Some Thoughts on Doom, Gloom, Prepping and the Bible by Aaron Hecht

I have been a "prepper" for several years now.

Some people might prefer to call me a "doomer" since they don't think the future is anything to worry about and anyone who does worry is just being overly pessimistic and ridiculous.

I don't mind it when people call me a "doomer" because it says more about them then it says about me, and I also don't mind because there's a chance, they're correct, and that I'm worrying about the possibility bad things happening too much. 

But I doubt it.

For that matter, my own lived experience has already provided me with plenty of confirmation that I'm doing the right thing.

In the last three years that Israel has been at war I have had many occasions to use the supplies, tools, skills and knowledge I had acquired on my prepping journey before the war started to make life more manageable for my family and neighbors. A few days after the war started, a young woman who had made Aliyah from America less than a year previously turned to me one morning as we were sitting down in the building's bomb shelter during a rocket alert and said, "you're one of those survivalist nutcases my mother warned me to stay away from, and I'm SO GLAD you're here with us now!"

Aside from when my wife said yes to my proposal of marriage it's probably one of the nicest things anyone ever said to me.

The most important "prep" I had prior to the war was being in good physical condition. I had been doing aerobics and weight lifting six days a week for several years and when this war started I found myself running around a LOT to help people in my neighborhood with all kinds of physically demanding chores, from cleaning out bomb shelters and safe rooms (which involves going up and down stairs a lot) to helping people do long overdue cleaning and maintenance on their apartments and giving out loads of free advice to people about what foods and drink, sanitary items, etc. they should be getting extra supplies of in order to get them ready to shelter in place for long periods of time if they needed to. I got many more expressions of gratitude for all this, but no one else ever called me a "survivalist nutcase" which made me kind of sad.

In the course of the war, especially during the really intense times as we were being bombarded by Iranian missiles, I had many more opportunities to help my neighbors and advise people about how to get ready for problems I saw coming around the corner.

But even I have my blind spots.

This evening's adventure

As I am sitting here writing this blog in my Jerusalem apartment, I have just spent most of the last three hours doing a "flight of the bumblebee" maneuver to try and get my home as ready as possible for a potential water cutoff after the Gihon company, which is the national water company in Israel, issued a warning that the taps might be running dry in several neighborhoods sometime this evening. Water supplies were already cut off to farmers in southern Israel this morning, and although I have no way of being sure, I'm guessing that if Gihon was issuing a warning here in Jerusalem, they were also doing so in other cities.

The reason for this interruption of the regular supply of water is that five of Israel's six ocean-water desalinization plants, which supply 80% of the drinking water, are currently offline. I saw the article about that in the newspaper this morning, in which the reason Gihon was giving for what they said would be a "temporary shutdown" was "severe turbidity" in the ocean water. I had to look up the word "turbidity" because I had never seen that word before, and according to dictionary.com it means "a quality of cloudiness or murkiness, particularly of water."

The article also said that Gihon was denying this shutdown was caused by a cyberattack from Iran or anywhere else.

Candidly, I'm skeptical.

If Gihon were to tell us that "extreme turbidity" had shut down one, or even two, of the desalinization plants it operates, I might be willing to believe them. But five out of six, all at once? That's a little hard to believe.

However, when I saw the article in the newspaper this morning, I was not particularly alarmed, even though I thought it was highly likely that an Iranian cyberattack HAD caused the desalinization plants to go offline. I know Israel has some of the best cyber defenses in the world and I also knew that this country gets hit by millions of cyberattacks every single hour, and this has been going on for years, and they almost never cause any serious problems. So I figured this problem would get fixed quickly and there was no danger of any serious issues.

Then, around 3 PM, the alert came in from Gihon that water pressure would be falling in several Jerusalem neighborhoods sometime in the evening and urging the general public to limit water use to essential needs.

I have to admit; I was quite shocked by this.

As much as I've been paying attention and trying to stay ahead of so many problems and issues, I had NO IDEA that the water supply in Israel was so tight. I had no idea how dependent we have become on desalinization, and I had no idea how quickly the supply could run out if those desalinization plants were to stop working for whatever reason. I always thought there were reserves available for at least a few weeks, if not longer, but we started feeling the pinch in less than 24 hours.

So, like I said, after getting the warning on my phone from Gihon, I immediately ran to the grocery store and got a few extra bottles of water, milk, juice and a bunch of fresh fruit (we were down to our last two bananas so I'd planned on getting more fruit this evening anyway.)

Then I did a load of laundry and washed the dishes which were in the sink and did a few other water-intensive chores that needed to be done in any case, but I wanted to get them done as quickly as possible in case the water pressure dropped significantly.

In the event, later in the evening, even as I was writing this blog, the word came down that the desalinization plants were beginning to come back online and there was no immediate danger.

But I don't regret the flight of the bumblebee routine I did today. It was good practice, and I'll use all the extra water and juice and fruit I bought today in the course of time. For that matter, the desalinization plants could stop working again at literally any moment, and next time the problem might not get fixed quickly like it was this time.

In a more general sense, I advise EVERYONE to take prepping seriously because the world is not getting any more stable, politically, environmentally, economically, culturally, socially, or in any other way. Natural disasters keep coming faster and faster, social unrest is increasing in many countries all over the world, there are all kinds of issues with supply chains for all kinds of things, including basic necessities like food and fuel, electricity and much else. These problems feed off of and into each other, and they can escalate very quickly and in unexpected ways. At the same time, the infrastructure that we rely on to make our lives what we've become accustomed to them being is a lot more fragile than most people realize, and there are many potential points of failure.

It's important to build margin into our lives so we can absorb shocks when they come.

What does the Bible have to say about all this?

Every time this topic comes up, someone will point out that the Bible advises us in 365 separate verses "fear not" and in Luke 12:26-28, Yeshua specifically says "If you then are not able to do the least, why are you anxious for the rest? Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; and yet I say to you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. If then God so clothes the grass, which today is in the field and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, how much more will He clothe you, O you of little faith?

Yes, brothers and sisters, Jesus DID say that, but as is so often the case, one must look to the context of the verse to get its true meaning.

Jesus wasn't telling people not to work and earn money so they could pay for the things they needed. He wasn't telling them to not take sensible precautions and avoid problems if possible.

In fact, in Luke Chapter 4, when the Devil is tempting Yeshua and trying to get Him to do stupid, careless things by reminding Him that God has promised to take care of His followers, Jesus responds by reminding the Devil what God told the Israelites in Deuteronomy 6:16, "do not put the Lord your God to the test."

Then in Mark 13:32-37 He says But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Take heed, watch and pray; for you do not know when the time is. It is like a man going to a far country, who left his house and gave authority to his servants, and to each his work, and commanded the doorkeeper to watch. Watch therefore, for you do not know when the master of the house is coming—in the evening, at midnight, at the crowing of the rooster, or in the morning lest, coming suddenly, he find you sleeping. And what I say to you, I say to all: Watch!”

This passage is a warning about being complacent and not paying attention to what is happening around you and the times in which you live.

It is NOT a commandment to be obsessed with "doom and gloom" but it IS a commandment to not be careless or negligent in looking after the things God has given you responsibility to look after.

As with so many other things, one needs to find the "sweet spot" where you're not worrying too much about the bad things that might happen but you're also not ignoring the fact that bad things certainly WILL happen.

That's what I've got for you this week brothers and sisters, I hope it blessed someone.

Onkelos and Uziel: The Curse and Blessing of Work

The curse and blessing of work

In the opening chapters of the Bible, God curses humanity with work.

Cursed is the ground because of you

By the sweat of your brow will you eat food

Until you return to the ground

It's true work is a kind of curse. I often see people lamenting that we have to work. "I just want to stay home and do [leisure activity]." A viral post made the rounds a few weeks ago on X:

Genuinely, I DO NOT like the concept of capitalism. I don’t want to work my job every day. I want to make art. I want to be in my garden. I want to feel something.

— ‏ً (@omgsidewalks) July 26, 2026

Lots of people dunked on this guy for wanting to spend time in his garden instead of working; an antediluvian desire if there ever was one! Of course, capitalism isn't to blame for work. Stalin's Soviet Russia had plenty of work, comrade. 

But I get it. Work does suck sometimes and I would sure rather be hiking, fishing, watching movies, reading books, or playing video games.

But work is also a kind of blessing. How can a curse be a blessing?

I've found that lots of idleness and lack of productivity isn't great either, long-term. Work is a kind of blessing that keeps us occupied in productive pursuits that benefit society. Work allows us to provide for ourselves and our families. In that sense, the curse of work is really an alternative form of blessing.

This is not foreign to Biblical interpreters. 

In Torah portion Re'eh, Deuteronomy 11, God says to Israel,

See, I give before you today a blessing and a curse.

The blessing would come if Israel kept God's commandments. And a curse would come if they didn't follow God's commandments.

What does this have to do with work?

 Two famous scholars interpret Deuteronomy 11 differently.

Onkelos translates it as we do today: "a blessing and a curse."

But Yonatan ben Uziel translated it as "blessing and its alternative."

Why "alternative", when a curse is the opposite of a blessing?

Onkelos lived in a dark time: Babylonian captivity after the Temple was destroyed. He translated it as curse because it's how people felt. (And indeed, the Babylonian exile was a curse from God; a plain, literal, tangible fulfillment of God's words in Deuteronomy 11.)

In contrast, Ben Uziel lived in good times when the Temple was standing and Israel was secure. He translated curse as an alternative form of good. 

When it comes to work, I side with Ben Uziel: it's not just a curse, it's an alternative form of good. And like Ben Uziel, I live in a good time with a good job, so perhaps it colors my view. But I remain convinced from my own life experience: work is a net good for humanity.

How can a curse from God be good? Because God corrects those he loves. God's curse isn't intended to destroy us, but to bring us in line with good.

The curse of work in Genesis, then, is meant to bring us in line with good. 

How so?

By engaging humanity into creative and productive pursuits that improve humanity and strengthen our dominion over the world.

Work is a curse and a blessing.

And if you're one of the few who love your work, well, you found the blessing inside the curse.

Some Thoughts on the heat, the rain, the storms and the elections by Aaron Hecht

As I'm writing this blog, reports are coming in about the results of primary elections in the United States. It looks like a lot of old familiar faces in both major political parties are being replaced by younger people with some very different ideas about how the United States of America should be governed going forward. In particular, it seems like American support for Israel is an idea that has less and less traction among a large and rapidly growing segment of the American electorate and the public officials they're voting for to represent them in both major political parties. On both the Left and the Right, there is also a revival of some of history's worst bad ideas, with some new packaging perhaps, but otherwise the same old nonsense that previous generations of Americans paid an enormous price in blood, sweat, tears and treasure to push back and stamp out.

There are voices warning these young people against the errors they're in the process of making, trying to tell them that the ideas they've fallen in love with have been tried repeatedly throughout history and they've always resulted in disaster. But they're not listening, because they're convinced that they will succeed where their predecessors have failed.

All of this is very sad for me to see, but on the other hand, I almost don't think any of it matters much anymore, because the other things which are dominating the headlines these last few weeks are kind of making all the political, economic and cultural developments in America more and more irrelevant.

I'm talking about the wildfires which have burned enormous areas in California, Oregon and Washington, Nevada, Minnesota, Utah, Colorado, British Columbia and Ontario up in Canada, and many other places. These fires have scorched hundreds of thousands of acres of woodlands and destroyed entire rural towns while also damaging larger urban centers like Spokane, Washington and sending massive clouds of smoke that people thousands of miles away are choking on.

I'm also talking about the storms and floods which have battered Indiana, Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, and the northeast. 

I'm talking about the hundreds of thousands of people who have lost electrical power for days at a time, the legions of people who have lost their homes and their vehicles, the children whose schools have burned down and the adults who have lost their jobs because the building where they used to work has been destroyed. I'm talking about entire communities which have been utterly shattered by the natural disasters that just seem to be coming one after the other this year (and last year, and the year before, etc.)

But it's not just happening in America.

Most of Europe is experiencing droughts this summer, with the Rheine, the Elbe, the Po, the Seine, the Danube, and many other major rivers running low, while smaller rivers, creeks, streams and ponds have completely dried up. 70% of the UK is in drought and farmers all over Europe are warning of abysmal harvests. There are even whispers about the possibility of food shortages and the need for governments to enact systems for rationing.

Quick sidenote, if you're one of those people who don't like the idea of government-controlled grocery stores like the ones Zorhan Mamdani is trying to set up in New York City, be advised, that sort of thing might become VERY widespread in the not-so-distant future whether anyone wants it or not. It won't happen because of someone's political ideology, it will simply be a necessity for the government to take control of the means of production and distribution of food, just like Joseph did when he was Prime Minister in Egypt back in Genesis Chapter 41, and for the same reason.

The last time this happened in Europe, the United States and Canada was during WWII, and my advice to anyone who is alarmed at the prospect of food shortages is to do what people did during WWII, and that is to find whatever little patch of ground you can and grow vegetables in it.

In WWII they were called "Victory Gardens" and they saved countless lives.

Youtube has many videos which will tell you how to get started and your local hardware store has the tools and seeds you'll need. It's work and it's a hassle, but it might just save your life or the lives of people you care about before the end of this decade.

Speaking of WWII, the largest civilian evacuations in European history since that terrible war happened this summer in France and Spain because of the monstrous wildfires burning there. Large wildfires have also hit Italy, Germany, Serbia, Albania, Greece and Cyprus this summer, and these crises are ongoing. In fact, Athens is being threatened by a large wildfire even as I sit here writing this blog. 

In the Far East, countries like Japan and South Korea have experienced days at a time when the temperatures ranged above 120 degrees Fahrenheit in the daytime while nighttime temperatures barely dipped down into the mid 80s Fahrenheit. Massive wildfires are also burning on several islands of the Indonesian and Malaysian archipelagos, many of them in areas that are too remote for firefighters to even reach, so they'll likely keep burning until they either run out of fuel or it rains in those areas. The smoke from these fires is reducing air quality in cities all over the South Pacific region.

The number of excess deaths from heat related injuries is estimated to be around 25,000 in Europe and it can be assumed that in other regions of the world suffering from extreme heat there are also tens of thousands of humans and an incalculable number of animals, fish, birds and insects that are also perishing.

But as bad as all these heat-related weather events have been, it's going to get worse.

A "Super El Nino'" is brewing in the western Pacific, and meteorological scientists are warning that it could be the most severe such event in 150 years. It will bring even hotter, longer, heat waves resulting in more droughts, fires, floods, and every other kind of natural disaster to every corner of the world then what we've already seen this summer. It is projected to last well into January, and that will cause further disruptions to the agricultural cycle which will reverberate far into 2027.

Brothers and sisters, please hear me.

I believe that the heat and extreme weather events we're seeing all over the world are a reflection of the spiritual climate.

Jeremiah 12:4 says; How long will the land mourn, And the herbs of every field wither? The beasts and birds are consumed, for the wickedness of those who dwell there, because they said, “He will not see our final end.”

Also relevant is Romans 8:19-22, which says For the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope; because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now.

Brothers and sisters I urge you not to waste too much time and energy in the months ahead being upset about what's going on in the electoral politics of the United States, or Israel, or any other country. I urge you not to waste too much time or energy arguing with people on the internet, or over the dinner table, or in the streets, or the water cooler at work, or anywhere else.

Vote if you must. Participate in political campaigns if you must. Write letters and make phone calls to your elected officials if you must.

If the elections don't go the way you were hoping, take the time to mourn, and take the time to mourn the larger implications. But don't take too long to mourn.

Above all, you need to get your heads around this.

It is too late to change things much, one way or the other.

No matter who controls the US Congress after these elections, they will have few options to make things much better or much worse. The same is true no matter who wins the upcoming elections here in Israel, or whatever elections are coming up anywhere else.

No matter how few people in the US, or Europe, or anywhere else, support Israel, there is One who has said He will never forsake us, and His support means more then the support, or opposition, of anyone else, whether they're in the US Congress, or the EU Parliament, or wherever else they might be.

As for the heat and the storms and the fires and all the rest, the last several years have all broken the previous year's records for temperatures in hundreds of cities all over the world. At this point, it is no longer reasonable or rational to be a "skeptic" about what's happening right in front of our faces. At this point, I don't think it matters anymore WHY it's happening, so arguments about that are also pointless.

The bottom line is that it is too late to change the trajectory that we're on, and the problems we've had because of extreme heat and the weather events it causes over the last few years are just going to get more and more severe going forward. That means everything we do is going to get harder, including some of the most basic functions of civilization like producing enough food for everyone who needs to eat and distributing it.

That means the range of options available to politicians, whatever their political party might be, whatever their ideology might be, whatever their constituency might be, etc. is getting very, very narrow, and that means, who gets elected and who doesn't matters less and less.

Brothers and sisters, I've said this before and I'll say it once more in this blog.

If you're spending more time on political campaigns than you're spending in prayer, that's a mistake.

If you're skipping church to go to a political rally, that's a mistake.

If you're letting political disagreements alienate you from people who you can otherwise be sharing the Gospel with, that's a mistake.

I think you get the point.

That's what I've got for you this week brothers and sisters. I hope it blessed someone.