The Book of Revelation never uses the phrase “climate change.” It doesn’t model CO₂ trajectories or negotiate emissions targets. Yet its pages are filled with ecological catastrophe: seas poisoned, rivers turned to blood, scorching heat, mass die‑offs, and a violently shaken earth. Whatever you think of the contemporary climate debate, the Bible has already given us a gallery of climate‑adjacent judgments—and, crucially, it tells us why they happen.
Below is a brief overview of the “climate” disasters in Revelation, what Scripture says about their causes, and then—IMownHO—a reflection on how our age has built a rival apocalyptic story, with Science as prophet and a “sort‑of‑woke” climate narrative as its gospel.
Climate‑Related Catastrophes in Revelation
Revelation’s judgments unfold in three great cycles: seals, trumpets, and bowls. Many of them are explicitly ecological.
1. The Seals (Revelation 6–8)
- Fourth Seal – Pale Horse (Rev 6:7–8)
- Rider named Death; power to kill “by sword, with hunger, with death, and by the beasts of the earth.”
- Not strictly “climate,” but mass die‑off, famine, and ecological breakdown are implied.
- Sixth Seal – Cosmic and Geological Upheaval (Rev 6:12–14)
- “A great earthquake.”
- Sun becomes black, moon like blood, stars (or meteors) fall, sky recedes like a scroll, mountains and islands moved out of place.
- This is global-scale geophysical and atmospheric disruption.
2. The Trumpets (Revelation 8–11)
Here the ecological language intensifies and becomes more specific:
- First Trumpet (Rev 8:7)
- Hail and fire mixed with blood cast upon the earth.
- “A third of the trees were burned up, and all green grass was burned up.”
- Massive vegetation loss.
- Second Trumpet (Rev 8:8–9)
- Something “like a great mountain burning with fire” thrown into the sea.
- “A third of the sea became blood… a third of the living creatures in the sea died… a third of the ships were destroyed.”
- Marine ecosystem collapse + disruption of sea trade.
- Third Trumpet (Rev 8:10–11)
- A great star (Wormwood) falls on rivers and springs.
- “A third of the waters became wormwood, and many men died from the water, because it was made bitter.”
- Freshwater contamination and lethal poisoning.
- Fourth Trumpet (Rev 8:12)
- “A third of the sun, a third of the moon, and a third of the stars were struck.”
- Reduced light, shortened day and night—think radical atmospheric disturbance.
- Seventh Trumpet (Rev 11:15–19)
- Lightning, voices, thunder, an earthquake, and great hail.
- Tied to the declaration that “the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ.”
3. The Bowls (Revelation 16)
The bowl judgments read almost like a nightmare caricature of ecological collapse:
- Second Bowl (Rev 16:3)
- Sea becomes “blood as of a dead man,” and “every living creature in the sea died.”
- Total marine biocide.
- Third Bowl (Rev 16:4–7)
- Rivers and springs of water become blood.
- The angel explicitly interprets this as judgment “for they have shed the blood of saints and prophets.”
- Fourth Bowl (Rev 16:8–9)
- The sun is given power “to scorch men with fire.”
- People are “scorched with great heat,” yet “blasphemed the name of God… and they did not repent.”
- Intense heat, possibly drought, and stubborn spiritual resistance.
- Seventh Bowl (Rev 16:17–21)
- A “great earthquake, such a mighty and great earthquake as had not occurred since men were on the earth.”
- Cities fall, islands flee, mountains are not found.
- Huge hailstones fall on men, who again blaspheme God because of the plague.
These are not gentle metaphors. Revelation envisions a creation convulsing—oceans, rivers, atmosphere, land, and climate all in upheaval.
What Does the Bible Say Causes These Disasters?
This is where the Bible diverges sharply from our modern climate narrative. The “why” in Revelation is not random weather or blind fate; it is moral and spiritual.
1. Divine Judgment in Response to Injustice and Idolatry
- The bowl on the waters (Rev 16:4–7) is explicitly “because they have shed the blood of saints and prophets.”
- The trumpets and bowls repeatedly note that people do not repent (Rev 9:20–21; 16:9, 11).
- Revelation 11:18 summarizes the climax:
“The nations were angry, and Your wrath has come… and should destroy those who destroy the earth.”
The ecological crises are not accidents. They are God’s measured response to systems that destroy both people and the planet.
2. Human Rebellion and Systemic Evil
- Revelation’s disasters are inseparable from the rise of the Beast, the False Prophet, and a globalized system of exploitation (“Babylon the Great,” Rev 17–18).
- This is economic, political, and spiritual corruption—idolatry institutionalized.
3. Demonic Deception
- Three unclean spirits “like frogs” go out to the kings of the earth to gather them for “the battle of that great day of God Almighty” (Rev 16:13–14, 16).
- Behind political posturing and moral blindness stands a deeper spiritual manipulation.
In short: Revelation’s climate catastrophes are the outworking of a broken relationship between Creator, creation, and human power. They are not solved by engineering alone, nor by policy alone, because they are symptoms of a world at war with God.
Opinion: Science as Prophet, Climate as Secular Apocalypse
Now let me shift into analysis—in my own voice.
We live in an age of strange convergences. On one side, a biblical vision of ecological judgment, rooted in spiritual rebellion, systemic violence, and divine justice. On the other, a secular narrative of impending climate catastrophe, rooted in computer models, IPCC reports, and policy frameworks.
Here’s the irony: for many secular humanists, “Science” has effectively become the apocalyptic prophet. The form is familiar:
- A looming global crisis.
- A call to repentance (of a sort): change your habits, restructure your economies.
- Threats of judgment: rising seas, deadly heatwaves, climate refugees.
- A priestly class to mediate the message.
- And, inevitably, a temple economy built around fear and hope.
I am not saying climate science is entirely wrong. I’m saying the way it is framed, preached, and weaponized often looks less like sober inquiry and more like an anxious, half‑baked religion.
The High Priests
The high priests of this new faith are not the quiet lab workers; they are the anointed interpreters of “The Science.” They sit atop major universities, global agencies, and advisory panels. Their pronouncements are treated as oracles—too sacred to question without being branded a heretic or “denier.”
Like any priesthood, they decide which data is orthodox, which lines of inquiry are heretical, and which conclusions are suitable to be proclaimed from the temple steps of global media.
The Choir
The choir is the legacy media, much of academia, and the influencer class. They amplify the liturgy: polar bears on ice floes; countdown clocks to catastrophe; every storm labeled “unprecedented” whether it is or isn’t.
They sing the same refrains:
- “The Science is settled.”
- “We have 10 years left.”
- “This is your last warning.”
The more shrill the tone, the more certain they seem of their own righteousness.
The Evangelists
The evangelists are the activists, NGOs, and politicians who turn this narrative into a full‑blown moral crusade. They call for repentance:
- Not primarily from greed, injustice, and idolatry—
- But from the wrong energy sources, the wrong diets, the wrong consumer choices.
They storm capitals, glue themselves to artwork, draft treaties, and build an eschatology in which salvation is a net‑zero target and redemption is a green economy.
The Money Changers
And then there are the money changers in the temple: the industries, funds, and political machines that have discovered climate anxiety is a gold mine.
- Carbon credits and trading schemes.
- Subsidies and mandates that enrich a few well‑placed corporations.
- Vast government budgets and NGO funding pipelines justified by an endless “climate emergency.”
These are not prophets. They are profiteers—operating a lucrative market in indulgences for a guilty, secular conscience.
The Real Convergence—and a Better Hope
Here’s the sober takeaway: the Bible does foresee a world in ecological crisis. It also foresees systems so corrupt that they “destroy the earth”—and God’s judgment on them.
But the causal chain in Revelation runs deeper than the secular story will ever admit:
- from idolatry to injustice,
- from injustice to systemic exploitation and violence,
- and from that to ecological devastation.
Climate, in Scripture, is not an isolated variable; it is woven into a moral and spiritual fabric.
So when I see our age enthroning “Science” as a kind of apocalyptic prophet, with a sort‑of‑woke, selectively interpreted “climate science” as its gospel, I don’t deny that the earth is groaning. I simply refuse to bow to a replacement religion that:
- ignores the Creator,
- mistrusts genuine repentance,
- and treats technocratic control and financial engineering as salvation.
Revelation tells us that the ultimate answer to a collapsing creation is not a new priesthood of experts, but the return of the One through whom all things were made, and in whom all things hold together. The Lamb who was slain will return as the King who restores—not by consensus report, not by trading schemes, but by a Kingdom of justice, power, and glory.
In that light, the question is not whether the climate is changing—it is:
Whose apocalypse are you living in, and whose Kingdom are you preparing for?
