Countdown to the Economic Crash—Are You Prepared?
Due to the controversial nature of the following commentary, I submit the following four-point appeal.
1. I am aware I’m somewhat of a “voice crying in the wilderness” with this alert. I ask the reader to not react and label me a “fear-monger.” I preach and live a joyous, faith-filled lifestyle. I believe “They will not be ashamed in the evil time, and in the days of famine they will be satisfied” (Ps. 37:19) while noting this is a conditional promise (see Ps. 37 in its entirety).
2. I believe because of rampant homosexuality, abortion, pornography, abandonment of Israel, widespread political corruption, obscene debt accumulation and celebration of immorality in America, judgment is at hand. The “warning” and “shaking” promised in Hebrews 12:25–29 is beginning. It will be severe and Christians are not exempt from the effects.
3. Every believer will experience the testing/fiery trial to develop and reveal the depth of our faith (1 Pet.1:6-9). Remember when God judged humanity with the flood? (Gen. 6-9). As the waters of judgment rose, the ark of safety rose higher. With what is coming, stay in peace and trust God to guide us while seizing opportunities to share the gospel.
4. What follows comes from much prayer, fasting, research, as well as counsel from respected, senior leaders. I am not marketing products, recruiting subscribers to an expensive end-times newsletter or soliciting donations to receive my “special” revelations. I’m trying to help you and your loved ones navigate successfully through what I sincerely believe will be challenging days ahead.
“America’s fiscal insolvency and its generational consequences means our country is broke. It’s not broke in 75 years or 50 years or 25 years or 10 years. It’s broke today. Indeed, it may well be in worse fiscal shape than any developed country, including Greece.”—Dr. Laurence Kotlikoff, Professor of Economics, Boston University in a testimony before U.S. Senate Budget Committee earlier this year.
When I was a little boy, my parents would comfort me in the midst of a severe thunderstorm with these words, “Don’t be scared. The angels are just rearranging furniture in heaven.”
Of course they knew it was a fabrication, but it bought them time and brought me temporary relief. When the next jarring thunderclap exploded, I tried to settle my fears with their words.
How many political leaders and financial analysts are doing something similar today when most of us know deep down in our hearts an economic catastrophe is around the corner?
President Obama repeatedly distracts us by telling us the greatest challenge we face is global warming.
Hillary Clinton says, “I don’t believe you change hearts. You change laws and systems.” In other words, big government must continue its ever-expanding control instead of transforming culture by persuasion and grass-roots activism.
Here’s the deal: Out-of-control spending and borrowing have become the cultural norm with our leaders who are inflicting an ever-mushrooming debt burden on the unsuspecting next generation—our children and grandchildren. It is immoral.
Reality not fantasy: There are consequences when we ignore the Laws of God and laws of economics. Barrons magazine states, “The fiscal state of the U.S. is in danger of hitting an iceberg.” Forbes periodical declares, “One day this unsustainable path we’re on will reach its day of reckoning.”
The Scriptures tell us of a curse that comes upon who disregard God’s directives; “You will become a horror, a proverb, and an object of ridicule …” (Deut. 28:37). Proverbs 13:18 says, “Poverty and shame will be to him who refuses instruction.”
This can happen to America.
James Madison, our fourth president and architect of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, warns, “I go on the principle that a public debt is a public curse and in a republican government it is a greater curse than any other.”
Read that again.
American history had its Black Friday when the great financial panic occurred on September 24, 1869, as a result of the manipulation of the securities market.
The Great Depression began on October 24, 1929, also known as Black Thursday when the Great Depression. Just one week before the 1929 crash, Professor Irving Fisher of Yale University announced, “Stock prices have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau!” And then sudden chaos came.
“When they say, ‘Peace and safety!’ then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape” (1 Thess. 5:3).
I’m not trying to ruin your day or make you think the sky is falling tomorrow; I am trying to awaken people to the imminent disaster coming our way.
These are not just my observations. I submit to you that a disaster is looming on the horizon and we’d better pray and prepare now. Unless we honestly uncover and untangle the diabolical scheme in place and submit ourselves to a total reset, the inevitable will happen. I’m referring to a fiscal crisis unprecedented in world history.
Debt and the Inevitable Day of Reckoning
As I prepared to write this commentary I saw a headline on the Drudge Report: “Doomsday Clock for Global Market Crash Strikes One Minute as Central Banks Lose Control.” The accompanying visual was that of a detonated atomic bomb mushroom cloud. The first sentences read, “it is only a matter of time before stock markets collapse under the weight of their lofty expectations and record valuations … Time is running out.”
“Get ready for a roller coaster ride through hell!” warns the brilliant economic forecaster Larry Edelson. His conviction is that we are entering a three-phase day of reckoning for our immoral spending and borrowing. Europe’s implosion comes first, then Japan, then America.
Should we add the current fiscal crisis evolving with China?
Widely respected economist and author James Davidson, who accurately forecasted our past financial disasters, says that the “cracks in the foundation are so severe that we’ve reached the point of no return. We are facing an unstoppable economic collapse.”
Lawyer Mark Levin, New York Times best-selling author and nationally syndicated radio host, just released his groundbreaking book, Plunder and Deceit. In it, he waves the same red flag. He warns, “The consequences for the rising generation and future generations of the statists’ immoral, politically expedient, and economically ruinous behavior and policies are unambiguous as evidenced by statistic after statistic, which are mainly ignored, discounted, or excused by most of the media, academia, and, of course governing statists.”
His book unveils the “stats,” but let me offer only a handful from my collected stash:
- Social Security turns 80 this month. Currently 58 million people receive monthly checks. In less than 25 years, 103 million will stand in line for their money. Changing demographics means there will not be enough money for recipients. The eventual implosion of this unsustainable government program will lead to massive misery and civil disorder unless something monumental happens. Raise the retirement age to 70? Drastically cut benefits? Further emphasize “income inequality” and give benefits based on a person’s income? This is real folks!
- Progressive politicians advocate for more social programs. In 1970, they accounted for 32 percent of federal expenditures; in 1990—44 percent; in 2000—54 percent. Today, they’re snowballing while illegal immigration surges with promised welfare benefits for all. This is no longer immigration; it is, as one leader called it, an “invasion.” Laws aren’t enforced. Scores of “undesirables” join legitimate cases to reap welfare benefits and escalate drugs and crime.
- When Ronald Reagan was president in 1980, our debt was less than $1 trillion. Today it is $19 trillion ($56,000 for every man, woman and child). That statistic this does not include unfunded liabilities like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, unemployment compensation, food stamps and more. This brings our total indebtedness to $210 trillion, which amounts to the frightening level of $658,307 per person! It’s unbelievable!
- Our debt grew by more than $1 trillion in the last year ($33,000 a second). It increased more last year than it did in our first 200 years as a nation!
- When Barack Obama became President in 2009, our debt was $10 trillion. By 2012, it exploded to $15 trillion. Now it’s $19 trillion. By the time he’s finished, our debt will have exploded from $10 trillion to $20 trillion under just one President! Congress and this Administration’s policies of reckless spending, borrowing, financial bailouts and ever-expanding social programs have brought our nation to the brink of disaster. The day of reckoning is right around the corner. This is not hyperbole.
To help us comprehend what 1 trillion means think of the following: 1 million seconds was 12 days ago. 1 billion seconds was 31 years ago. 1 trillion seconds was 31,000 years ago!
5 Areas to Address with the Approaching Calamity
The book of Daniel lays out a frightening vision of end-time events. Jesus Himself quoted from this Old Testament book. It also reveals that certain insights are reserved for us at the end of the age. Let’s look heavenward for this direction and consolation now. “But you, Daniel, close up and seal the words of the scroll until the time of the end” (Dan. 12:4). In the meantime, we need to address these areas:
1. PRAYER
Jesus told us in Luke 21 that certain things (“persecution…betrayal… Jerusalem surrounded by armies… great distress… fear…”) precede His Return. Why are we surprised when they occur? And when I cite “persecution,” I’m referring to ISIS barbarism, not a snicker we experience at work. He concluded His prophetic signposts with these words: “Therefore watch always and pray that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will happen” (Luke 21:36).
2. PROCLAMATION
Proclaiming the gospel and biblical truth is the prescription to the coming crises. We are highlighting symptoms and diagnosing the real problem, which is a moral one! Those who are deceiving and lying to people; stealing from children; irresponsibly borrowing and spending; engaging in undisciplined and corrupt conduct; promising and providing entitlements to lawbreakers and lazy freeloaders; yielding to fraud and greed; exploiting the unsuspecting; and, stubbornly refusing to repent, can all change but only when hearts are changed by the living God and a humble response to the gospel.
When I spoke to 300 Christian leaders in Cleveland before the first presidential debate, I was preceded by Senator Ted Cruz’s father. He once was a selfish, drug-taking, alcoholic deadbeat dad until the gospel transformed his life. He then returned home to his family, later entered the ministry and helped raise a son now running for president of the United States!
Sports icon Frank Gifford died recently and his wife, Kathie Lee, shared for 15 minutes on the Today Show how Jesus Christ transformed his entire life. “He knew what hard work was. He never had an entitled moment in his life!” How different from the socialistic lifestyle promoted and embraced by many politicians and gullible people today.
3. PARTNERSHIP
Our young people, especially those 18–31 years old, are the main victims of the economic collapse looming on the horizon. They are manipulated and easily seduced by the lies, the coolness factor of politicians and the appeals to social justice, income inequality and grandiose utopian causes. We must partner with them to expose the immoral, pernicious plans that are undermining their entire future.
Thomas Jefferson emphasized there must be an intergenerational bond where our children and grandchildren are provided for, not exploited. “We shall all consider ourselves unauthorized to saddle posterity with our debts, and morally bound to pay for them ourselves.”
18th century statesman, Edmund Burke, also underscored this intergenerational “partnership.” If the older generation violates this (as is the case today), he warned of “destroying at their pleasure the whole fabric of society, hazarding to leave to those who come after them a ruin instead of a habitation.”
4. PORTFOLIO
Take a moment to ponder Greece recently when banks and ATMs were closed. Are you ready for similar civil unrest and food shortages? Remember what happened in Ferguson and Baltimore when people were angry, frustrated and desperate? Imagine trying to withdraw your savings when masses are attempting the same. With a market crash resulting in investments plummeting 60-70 percent, government setting restrictions and panic sets in, it’s not the time to hastily try to figure out what to do when the National Guard moves in.
Far-fetched? Remember between October 2007 and March 2009, the US stock market dropped in price by 57 percent. When the dominoes start falling and the IOU bubble bursts, will you be ready?
Now is the time to prayerfully and calmly review your finances and plans for a time of crisis. Diversify your financial portfolio and make sure you have sufficient funds for an emergency. Ecclesiastes 11:2 instructs us, “Give a portion to seven, or even eight, for you do not know what calamity may happen on the earth.”
5. PREPARATION
“A prudent person foresees danger and takes precautions. The simpleton goes blindly on and suffers the consequences” (Pr. 22:3, NLT). Joseph was alerted to the coming calamity in the Old Testament and followed God’s leading in preparation, saving an entire nation! Granted, some may go to extremes as “end-times preppers,” but don’t let that deter you from seeking God in a faith-filled way so He can guide your steps.
“But if any do not care for their own, and especially for those of their own house, they have denied the faith and are worse than unbelievers” (1 Tim.5:8, MEV).
Our Founding Father’s Closing Counsel
It would do us all good to heed the wisdom of our first President, George Washington, who urged Americans in his day, “Avoid… the accumulation of debt not only by shunning occasions of expense but by vigorous exertions to discharge the debts, not throwing upon posterity the burden which we ourselves ought to bear.”
The countdown continues.
Are you prepared?
Larry Tomczak is a best-selling author of eight books with 43 years of trusted ministry experience. He is a cultural commentator whose weekly articles appear on sites reaching 26 million monthly. He is a public policy advisor with Liberty Counsel. Connect and view short video commentaries at larrytomczak.com.
