Canada Wildfire Continues To Burn

For more than a week, the Fort McMurray wildfire in Alberta, Canada has burned, bringing a halt to up to a quarter of the country’s oil production! Over 100,000 residents of the area have been evacuated and 20 percent of homes have been destroyed in a fire that experts expect to take months to completely put out (BBC, May 8, 2016). At present, the fire is burning out of control; however, officials are encouraged that the fire is now burning into uninhabited areas and cooling temperatures are slowing its spread (CNN, May 9, 2016). The fire has destroyed more than 400,000 acres in what many predict to be Canada’s most expensive forest fire (ibid.). Thankfully, there has been no human life lost to this fire so far. However, it is sobering to watch the power of fire fueled by high temperatures, dry conditions and wind.

One of the warnings God gave ancient (and modern) Israelites was that if they rebel against His laws, their “heavens [would become] like iron” and their “earth like bronze” (Leviticus 26:14-20). Sadly, this may be only a foretaste of cataclysmic end-times events that are prophesied to come. Shortly before the return of Christ we can also expect that an entire third of the earth’s trees will be burned up by fire (Revelation 8:7). God will use these frightening events to get our national attention in the hope of motivating us to repent and return whole-heartedly to Him. For more on this vital topic, be sure to read “There Must Be National and Personal Repentance.”