Early Friday morning, April 5, I was listening to news while getting ready to start morning work. The announcement came that a 4.2 earthquake centered somewhere beneath New Jersey had shaken the northeast, with 4.8 on the Richter recorded in New York City.
While 4.8 would be barely noticed in parts of California or some of the western environs, an earthquake of any magnitude in the northeast U.S. provokes considerable angst. These just don’t occur that often beneath the solid rock that is Manhattan.
A day or two before the quake, a torrential storm of rain, wind, and lightning struck the New York City area. A photographer caught an explosive lightning strike hitting the Statue of Liberty’s torch. Before that, of course, we know the Francis Scott Key Bridge, named after the author of our national anthem, in Baltimore collapsed when struck by a container ship heavily loaded with environmentally dangerous cargo.
Now, I’ve not been one to easily accept that God necessarily makes His Displeasure Known through Displays of Geophysical Reaction.
However, there has seemingly come the time to acknowledge that things have reached the point that coincidence likely has diminished as a percentage of cause and effect in considering such occurrences as witnessed just recently.
While the earthquake was shaking the Big Apple and regions of the eastern U.S., another report reached my ears.
The audio on one or the other news programs I was listening to had a United Nations official saying that Israel must be dealt with harshly in the matter of its attacks on the civilian populations of Gaza. Benjamin Netanyahu must be replaced as Israel’s prime minister and Israel made to cease wreaking destruction on the defenseless Palestinians.
It was reported that, at that time, the U.N. Building was affected by the shaking, as was downtown Manhattan and even Yankee Stadium.
Whether one holds to the notion that God reacts in this way to matters adversely affecting Israel, it can’t be dismissed that there has been, of late, an incremental stepping up of such geophysical gyrations.
The Prophet Zechariah foretold that all nations will eventually come against God’s chosen nation and people. God will, Zechariah says, cause all to be injured who do so (Zechariah chapter 12).
God Himself tells through the Prophet Joel that He will bring all nations to face the horror of Armageddon because of their dealings in forcing Israel to divide His land –the land He granted Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob forever (Joel chapter 2).
In that regard, an article makes clear what Israel’s leader thinks about the current pressures being brought against his country.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met on Thursday with a Republican U.S. Congressional delegation, which was organized by AIPAC, at the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem.
During the meeting, which also included the AIPAC senior leadership, the Prime Minister briefed the delegation on the fighting in the Gaza Strip and answered the Representatives’ questions on defeating the Hamas terrorist organization, the unrelenting efforts to free the hostages, and the issue of humanitarian aid…
[Netanyahu gave the representatives 3 points in outlining Israel’s need of help from the U.S., the most important for considering the dividing of the land being the third point.]
“The third thing is this: there is a contrary move, an attempt to force, ram down our throats a Palestinian state, which will be another terror haven, another launching ground for an attempt, as was the Hamas state in Gaza. That is opposed by Israelis, overwhelmingly. We just had a vote in the Knesset: 99 to 9. Do you have those kinds of numbers? I think you might have those numbers if you bring that same resolution, that same resolution to Congress. I think you’ll have a similar or at least a very powerful majority.”
Netanyahu concluded: “I think it’s important because the people of Israel choose life, and life means security, and security means defeating our enemies but also standing together for our common civilization.”
[Source: Netanyahu to Republicans: ‘There’s an attempt to ram a Palestinian state down our throats’ | Israel National News – Arutz Sheva; April 5, 2024]
So many strange things are happening in a seeming convergence of prophetic signals. It is certainly prudent, as Watchers on the Wall, to observe the geophysical gyrations in order to try to discern the Prophetic Forecast. We should keep Watch, as Jesus Instructs.
“And what I say to one, I say to all, watch” (Mark 13:37).
Terry James Prophecy Line 
Israel…….NEVER AGAIN!
I stand FIRMLY with God’s chosen people.
AMEN! I am, too.
Genesis {12:2} And I will make of thee* a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make
thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: {12:3} And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed. *Abraham
Abraham’s blessing was also conveyed upon his descendants Isaac and Jacob.
Exodus {6:2} And God spake unto Moses, and said unto him, I [am] the LORD: {6:3} And I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, by [the name of] God Almighty, but by my name JEHOVAH was I not known to them. {6:4} And I have also established my covenant with them, to give them the land of Canaan, the land of their pilgrimage, wherein they were strangers.
As we can see, no one who believes the Bible is God’s Word could possibly be an anti-semite.
A friend recently posted a picture of her beautiful community that we used to live in. The park near her, had a tree full of buzzards which had never been present before. I have noticed them out on our land, circling where we never used to have them. Shark attacks on the increase and all of creation seeming to be thrown into unrest. It only makes sense that as lawlessness increases in the heart of man, so will the rest of creation respond as well. We are in ominous times as the birth pangs increase. Meanwhile, most are living like the days of Noah, scoffing at the signs and warnings. Longing for His return as I grieve over the state of things, yet rejoicing to know, He will soon take us home.
You are right, Shelli.
Paul expressed this very thing:
Romans {8:22} For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. {8:23} And not only [they,] but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, [to wit,] the redemption of our body.
Believe or don’t believe, God is not changed by our lack of understanding.
He tells us repeatedly in scripture that He will express Himself in His creation…earthquakes, in the sun, moon, and stars…and the roaring of the waves, to name a few.
If you want to know whether God is active right now, check out Bill Koenig’s website https://www.watch.org and discover how well he has documented all of the “natural disasters” that have “coincidentally” befallen the USA every time we do something against Israel. Once is a coincidence, twice, maybe even 3 times. But with predictable regularity over decades?! Even the enemies in the land of Canaan and the Egyptians were able to fully believe that the Hebrew’s God fought for Israel.
If we claim to believe in YHWH, then why do we struggle to believe He is omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent?! HE IS ALIVE, HE IS THE LIVING GOD! He told us what to expect in the Last Days and we know we are in them because He gave us a multitude of signs to know it. What is the question exactly?! Do we just chat about this and speculate for sport or is our faith real? Is it so hard to BELIEVE that God is sovereign and behind everything, and I mean everything, that happens?!
Just as David said when he prepared to fight Goliath “Just who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?”
I shake my head when anyone who claims to be a Christian doubts God is in control of every single thing that happens in this Universe.
Faith or no faith, today is the day to decide.
You point is well taken, Robin.
I saw the following list on a recent Jack Hibbs “Epicenter Israel” program which listed all the nations to which Israel itself or dispersed Jews were either subjugated or, in some cases, actively oppressed. These entities have either ceased to exist or do so now a greatly diminished capacity:
Ancient Egypt, Philistia, Assyria, Babylon, Ancient Persia, Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome, Byzantium, the Ottoman Empire, Spain (inquisitions), Nazi Germany, and the former U.S.S.R.
Despite all of this, Israel exists again and in a small section of its original land.
Though I believe the Rapture will complete America’s decline, I believe that the present Biden administration and left-wing allies in Congress will accelerate the process if it continues to tie Israel’s hands when it comes to defending itself and allows increasingly active antisemitism, especially in our universities, to go on with impunity.
As you correctly said, God controls everything, from the machinery of the universe to the course of history. We humans, however, do have the choice on which side of that history we wish to be.
We know that when the world became irrevocably evil and was also inhabited by hybrid beings called the Nephilim, the only remedy was to for God to take direct action. We see the former unmistakably underway and it is not an improbable assumption that the human genome is being altered either in the lab to create hybrid life forms or even possibly by medications using genetics on the existing population. (Make me wonder about exactly what the Covid mRNA shots might already be doing to us!)
Sodom and Gomorrah became center for sexual deviancy to such an extent that even visitors to these evil cities were not safe. In America today, kids in so-called churches and public schools are no longer safe from this. I do not see God allowing this to continue much longer.
It is also my view that the people of darkness are increasing down here much faster than those of light. Once again, I believe God is already taking his initial direct actions in response.
I feel very soon that he will remove the sons and daughters of light from Earth at which time his interventions will rapidly intensify as the Book of Revelation clearly illustrates.
The shadows of the future Tribulation are already being cast into the present and like most those in Noah’s and Lot’s time, they are unaware of what is to come, despite the warnings.
There was also an earthquake in Iran on that same day. About a 4.5. Not unusual for Iran but it was the only one of that magnitude on that day.
I take it you have never read Bill Koenig’a book “Eye to Eye”? Had you done so, you would have realised that, indeed, there are no such things as coincidences. Surely, if, as we claim, God is in control, this has to be true? There comes a point when claiming ‘coincidence’ is just plain ludicrous. The problem with too many of us, is our God is too small.