Revelation 6

And I heard a voice in the midst of the four living creatures saying, “A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius; and do not harm the oil and the wine.”—Revelation 6:6

I have no doubt that many who have read this verse have wondered how could a quart of wheat cost a day’s wage and {cooking} oil and wine be too expensive to even think about buying. I wonder how many people are wondering that now. In these days of high fuel costs and skyrocketing food costs, there is no reason to wonder how these things could be. Simply put, it is basic economics.

The law of supply and demand is based on the premise of scarcity of goods and limited resources. Revelation 6 speaks to the arrival of the Anti-Christ. He will speak of peace but it will be a deception. Behind the scenes, he will be manipulating people and events against the very peace he is promoting. The evidence is in the following verses. Shortly after the Antic-Christ arrives, War will follow. Next, will be Famine, followed closely by Death and Hades.

This is the sequence of events: the Anti-Christ comes to proclaim peace but will work to start wars all over the earth. The natural consequence of war is famine and plagues. Because of the devastation of war, farmlands will be burned; soils will be poisoned by radiation and radioactive fallout. People will be wounded and without access to adequate medical care, infections will set in. These left untreated will lead to plagues. The radiation from nuclear, germ, and biological weapons will also contribute to the spreading of plagues. Because of the scarcity of food, wild animals will venture into populated areas to scrounge for food. Their hunger will cause them to attack people in packs and even each other. The lack of food, attacks of animals, effects of war, and uncontrolled plagues will lead to death.

So, what does this have to do with economics? War will lead to destructions of pipelines causing fuel prices to increase. Planes, trucks, and trains will also be targets of terrorist and soldiers. Each knows that one way to win a war is to cut off supplies and starve the people into submission. As mentioned earlier, the effects of war will lead to scarcity of goods. Wheat fields, for example, will be burned out through fire and radiation poisoning. This will lead to a scarcity of goods. This scarcity will drive up the price of wheat and anything made with wheat. The scarcer the product and the greater the demand for it, the higher the price for it will be.

Here’s an analogy from our own lives. Because terrorists were attacking pipelines in the Middle East, the Arabs had to increase security. This increased their costs, which they passed on to us. Then, Gustav and IKE damaged some of the oil platforms in the Gulf. This led to a supply issue. Yet, demand for the product, gasoline, never went down. As a result, prices went up, way up. This in turn, led to increase prices in almost everything from food to electronics to air fare because gasoline was a factor with each. Manufactures have to get their products from the warehouses to the retail stores. Increased gas prices meant increased transportation costs, which were passed on to the consumers. This is why airlines starting increasing their ticket prices and charging for checked bags. The additional weight of each bag meant more fuel consumption.

We’ve seen items like bread and milk increase fifty cents to a dollar each. And those increases were without the devastation of war and famines. Imagine what prices would have been like with these.

What’s the conclusion of the matter? We are seeing the small fulfillments of Biblical prophecy in our lifetime. We are seeing nations rise against nations and hearing about rumors of wars. Parents are betraying their children to death and children their parents. As Jesus said, these are the beginning of birth pangs. We are only seeing the tip of the iceberg. In the coming months and years, things are only going to get worse. It doesn’t matter who is in the Oval Office, God has a plan. Things are set in motion. We can only pray for the leadership of whoever gets in office and pray that we miss all this that is to come.