Friday, November 5, 2010

And Earthquakes in Divers Places

Kind of interesting:

Earthquakes dog Clinton on overseas trips

By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Matthew Lee, Associated Press – 12 mins ago
CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand –

What is it about Hillary Rodham Clinton and earthquakes? Seems the secretary of state rarely takes an overseas trip that is not in some way affected by a temblor. Clinton and her staff were jolted from sleep in their hotel rooms in New Zealand early Saturday by a strong aftershock from a 7-magnitude quake that struck in September. It was the second aftershock since she arrived here Friday.

Three days earlier, she may not have felt the earth move under her feet, but a 6.0-magnitude quake rattled villages in Papua New Guinea as she was wrapping up a visit there.

Those seismic events were at least the third, fourth and fifth to have hit countries while Clinton was visiting. On her first trip abroad as America's top diplomat in February 2009, Clinton was shaken awake by a minor quake in Japan. Four months later, she felt a 5.0 quake in Honduras. Then, in October 2009, tremors struck Pakistan while Clinton was there.

And those are just the ones she's been present for.

Days before Clinton was to visit Chile in March of this year, an 8.8-magnitude earthquake caused severe damage in the South American country, forcing her to cancel plans to spend a night in Santiago. But she still made a brief stop in Chile to get a look at relief efforts, much as she did in January after Haiti was devastated by a powerful quake.

Of course, the reason Clinton was in Papua New Guinea and New Zealand this week and travels to Australia on Saturday is the Haiti quake. She was in Hawaii en route to the three countries when Haiti was struck on Jan. 12, causing her to return to Washington to oversee U.S. relief efforts.

Caught my attention so I prayed about it for a few minutes. It's hard to know for sure if an impression comes from God or not in such a brief prayer time of course, but what occurred to me as I prayed was that we wouldn't have known about all these various earthquakes if they hadn't occurred in conjunction with Hillary's travels, which caught the eye of a reporter who then posted on the odd coincidence at Yahoo.

There being so many of them does bring to mind Jesus' reference to earthquakes as one of the signs that the very end is very near, a warning that three of the four gospels reported, suggesting its special importance:

Mt 24:7 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.

Mr 13:8 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be earthquakes in divers places, and there shall be famines and troubles: these are the beginnings of sorrows.

Lu 21:11 And great earthquakes shall be in divers places, and famines, and pestilences; and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven.
Something to consider.