Los Angeles Fires Blazing

Winter wildfires are nothing new to southern California and the Los Angeles basin. This area tends to be sunny and dry, attracting millions of people to make their homes in it—including many of the rich and famous, who have built luxurious homes in the hills. However, due in part to a very dry period and unusually high winds, this year’s fires are exceptionally destructive (BBC, January 7, 2025). While the statistics are constantly changing, at the time of this writing, power loss has affected hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses in the L.A. area (Los Angeles Times, January 9, 2025), at least 25 people have died, and 88,000 people remain under evacuation orders, with a similar number warned they may join them, as fires continue to rage (NBC News, January 11, 2025). Experts suggest this could be the most expensive fire in California’s history: “AccuWeather, a company that provides data on weather and its impact, puts the damage and economic losses at $250bn to $275bn” (The Guardian, January 13, 2025). To date, more than 12,300 structures have been destroyed, with more to come (NBC News, January 16, 2025). California’s governor noted that fires are no longer restricted to one time in the year, saying, “There’s no fire season. It’s fire year” (BBC, January 14, 2025).

While the expense and destruction of these raging L.A. fires are tragic, Bible prophecies have long-warned Israelite-descended nations that forsake God, “Your country is desolate, your cities are burned with fire” (Isaiah 1:4–7), and “your land shall be desolate and your cities waste” (Leviticus 26:33). The sudden destruction we are witnessing in southern California could be a foretaste of even greater destruction that is going to come on a world that has turned its back on God. Thankfully, Jesus Christ is going to return and put an end to not only tragedies like what we are seeing today in the L.A. area, but also the behaviors that have contributed to these problems. To learn more about this sobering topic, read “Your Cities Are Burned with Fire.”