Danger Zones Ahead!

The Bad News Segment

Shaking to Come

HAG 2:6 This is what the LORD Almighty says: “In a little while I will once more shake the heavens and the earth, the sea and the dry land. 7 I will shake all nations, and the desired of all nations will come, and I will fill this house with glory,' says the LORD Almighty.”

Paul’s Time in Jerusalem (Acts 21: 17-36)

Vv 17-19: A detailed reportVv 20-25: DANGER ahead! What path should we take?Vv 26-36: Things blow up in Paul’s face; the chosen path becomes a gauntlet.

When Paths become Gauntlets

1 Chron. 12:32a: . . . men of Issachar, who understood the times and knew what Israel should do . . . .With that in mind, . . .

Gauntlets We Face: Threats to Our Planet

In 2004 a United Nations report identified six clusters of threats facing the planet

Economic and social threats, including poverty, infectious disease, and environmental degradationInter-state conflictInternal conflict, including civil war, genocide, and other large-scale atrocitiesNuclear, radiological, chemical and biological weaponsTerrorismTransnational organized crime.

A More Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility, Report of the Secretary-General's High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change, New York: United Nations, 2004, p. 2.

Structures

of sin

Grim reminders of the reality of Genesis 11:1-9 (“nothing that they plan will be impossible for them”)

Technological Shifts: WMD

From dynamite

. . . to nuclear weapons

. . . to gene splicing and nanobots

Our most powerful 21st-century technologies—robotics, genetic engineering, and nanotech—are threatening to make humans an endangered species.

Bill Joy, Wired 8:04

"Molecular nanotechnology, when fully developed, will provide the basis for the next technological revolution, possibly the most beneficial yet disruptive in human history.

Thomas D. Vandermolen, http://www.nanotech-now.com/

Does the Future Need Us?

A world in conflict

Ideological Shifts

Start with enlightenment rationality and traditionalism

. . . add nationalism and forms of socialism

. . . mix in empowered fundamentalism

A return to the Dark Ages? Or a modern rebellion against secularism? Either way—as we've so painfully learned—we ignore this phenomenon at our grave peril.

Sojourners Magazine 31:2 (2002)

What are the keys to entry into an increasingly "closed" world of nationalistic, defensive, and religiously polarized nations?

Ted Ward. "Christian Missions-Survival in What Forms?" IBMR 6:1 (1982): 3.

Resource Shifts

From agrarian/coal

. . . to mass farming/oil

. . . to oil/water crises

For the first time in human history, we are capable of depleting crucial global resources—and on course to do so in the near future.

The fact that water use is rising twice as fast as population has led UNEP water experts to forecast that by year 2025 or sooner, “two out of every three people will live in water-stressed areas.”

Water scarcity

Enough to eat

Health Shifts

From Plague, TB, and Flu . . .

. . . to cancers of various kinds

. . . to AIDS and superbugs

4.9 million people became newly infected with HIV in 2005, including 700,000 children. Of these, 3.2 million new infections occurred in Sub-Saharan Africa. Global Health Council, http://globalhealth.org/view_top.php3?id=227

“The antibiotic era is really only 60 years old, but as we get more and more resistance going on, it acts more and more like the pre-antibiotic era,” . . . . “It's a little bit of a doomsday and over-dramatic message to say, ‘Well, we're going back to that.’ But in many ways, we are.”

Super-Resistant Superbugs, www.cbsnews.com

The greatest human emergency in history

How are

the children?

Religious Shifts

From a normal part of life

. . . to declared dead

. . . to resurgence

In some ways, it’s like being hit by a In some ways, it’s like being hit by a tidal wave and unable to hold your tidal wave and unable to hold your footing. The fact is, no amount of footing. The fact is, no amount of institutional organizing can cope with institutional organizing can cope with the momentum.the momentum.

Lamin Sanneh, Whose Religion is Christianity?, p. 3

““In the long run . . . In the long run . . . Muhammad wins out.”Muhammad wins out.”

Samuel Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations

Growth in

world religions

"Europe will be Islamic by the end of the century."

Denmark will most likely be 33 percent Muslim by 2040. The U.K. can expect an increase of more than 2 million immigrants over the next decade. France is the most "islamized" Western country. Several Muslim leaders call openly for the introduction of sharia in Europe as soon as the Muslim population increases enough to enforce it.

(German newspaper Die Welt)

The Challenges We Face

We thus find ourselves confronted by a challenge . . . in which I have identified three points:

1. a challenge to our freedom to operate across the frontiers;

2. a challenge to the meeting of almost unprecedented human need . . . ; and

3. a challenge to the whole institutional structure of the historic missionary movement, upon which so much of our witness and evangelism has, in the past, depended.

Charles W. Ranson, Challenge and Opportunity” Occasional Bulletin 7:1 (January 20, 1956), 4-5.

. . . from 1956!

Implications for MissionsTechnological Shifts

Do we have contingency plans in place that will enable us to appropriately respond to the increasing dangers? If not, should we?

Ideological ShiftsIdeological persecution is a fact in many parts of the world; are those we are sending prepared to help local fellowships and churches meet this challenge?

Resource shiftsTo what extent are we aware of the reality of coming water, oil, and land wars? How well have we responded to other resource conflicts (diamond wars in Sierra Leone)?

Health shiftsAre we ready for the possibility of a catastrophic health crisis?