“When the Lamb opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, ‘Come!’ I looked, and there before me was a black horse! Its rider was holding a pair of scales in his hand. Then I heard what sounded like a voice among the four living creatures, saying, ‘Two pounds of wheat for a day’s wages, and six pounds of barley for a day’s wages, and do not damage the oil and the wine!’” Revelation 6:5-6
Hours ago as the final meeting adjourned at the NATO/G-7/EU emergency summit called to discuss the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the resulting consequences, U.S. President Joe Biden spoke to the international press. According to CNN and other sources, he said:
“We had a long discussion in the G7 with … both the United States, which has a significant — the third largest producer of wheat in the world — as well as Canada, which is also a major, major producer. And we both talked about how we could increase and disseminate more rapidly food … In addition to that, we talked about urging all the European countries and everyone else to end trade restrictions on sending, limitations on sending food abroad. So we are in the process of working out with our European friends what it would be, what it would take to help alleviate the concerns relative to food shortages.”
President Biden underscored the seriousness of the coming food insecurity, saying it was more than speculation at this point, that it is “going to be real.” It will likely affect the U.S. as well.
French President Emmanuel Macron also emphasized the gravity of this particular aspect of the war, whose immediate cause was the Russian invasion of Ukraine last month. Said President Macron:
“This situation will create a food crisis, extremely serious humanitarian situations in several countries and are sure to have massive political consequences in several countries.”
Earlier at the conference, France circulated a document noting that more than fifty million tons of wheat were exported from Russian or Ukraine in 2021. Ukraine’s agricultural capacity is current being ground up by Russian tanks and pocked by missiles while Russia, the worlds largest exporter of wheat, is “off limits” due to the sanctions. CNN goes on to say: “The document estimates 27 mostly African and Middle Eastern countries source over 50% of their wheat from Russia or Ukraine.”
“This situation will create a food crisis, extremely serious humanitarian situations in several countries and are sure to have massive political consequences in several countries.”
French President Emmanuel Macron
Food supplies of barley and corn from Russia and Ukraine will likely also be affected. We’re not talking about another famine in Somalia or a recurring crop failure in North Korea. We talking about a potential famine that could straddle continents.
We cannot always control events during a war. Wars tend to be easier to start than to stop. A stray Russian missile among hundreds launched at the Ukraine that overshoots it’s mark in Lviv and lands in Poland, blowing up a building as it crashes could turn this conflict into a wider war as Poland demands relief under Article V and as NATO’s credibility is at sake. Trouble on the Korean penninsula is another possibility, or a Chinese invasion of Taiwan, an Israeli airstrike on Iran, and so on. With the U.S., Britain, France and Germany preoccupied with Russia, there is no limit to the mischief that could break out elsewhere
We, in the U.S., may feel immune–confident and secure against a global food shortage because of our domestic wheat production. But remember that 61% of the continental U.S. is experiencing long term drought conditions. A substantial lack of rain or snow melt this year could evaporate the hopes of even a modest grain harvest. Then, again, we have the onging problems with the supply chain, perhaps a shortage of fertilizer or pesticides as well.
The four horsemen of the apocalypse is a reference to Chapter Six in the Book of Revelation, commonly and historically believed to be written by the apostle John at Patmos during the reign of Domitian. The first horseman rides a white horse. The contending theories are that this horseman represents either disease (the rider’s bow in this hypothesis is used to spead the disease) or the Antichrist, and there are more or less compelling reasons for either of the interpretations. But there are clues that suggest that this is victory ties into war in some sense.
We’re all familiar with disease aftermore than two years of a COVID pandemic and roughly a million victims dead in America, alone. But likely COVID is not the real threat here (though it could be.) Biological warfare is not an unreasonable expectation in an “all out war” between the major powers, and then we’ll be facing diseases such as anthrax, plague, smallpox, viral hemmorhagic fevers including Ebola, Marlburg and so on.
The second (red) horseman in Revelation 6:3ff clearly represents war, even if the first horseman does not. Whether this refers to the present war waged by Russia on Ukraine or a broader war with NATO to follow shortly, or a war that will not occur for another eight centuries from now is not yet certain.
The third (black) horseman (6:5 and 6:6) represents famine and the fourth horseman (Revelation 6:7, 6:8) rides a pale horse and represents death. Not over all the earth, but only over a quarter of it, perhaps confined to a certain large continent or smaller parts of two continents.
I really can’t do justice to the topic of the horsemen in two hundred words. But there are useful commentaries available if someone wishes to study further.
God’s greater purpose
God’s greater purpose during the End Times is for people to come to repentence and reconciliation with their Creator. Yet, rather than seek His face in the terrible times that John describes, the people of Earth will harden their hearts and curse God. Still, the implicit subtext is that even when as world falls apart God will forgive and deliver anyone who repents and calls on Him.
In Noah’s day, people likely could have been spared drowning had they entered the ark before the doors to the ark were shut. Noah and his family could not have possibly have opened these immense doors by themselves once the rain started. One artist many years ago portrayed people futilely clinging to the outside of the ark as the waters rose, reminding me of those people who tried to leave Kabul last summer by holding on to the engines and wheel assemblies of the huge transport planes as they departed. Sadly, they did not survive, either.
It is possible that the horsemen are very near
There seems to be an important sequence in how the horsemen are introduced in Revelation 6, so death (#4) would likely not precede war (#2.) That’s simple casualty (i.e., war kills people as the unfortunate Ukrainians are suffering now.) But certainly it’s possible that these two–perhaps all four–horsemen could be present running amok at the same time as the chaos increases (but not true chaos, because God’s plan is working as prophesized.)
There’s only been one other time in my life that I thought we were possibly approaching the end of human history, and that was the Yom Kippur War in October 1973. I was a young Christian then. Now, in 2022, there are even more compelling reasons to stay alert.
My dispensational brethren might protest and say that the Rapture hasn’t happened yet. Dispensationalism for those of you who are unfamiliar with the term is a school of thought, a certain interpretation of Scripture that places the rapture of the Church before the horsemen arrive. John Darby, C.I. Scofield, Lewis Sperry Chafer and Hal Lindsay were the more well known dispensationalists in the U.S. As a former dispensationalist myself, I know how “right” it feels and how fiercely it is defended (I once defended it.) But there are problems with Darby’s paradigm that I won’t go into at the moment. I will say this: If we believe that God will only do this, not that and at such and only at such a time, then we might overlook what He is doing now. We might also reject it. Many devout Jews rejected Jesus because He did not meet their Talmudic expectations. Why did he not strike the Roman infidels dead and free Israel? Even John the Baptist was momentarily confused just before John’s death. And Jesus’ disciples did not understand who John really was after his execution. While the apostles were yet alive early Christians apparently quit their jobs to wait for the Second Coming. Paul apparently hoped to be alive himself for the Rapture. If we protest too stubbornly or vehemently that we can’t be approaching the tribulation because the Rapture has not yet occurred, then we will not be able to process the midweek events that follow, or have a context to understand what is happening today.
Again, I am not saying that NATO and Russia will war with each other in the next few months (if at all) and if so, that this war will be a nuclear war and a future nuclear war will be the war that John refers to in Chapter 6. But it is a possibility, albeit remote. And it’s somethig that we should pray about and consider all possibilities.
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