Why do people try to predicte a future they don't know about?

Answer 1

Idiocy and money, mostly.

In terms of money, some people indeed make a profession about predicting what might happen in the future, particularly in relation to financial matters. This is in some cases wise to do, as long as one realizes the limitations of human knowledge and outside events intervening. Often such advise will present various possible scenarios ranging from positive to the worst case, and so cover themselves, and they also have legal disclaimers. Such advise can often be helpful to both government and big business, as well as private individuals, as long as its limitations are realized.

Some people may also wish to predict future events in terms of the prestige it may give them when they are found to be correct. Often they will be so because they have made a very intelligent and well-informed prediction. If they make lots of predictions, they will of course tend to down play where they have been wrong and point to factors which intervened. For those who are in it for the money, making accurate predictions, or at least being closest to the mark, is worth a lot of money.

Weather prediction is a good example of predicting the future short term. As better data collection through more sophisticated technology, particularly radar and satellites, has become available, then the accuracy of such predictions increases. Long term weather predictions contain too many variables to be accurate, although meteorologists are developing a better understanding of these as well, such as La Nina and El Nino.

In terms of The Bible predicting world events, then those who wrote of future events, were given relevant knowledge according to God's sovereign will. Thus, the individuals concerned, mostly known as prophets, were not concerned about predicting something they didn't know about. They were concerned about telling people whatever God told them to say, including events in both the near and distant future.

Thus, the prophets, once they were told of such events by God, knew about them, insofar as they understood what God was saying through them. This is said in terms not of the words themselves, but sometimes things were foretold by the prophets centuries in advance and so they would have no idea of the reality of the events or persons described. In such cases they would understand the actual words, but not know the exact historical context in which the words would eventually be fulfilled.

Since the prophets knew they were truly representing a God who not only cannot lie, but who knows the future perfectly, they spoke with authority. The fact that literally hundreds of such prophecies have been literally fulfilled, many of them in Jesus Christ, is testimony to the truth of the Bible. It is testimony also to the fact that we can know the future if we have a good and reliable source on which to base our predictions. People err when they go outside of what has been clearly revealed and add their own ideas, especially dates, as some cults like to do.

Answer 2

It's hard to say. It just comes to you and you notice it the next day or so. In December 15th of 1960 I had a dream that I was rising to Heaven and I saw what appeared to be the figure of Jesus Christ blessing the U.S. I could the U.S. completely (like seen on Google Earth). All of a sudden I saw two planes crashing over Brooklyn, N.Y. and I immediately descended towards the area of the crash and I saw people lying on the snow covered street. They were moaning and bleeding. I tried to move as fast as I could to help them, but I bumped into an invisible glass wall and I felt totally frustrated and in the dream I cried out loud, "Oh, God Why!" and that was the end of the dream. The next day (December 16, 1960) I heard about the crash when I was at school!