The end of the world is now closer than ever. The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists set the time of their symbolic “Doomsday Clock” forward by 4 seconds on January 27, pushing it to 85 seconds until “midnight”—the symbolic hour of global nuclear destruction. This is the nearest to “doomsday” the clock has ever been set to since it was created by Albert Einstein and his associates 79 years ago.

Three Nuclear Conflicts

“Last year started with a glimmer of hope in regard to nuclear risks,” the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists wrote in a statement. This hope was due to United States President Donald Trump’s promises to end nuclear-armed Russia’s war on Ukraine and his calls for global powers to work toward denuclearization.

But over the course of the year, those efforts failed to deliver results, while nuclear risks grew elsewhere.

The Bulletin stated: “[N]egative trends—old and new—intensified, with three regional conflicts involving nuclear powers all threatening to escalate.” The statement continued:

The Russia–Ukraine war has featured novel and potentially destabilizing military tactics and Russian allusions to nuclear weapons use. Conflict between India and Pakistan erupted in May, leading to cross-border drone and missile attacks amid nuclear brinkmanship. In June, Israel and the United States launched aerial attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities suspected of supporting the country’s nuclear weapons ambitions. It remains unclear whether the attacks constrained those efforts—or if they instead persuaded the country to pursue nuclear weapons covertly.

Besides these potentially nuclear conflicts, the Bulletin also sounded the alarm about China’s rapidly growing nuclear arsenal, global increases in nationalism and autocracy, the collapse of nuclear arms control treaties, Russia’s and China’s antisatellite weapons, and increasing biological and AI-based threats.

“Our current trajectory is unsustainable,” the Bulletin said. “National leaders—particularly those in the United States, Russia and China—must take the lead in finding a path away from the brink. Citizens must insist they do so.”

Alexandra Bell, president and ceo of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, said: “The Doomsday Clock’s message cannot be clearer. Catastrophic risks are on the rise, cooperation is on the decline, and we are running out of time.”

‘Greater Anguish Than at Any Time’

Some of the Bulletin’s analysis is flawed. But it is beyond debate that the world is in a hazardous era and moving more deeply into it. After the Doomsday Clock was moved closer to midnight in 2002—from nine minutes to seven—Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry highlighted both the gravity of the change and the media’s failure to take notice.

“The world should have jolted out of sleep at the news,” he wrote. “Headlines should have splashed across all the media. But no real alarm was sounded. The majority of the news media dismissed it. And many still slumber on as the world heads toward self-destruction.”

Mr. Flurry said the reason the Doomsday Clock’s adjustment was so significant is connected to the Bible’s warnings about nuclear World War iii. “Nearly 2,000 years ago, Jesus Christ prophesied about this global state of affairs,” he wrote. He then quoted Christ’s words recorded in Matthew 24:21-22, which in the New Living Translation state: “For there will be greater anguish than at any time since the world began. And it will never be so great again. In fact, unless that time of calamity is shortened, not a single person will survive. ….”

Mr. Flurry wrote:

Jesus Christ was talking about a time when the annihilation of all human life would be possible. This has everything to do with the Doomsday Clock. Yet how many theologians discuss these two verses?

Mr. Flurry emphasized that while current events point to devastation in the near future, they also show that the most hope-filled event in mankind’s history is nearer than ever. In verse 22, just after Christ says that nuclear war at the end of this age will be so cataclysmic that it could wipe out all human life, He adds a key detail: “But it will be shortened …” (nlt).

This global nuclear war that now looms on the horizon larger than ever will be cut short. Before the nations of the world detonate enough weapons to annihilate human life, the war will be divinely interrupted. And just after that season of unprecedented death, an epoch of unprecedented global peace will begin. Mr. Flurry continued:

[S]even minutes to nuclear annihilation really means seven minutes to the greatest possible news you could ever hear: It is all a sign that Jesus Christ is about to return to Earth—to stop mankind from destroying himself—and show the world how to have peace, happiness and joy.

Now those seven minutes on the symbolic Doomsday Clock are down to just 85 seconds.

To understand more about how close mankind is to an unfathomably devastating nuclear war, and why the carnage will be cut short before it ends all human life, request Mr. Flurry’s free booklet Nuclear Armageddon Is ‘At the Door.’