Visions of Judgment: The Ride of the Third Horseman—Famine

With the potential for the food-producing countries to feed the entire globe, it's hard to imagine how famine could grip the earth in the crisis that ends the age. Yet, the third seal opens to a horrifying scene of food scarcity that leads to global famine. How could this happen? What will be the result?

by Darris McNeely

Right now people are suffering from famine in many parts of the world. Famine has returned to Ethiopia where nearly 6 million are in desperate need of emergency food supplies in order to avert starvation. Perhaps another million require immediate help in Eritrea. In southern Africa, 14 million people in six countries currently suffer from food shortages.

More than 2 million people have died in the past decade in North Korea due to food shortages caused by a combination of flood, drought and bad government policy created by Kim Jong Il, the nation's dictatorial ruler, who currently threatens the use and/or sale of nuclear weapons. Many feel this is a periodic ploy to gain concessions, including supplies of food, from the world community. (See "Kim Blamed for North Korean Drought," Washington Times, Jan. 6, 2003.)

Famine is a scourge that appears cyclically throughout history. Sometimes it is caused by drought, blight, floods and other natural means. At other times, it is caused by inefficient or outright malevolent government policy.

In today's global society, there should be no real obstacle to alleviating the effects of food shortages wherever they occur. Modern agricultural methods create bumper crops in the developed world resulting in massive amounts of food production, more than enough to feed the hungry of the world. There is no reason to expect people to starve when this is coupled with the means to transport food to any location in the world. Yet famine and suffering from food shortages continue—and grow.

The third horseman

We come now to the third horseman's ride. Notice what it says in Revelation 6. "When He opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, 'Come and see.' So I looked, and behold, a black horse, and he who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hand. 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 6:5-6).

The Expositor's Bible Commentary explains: "This amount suggests food prices about twelve times higher than normal and implies inflation and famine conditions (Matt. 24:7). A quart of wheat would supply an average person one day's sustenance. Barley was used by the poor to mix with the wheat." Oil and wine are symbols of plenty. The reference here can indicate there will be pockets of abundance in the midst of famine. Christ's reference to famine "in various places" (Matthew 24:7) indicates the same possibility.

With the opening of this seal comes a period of severe famine unlike any in the past. While there have been famines throughout history of varying severity, it appears this will be worse. We have all seen pictures of famine in our time, usually in parts of drought-stricken Africa. In 1984, a famine in Ethiopia developed through natural means, but was aggravated by the unstable government. Millions were at risk.

Fortunately, a massive humanitarian effort from around the world stopped the famine from killing as many as predicted. (Even then, corrupt government officials withheld some of the donated food as a weapon to starve their political opponents.) This was testimony to the generosity of the many wealthy nations and the global means of transport that is available. However if a nation's social fabric begins to unravel, then larger problems can set in. The crises in southern Africa may be a foretaste of larger tribulations to come.

Prelude to an apocalypse?

The six southern African countries of Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Swaziland and Mozambique currently suffer from large food shortages and will need help for months to come. But food is not the only problem. The famine is aggravated due to the AIDS epidemic that grips the continent. About 25 percent of the adult population of these countries is infected with the virus. As the adults succumb to this plague, there are fewer people left to plant and harvest the crops. Worse yet, as the adult community dies, the knowledge needed for survival is not passed to the younger generation. Consequently, the society loses its ability to produce food—even if weather and soil conditions were optimal.

A recent article in Britain's The Economist gave the story of one woman whose personal tragedy represents the larger unfolding catastrophe.

"In the past, when food was short, Jenerah Michelo, a Zambian subsistence farmer, could buy or beg from neighbours. But then her husband died of AIDS, leaving her with six children, a nearly empty food pot and a debilitating virus in her bloodstream. Now she is too feeble to forage, and neighbors are reluctant to help because she is a 'patient.' Foreign donors sometimes bring food and tablets to treat convulsions. But the medicine should be taken after a full meal, 'so I get side effects, I become weak and dizzy, I cannot manage.' She cannot get hold of anti-AIDS drugs, but if she could, they too would be useless without adequate nourishment" ("Cursed, Twice Over," Feb. 13, 2003).

In President Bush's January State of the Union address, he pledged $15 billion in emergency medical aid to Africa over the next five years. This is a generous, noble and helpful step in a mounting battle. But medicine alone will not solve the crisis. Other factors, not the least of which is education, are needed. Another major need is food. A person infected with the HIV virus needs extra calories, especially protein, as well as powerful drugs, to keep it from developing into AIDS. When there are massive food shortages, the death toll keeps rising.

In rural Africa today, the future looks bleak. In fact, the future is dying. The combination of famine and disease is hitting mainly those who are in their most productive years, those under 40. A majority of victims are women who traditionally do most of the farming. As parents die, the children leave school to take care of themselves and other children in the family. The tribal village has been the traditional backbone of African society, but it is beginning to crack under the strain of loss from the famine.

A social breakdown is occurring in many areas of Africa due to the twin problems of famine and disease. The Economist ended its report by saying, "Indeed, there are signs of such a breakdown in Mrs. Michelo's village: her family cannot help her, her neighbours will not, and some have even been stealing her chickens. Such theft was unknown during previous food shortages, as was hoarding by the better off, which has now become commonplace" (ibid.).

Famines of the past

Famine is listed in Revelation 6 as the third seal, which follows the horsemen of war and false religion. While nature can be a cause of famine, quite often war and misrule, malignant political or religious ideology, are prime factors. A look at past famines in history can give us an idea of how devastating they can be to society.

During the 20th century there were two humanly engineered famines with devastating consequences. In 1932-34, the Soviet dictator Josef Stalin sought to suppress Ukrainian nationalism by forcing a system of collectivized agriculture upon the peasants. Food supplies were removed to the cities, crops failed and food supplies were barred from the region. This manmade famine resulted in the starvation of between 6 and 8 million. This famine was a state-sponsored attempt at genocide.

China's "Great Leap Forward" in 1958-60 resulted in mismanaged food production and the disruption of distribution chains. Fertile rice fields were plowed over and factories built on them. Farms were collectivized. Farmers who knew only the land were at a loss as to what to do in and with factories. Coupled with bad weather, the result was the death by starvation of 20 million people during 1960 and 1961.

Famine in prophecy

Step back into the book of Leviticus for a look at God's warning to man through the example of Israel. Here we can see the pattern of false religion, war, famine and pestilence in the instruction to Israel to remain faithful to their relationship with God.

Leviticus 26 is a chapter of promises from God, the promise of blessings for obedience and of curses for disobedience. The first step toward blessings is true religion, or faithfulness to the true worship of God. "You shall not make idols for yourselves; neither a carved image nor a sacred pillar shall you rear for yourselves; nor shall you set up an engraved stone in your land, to bow down to it; for I am the LORD your God. You shall keep My Sabbaths and reverence My sanctuary: I am the LORD" (verses 1-2).

For keeping His statutes and commandments, God promises "rain in its season, the land shall yield its produce, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit...you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land safely. I will give peace in the land, and you shall lie down, and none will make you afraid; I will rid the land of evil beasts, and the sword will not go through your land... For I will look on you favorably and make you fruitful, multiply you and confirm My covenant with you" (verses 3-9).

By avoiding false religion, Israel would be able to receive divine blessings of peace and material abundance. Good health, the absence of disease, would follow. In other words, the horsemen of apocalyptic disaster would not ride through their land as long as they obeyed God and worshiped Him in truth.

This promise applies to all nations, and in time, they will receive the promised benefits if they, too, live the way God reveals. Until then, we will continue to see the cyclical occurrence of famine by all causes—people by the millions dying when they could live.

In the parallel account in Deuteronomy 28 God details the horror of a people stricken with the curse of famine. Perhaps this warning serves to illustrate the stories from history wherever famine has occurred for whatever reason. It bears our study here to understand what lies ahead for this world when the third horseman rides.

For disobedience to the covenant—the basis of the loving relationship between God and Israel—God says He would bring a nation from afar to besiege and blockade the cities. All the food stores would be forcibly taken. The resulting starvation would cause the social structure to unravel at a frightening speed. The results are hard to read but read them we must.

"You shall eat the fruit of your own body, the flesh of your sons and your daughters whom the LORD your God has given you, in the siege and desperate straits in which your enemy shall distress you. The sensitive and very refined man among you will be hostile toward his brother, toward the wife of his bosom, and toward the rest of his children whom he leaves behind, so that he will not give any of them the flesh of his children whom he will eat, because he has nothing left in the siege...

"The tender and delicate woman among you...will refuse to the husband of her bosom, and to her son and her daughter, her placenta which comes out from between her feet and her children whom she bears; for she will eat them secretly for lack of everything in the siege and desperate straits in which your enemy shall distress you at all your gates" (Deuteronomy 28:53-57).

Famine-induced cannibalism is the lowest depth of depravity to which a nation can sink. Scenes like this have occurred in history and God says they can happen again. Reading this in the light of today's headlines is profoundly sobering. These are the deeply distressing events that inevitably occur when men and women become entrenched in a pattern of disobedience to God's laws, stubbornly refuse to submit to their Creator and ignore His warning messages.

Hope in the midst of horror

Jesus Christ wept over the fate awaiting Jerusalem in the first century. He knew that scenes such as this would occur within the "city of peace." He wanted to gather them into a loving and protective embrace and keep them from such tragedy. But their sins and defiant attitude would not permit the necessary repentance. All He could do was leave them to impending desolation and the cruel lessons of experience (see Matthew 23:37-39).

There is one horseman yet to ride in this grisly scenario. We will see in our next installment that he rides in tandem with this third horseman. We have not yet seen the depths of the trial that awaits the world, as the seals of Revelation are opened. Lest we lose hope, perhaps this is the time to consider again the ride of the fifth horseman, Jesus Christ.

In His Olivet prophecy, Jesus gave the first description of these seals—and His prediction is unerring. There would be a time of great tribulation, greater than any previous world conflict and unless the days would be brought up short, no human flesh would survive. No treaty, no cease-fire, no human being, would be able to stop the age-ending cataclysm. Events will drive the world into an out-of-control spin. But for the sake of a remnant called "the elect," "the days will be shortened" (Matthew 24:21-22).

Too often, people speak of this period as "the end of the world" or by some other similar gloomy name. The world will not end, and human life will not be extinguished. The Bible gives us hope that the light will dawn out of the chaos at the end of the age. It is when we keep our eyes firmly focused on this truth that we can have hope beyond the tensions of our present world.

The time when God conclusively intervenes in history is drawing near. Out of the midst of this destruction, the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven. Everyone will see His appearing in the clouds of heaven (Matthew 24:30). God speed that day, as we all pray, "Your kingdom come." —WNP

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