In each of the first three books of the New Testament (the Gospels according to Matthew, Mark, and Luke) are recorded the words of Jesus that he spoke concerning the events that shall precede the end of the world. One of the most notable aspects of the Sermon Jesus spoke on the Mount of Olives in the last week of his earthly life was His testimony to the disciples that there shall be wars, tumults, and rumors of wars. Nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places, there will be famines; this is but the beginning of the sufferings. (Cf. Matthew 24:6; Mark 13:7; Luke 21:9)

We see all of these events in the world today. Unbelieving men see them too but they do not understand what they see. We, who believe and study all the events of history through the spectacles of the Holy Scriptures, see these events in the world around us and we understand what we see. (This is not a proud boast but this is the truth.)

The news media report that war, guerilla conflict, terrorism, and other kinds of strife afflict more than twenty nations of Asia, Africa. Latin America and parts of Europe. The most critical conflict is China’s war with Vietnam. It is a conflict that China claims has been resolved, but men fear that this conflict carries with it the threat of Soviet intervention and the expectation of worldwide tension and conflict. Other countries that currently experience disputes range in population from China’s 865 million to South Yemen’s 1.7 million. These countries make up about a quarter of the earth’s 4.2 billion people. These wars in the world are an eloquent and clarion testimony that the words of Jesus are true. Jesus said there would be wars and rumors of wars until the end of the world and this is happening before our very eyes. But the end is not yet. The Man of Sin has not yet been revealed. The scope, the intensity, and the seriousness of the conflicts are difficult for outsiders to gauge because of limited access to information on these hostilities. However, we do know that the chief areas of trouble are in such Asiatic countries as

Israel, Lebanon, Iran, Vietnam, Cambodia, China, Burma, the Philippines, Kashmir, India, and Pakistan. In Africa the countries that experience strife and tumult are Tanzania, Uganda, Rhodesia, Mozambique, Zambia, Angola, Ethiopia, Somali, Eritrea, North Yemen, South Yemen. Momo, and Spanish Sahara. In addition Egypt is still in a state of war with Israel, although the signing of a treaty seems imminent. In Latin and South America El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Honduras, Chile, and Argentina experience some form of confusion and

revolution. This brief summary of the major trouble spots in three of the continents of the world should help us who are members of Christ’s victorious but militant Church to understand that the word of Christ is faithful and true. Having briefly reviewed the trouble spots we say with the apostle Paul, who wrote to the Church of Thessalonica as follows: “Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober. For they that sleep, sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night. But let us, who ate of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for an helmet, the hope of salvation.” (I Thessalonians 56-8)