences always occur in the same order. In each cycle, the four turnings are (1) a High – period of confident expansion as a new order takes root after the old one has been swept away, (2) an Awakening – a time of spiritual exploration and rebellion against the now-established order, (3) an Unravelling – an increasingly troubled era in which individualism triumphs over crumbling institutions, (4) a Crisis (the Fourth Turning) – when society passes through a great and perilous gate in history. Together, the four turnings comprise history's seasonal rhythm of growth, maturation, entropy, and rebirth.

Although published in 1997, The Fourth Turning offers bold predictions about year 2020-26 as the start and culmination of a crisis commensurate with the American Revolution, Civil War, and World War II. Come to think of it, Strauss and Howe are not ordinary men making things up; they are men who occupy positions of trust and authority, seasoned leading thinkers in the US who have both national and international reputation. A stunning fact is that the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic at the beginning of year 2020, coupled with various urban unrests and instability in America and worldwide, make the predictions in the book worth-noting. Strauss and Howe also indicated that, at the fourth turning, society will have to pass through great and perilous gate and the survival of the nation will be at stake. What gate could this be?

It must be noted that the American Revolution resulted in a war between 1775 – 1783. Approximately 80 years on, there was the American Civil War between 1861 – 1865; and approximately 80 years later there was World War II between 1939 – 1945. Strauss and Howe stressed that America has had three historical cycles already since her independence and, interestingly, each cycle ended in a war. The fourth cycle began after World War II and approximately 80 years on (2020-2026) the fourth cycle would end. Would the fourth cycle end in a war as the previous cycles? Back in 1997, Strauss and Howe predicted that the fourth turning (±2005 – 2025) of the fourth cycle will be great and perilous and the survival of the nation will be at stake. Commenting on The Fourth turning and the ensuing evidential occurrences, Warren Wright wrote in the Leader’s Edge magazine, “right now we are in the winter of history—the fourth turning of a crisis. It started with the Great Recession of 2007-09 and is likely to last toward the end between 2025-2030, which means we are not out of the woods after the coronavirus pandemic. If history repeats itself, as it has for the last three centuries, we still have a bumpy road for the next several years.”

Samuel Phillips Huntington

Samuel Huntington (1927 – 2008) was an American political scientist, adviser and academic. He spent more than half a century at Harvard University, where he was director of Harvard's Centre for International Affairs and the Albert J. Weatherhead III University Professor. He graduated from Yale University, served in the U.S. Army, earned his Master's degree from the University of Chicago, and completed his Ph.D. at Harvard University, where he began teaching at age 23. During the presidency of Jimmy Carter, Huntington was the White House Coordinator of Security Planning for the National Security Council. He is best known for his 1993 theory – "Clash of Civilizations", a post–Cold War new world order. In 1993 he argued that future wars would be fought not between countries, but between cultures, and that Islamic extremism would become the biggest threat to Western domination of the world.

Through his study and research, Huntington observed 'convulsions' every 60 years in American history. He noticed (1) the Revolutionary period of the 1760s and ’70s; (2) the Jacksonian uprising of the 1820s and ’30s; (3) the Progressive Era, which began in the 1890s; (4) and the social-protest movements of the 1960s and early ’70s. Then in 1981, Huntington predicted that the next moral ‘convulsion’ would hit America around the second or third decade of the 21st century (2020s – 2030s). True to his word, the events and stresses of year 2020 are like hurricanes that hit in the middle of an earthquake. Would these ‘convulsion’ we are already experiencing overturn and make way for relief and good living or degenerate into a real crisis?

Peter Turchin 

Peter Turchin (1957) is a Russian-American evolutionary anthropologist, specializing in cultural evolution and cliodynamics — mathematical modelling and statistical analysis of the dynamics of historical societies. Turchin received a B.A. in biology from New York University, and a Ph.D. in zoology from Duke University. His research interests lie at the intersection of social and cultural evolution, historical macrosociology, economic history, mathematical modelling of long-term social processes, and the construction and analysis of historical databases. Peter Turchin is a Professor of Evolutionary Biology at the University of Connecticut, Research Associate in the School of Anthropology at the University of Oxford, and Vice President of the Evolution Institute. He has authored eight books.

In 2012, Turchin made a bold prediction: The United States was on track for a chaotic, violent 2020s. In the 2012 article published in the Journal of Peace Research, he analysed political violence, including riots, lynching and terrorism, in the United States from 1870 to the present. Violence peaked around 1870s, 1920s and then 1970s. Extrapolating 50 years from 1970s, he predicted another chaotic, violent 2020s. In his book, Ages of Discord: A Structural-Demographic Analysis of American History (2016), Turchin and his collaborators used mathematical models to study the rise and fall of societies – an analysis that postulates a new American civil war arriving as soon as 2020 – 2030. Based on lots of statistical data, Turchin identified that periods of growth and prosperity are followed by periods of instability and decline. These cycles last about 150 – 200 years. The second cycle that started after the American civil war is now coming to an end with a decline in social cohesion, stagnant cooperation and social turmoil. According to the data and the model used by Turchin, the present cycle of discord will culminate in about 2020 and usher in a period of extreme violence and upheaval before the USA will find its roots again to restore its march towards prosperity.

Jack Goldstone

Jack Goldstone (1953), is an American sociologist, political scientist, and historian, specializing in studies of social movements, revolutions, political demography, and the 'Rise of the West' in world history. He is a leading authority on revolutions and social change. Goldstone is the Virginia E. and John T. Hazel Professor of Public Policy and an Eminent Scholar in the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University in Arlington, Virginia. He is also a Woodrow Wilson Centre Global Fellow and Mercatus Centre Senior Fellow. His research focuses on global population trends and their effect on economic growth, inequality, and democracy. Goldstone has worked with US government and international organizations on these issues, leading a National Academy of Sciences study of US assistance to support democracies, and advising the World Bank and the US State and Defence departments. He is the author and editor of 13 books and over 150 research articles.

In the early 1990s, when Bill Clinton was in the White House and the United States looked unshakeable, the Clinton administration appointed Jack Goldstone to study how states fail. They meant other states; not the US. Few expected that his model would later predict their own country's collapse. In 1991, Goldstone published a simple model to determine a country’s vulnerability to political crisis. This model of how states fail predicted that political instability in the US would peak in the years around 2020. Goldstone also argued that in the 21st century, America was likely to get a populist, America-first leader who would sow a whirlwind of conflict.

Reflecting on the Ages of Discord by Peter Turchin, Goldstone said history may look back upon the 2020s as the "turbulent twenties. “What the model predicts is that the 2020s will be dangerous, and the late 2020s could be even worse, and if we do not arrest those trends, the cycle will take us into a crisis," he added. In an unpublished paper submitted for peer review, Professor Goldstone and Peter Turchin have emphatically concluded that the US is "headed for another civil war".

A few more present-day thinking men around the world could be mentioned, however, almost all of them make the same or similar point: the world is on the verse of a stupendous crisis. In whatever way you turn, in every field of knowledge – be it finance and economics, environment and natural disasters, climate and pollution, politics and government, food and water, disease and health, … the same message runs through: the world is on the verse of a stupendous crisis. In line with the predictions of the thinking men is what the Bible talks about in 2Tim. 3:1 – that in the last days perilous times will come. How would the world (led by the US) go through this looming challenge? Will it result in a new world order spearheaded by an ecumenical movement as some people speculate? Or will the crisis escalate beyond the capacity of world leaders in a way that will necessitate the need to hand over global leadership to the Vatican? Well, in November 2021, leaders from the world’s major religions gathered at the Vatican to demand that politicians enact global laws to combat climate change. As COVID-19 pandemic continues to cause panic and distress in various parts of the world, global governments have interfered in people’s human rights, faith, lives and businesses. This is feeling very much like the beginning of the end when people’s fundamental human rights would be denied them for the sake of public good.

Historians say history is seasonal, thus, history repeats itself in similar cycles. In the words of the philosopher (Ecclesiastes 1:9), the Bible confirms this – "That which has been is what will be, that which is done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun" (NKJV). Today’s generation would have a great deal of understanding if we paid attention to history and prophecy. Just as the disciples of Jesus were sleeping at that critical hour when Jesus told them to watch and pray, so now the vast majority of Christians are fast asleep spiritually. Most are interestingly distracted by worldly pleasures; some are struggling with addictions and doubts; weakening their ability to take heed to the warnings of Christ. The frequency and intensity with which natural disasters, famines, earthquakes, floods, wars, lawlessness and wickedness of men occur on the planet currently confirm the words of Jesus. Those who claim to be the followers of Christ urgently need a wake-up alarm – they need to stand up and sound an urgent call to holiness, to a revival of genuine spirituality in their own lives and that of their families and friends. And such a reform never comes by muttering a prayer or taking an occasional nibble of Scripture. Now is the time for God’s people to make a full commitment, because prophecies are swiftly being fulfilled in our own eyes. We are on the borders of eternity – the handwriting is on the wall.

After Jesus had viewed Jerusalem from afar and had lamented over the city because of the hard-heartedness of His own people, He also prophesied about the destruction of the city and all its magnificent buildings including the Jewish temple. This statement startled the disciples so they inquired of Him, “Tell us, when will these things be? And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?” (Matt. 24:3). In answer to their questions, Jesus foretold all the events that would occur from generation to generation until He comes back a second time at the end of time. In His answer, Jesus mentioned there will be deception, wars, rumours of wars, nations rising against nations, kingdoms rising against kingdoms, famines, pestilences, earthquakes in various places, tribulation, false prophets, lawlessness, preaching the gospel in all the world, false christs and false prophets showing great signs and wonders to deceive; and finally, His return to earth on the last day. Then He said, ^“So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors. Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled” (Matt 24:33,34). Has this present generation seen all these events Jesus mentioned? Then, indeed, this generation shall not pass till these things be fulfilled.

Let us hold on to the faith in we have in Jesus; believe only God’s Word, and continue praying for The Holy Spirit.

God bless you.