Zoom on lightning caused by electrical discharge within volcanic ash column, Eyjafjallajökull, Iceland
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“The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast and his kingdom was plunged into darkness.” Revelation 16:10
The images coming out of Iceland have been stunning. Visual, visceral images of lightning charged fire and brimstone being hurled heavenward from the bowels of the earth, as if hell itself had been unleashed. And, from the looks of things, this is just the beginning.
A plunge in to darkness
A friend of mine called yesterday, leaving a message on my voicemail. A little chit chat and then – “I was wondering what you think of the volcano. I think the other one is going to blow (Katla) and the world will be in darkness.” Interesting words, as my friend is an unbeliever. I have been trying for some time to reach her with the gospel, and so far, she has been politely attentive but, not very receptive but, apparently, the increasing number of natural disasters, is beginning to get her attention, – which is exactly what they are designed to do. For the world is indeed in the process of being plunged in to darkness both spiritual and physical and people across the globe are going to be finding themselves increasingly affected in personal ways as these disasters and other supernatural events continue unabated; increasing in both frequency and intensity.
For the thousands that have perished in recent earthquakes, a little lag time at an airport is not such a big deal. But, for those caught in the frustrating circumstances of finding themselves stranded and having to bathe out of an airport sink, it is a big deal. With the recent grounding of virtually all air travel across Europe, millions of people have been affected and all this from the eruption of just one volcano. What will the evening news look like when city after city and country after country are affected by simultaneous mega disasters? A scenario even the director of Hollywood’s worst disaster movies could never have imagined.
Days of Purification and judgment
I read somewhere that the name Katla is derived from the name Katherine. If this is so, this could be interesting because the name Katherine means pure. And fire, we know from scripture is a purifier. Fire in the Bible is also a symbol of testing and of judgment. For us as believers, the fire will try the quality of our works and we know, that what is not of Christ will be burned up just as it says in 1 Corinthians 3:13 – “And, the fire shall test the quality of each man’s work” but, for unbelievers and the nations who have oppressed Israel, it is a time of judgment.
“How long O Lord? Will you be angry forever? How long will your jealousy burn like fire? Pour out your wrath on the nations that do not acknowledge you, on the kingdoms who do not call on your name, for they have devoured Jacob and destroyed his homeland.” Psalm 79:5-7
The days as we know are short, I pray that we who are in the Lord will understand and know that we are in a time of refining; of purifying– that we might be the bride our Lord longs for; the one who in garments spotless and clean has made herself ready for the soon return of her beloved bridegroom.
Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem, they shall prosper who love thee! Psalm 122:6 Watching and waiting with YOU for the soon return of Jesus! Cindy
Heaven Bound 
That was a good article, Cindy. With all of the natural disasters going on in the world today, I believe these are signs. The whole world will feel it and change is defiantly in the atmosphere. I was recently saved (last fall) and my life has changed dramatically. God bless you!
– Aaron
By: Aaron Joseph Hall on April 22, 2010
at 4:09 pm
Aaron, thanks for taking the time to write! I am so happy to you hear of your salvation. I count it a blessing to be called your sister! May God bless you richly in your new walk with him! Cindy
By: cindybythesea on April 23, 2010
at 4:36 am
Awesome photo! We tend to think how awesome something like that looks in photos.. and it is … but put that volcano in our back yard and see how pretty we think it is then…. it would be terrifying. These really are the warning signs, I dont think any of us are prepared for whats next or can imagine whats next. Love you Mom!!
By: Kristin on April 22, 2010
at 5:16 pm
Great post Cindy! Awesome times we are living in.
Thought I would pass this on to you. I recently came across Dr. Owuor. I don’t know if you heard of him yet. The man has supposedly given the gift of prophecy and visions from the Lord. So far I can’t find any thing wrong with the guy. Could the Lord be using him? Decide for yourself.
He is not another Benny Hinn or Tod Bentley. This guy preaches repentance. I think he is the real deal.
http://www.repentandpreparetheway.org/
By: Brandon on April 22, 2010
at 8:05 pm
Hi Brandon, Thank you so much for your encouragement, I really appreciate it! Wow, there is a lot on that website – haven’t had a chance to peruse it yet, but hopefully will soon. Grace and blessings! Cindy
By: cindybythesea on April 23, 2010
at 4:48 am
Greetings Cindy,
While reading your insightful post, it reminded me of an email I sent to Steve Coeper a couple days ago concerning 2 news articles out of Israel. They both brought to mind Isaiah 60. The fulfillment of the glory of the Lord upon Israel (and the church), arising to shine in the midst of gross darkness. Here is the body of the email:
World Bible Winner in Israel and her name means ‘Light” and the quote: “The Jerusalem Post the enormity of the achievement, saying that it marks a return of the central place of Bible studies to the irreligious population, after some three decades of religious domination in the contest.”
I thought wow, the quote by the Jerusalem Post indicating a spiritual awakening perhaps…a nation, not just groups of Israeli’s, returning to the Word of God, that in the near future will lead them to Jesus, their Messiah.
http://www.jpost.com/LandedPages/PrintArticle.aspx?id=173534
Also, the reportedly “dark mood” in Israel as they mark their 62nd Anniversary. Their recognition, as a nation, of the reality of how they are viewed by the rest of the world, including the US President…things that have never been before
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/20/world/middleeast/20israel.html
What comes to mind is Isaiah 60:
1Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the LORD is risen upon thee.
2 For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people: but the LORD shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee.
3 And the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising.
4 Lift up thine eyes round about, and see: all they ather themselves together, they come to thee: thy sons shall come from far, and thy daughters shall be nursed at thy side.
5 Then thou shalt see, and flow together, and thine heart shall fear, and be enlarged; because the abundance of the sea shall be converted unto thee, the forces of the Gentiles shall come unto thee.
6 The multitude of camels shall cover thee, the dromedaries of Midian and Ephah; all they from Sheba shall come: they shall bring gold and incense; and they shall shew forth the praises of the LORD.
7 All the flocks of Kedar shall be gathered together unto thee, the rams of Nebaioth shall minister unto thee: they shall come up with acceptance on mine altar, and I will glorify the house of my glory.
8 Who are these that fly as a cloud, and as the doves to their windows?
9 Surely the isles shall wait for me, and the ships of Tarshish first, to bring thy sons from far, their silver and their gold with them, unto the name of the LORD thy God, and to the Holy One of Israel, because he hath glorified thee.
10 And the sons of strangers shall build up thy walls, and their kings shall minister unto thee: for in my wrath I smote thee, but in my favour have I had mercy on thee.
11 Therefore thy gates shall be open continually; they shall not be shut day nor night; that men may bring unto thee the forces of the Gentiles, and that their kings may be brought.
12 For the nation and kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish; yea, those nations shall be utterly wasted.
13 The glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee, the fir tree, the pine tree, and the box together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary; and I will make the place of my feet glorious.
14 The sons also of them that afflicted thee shall come bending unto thee; and all they that despised thee shall bow themselves down at the soles of thy feet; and they shall call thee; The city of the LORD, The Zion of the Holy One of Israel.
15 Whereas thou has been forsaken and hated, so that no man went through thee, I will make thee an eternal excellency, a joy of many generations.
16 Thou shalt also suck the milk of the Gentiles, and shalt suck the breast of kings: and thou shalt know that I the LORD am thy Saviour and thy Redeemer, the mighty One of Jacob.
17 For brass I will bring gold, and for iron I will bring silver, and for wood brass, and for stones iron: I will also make thy officers peace, and thine exactors righteousness.
18 Violence shall no more be heard in thy land, wasting nor destruction within thy borders; but thou shalt call thy walls Salvation, and thy gates Praise.
19 The sun shall be no more thy light by day; neither for brightness shall the moon give light unto thee: but the LORD shall be unto thee an everlasting light, and thy God thy glory.
20 Thy sun shall no more go down; neither shall thy moon withdraw itself: for the LORD shall be thine everlasting light, and the days of thy mourning shall be ended.
21 Thy people also shall be all righteous: they shall inherit the land for ever, the branch of my planting, the work of my hands, that I may be glorified.
22 A little one shall become a thousand, and a small one a strong nation: I the LORD will hasten it in his time.
Blessings of Peace and Grace to you and yours,
Angie
By: Angie on April 22, 2010
at 10:34 pm
Great observation Angie, I saw those stories as well and sort of passed over them, thank you so much for bringing them to light – on reading your comments, I can see how significant they are. Beautiful piece of scripture as well! I really appreciate you taking the time to share them with me and the other readers. Blessings to you and your family, Cindy
By: cindybythesea on April 23, 2010
at 4:52 am
Cindy,
I just had to share one more thing!
Right after posting my comment I read Oswald Chambers’ Daily Devotion for today, 4/22. It spoke more to me concerning your post, and of the purification of of the saints by the LIGHT of the face of God.
http://www.myutmost.org/04/0422.html
To God be the Glory now and forever more!
By: Angie on April 22, 2010
at 10:55 pm
The name ‘Katla’ means “kettle” in Icelandic.
‘Kettle’ shows up in English scripture just once in (in most translations) — in 1st Samuel 2:14 regarding Eli’s Worthless Sons. Their gluttonous, anti-scriptural custom, as priests, was to dip their forks into the KETTLE where the sacrifices were being boiled and take the choicest meat out first for themselves. (That insights could head us in any number of directions in an age of greed and false spiritual leaders.)
In Hebrew, that same word (H1731, ‘duwd’, pronounced “dood” or “dude”) shows up exactly seven times, the most interesting of which are:
Job 41:20 (regarding Leviathan) — “Out of his mouth go burning lamps, and sparks of fire leap out Out of his nostrils goeth smoke, as out of a seething POT [duwd] or caldron. His breath kindleth coals, and a flame goeth out of his mouth”
Jeremiah 24:2 (one of the commissioning passages for his prophetic ministry of dark days and hard messages not well received) —
“The LORD shewed me, and, behold, two baskets of figs were set before the temple of the LORD, after that Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon had carried away captive Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah, and the princes of Judah, with the carpenters and smiths, from Jerusalem, and had brought them to Babylon. One BASKET [duwd] had very good figs, even like the figs that are first ripe: and the other BASKET [duwd] had very naughty figs, which could not be eaten, they were so bad.”
If I may be forgiven the tongue-in-cheek conclusion (with apologies to Willy Wonka, as well as the former pot-smoking Dell guy) the thing that skeptics (particularly American ones) need to be asking themselves in this hour is: “Duuude! Am I a good fig or a bad fig in God’s eyes?”
By: ultraguy on April 24, 2010
at 8:04 pm
Cindy, I passed a church sign today that instantly made me think of you, though not sure why. Anyway, it wasn’t the typical “cutesy” punny ones that you see a lot. It was direct and succinct. I logged on to tell you about and see you writing about the same thing.
The sign? It simply said…
Prepare your hearts America and repent, for judgement comes.
In this day and age, it is refreshing to find blogs and people and churches willing to stand for Christ.
By: tam Z on April 24, 2010
at 8:24 pm
Thank you Tam for sharing this with me. And, thank you for your continued encouragement. What I find so amazing is God working in the body the way he is right now – between people like you and me and the many others who are waiting and watching daily for his soon return. What a blessing! Grace and peace to you and your family, have a blessed day in the Lord tomorrow! Cindy
By: cindybythesea on April 25, 2010
at 10:15 am
Dear Cindy by the Sea,
The first part of the comment below is from the same post left with brother ultraguy.
This first quote is from Jerusalem, Ari, 21 April 2010. “A great Rabbi of the Old City made an observation about a major global “act of G-d” that left me wondering how I could have been so blind not to have seen it myself. Right after Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Memorial Day), half of Europe was comprehensively blanketed under clouds and layers of black ashes. I saw this cataclysmic natural phenomena play out, but for some reason I didn’t have the presence of mind to seek a deeper understanding or try to decipher what the divine message encoded in this event may be.
It doesn’t take a detective to see the historical irony in the same continent that either perpetrated, or was complicit, in turning six million Jews into ashes the Just over 60 years ago now finds themselves blanketed in this mysterious black ash. ”
This part of the post is particular to your blog, Cindy by the Sea, because of Katrina. Jerusalem 21 April 2010 Ari goes on from his article as follows.
The Jerusalem article from Ari says, “The volcano in Iceland erupted within a day of England’s announcement that they were banning the image of “kotel”, or the Western Wall, in relation to Israel. Despite the basic knowledge that the Western Wall is the holiest site to the Jewish people, the English embraced the fiction called Palestine and stated that Western Wall and half of Jerusalem belongs to this mysterious entity. Rather than even address such a ludicrous contention, it is merely worth noting that the rapidly escalating animus towards Israel and the Jewish People is not reserved to the English, but is rather rearing its ugly head throughout Europe, and to a large degree throughout the entire Western World.
Hence, this volcanic eruption was executed by the Almighty to send a clear and unequivocal message to Europe and the rest of the world that the sins of their past are not forgotten. The sins of the fathers are not revisited upon the children unless the children continue in the fathers sinful ways. And as anti-Semitic attacks in Europe have not reached today’s levels since the Holocaust, and Jews have not been as isolated and vilified since those times either, the children are resembling their parents more and more every day.
When discussing the divine orchestration of world events and the intended messages that they may be conveying, I have felt a significant and sharp discomfort, if not resentment, on behalf of many, Jews and non-Jews alike, throughout the world. Case in point: the Gaza disengagement. Within hours of the illegal, unjust, and inhumane transfer of Jews from their homes in Gaza in order to unilaterally hand over the entire region to the same terrorists that had been murdering the residents for over 30 years, there was a deluge of historical proportions that wiped out the entire city of New Orleans. The day after I personally witnessed the graves of tens of Jews buried in the Gaza cemetery exhumed to be reburied in Israel in order to prevent the desecration of their bodies by the gracious peace partners that we were gifting our homeland to – there was scarcely a newspaper or magazine which didn’t have at least one picture of the overturned coffins in the saturated marshlands that just a few days before had been respectable cemeteries in New Orleans. As 8,000 Jews were forced by the government out of their homes in Gaza creating cities of refugees, well over 80,000 New Orleans residents were forced out of their homes by their government into tents and stadiums as well. The parallels continue, yet rather than accept these insightful and mysteriously similar parallels with the shocked fascination which I expected, I felt waves of anger, discomfort, and resentment. Who was I to know the reasons behind G-d’s actions? Was I a prophet that I could decipher the motives of the Creator?
It didn’t seem to matter that I never claimed to have any definitive knowledge of the reasons behind the flood, or any other world event that I have ever tried to make sense out of – the vitriol I encountered was almost reflexive. I have spent many months revisiting this subject and seeking understanding as to why the response I received was so overwhelmingly negative. Personally, I have always seen the world through a paradigm in which the events of our personal lives, as well global events affecting the entire world, are messages from G-d to communicate with us help guide us towards an enhanced understanding of how we can come close to him and bring more goodness and divinity into the world. While it would indeed be arrogant to ever claim that one knows G-d’s reasoning, it would seem like irresponsible and neglectful not to even try. For if the reason for the events of our world are to give us a platform to connect and come close to our Creator, and we seek this understanding with truth and humility, then the very ideas and understandings we are endowed with are gifted to us from above as well. Hence while we can never know anything for sure, we are definitely supposed to try to understand for otherwise the messages may very well elevate in volume and intensity until we have no choice but to listen up.
The only reason I could surmise as to why I encountered this seemingly reflexive repulsion to the concept of divine guidance and deciphering the reasons behind worldly events is because the message may be one that they don’t want to hear. Either their belief in G-d is not sincere or authentic, they don’t understand that our G-d is interactive and perpetually involved in even the most minute details of our lives, or the message is simple too painful to bear.
Ultimately, however, we reap what we sow. Whether the message is that it is time to leave our homes in the exile and return to The Land of Israel, to contend with various contradictions and falsehoods in Israel itself, or one of the myriads of other concepts that we need to grasp and internalize – these truth will come into fruition, the only question is what side of the fence we will be on. Will we be victims or heroes? Will we be the protagonist or the antagonist? As Mordechai said to Esther “Rescue and salvation will come to the Jewish people one way or the other, the question is whether it will be through you.
The reason I write this now is because we are in turbulent and erratically unpredictable times and there is no paradigm to refine and nurture than that of Emunah, or faith. Without the knowledge that there is a creator above that is lovingly guiding us and protecting us, the events of our times may seem meaningless, terrifying, and render one feeling helpless and alone. However, if we open our hearts to the knowledge that there is a G-d in the world and that coincidence is a fiction of the highest order, we can emerge lucid, inspired, and empowered to merge our thoughts, desires, and actions with the Divine will. We can transform our lives from ones laden with fear, doubt, and anxiety to lives of beautiful and harmonious dialogue with G-d. The choice is ours. ” End of quotation from Jersualem.
Que exige Dios de nosotros? Te deum laudamus. Non nobis Domini non nobis sed Nomini tuo da gloriam.
Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable to thee oh Lord, my strength & my redeemer.
YosoY
By: YosoY on April 25, 2010
at 2:06 pm
Yosoy, Incredible assessment! I had never thought of the ashes spreading over Europe in quite that way, but, you’re right. How Israel is treated especially during these last days will become pivotal to the very survival of people and nations. I love the scripture you quoted from Esther. With or without us, God’s purposes will stand. But, we do have a choice as to what role we will play. Grace and blessings and thanks so much for taking the time to share, Cindy
By: cindybythesea on April 25, 2010
at 5:28 pm
Cindy
i am a new reader. many thanks for your work in Yeshua! Check this out Katla = witch [read this article originally posted at Nathan’s Leal’s Watchman Forum]:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100423/sc_afp/icelandvolcanoeruptionkatla;_ylt=AhxHg4.099ami083Y2mU_X5h24cA;_ylu=X3oDMTNodWJmZDBrBGFzc2V0A2FmcC8yMDEwMDQyMy9pY2VsYW5kdm9sY2Fub2VydXB0aW9ua2F0bGEEY2NvZGUDbW9zdHBvcHVsYXIEY3BvcwM2BHBvcwM2BHNlYwN5bl90b3Bfc3RvcmllcwRzbGsDa2F0bGF0aGUzOXdp
By: Arnie on April 25, 2010
at 2:11 pm
Hi Arnie, thanks for sharing that link, good article, very informative and descriptive. It was interesting how Katla is referred to as a witch – reminds me of the legends of the volcano goddess Pele here in Hawaii. Grace and blessings! Cindy
By: cindybythesea on April 25, 2010
at 6:02 pm
Cindy,
It’s funny that you should mention Rev.16:10 in your article which refers to “the beast” because every time I see that volcano picture you posted (which I have seen on multiple sites) I see the face of a horrible beast in the bottom right corner of the picture.
The fire showing through the ash and smoke shows two eyes a nose and mouth. To me it looks hideous.
By: John on April 26, 2010
at 1:52 am
Hi John, I hadn’t quite noticed the face before but, I see it now, thanks for pointing it out. I did have the distinct feeling of something very unusal when I selected this photo, something very evil, something from the pits of hell. It sounds like you concurr. Thanks for writing brother and stay strong in the Lord! Cindy
By: cindybythesea on April 26, 2010
at 2:29 am
If only more people would hear about this.
By: Dee Mcneil on May 28, 2010
at 7:52 am