This week saw a new kind of climate forecast, one which predicts the conditions during the next five years.


Researchers have produced a computer model to predict how the world’s surface temperatures will vary over the next five years. Published in the journal Nature Communications, they predict a temperature anomaly leading to increased likelihood of extreme temperatures – the kind which have proved to be most concerning in recent years. This climate analysis is effectively providing a long-view weather forecast for warmer seasons. These predictions relate to concerns over the future of this years’ weather anomalies: the widespread fires and heatwaves, the sudden floodings, and the state-wide drought in SE Australia which is occuring in the middle of its winter season (see previous article). To add a real-world insult to injury, strong mathematical predictions are likely to affect the cost of insurance cover – for holidays, medical care, farming, housing… - in regions which are already suffering.


We have forgotten where we came from, and how the self-reliance of the kings of Judah always resulted in failure. We are a God-fearing society, are we…? yet God has become a joke in people’s hearts, a myth, a hindrance to our personal show of strength. The firm reliance of King David - Judah's greatest and most successful king - on God has been forgotten in our pursuit for self-reliance.


We should ask whether we are willing and able to develop the means to halt and reverse climate and weather degradations – and if so, we have no spare time: we need to do it with urgency.


...Or we can give credence to that other – more ancient – prediction which declared that our race would ultimately fail by abandoning God, and can follow its advice. In doing so, we might recall David's words from a Psalm:




A simple “mathematical model” of our future would forecast that the way we handle this crisis will affect how we progress afterwards. Ultimately – in meekness, in submission, or in absolute desperation or through gritted teeth – we will call to the Heavens to save us. Our future beyond our rescue depends upon our manner of approach.