I urge you to read the book Nuclear War: A Scenario, published in 2024 by Annie Jacobsen. It is a gripping narrative of how a nuclear war destroys all civilization in less than two hours.

Indeed, perhaps no humans at all survive after the first few years of radiation and starvation, and after the end of the technology and the ideals of civilization.

It takes 24,000 years for life on Earth to recover (with or without any humans surviving).

To help grasp how long 24,000 years is, compare it to Abraham living about 4,000 years ago; Moses living around 3,500 years ago, and Jesus rising from the dead about 2,000 years ago.

Or, if you can’t endure reading about the horrors of so many annihilations, you need only read the beginning of the book, which describes what happens to the Washington, D.C. area if one North Korean nuclear-tipped missiles hits Washington, D.C. (It’s believed North Korea already has about 50 such missiles!)

As a follower of the Way of Jesus, our response to such a risk must be to express our faith through love by taking wise actions to avoid such a civilization-ending catastrophe.

For that matter, we need to express our faith through love by taking wise actions through love to avoid such a catastrophe consuming even one city—even one more “Hiroshima” or “Nagasaki” is one too many!

I stress wise actions because foolish actions (such as scrapping all of our nuclear weapons while others keep their nuclear weapons) would cause dangerous instability that would increase  the risk of nuclear war.

And so, we must pray for wisdom for ourselves, our friends, and any potential enemies, relying on God to generously give us wisdom, as promised by James, the brother of Jesus (James 1:5).

We also must pray for wisdom for the leaders of ourselves, our friends, and our potential enemies, as encouraged by the Apostle Paul, who wrote Timothy:

I urge, . . . first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercessions and thanksgiving be made for all people—for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. (1 Timothy 2:1-2)(emphasis added).

This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. (1 Timothy 2:3-4)(emphasis added).

And, if war breaks out (such as in Ukraine, Gaza, Korea, or Taiwan), we must pray for our enemies and love them. (Matthew 5:43-45).

Like Abraham, Moses, the Prophets, and Jesus we must intercede with God, urging him to be compassionate, gracious, and loving, even when it means forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. We must urge God to limit the bad effects of people’s bad choices (such as building or using nuclear weapons) as much as feasible. (Exodus 34:6-7).

For example, Abraham argued with God, urging him not to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 18:23-32).

Moses argued with God, urging him not to destroy Israel after Israel sinned by worshipping the Gold Calf. (Exodus 32:9-14,30-34).

In the time of the Prophet Isaiah, the people were told to see the Ways of the LORD with their eyes, hear the Ways of the LORD with their ears, and understand the Ways of the LORD with their hearts, and turn to the LORD to be healed, lest they suffer catastrophes:

Until the cities lie ruined

   and without inhabitant,

until the houses are left deserted

   and the fields ruined and ravaged.

(Isaiah 6:11).

By the time of the Prophet Jeremiah about 100 years later, Jerusalem and the Temple had been struck with utter ruin when the Babylonians annihilated them. Jeremiah lamented:

When [Jerusalem] fell . . .,

     there was no one to help her.

Her enemies looked at her

     and laughed at her destruction.

(Lamentations 1:7)

[Jerusalem’s] fall was astounding;

     there was none to comfort her.

(Lamentations 1:9)

[The LORD] summoned . . . terrors on every side.

In the day of the LORD’s anger,

     no one escaped or survived.

(Lamentations 2:22)

Hundreds of years later, on the first Palm Sunday, Jesus looked at Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives.

Jesus wept. (Luke 19:41). He said:

“If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. The days will come upon you when your enemies . . . will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone upon another, because you did not recognize the time of God’s coming to you.” (Luke 19:41-44).

In the 1850s, Harriett Beecher Stone looked at slavery in America. She wept.

She ended her anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin with a prophecy of doom that echoed the prophesies of doom by Isaiah, Jeremiah and Jesus:

If America did not take the path of “repentance, justice, and mercy,” there was no doubt that the “injustice and cruelty” in America would bring “the wrath of Almighty God.” (Visions of America, page 68).

She recognized that “[b]oth North and South have been guilty before God; and the Christian Church has a heavy account to answer.” (Visions of America, at page 68).

Nevertheless, near the end of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, she did not yet abandon all hope for a peaceful end to slavery. As she put it, “[a] day of grace is yet held out to us.” (Visions of America, at page 68).

Similarly, a day of grace is yet held out to America, to Russia, and to all Humanity.

The details of what wise actions we should take are best examined elsewhere. They include better communications in a crisis. And ways to enable more time to make key decisions, including launching missiles.

Again and again, in the Scenario, key mistakes were made because there was so little time to gather facts, analyze facts, and make decisions—there was so little time to see, hear, and understand.

For example, 40 years ago when Reagan was President, he worried that he only had six minutes to decide whether to launch nuclear-tipped missiles.

Presumably, this 6-minute launch window keeps shrinking. For example, Putin boasts how much more quickly his newly deployed hypersonic missiles can destroy targets than his traditional ballistic missiles can!

Why is there so little time? Why don’t nations simply wait to retaliate?

Fear!!!

Partly fear of missiles and cruise missiles that are far more accurate than during the time of Reagan and Gorbachev—far more likely to “decapitate” the leadership and the nuclear weapons of the other country before they can launch their nuclear counterstrike.

And so, the axiom “Use them or lose them”, increasingly undermines the wisdom of Reagan and Gorbachev: “A nuclear war must never be fought and cannot be won.”

Due to threats of nuclear war by Putin after the invasion of Ukraine, this wisdom was re-affirmed in a joint statement on January 3, 2022 by China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. These five incredibly powerful nations underlined “their desire to work with all states to create a security environment more conducive to disarmament with the ultimate goal of a world without nuclear weapons with undiminished security for all.”

Good words. Nevertheless, the fear of nuclear war grows.

Why?

Part of the fear is that nations with only a “few” nuclear weapons, might launch them unless we destroy the weapons before they can be launched.

For example, in the book’s Scenario, this fear led the President of the United States to launch tens of nuclear weapons at North Korea after North Korea launched one missile that annihilated Washington, D.C.

The mistake that the U.S. made was that about 50 of our missiles came from silos whose missiles had to travel over Russia in order to reach North Korea. The missiles don’t have enough fuel to reach North Korea unless they take the “shortcut” over the North Pole.

Obviously, if the United States waited, it would have been able to deploy overwhelming firepower from bombers and submarines. But who would want it said that we could have stopped the annihilation of about 50 U.S. cities, if we only hadn’t delayed firing our missiles ASAP over the North Pole?

The mistake the President of Russia made was that his early warning system has a number of flaws. These flaws mistakenly reported that the missiles heading over Russia to North Korea were actually going to land on Russia.

On top of that catastrophic error, the United States uses sophisticated technology to prevent Russia from shooting down our missiles. This technology confused the Russian early warning system into mistakenly concluding that the United States had already launched about 1,000 missiles that were going to hit Russia!

Faced with his alarming (albeit erroneous!) information from his early warning system, the Russian President launched all his nukes. He feared he must use them or lose them. But what he really did was prove that a nuclear war must never be fought and cannot be won.

These horrible mistakes remind me of what happens when you’re using a time clock in chess. Sometimes, if you want to play a quick game (perhaps because one of the players must leave in a few minutes) you’ll only give each player a few minutes to make all their moves.

In this Scenario, each player would only be given six minutes to play the most important “chess game” imaginable!

After a 6-minute chess game is over, both players would shocked at the mistakes they each made. It could even be humorous to spot the stupid moves each player made when under the stress of intense time pressure.

But there’d be nothing humorous about the annihilation of the ideals and infrastructure of civilization—perhaps even the extinction of all Humans.

Therefore, we must make wise use of the “day of grace that is yet extended to us.”

Today is the Day of salvation. (Isaiah 49:8 KJV; 2 Corinthians 6:2 KJV).

Do not harden your hearts!Hebrews 3:7-15).

As the author of the book of Hebrews urged:

Today, if you hear his voice,

do not harden your hearts. (Hebrews 3:16).

Unfortunately the churches in the United States and Russia have a heavy account to give. They have not listened to the voice of the LORD. And so they have not seen, heard or understood the danger.

instead, many Christians in both Russia and the United States have hardened their hearts by embracing Christian Nationalism!

As Isaiah warned, such failure to see, hear or understand leads to the hardening of hearts. And such hardening of hearts, leads to catastrophes “until the cities lie ruined and without inhabitant” (Isaiah 6:11).

in much the same way, Pharaoh hardened his heart, leading to similar catastrophes in Ancient Egypt (Exodus 4:21-15:21)).

All too often, Christian Nationalism in the United States and Christian Nationalism in Russia have formed an unholy alliance with the Power of Money, the Power of Religion, and the Power of the Kingdoms of the World. This unholy alliance encourages the building of weapons (including nuclear weapons) and encourages wars.

Jesus began his public ministry by overcoming the temptations of the Powers of Money, the Power of Religion, and the Power of the Kingdoms of the World (Matthew 4:1-11; Luke 4:1-13), Powersthat lead to Nationalism.

Similarly, in order to act wisely to get Shalom instead of getting Mutual Assured Destruction, the people following the Way of Jesus need to start by overcoming the Powers of Money, Religion, and the Kingdoms of this World, including their manifestations as Christian Nationalism in both America and Russia. (my blog “Nationalism Is Patriotism Gone Astray”).

Then we need to use wisdom to use “countervailing powers” to restrain the Powers of Money, Religion, and the Kingdoms of this World. (my blog “Alcatraz: Escaping by Using ‘Countervailing Powers’ Wisely”)

Then we need to pray for Wisdom!

Pray for Wisdom!!

Pray for Wisdom!!!

Because TODAY is the Day of Salvation. We must listen to the voice of God—to the Wisdom of the Way of Jesus.

And then, we must not harden our hearts.

Instead, we must see, hear and understand, and turn to the LORD to be healed.

TODAY!!!

We must see, hear and understand the times, and have the Wisdom to know what should be done! (1 Chronicles 12:32).

THINGS TO THINK ABOUT

Have you ever made mistakes because you have so little time to see, hear and understand?

In what ways do the Powers of Money, Religion, and Kingdoms of this World encourage the building of weapons (including nuclear weapons) and encourages wars. How? Why?

READ MORE

For related thoughts, please read my blogs “Nationalism Is Patriotism Gone Astray”,  “Ending Violence: Embracing the Spirit of Peace”,  “Jesus Climbs the Temple Mount”, Hiding in Plain Sight”, “Camouflaging Hideous Death with Fake Life”, and “Civilizations and Governments: Securing Shalom”.