IX. Speed to Characterize Final Movements

These warnings were repeated often and in varying forms, the repetition indicating their great importance. A few years before the outbreak of World War I (1914-1918) Mrs. White gave additional forewarnings of an impending crisis. In 1904 she declared:PFF4 1010.1

“Soon great trouble will arise among the nations,—trouble that will not cease until Jesus comes.” ^{45“The Need of Earnest Effort,” The Review and Herald, February 11, 1904, p. 8.}PFF4 1010.2

Again in 1904 she wrote:PFF4 1010.3

“The wars and rumors of wars, the destruction by fire and flood, say clearly that the time of trouble, which is to increase until the end, is very near at hand. We have no time to lose. The world is stirred with a spirit of war. The prophecies of the eleventh of Daniel have almost reached their final fulfillment.” ^{46“The Day of the Lord Is Near, and Hasteth Greatly,” The Review and Herald, November 24, 1904, p. 16.}PFF4 1010.4

International strife will increase, she declared in 1910:PFF4 1010.5

“Soon strife among the nations will break out with an intensity that we do not now anticipate. The present is a time of overwhelming interest to all living. Rulers and statesmen ... observe the intensity that is taking possession of every earthly element, and they realize that something great and decisive is about to take place, that the world is on the verge of a stupendous crisis.” ^{47“Go Preach the Gospel,” The Review and Herald, November 17, 1910, p. 8.}PFF4 1010.6

And still earlier in 1897 she had written:PFF4 1010.7

“Great changes are soon to take place in our world, and the final movements will be rapid ones.” ^{48E. G. White, Testimonies for the Church 9:11, from her Letter 21a, 1892.}PFF4 1010.8

A universal revolution in human affairs has indeed taken place—the most tremendous, sweeping changes in the long changing history of mankind. Beyond question we have entered a new epoch in human affairs-social, economic, moral, material, and political. The map of the world has been altered in a manner no one had ever previously envisioned. Old empires and dynasties have disappeared. New nations and systems have sprung up. This is particularly true of the world’s philosophy of life and political ideologies. Universal revolution has come in human affairs, and the movements are incredibly rapid ones. The tempo has been stepped up, and mankind lives at a pace unparalleled in all past time. Ours is now a “split-second” world.PFF4 1010.9