It is occasionally fun to look at the times around us an attempt a crude calculation of how long it will be until Jesus returns. Has Iraq finished rebuilding Babylon? Has the U.N. taken yet another step toward becoming a one world government? Is the Euro about to take over as a global currency?
I’ve found technology to be something interesting to think about here. Even one generation ago, it would have been nearly impossible to coordinate and organize a global government. But with technology, that goal is far easier. Technology makes us capable of what we couldn’t do before. Tracking citizens and criminals is possible in a whole new way. Enforcing regulations and coordinating policy implementations across broader regions is now a reality. Real time tracking of crises and and emergency allocation of resources is easier than ever. And it’s being done.
So for years, I viewed the growth of technology and the exponential increase in information generation and aggregation as a harbinger of the end times. Now, it’s easier than ever for the stage to be set for one man to rule the whole world (if you take that view of the AntiChrist and the end times).
But, as has become incredibly clear in Tunisia and now Egypt, technology does not have simply a unifying impulse. Technology makes us capable of new things, but technology is, in itself, aimless. Though technology itself is ordered, it can just as easily be subverted for disorder. Despotism as well as anarchy come from democracy. Big Brother and 4chan’s “Anonymous” both come from technology. Technology makes government possible on a global scale, and it makes it possible for anyone to disrupt any emerging world order.
Which ruins my hobby of trying to calculate when Obama is going to declare himself the AntiChrist. (jk, jk.)