Dead Sea Disappearing?

The following appeared in a news release yesterday:

“Dead Sea Gone in Fifty Years”

AMMAN – The Jordanian government sounded the alarm on Tuesday concerning the Dead Sea. If the water level continues to drop at its current pace, there will be no Dead Sea left in fifty years, according to Jordanian Minister of Water Hazem Nasser.

The minister, speaking at a water management forum, strongly advocated for the construction of a canal between the Red Sea and the Dead Sea. Plans for a 200-kilometer-long canal have been in the pipeline for years. Rescuing the Dead Sea through the construction of this waterway would involve an estimated cost of around 1 billion dollars.

The use of water from the Jordan River for irrigation has resulted in insufficient flow reaching the Dead Sea. Since the 1960s, the water level has consequently dropped by one third.

Much will likely be said and done concerning the Dead Sea over the next fifty years, if this press release is any indication. And I think that may well be true. What is certain, is that the region surrounding the Dead Sea (Moab and Edom) will play a major role in the coming “time of the end.” It is, after all, the area where the final judgments upon the nations will take place (see e.g. Isaiah 63:1).

It is also quite possible that “the lake of fire and sulphur” in Revelation 19:20 is a reference to the Dead Sea. That region, after all, was once before filled with fire and sulphur—thousands of years ago (Genesis 19:24,28).

From the Bible we know that the Dead Sea, after these devastating events, will disappear—not because the sea itself will vanish, but because the Dead Sea will become a living sea! Ezekiel 47 describes how the sea will be filled with living water. So much so, that fishing spots will be found along its shores.

About the sea in that time it is written:
“…its fish shall be of very many kinds, as the fish of the Great Sea, very vast in multitude.”

What will happen to the Dead Sea is, in fact, illustrative of what God will do with death in general: He will swallow up death in life!

Anyway, the next fifty years—and beyond—promise to be fascinating…!

Delen: