Basic HTML Version
to be one of the more harmful
devices inflicted on modern soci–
ety. About 40 percent of all water
piped into a borne is used-or
rather, wasted- by the flush toilet.
The average person using one con–
taminates 13,000 gallons of fresh
water a year to wash away 165
gallons of sewage.
But this wastage isn't the worst
problem! Nor are the huge ex–
penses involved in constructing and
maintaining complex sewer lines
and treatment plants.
The most ·negative aspect is that
sorne of the effluent becomes part
of the water supply to those who
Iive downstream. At times plain
raw sewage is just dumped into
lakes and rivers. Or raw sewage can
leak out of aging sewer lines and
thus befoul surface and under–
ground water.
Even when the sewage reaches
treatment plants and is processed,
unwanted by-products still pollute
water supplies. A financia!
headache for cities using treatment
plants is what to do with all the
sludge taken from sewer water.
Sorne cities just flush it out to sea.
Sorne offer it as fertilizer. However
it is disposed of, its accumulation is
a constant problem.
While an increasing number of
researchers believe Western society
took a wrong turn a century ago
wben it adopted the running water–
flush toilet system, many assert
there is nothing economically feasi–
ble that can be done to change it
now. And so, industrial nations are
headed toward a real dilemma:
They can't afford to give up the
flush toilet now, yet the time is
coming when water won't be avail–
able at an affordable price to flush
it. Then what?
It's not that there aren't alterna–
tives. There are increasing num–
bers of tbem on the market. The
best systems are based on the sen–
sible principie laid down in the
Bib1e long ago, but ignored by soci–
ety: Human waste ought to be
carefully reintegrated, through mi–
crobia1 activity, with the ground
(Deut. 23:12-14), not dumped into
the drinking water supply!
Add Floods and Drought
To all these factors making fresh
water scarce, add two more: floods
April 1986
and drought! Floods occur when
rain falls in excessive quantities or
in improperly dniined regions.
Such occurrences can interfere
with supplies of clean water.
Drought is caused by rain either
not falling, or falling in the wrong
places-over the oceans, for exam–
pte, instead of over the land. Dry
conditions are producing a whole
new set of complications. As
groundwater is being depleted in
sorne areas, seawater is seeping in
and mixing with the fresh water.
Or the land is simply collapsing
and sinking in.
Worldwide, three fourths of the
available fresh water supply is used
for irrigation. Much of this water
comes from underground reserves.
The vast Ogallala aquifer, the main
water source for the North Ameri–
can Great Plains (called the bread–
basket of the world) is being
severely depleted. Likewise the wa–
ter table under the agriculturally
critica! San Joaquín Valley in Cali–
fornia has been so lowered that the
land has settled 30 feet in sorne
places.
As the water level drops it is
becoming very expensive to run
electric pumps to draw water out.
Yet if agricultura! output declines
substantially in these areas, signifi–
cant effects, nationally and interna–
tionally, occur.
What is needed is clean rain in
the right places, in the right quan–
tity. But that is becoming increas–
ingly rare, and most people do not
know why!
Heallng Waters!
The period of time God has al–
lowed for human beings to go their
own selfish, competitive ways and
to struggle with their problems in
their own ways is about to come to
a sudden close. Human history is a
record of how nations have rejected
God's government and bis spiritual
law that would bring peace and joy.
The God who created nature and
all the water there is, is beginning
to punish humanity, as a parent
punishes a disobedient, self-ce.n–
tered child, till we learn our les–
sons.
One of the ways he punishes na–
tions is to allow the altering of
water supplies. H.e may accomplish
this either by letting humans reap
the results of their own folly (Jer.
2:19; 4:18), or by intervening in
human affairs himself (Deut.
28:20, 23-24). In either case,
severe shortage of vital water sup–
plies is one of the conditions God
will use to bring us to our senses
and cause us to at last submit to bis
ways that bring satisfaction, peace
and prosperity.
When God sends the Messiah to
set up bis kingdom over all nations,
the powers of this world will have
brought this earth to chaos and
near-total ruin. The policy of God's
government will be to heal, rebuild
and restare until the whole world is
a paradise.
Think of it- no more shortages
of water as nations learn to obey
·God. Rain will come when
it
should · (Ezek. 34:26) and in just
the right amounts (Ps. 65:9-13).
Where will be the need of compli–
cated irrigation systems and huge
dams with all of their known draw–
backs?
Vast deserts and desolate ex–
panses will be inhabited: ..1 will
open rivers on the bare heights,
and fountains in the midst of the
valleys; I will make the wilderness
a pool of water, and the dry land
springs of water," God promises
(Isa. 41: 18,
Revised Standard Ver–
sion).
Pollution of the environment will
not be tolerated (Rev. 11 :18; Isa.
11 :9). Only then will the world's
supply of fresh water be abun–
dantly adequate for all earth's in–
babitants. o
19