ARE WE LIVING IN THE BIBLICAL “LATTER DAYS?” - 10 OF 16 By Steven M. Collins A Massive Die-Off of Life in the Oceans: The Bible also prophesies that the latter-days would see a great “die-off” of life in the oceans. Revelation 8:9 (the same prophecy about a possible meteor hitting somewhere in an ocean) foretells that “the third part of the creatures which were in the sea…died.” If a large meteor hit the ocean, its effects could catastrophically fulfill this prophecy. As described above, this would be a “maximalist” fulfillment of this prophecy (if the “star” falling to earth was a literal heavenly object). However, this prophecy can also be fulfilled via a “minimalist” application if the “star” falling to earth was something seen by John only in the spirit world and not the physical world. In a minimalist option, this prophecy may already have been fulfilled! This prophecy has an undefined variable in it. What is the base period from which one is to calculate when “1/3rd” of sea-life “in the sea” has died? Do we start with the amount of sea-life during Creation Week when God created whales and sea-life life “abundantly” in the oceans (Genesis 1:21)? Do we start with the population of sea-life when John received this vision in the 1st century AD? Or is our base figure the amount of sea-life in the oceans when the “latter-days” begin? Let’s examine how this prophecy may already be fulfilled. The cover story of the April, 2007 issue of National Geographic (“The Global Fish Crisis”) confirms a massive die-off of oceanic life due to over-fishing, pollution, etc. It bluntly asserts: “The oceans are in deep blue trouble. From the northernmost reaches of the Greenland Sea to the…the Antarctic Circle, we are gutting our seas of fish. Since 1900, many species may have declined by 90 percent, and its getting worse. Nets scour reefs. Supertrawlers vacuum up shrimp. Nations flout laws” Consider the following statements found in this article (pp. 42-43, 47): A. “the population of [giant bluefin in the Mediterranean] is in danger of collapse.” B. “The word’s oceans are a shadow of what they once were.” C. “…the number of fish swimming the sea is a fraction of what it was a century ago.” D. “…cod have plummeted from the North Sea to Georges Bank off New England.” E. “In the Mediterranean, 12 species of shark are commercially extinct…” F. “With many Northern Hemisphere waters fished out…” G. “In Asia, so many boats have fished the waters of the Gulf of Thailand and the Java Sea that stocks are close to exhaustion…” H. “…the incalculable number of fish and other sea creatures scooped up in nets, allowed to suffocate, and dumped overboard as useless bycatch.” I. “…stocks of southern bluefin tuna…had been fished to between 6 and 12 percent of the original numbers in the South Pacific and Indian Ocean.” These facts indicate that the aggregate die-off of sealife in the world’s oceans may already have surpassed the 1/3rd die-off of oceanic sealife prophesied by the book of Revelation to occur in the latter days. Indeed, the article also asserts: “Nearly a third of the world’s species are over-fished, with the Atlantic the hardest hit.” [Emphasis added.] Who is responsible for the destruction of life in the seas? National Geographic cites the “vastly increased killing power [of] the shadowy network of international companies making huge profits from the trade, negligent fisheries management and enforcement and consumer indifference to the fate of the fish…(p. 42).” [Emphasis added.] As described earlier, Revelation 18 prophesies that one of the signs of the latter-days would be the globalization of the world’s economy. The multinational fisheries industry is just one aspect of the globalization of all world trade. The “shadowy network of international companies” aptly describes Revelation 18’s prophecy about “merchants of the earth” getting rich via their exploitation of global trade. Lax fisheries management implicates the governments (i.e. “kings”) of the earth, prophesied by Revelation 18 to be the partners of the corporate “merchants of the earth” in implementing a self-serving globalization of the world’s economies. I recommend the reader examine this article at a local library to grasp the widespread devastation now occurring to the world’s oceanic life. If the grim assertions in the article are true, Revelation 8’s prophecy about a 1/3rd die-off of life in the seas already appears to be fulfilled, no matter what original baseline is used for the die-off calculation.
Posted on: Tue, 04 Mar 2014 23:30:59 +0000
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