DISTRESS OF NATIONS WITH PERPLEXITY
Luke 21:25b
From Booklet “The Sign of the End of
Time” (Grotheer)
(The full text of the booklet will be published online soon)
Thirdly, the record in Luke connects this event with a
specific condition to begin among the nations - "distress of nations with
perplexity." The word, "distress" is a translation of the Greek
word, sunoche (auvoxn),
meaning a constricted passage way, or being
"in the narrows." The prepositional phrase - "with perplexity" (ev air o
p la) - carries the force of inability to meet the demands placed on the
nations financially. The word, aporia, is
found in the papyri used in an imperial
edict, in this sense. The verb form is used of a weaver who disqualified
himself from public service because, though having means, they were inadequate
to meet the demands of the office. (The Vocabulary of the Greek New
Testament, p. 68) We might illustrate the financial picture conveyed by the
use of this word, aporia, by contrast.
Following the Panic of 1837, an editor of a paper in the midwest declined an offer of a cow and calf for a
$1.00 advance subscription for his paper "because he had no way of
realizing that amount of cash from the transaction."
There was almost literally, no money. Now there is money but it is not
adequate to cover the increasing costs.
This financial crisis for the nations began in 1967 as
predicted in harmony with the sign given. The late C. V. Myers, noted in the London
Financial Times, as
the "well-known Canadian financial expert" wrote in his Finance
& Enemy of July 4, 1974:
It has now been established over the
course of the last seven years -- since 1967 -- that there
is nothing in this world the international monetary authorities can do to stem
the advance of gold, or to stem the collapse of inflation -or to avoid the enormous deflation -- the global liquidity
crunch -- and the resulting depressions.
In 1975, Myers wrote from
From all that I have observed of
international conferences since 1967,
I do not believe that any conference is going to come up with any
workable answer. It seems that the situation
will just continue to deteriorate. Only six months ago we heard every monetary authority in the world shouting,
"either
we lick inflation or we are doomed. This is the battle of the
century."
President Ford said, we have a war, and we intend to fight
this war against inflation. The way he is
fighting this war against inflation is to add a $70 to $100 bit. deficit to the
What happened to all the dire predictions of the result
of inflation? All brains have been stunned.
There is no answer - - so now they begin to think no answer is necessary. Or at least they have decided there is no use
thinking about it at all. Therefore I can only see as the end product,
as I have repeatedly said in these letters
-- and especially after attending the big world meetings of the IMF -- the answer is total collapse. Either the
countries will have to go back to a system which will stabilize the
money, such as gold -or the social order, not only of the
Recently D'Estaing [Economist and former Premier of France] observed: "The world is unhappy. It is unhappy because it doesn' t
know where it is going, and because it
senses that if it knew, it would discover that it is heading for
disaster.... The crisis the world knows today will be a long one. It is not a
passing difficulty. It is actually the recognition of permanent change." (ibid.
March 11, 1975, pp. 1-2)
Keep in mind this beginning date for the
"distress of nations" - 1967. Newsweek, noting the great
California Tax Revolt of 1978, observed that "since 1967, the value of the
dollar has declined 47.6 per cent, and the average
American working family is now barely better off in real dollars than it
was a decade ago." (June 19, 1978, p. 21) The Consumer Price Index prepared by the U.S. Department of Labor uses as
its "Base Period -1967=100." (See Appendix A) Jesus gave the
signal when these things would begin to come
to pass - the sign of the end of time -