Confusion and controversy are intensifying regarding a future "New World Order," commonly abbreviated as NWO. What does it mean? Would it be good or bad for the world?

Let's first acknowledge an implied difference between a new world order and the "New World Order."

Hopes for a new world order

During the past century, many world leaders and others have expressed their desire and hope for a better world with peaceful relations among all the nations, and some have used the phrase a new world order.

For example, Woodrow Wilson and Winston Churchill spoke of their desires for a new world order following World War I and World War II, respectively.

The popular usage of the phrase escalated when President George H.W. Bush expressed in a half dozen speeches his hope for a new world order. In his March 6, 1991, address to Congress, he said, "Now, we can see a new world coming into view. A world in which there is the very real prospect of a new world order... A world where the United Nations, freed from cold war stalemate, is poised to fulfill the historic vision of its founders."

Some were alarmed by President Bush's use of the term, but it was largely seen in the context of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the cold war. Now, however, it seems many more Americans have become quite alarmed after numerous remarks by President Barack Obama indicating his desire to see a powerful "international order" to solve the world's problems.

Influence of books on popular thought

British writer and futurist H.G. Wells published a nonfiction book in 1940 titled The New World Order. The book addressed the ideal of a world without war in which law and order emanated from a world-governing body and collectivist economy.

Other books have taken a negative view. Consider two popular dystopian novels where a society promoted by the rulers as a utopia becomes, in reality, a nightmare.

Brave New World is a 1932 novel by Aldous Huxley about life in London in A.D. 2540. It describes a totalitarian state in which everyone is kept preoccupied and "happy" by hypnotic recordings, propaganda, disinformation, materialistic consumption, promiscuous sex and drugs.

Nineteen Eighty-Four is a 1949 novel by George Orwell picturing a world of pervasive government surveillance (by "Big Brother") and incessant public mind control.

American televangelist Pat Robertson in his 1991 book The New World Order popularized the NWO theory that rich and powerful people, banks, secret and semisecret societies, and other groups conspire together to form the shadow government that controls world events from behind the scenes, steering us constantly and covertly in the direction of world government under the Antichrist.

Many other books and booklets about an NWO have been marketed as well.

Fears of the New World Order

Until about 1990, most people ignored the warnings of conspiracy theorists about a coming NWO. But in addition to the other influences, the Internet has given a powerful worldwide voice to all the conspiracy theorists and subcultures.

And globalization is proceeding at an astonishing pace, having major impacts on the nations and peoples of the world—impacts good and bad.

Would a New World Order be good or bad? An NWO implies that all nations surrender their sovereignty to a world-ruling government. For nearly a century, the world has depended on the protection and leadership provided by a strong, independent United States of America. Considering the corruption that absolute power seems to always bring, a powerful world government ruled by human beings would be a catastrophe for the United States and all the world.

But that doesn't mean we need to research all the different conspiracy theories out there. The real and important truth about the past, present and future of the world is in the Bible!

The real conspiracy and the real solution

The power of human conspiracies is usually overemphasized. But throughout history, there has been one superpowerful conspiracy by Satan the devil, "who deceives the whole world" (Revelation 12:9).

Will an NWO happen? In a sense, the answer is that the world is going to experience two! First, there will be a New World Order that will be bad and ugly—a dystopia. Satan will mastermind the formation of an international government and religious system referred to in the Bible as "the beast" and "Babylon the great" (Revelation 17:5-7, 13). They will dominate "all the nations" and "the kings of the earth" and "the merchants of the earth" (Revelation 18:1-4).

But Jesus Christ, the "King of Kings," will destroy that order (disorder!) and will replace it with a worldwide utopia—the glorious Kingdom of God (Revelation 19:11-16). He loves His human creation and has our best interests at heart. His government will never be corrupted but will produce a world where disease will be replaced with health, hunger will be banished by abundance and everyone will be able to achieve his or her full potential.