On the Other Side of Ruin
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| Gaza, 2023, after an Israeli strike. Photo from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Middle East. Photo by Ashraf Amra. |
The “map of ruin”
When I was a 30-something single adult working in Kentucky, I had a dispute with my roommate and wound up on a friend’s sofa for a few nights. In our discussion, I referenced the Bible narrative in 1 Samuel 6, where the Israelite men of Beth Shemesh looked into the ark of the covenant. The plague-weary Philistines had just expelled it from the land, filling it with an offering of golden rats and tumors. The same plague then spread throughout the Israelite region, killing thousands. I told my friends that night, it seems that a lot of suffering results from frail human flesh looking too deeply into the most profound, holy things of God.
There may be a natural, medical explanation for the plague that hit the Israelites rather than a punishment from God, but that night, I was referencing the metaphorical aspect of the story as believed by the Israelites and the author of 1 Samuel.
The next morning, I heard these words as I awoke: “This instrument can teach (a phrase taken from a TV ad seen at the time, referencing TV itself) and will be an instrument of teaching on the map of ruin.” It was clear as a ringing bell. That was in the late 1970s, and I’ve never doubted since that it was a prophetic warning for the US and maybe the world. I have waited decades for those words to come to pass.
I truly believe that we are in those days. We are on the cusp of nuclear war; there are claims against Israel of genocide in Gaza; all of our military bases in the Middle East have been trashed by Iran; Russia and Ukraine are destroying each other; unnecessary trade wars are breaking our economy where most Americans live; and the US has a sleazy, lunatic president who has been given the keys to all the power and finances of the United States.
Why does God allow ruin? Why doesn’t the Almighty come down and smite the evil-doers so we can all go about our business?
Jericho’s walls are more than stone
When the Israelites marched across the Jordan River by the thousands, the people of Jericho locked the gates and hunkered down for a siege. Six days of armed soldiers, priests blowing trumpets, and the ark of the covenant circling the city must have rattled the superstitious Canaanites. On the seventh day, the Israelites circled 7 times, with trumpets blaring. At the end of the seventh circuit, the Israelites all shouted, and the walls crumbled.
It wasn’t just walls that crumbled that day, and let’s draw from the story without trying to figure out if it really happened as narrated or if there was an earthquake. What fell that day were ancient traditions that included child sacrifice, idolatry, temple prostitution, crimes, and oppressive practices against crime.
God did not allow Israel to take the land of Canaan from a peaceful people who were just living life and minding their own business. Yahweh warned Israel that if they became like the Canaanites, the land would spew them out as well.
About the time that the Israelites were invading Canaan, archaeologists describe what they call the Late Bronze Age collapse. Drought, famine, and raiding by the Sea Peoples had already devastated major cities like Ugarit and Hatti. Those devastations changed the geopolitical aspect of the region, but not the baked-in traditions and beliefs. The Mosaic Law drew from, but also challenged, the ancient mores, laws, and lore in a way that was unprecedented.
A New Covenant to replace the old (Jer. 3:14-16; 31:31-34)
The book of Jeremiah was written after Northern Israel had been in captivity for many years, their population replaced with foreigners. They would never again be the nation that they were before Assyria attacked and conquered them. Judah was about to experience the same treatment from Babylon.
At the time, a young prophet named Jeremiah was making astonishing predictions. The temple would not save them. It would be destroyed, the land would be devastated, and their precious ark that represented national atonement for sin would disappear forever.
14 “Return, O backsliding children,” says the Lord; “for I am married to you. I will take you, one from a city and two from a family, and I will bring you to Zion. 15 And I will give you shepherds according to My heart, who will feed you with knowledge and understanding.
16 “Then it shall come to pass, when you are multiplied and increased in the land in those days,” says the Lord, “that they will say no more, ‘The ark of the covenant of the Lord.’ It shall not come to mind, nor shall they remember it, nor shall they visit it, nor shall it be made anymore.
Jeremiah stood at the Temple gate and prophesied destruction, ruin, and waste for all of Judah because they replicated all the vices of the Canaanites, including the sacrifice of innocent babies to false gods.
Unlike Isaiah, who commanded the former king of Judah to resist an Assyrian assault, Jeremiah relayed the command to surrender to Babylon and save the city. The leaders refused. The Temple of Solomon, built by King David and his son, was in ruins when the attack was over. The ark did disappear and has not been seen since. Moreover, the Second Temple, built by the refugees from Persia and expanded by Herod, was also burnt to the ground in 70 AD. The Jewish diaspora resulting from their opposition to Rome lasted until 1948.
The Fatima prophecy
Fast forward to 1917, when an apparition purporting to be Mary, the mother of Jesus, appeared to 3 Portuguese children. Her message was basically that WW I was about to end, but if mankind didn’t repent of their sins, a worse war would arise that would bring terrible consequences. Prayers and devotion to her Immaculate (sinless) Heart would bring peace to the world. Furthermore, she wanted the nation of Russia to be consecrated to her IH. There is a nice summary of her message, miracles, and demands here.
Setting aside the debate about whether the apparition was really Mary, which I doubt, she did, in fact, know the future of the planet. She didn’t specify which sins were such an offense to God that He would bring the ruin and terror of another war upon the world.
I have my own opinion about what she referred to. The nations of the world were awash in bigotry, isolationism, and toxic nationalism. Patriotism is fine. Being proud of the uniqueness of your ancestors and their particular beliefs and traditions is no sin. Nationalism, the aggressive kind that says my nation is superior to yours, our destiny is to rule over others, and we can take your land and resources and oppress you, is the kind of global sin that really pisses off the Almighty.
In WW II, bigotry was ubiquitous, including here in the U.S. Antisemitism here in the U.S. was almost as bad as in Germany. We had our own Nazi movement. There were parks Jews couldn’t visit, jobs they couldn’t apply for. Blacks were so oppressed that the Army was afraid to use them, but the war showed that they were perfectly competent soldiers and pilots. Men were astonished to see female pilots. The Navajo Code Talkers made a surprising contribution to the war using their own language.
Women were discovered to be brilliant mathematicians, scientists, home managers, code breakers, pilots, and factory workers. Men came home from the war to wives who were more independent and confident in their ability to handle difficulties.
The Japanese had never heard the voice of their emperor until the day they heard him announce on the radio the surrender of Japan. They worshiped him as a god.
The horror of the German death camps laid the groundwork for Jews to establish the nation of Israel in 1948.
The pressure and necessities of the war led to advances in aviation, radar, armaments, and physics.
Beyond the ruin of WW II, in which millions died and cities were leveled, mankind took great leaps into the future, changes which were inconceivable in 1930.
Now let’s talk about us
Freedom isn’t free. It always has to be fought for and defended with our lives if necessary. There will always be someone who wants to take it away. As of this writing in 2026, there are both external and internal forces resisting our Constitution and democratic way of being governed. External forces would refer to foreign nations using cyber warfare to influence our elections. Internal would refer to the Trump administration and beyond. Let me explain.
The founders of our nation gave us a constitution that would purportedly lift all citizens together, that would resist abuse and corruption, and that would be flexible enough to meet new problems and challenges. For 250 years, it has worked wonderfully with additional unwritten guardrails and protocols to keep any of the 3 separate divisions of government from dominating the others.
Then came Donald Trump, diagnosed as a “malignant narcissist” in 2017 by over 70 psychologists and sociologists. Trump was the swamp monster, but the GOP created the swamp over many decades. Extremely rich families, purporting to be Christians, networked together to establish think tanks and connections to law firms that potentially could produce RW judges. One of the major products of this movement was the Heritage Foundation.
The big hook for the Christian vote during this time was the topic of abortion. The aphorism “It’s not a choice, it’s a child” won the hearts, votes, and donations of millions of Christians. Meanwhile, the concept of “the unitary executive” was born. Former Atty Gen Bill Barr wrote about how the U.S. needed a strong executive branch, a president who could get things done without the bureaucratic annoyance of a House or Senate.
Now, listen up, folks, because you need to understand this. The unitary executive is a conservative idea that elevates a president who will work with extremely wealthy families, smoothing the way for them to make even more money by cutting regulations and handing out special contracts and jobs to those who support the unitary president. You DON’T plan on handing that power to a Democrat. The idea of the unitary executive means a conservative one-party system in which the people of America don’t have the same voice as the wealthy. They want to be oligarchs like what they have in Russia.
Donald Trump is a nation wrecker. His vanity projects in Washington, D.C., have wrecked the reflecting pool, the rose garden, the cherry trees from Japan, the East Wing of the White House, and the Kennedy Center. He wants to build an arch that will overshadow the national cemetery. There isn’t time or space to describe how he has troubled the world except to say that, thanks to him, we are in a long, dreary war with Iran. Trump could actually be the long-awaited Antichrist.
God allows the destroyers to rise because their power is based on the sins of the people, but he also raises the rebuilders who will hold the destroyers accountable. On the other side of ruin, there is always something BIG, a long-term global change in understanding, temperament, tradition, and/or culture that could not have occurred without destroying the cultural and spiritual walls keeping them in place.
Trump and the Republican/libertarian swamp creators, those for whom the Constitution is an inconvenience, are living on borrowed time. They are sure that whatever ruin ensues, their wealth can insulate them, their families, and their friends. What they cannot escape is the day of reckoning we Christians call Judgment Day. We all die, and we all face it.
What a surprise it will be for them when they discover that there are no yachts in hell.
Sources
Richard Friedman, “Is It Time to Call Donald Trump Mentally Ill?” New York Times, Feb. 17, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/17/opinion/is-it-time-to-call-trump-mentally-ill.html.
Martin Jay, “Bill Barr and the ‘Unitary Executive Theory.’” Salmagundi, Spring-Summer, https://x.com/0ivankaTrump1/status/2104309948523897088/video/1.
Katherine Stewart, Money, Lies, and God: Inside the Movement to Destroy American Democracy, 2025.
--------, The Power Worshippers: Inside the Dangerous Rise of Religious Nationalism, 2020.
Jane Mayer, Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right, 2016.
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