With end-time “Assyria” openly displaying threats and thuggery, and end-time “Egypt” gross ineptitude, the world has entered yet another phase toward a countdown to catastrophe. With instruments of destruction unlike any existing previously for their capacity to annihilate in the hands of criminally minded madmen, the stage is set for a showdown that has been secretly brewing for decades but that through our merciful Father in Heaven has been stayed until now.
How many more warning signs do we need to wake us up to the times Isaiah predicted would come upon us suddenly when not expecting it, when we had fallen into a worldly comfort zone we assumed would last forever? Now we clearly catch a glimpse of what a current world power is capable of in disrespecting human life and property—even without resorting, at this point, to weapons that will ultimately be used to destroy ninety percent of the world’s population.
As the first of a series of end-time plagues has already overtaken us, have we taken warning and set our houses in order? If the righteous “will eat the fruits of their own labors” when a Sodom-and- Gomorrah type of destruction comes upon the world (Isaiah 3:10), have we prepared for such a day? Even as food shortages are spreading in our own nation and around the world, have we considered that things will never return to normal—that the new normal will be famine?
“The ministers of Zoan have been foolish, the officials of Noph deluded; the heads of state have led Egypt astray. Jehovah has permeated them with a spirit of confusion; they have misled Egypt in all that it does, causing it to stagger like a drunkard into his vomit. And there shall be nothing the Egyptians can do about it, neither head nor tail, palm top or reed” (Isaiah 19:13–15).
“Your covenant with Death shall prove void, your understanding with Sheol have no effect: when the flooding scourge sweeps through, you shall be overrun by it. As often as it sweeps through, you shall be seized by it: morning after morning it shall sweep through, by day and by night [it shall seize you]; it shall cause terror merely to hear word of it” (Isaiah 28:18–19).
“Jehovah will rise up as he did on Mount Perazim, and be stirred to anger, as in the Valley of Gibeon—to perform his act, his unwonted act, and do his work, his bizarre work. Now therefore scoff not, lest your bonds grow severe, for I have heard utter destruction decreed by my Lord, Jehovah of Hosts, upon the whole earth” (Isaiah 28:21–22).
“Just as my servant Isaiah has gone naked and barefoot for three years as a sign and portent against Egypt and Cush, so shall the king of Assyria lead away the captives of Egypt and the exiles of Cush, both young and old, naked and barefoot, with buttocks uncovered—to Egypt’s shame. Men shall be appalled and perplexed at Cush, their hope, and at Egypt, their boast. In that day shall the inhabitants of this isle say, See what has become of those we looked up to, on whom we relied for help and deliverance from the king of Assyria! How shall we ourselves escape?” (Isaiah 20:3–6).
“Have you not heard how I ordained this thing long ago, how in days of old I planned it? Now I have brought it to pass. You were destined to demolish fortified cities, [turning them] into heaps of rubble, while their timorous inhabitants shrank away in confusion, becoming as wild grass, transiently green, or like weeds on a roof that scorch before they grow up” (Isaiah 37:26–27).
