To be an infallible guide, the Bible must be able to instruct in all things pertaining to life and godliness. Such instruction, to be competent, must reveal the eternal purpose of God concerning this earth and its inhabitants. This purpose being a fixed one, God's omniscience must foresee and declare those events which are to affect the destiny of His people. To believe otherwise would belittle the Creator, and make Him unworthy of confidence in time of dire need.
Taking this view of the Bible, we are compelled to believe that the terrible calamity just visited on the Pacific Slope is significant, as indicating something for which the people ought to be prepared. The havoc wrought in San Francisco, Santa Rosa, and other cities of California, was not wholly accomplished by the shaking of the earth; in San Francisco particularly, fire of the most persistent character followed, devouring buildings deemed indestructible by fire or earthquake—two elements of destruction associated together in God's Word. Isa. 29:6.
By the combination of these two elements the destruction of the world will be accomplished in due time. The prophet says:
Collapse of the large, four-story Valencia Street Hotel, in which four stories were telescoped into one. The street also sunk several inches here. Between thirty and forty were killed in this building, which caught fire soon after its collapse.
"And the seventh angel poured out his vial [of wrath] into the air; and there came a great voice out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, It is done. And there were voices, and thunders, and lightnings; and there was a great earthquake, such as was not since men were upon the earth, so mighty an earthquake, and so great. . . . And the cities of the nations fell. . . . And every island fled away, and the mountains were not found." Rev. 16:17-20.
Those who passed through the recent earthquake will corroborate the statement that the scenes which followed it beggar description. Rich men lost their all, and were reduced from affluence to poverty. Poorer people were reduced to beggary, and cried like children. Confusion prevailed. But calamitous as was this recent occasion, the event predicted in the foregoing scripture will bring infinitely greater distress, so much so that "the mighty man will cry there bitterly," for that day will be "a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of wasteness and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness." That day will be "the day of the Lord's wrath," in which "He shall make a speedy riddance of all them that dwell in the land." Zeph. 1:14-18.
At this time the ethereal arch of heaven will pass away as a scroll being rolled together, and every mountain and island will remove. Then all men—kings, rich men, chief captains, and earth's mighty men, with the bond and free—will hide together among the rocks of the hills, and in one mighty chorus of lamentation, cry to the rocks and mountains to fall on them, and to hide them from the face of Him whose wrath they have provoked by their glaring enormities in sin. Rev. 6:14-16. And again fire will follow.
That this is not a fancy sketch, we have only to refer again to Scripture. Speaking of the attitude of those who will make light of the evidences of Christ's near coming, the apostle Peter says such are willingly ignorant of the fact that by the word of God the world was once destroyed by water. He then adds: "The heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men." 2 Peter 3:4-7.
Such a sure and terrible ending of all things sinful must be reserved for definite time in the purpose of God, who could not be true to His declared merciful character should He fail to give warning of its direct approach. When the Saviour was asked what signs would herald His second advent and the end of the world, among other things He said: "Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and great earthquakes shall be in divers places." Matt. 24:1-8; Luke 21:10, 11.
The ever-increasing number of earthquakes during the last few centuries is told in cold, tabular fact elsewhere in this paper.
Now there comes to us unheralded the sad catastrophe in California, breaking down and destroying important centers of industry. This also must be accepted as a premonition of the great and terrible earthquake before which all the cities of the nations will soon surely fall, and the accompanying fires of the last day which will complete the destruction of all sinful things.
He who pays heed to this warning and lets the Lord direct his ways, will certainly escape the general ruin, because he will have found shelter under the protecting wing of the Almighty. A thousand shall fall at his side, and ten thousand at his right hand, but it—the destruction—will not come nigh him, because he has made the Lord his refuge, even the Most High his habitation. The angel of the Lord shall keep him in all his ways. Ps. 91:5-11.
In that day every earthly thing will be removed by the terrible shaking it will receive. One thing alone will remain, the Word of God, because it can not be shaken, hence must stand forever. Fixed on this, one will be safe, even tho the earth be removed out of its place. Heb. 12:26-28.
Shall we not, then, learn the lesson God would have us study in what is occurring about us, and so yield our hearts to be controlled by Him that our lives may be moulded after the fashion of His own, and we be prepared to meet those things that are so rapidly coming upon the earth? God grant that we may. J. O. CORLISS.
