Things to Come in 2018
Things to Come in 2018
By Todd Strandberg
The year 2017 was an amazing year for prophetic progress. The top news item was Trump’s decision to relocate our embassy to Jerusalem, but there were a lot of minor events that showed the stage is being set for the tribulation hour. Bible prophecy was unfolding at a pace that I’ve never seen as a prophecy watcher.
This new year should be very interesting because we have several conflicts and scenarios that have built up to where they need to be resolved at some point. I see three examples that I would be very surprised if they ran into 2019:
North Korea
The first one is the North Korean Nuclear standoff. Trump has promised that he would not allow Kim Jong Un to gain the ability to attack North America with atomic weapons. Fat boy is pressing forward at full speed to develop a vast nuclear arsenal that could kill millions of people.
I don’t expect to wake up some morning to news of the world’s first nuclear war. If there was just a conventional war on the Korean peninsula, tens of thousands of people would be killed. In the short run, my expectation is for more missile tests and underground nuclear explosions.
The most likely resolution to this conflict will be a collapse of the dictatorship that keeps Kim Jong Un in power. The cold war ended when the Soviet Union imploded from the expense of keeping up with America’s military might. North Korea is starving its people to pay for all this nuclear hardware.
In the past few weeks, several soldiers have defected from the north. One of them was full of parasites from a poor diet. Two other defectors were found to have been exposed to high levels of radiation. North Korea may have already been turned into a nuclear wasteland from all the tests in recent years.
Trump Derangement Syndrome
One weakness of the human mind is the ability to maintain an attack mode over a long period of time. Most wars end because one side becomes mentally exhausted. The liberal media war on Trump is set to be a prime example of this phenomenon.
The term Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS) has been coined to explain the hysterical reaction and belligerent behavior of people, directed towards anything related to President Donald Trump. The diagnosis is a satirical mockery of these people, but the psychological condition is real.
The Conspiracy News Network (CNN) seems to be the clearinghouse of all TDS news events. A couple weeks ago, it roasted Ivanka Trump for posting a vacation photo that showed a confederate flag on a boat in the background. A few days later, a White House intern was accused of flashing a ‘white power’ hand gesture in a group photo with Trump. The kid said he was Jewish and was only giving the “OK” sign. The weirdest incident was someone yelling at Donald Trump’s Animatronic in Disney World’s Hall of Presidents.
I pray that Trump will have unrelenting political success during this current calendar year. The press is so invested in causing his failure that just having his poll number break 50% would trigger a meltdown in news rooms. Since all reporters are compelled to read every tweet Trump posts, I find myself laughing every day at their insane reactions. Now that nearly half the population realizes that the press makes up negative stories about Trump, we are getting close to the point where CNN will be forced to wave the white flag.
Economic Bubbles
The event that has me the most fascinated is the financial bubble in various assets like stocks, bonds, and cryptocurrencies. We are seeing wild speculation that cannot be compared to any other time in history. Any reasonable economist would tell you it’s impossible for us to repeat last year’s performance.
In 2017 the Dow Jones increased every month, which has never happened before. Most investors are convinced that we have a stock market that can only go higher. A large number of stocks and bonds are at valuations that exclude the possibility of a future recession. Since it takes two quarters of negative growth before a recession can be declared, we only need to make it until the end of the year to break the record for the longest period of positive growth.
The rise of bitcoin in 2017 has been nothing short of spectacular. There is an ad on the web that says cryptocurrencies are at $200 billion. They are now at $800 billion. Once we reach the trillion-dollar level, we will be at a point where a collapse in cryptocurrencies could affect the overall economy.
I think that Bible prophecy is the key driving force in why the bubble continues to expand. Jesus said the time of his return for the Church would be marked by the tranquility of an eating and drinking party attitude. We could all be living in mansions if we poured our life savings into Bitcoin or Facebook, but the mansion I’m looking for is one that is not made by human hands.
“In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also” (John 14:2-3).
–Todd