The following is from the Trumpet Brief sent out yesterday. These daily e-mails contain personal messages from the Trumpet staff. Click here to join the more than 20,000 members of our mailing list, so you don’t miss another message.

You cannot trust conventional wisdom. It can be wildly wrong. Evidence of this is everywhere, but consider one case: Brexit.

Remember in June 2016 when Britain voted to leave the European Union? The political and media establishment were shocked, dismayed, even apoplectic. Their confident predictions that this would never happen had been shattered—so, naturally, they confidently predicted utter disaster for Britain. The nation had given in to its tribal instincts and was hurling itself off a political, economic and civilizational cliff.

Nearly two years have passed. And as Fraser Nelson noted in a Wall Street Journal column last month, the results have defied the sky-is-falling forecasts. In “The UK Is Doing Just Fine, Thanks,” he wrote:

• In the run-up to the 2016 referendum, the International Monetary Fund predicted that a vote for Brexit would result in “sharp drops in equity and house prices” and a downturn in foreign investment. But all three measures went on to hit record levels.
• Barclays predicted that there would be a 0.4 percent contraction in gross domestic product in 2017, Credit Suisse a 1 percent fall, Nomura a 1.3 percent fall. In the end, GDP rose by 1.4 percent.
• The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development warned that consumers would be shaken and cut back on their spending. They didn’t.
• The UK Treasury said the economy would “fall into recession with four quarters of negative growth,” while “unemployment would increase by around 500,000, with all regions experiencing a rise in the number of people out of work.” As it turned [out], economic growth accelerated after the Brexit vote. Employment rose by 560,000, and the unemployment rate now stands at a 43-year low.
• The number of people working stands at a record high, and income inequality is approaching a 30-year low, according to the Office for National Statistics.
• New orders for manufacturers are at their highest level in a generation, and employers in general are struggling to find enough staff to cope with demand.
• Even the (relatively new) national happiness index stands at a peak.

As we noted just after the British vote fulfilled an accurate forecast by Herbert W. Armstrong from 60 years before, this didn’t solve all of Britain’s problems. The nation lacks strong leadership. It is terribly divided. The process of Brexit is proving messy.

Still, it turns out that separating from the bureaucratic bloat of Europe is a good thing. Be assured that other European nations are taking note, and that more challenges to the European Union status quo are coming.

Political and media talking heads always project a lot of confidence—but remember: You cannot trust conventional wisdom.

What you can trust is biblical prophecy and the perspective it gives you on current events.

Look back at Richard Palmer’s August 2016 Trumpet articles “What’s Next for Britain?” and “… And What’s Next for Europe?” to be reminded of how different the Bible’s forecasts regarding Brexit were from the conventional wisdom, and how much the scenarios he outlined are unfolding before us.