Recent protests have highlighted the concern amongst some young (and not so young) people on the topic of climate change.
The basic issue for them is that the burning of fossil fuels is producing a very rapid and possibly irreversible change in climate. Humans are to take immediate action to end fossil fuel usage or risk precipitating the extinction of all life on Earth. For some young protesters, such a prediction has caused enormous anxiety about their future. After all, planet Earth is the only home we have!
However, the Bible is crystal clear that the end of the world will not occur by human hands, but will take place when Christ returns. Peter says in 2 Peter 3:10-11:
10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.
11 Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness…
Paul makes a similar point in Romans 8:18-22 where the end of the world is intimately connected with the return of Christ and the revealing of the sons of God.
While waiting, we are to be faithful stewards of the earth’s resources, preach the gospel and hold on to God’s promise in Genesis 8:22:
22 While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.”
– Phil Pratt