According to a Forbes magazine ranking, “Russian leader Vladimir Putin has trumped US President Barack Obama as the most powerful man in the world, while German Chancellor Angela Merkel retains her title as the world’s most powerful woman” (EU Observer, October 31, 2013).

In a recent address to U.K. family lawyers, the Family Division’s president commented “Happily for us, the days are past when the business of judges was the enforcement of morals or religious beliefs” (The Times, October 30, 2013).

Was Jesus Christ just a compassionate prophet, or was He truly God in the flesh? The Apostle Paul warned that many would come and preach “another Jesus whom we have not preached” (2 Corinthians 11:4) and theories about Jesus certainly abound. Some professing Christian scholars even claim that Jesus was nothing more than “an exploited peasant with an attitude” (“John Dominic Crossan’s ‘blasphemous’ portrait of Jesus,” CNN.com, February 27, 2011).

Recent news headlines are both shocking and disturbing. An insane gunman mowing down children at a summer camp in Norway. A deranged father keeping two mentally incompetent daughters as sex slaves. A psychotic father decapitating his handicapped seven-year-old son. Thousands of rioters destroying cars and buildings and stealing as they rampage. A rapist assaulting an 85-year-old woman for the “thrill of the moment.” And the gory list continues. What is happening? Has the whole world gone mad? Will the carnage ever cease?

The Bible tells us that at the end of this age, “many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase” (Daniel 12:4). Those words certainly seem to ring true in our present, modern life style where so many are traveling all the time and new discoveries in technology, science and, even in the humanities, seem to overwhelm us almost hour by hour. Is life too busy?