The Dreaded D Word In Financial Circles - Depression - Is It Coming Soon? Some Say Yes!
This piece was sent a month ago. I have permission to circulate it, and events have happened since first reading it that makes the content ring with a degree of reality and truth.
“People hate it when David Wilkerson talks about it - and they hate it just as much when I talk about it.
But right now I have to bring it up again because of what is happening. Yesterday WorldNetDaily published the following: “Alarm: China signals flight from dollar. Investment CEO says he’s ‘never seen people more nervous’ “
An unprecedented signal from senior Chinese leaders that the Asian economic giant might abandon the U.S. dollar sent shockwaves through the markets today as the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 360 points and the greenback fell to a record low against the euro. Xu Jian, a Chinese central bank vice director, told a conference in Beijing, “The dollar is “losing its status as the world currency.” Meanwhile, at the same meeting, Cheng Siwei, vice chairman of China’s National People’s Congress, said, “We will favor stronger currencies over weaker ones, and will readjust accordingly.”
Craig Smith, CEO of Swiss America Trading Corp., told WND he’s been in the investment business for 30 years and has “never seen people more nervous.” Alarmed by today’s economic news, he dispatched a note to brokers with a warning of ominous potential consequences if China and other trading partners abandon the dollar. “If that were to happen, all bets are off, and we will be in a depression that makes 1929 look like child’s play,” he said, “or we will experience Weimar Republic inflation as the dollar makes extreme moves toward devaluations.”
Actually, according to all the data, the Dollar situation is not even the worst of the problems. There is a global Credit Crunch underway - affecting giant banks and Investment companies the worst - and every day we are getting news of MULTI-BILLION dollar write-downs. All of this is linked to the Housing and Mortgage crisis in America - and its effects are being felt worldwide - and it is growing worse.
This Credit crisis by itself actually threatens the entire SYSTEM - no exaggeration. It is already underway - NOW. Many international banks are in crisis mode already - but how long it takes to reach “Main Street” is difficult to know. There is already some fallout. For instance, giant retailers such as Wal-Mart reported yesterday their worst October in over a decade. But this is just the beginning of sorrows.
As one commentator put it today: “The dollar fell another 2 per cent last night, gold soared to $840 per ounce, oil topped $98 per barrel, General Motors reported a $39 billion loss after the market closed on Tuesday, the real estate market continued its downward slide, and the major investment banks are marching in lock-step towards bankruptcy.”
For many months now we have been saying that this Housing bust will be the worst by far that this nation has ever seen. This is no longer a “controversial” viewpoint. Even many of the most mainstream economists now openly admit the same thing.
The “D-WORD” that I mentioned in the title of this article is, of course, the word “DEPRESSION”. I continue to stand by my statement of many months ago that within 3 years this nation will be in a terrible financial depression - possibly the worst that it has ever seen. Right now, things are right on track to see this fulfilled.
BUT WHY?
The answer to this question mostly lies in one word - “GREED”. There has been an absolute orgy of Greed in this country - from the Investment Bankers selling shady Mortgage-Backed Securities to the condo flippers and Real Estate Appraisers and “Junk Bond” specialists and “Liar’s Loan” officers, and what is left is an absolute mountain-pile of shameful, unethical financial garbage, which nobody is willing to swallow any more. And then there are the DERIVATIVES -a market worth over $400 TRILLION which, if it ever gets infected by this toxic junk, may cause the WORST SYSTEMIC AVALANCHE that the world has ever seen.
GREED is the word. At the end of the day, all of this has been for the love of the Almighty Dollar.
In fact, even CHRISTIAN AMERICANS love the Almighty dollar so much that they are willing to make up ENTIRE DOCTRINES to prove that God loves money just as much as they do. It is a new kind of gospel - never seen in the history of the world before. The Americans invented it and spread it around the earth. Even in REVIVAL COUNTRIES, this gospel of greed is taking over. Carter Conlon says that he was in a poor African nation recently where there are 700,000 little children living without parents on the streets - and yet the PASTORS ARE DRIVING BMW’s and preaching SELFISH PROSPERITY. Where did they get such sickness? They got it from America. We beam it to them live by satellite.
This is why I believe God is about to make an EXAMPLE of the USA. All the nations follow her lead. The entire church worldwide looks to her for guidance. She has become a center of corruption and spiritual sickness almost without precedent in the history of the world. She has made the whole earth “drunk” with her fornications, her movies, her MTV, her music, her rebellion, her love of money.
I am convinced that God is about to make an ‘example’ of her before all nations. He cannot have a “Christian” country spreading such things in the earth.
When I am in Nigeria again this February I plan to preach this very thing - that God is making an example of America so that all the nations will fear. That this is what happens when you follow a creed of “God wants me rich”, of pleasure-seeking, materialism, selfishness and greed. God is about to demonstrate to the whole earth what will happen to such a nation. Do you think He is just going to stand by and watch us?
God has a controversy with you, America. He is girding Himself up for war. I hope you are ready to find out what it is like to get yourself on God’s “wrong side”.”
When I read the piece above I thought that in the light of what we have witnessed in 2008 already if only part of what is being prophesied is true it is indeed going to be a very rocky financial time for many.
Sandy Shaw
Sandy Shaw is Pastor of Nairn Christian Fellowship, Chaplain at Inverness Prison, and Nairn Academy, and serves on The Children’s Panel in Scotland, and has travelled extensively over these past years teaching, speaking, in America, Canada, South Africa, Australia, making 12 visits to Israel conducting Tours and Pilgrimages, and most recently in Uganda and Kenya, ministering at Pastors and Leaders Seminars, in the poor areas surrounding Kampala, Nairobi, Mombasa and Kisumu.
He broadcasts regularly on WSHO radio out of New Orleans, and writes a weekly commentary at http://www.studylight.org entitled “Word from Scotland” on various biblical themes, as well as a weekly newspaper column.
His M.A. and B.D. degrees are from The University of Edinburgh, and he continues to run and exercise regularly to maintain a level of physical fitness.
Sandy Shaw
sandyshaw63@yahoo.com
