Several headlines in recent global media articles reminded me of the biblical prophecy in Matthew 24:7 that in the latter days, there would be “earthquakes in divers places (KJV).” This was a prophecy uttered by Jesus Christ himself, so we should take it very seriously. At the outset, I’d like to suggest that the term “earthquake” in Matthew 24:7 should be taken in a broader application than merely earthquakes. I checked my Young’s Concordance and noticed that there was no specific Hebrew or Greek word for “volcano” in the Bible. Therefore, I think the word “earthquake” in Matthew 24:7 can be understood to refer to any seismic event such as earthquakes, volcanoes, landslides, etc.
The first area that caught my attention recently were the hundreds of earthquakes which were being felt in the Greek Santorini Island area in the Aegean Sea. This region especially needs to be treated with caution as that island blew up in a massive volcanic eruption in ancient times. Understandably, there are fears that a long series of lesser earthquakes could be a precursor to a large earthquake or even a new volcanic eruption. Many thousands of people have been evacuated from the Santorini island region due to the obvious dangers. The strongest recent quake on the Richter scale registered at 5.2 and this level of quake is generally associated with minor damage. Details on these quakes are found in the first link and second link. I do have a small personal connection to the Island of Santorini. When I flew from the Tel Aviv/Jerusalem airport to Frankfurt, Germany in 2000, I saw the island of Santorini as we flew over the Aegean Sea while we were en route to Germany. Santorini’s shape is unmistakable from the air as one can easily see a circular shape of islands surrounding an ancient caldera filled with water in the middle of those islands.
A second item that caught my attention was the fact that an area south of Los Angeles is slowly sliding into/toward the Pacific Ocean due to a gradual landslide. This affects the Palos Verde Peninsula listed as being 25 miles south of downtown Los Angeles. The terrain on the Peninsula was at one point slipping 4 inches per week toward the Pacific Ocean. That may not sound like much, but if that rate continued for weeks, it is easy to see that foundations of structures would be cracked and lot shapes would be altered. In dry times such slippages can be quite slow, but a major landslide taking neighborhoods with it can occur when the ground is water-logged. The third link states that besides California; Oregon, Washington and Idaho are especially vulnerable to such terrain landslides.
Then came news that a major earthquake at 7.7 on the Richter scale had occurred in the Caribbean Sea between the nations of Honduras and Cuba. Tsunami warnings were issued for the region but later cancelled. An earthquake of that size is far stronger than the quakes in the Santorini region, but it is the frequency of the earthquakes in the Santorini region which were of major concern. Hundreds of quakes within a short span of time could be foreshocks constituting a harbinger of an imminent major quake so authorities had to take it seriously and implement evacuations. The Caribbean earthquake was far enough out to sea that no evacuations were necessary.
I also checked my Concordance to see if any additional prophetic information could be gleaned from the word “divers” in the KJV of Matthew 24:7. The Greek word translated “divers” in the KJV did not specifically hint at the scale of the prophesied latter-day earthquakes. In other words, it did not specifically state it was addressing huge quakes and seismic events. It certainly would include any such major seismic events, but I was left with the impression that it simply means that earthquakes of various strengths would be found in widely-scattered locations all over the earth. Since we tend to not notice earthquakes until they are strong enough to cause major damage, there are many earthquakes around the earth that escape our attention. This allows for a “stealth” fulfillment of the prophecy about earthquakes in Matthew 24:7. The prophecy may address simply the wide-spread nature of earthquakes around the planet in areas not normally associated with earthquakes, or it could mean there will be strong earthquakes in widely-scattered areas on earth.
We all know that one of the regions of the earth most subject to strong earthquakes is called the “Ring of Fire” which lies on the perimeter of the Pacific Ocean with the land masses of North and South America as well as the East Asian regions of Japan, China, the Philippines, Indonesia, etc. being included in the danger region. The great San Francisco earthquake of 1906 and the Anchorage, Alaska quake of 1964 were among the largest and most destructive earthquakes in modern American history. Both were in the American sector of the Ring of Fire region around the Pacific Ocean.
As you follow world events, I think it is worth noting when and where earthquakes occur. Since Jesus Christ deemed earthquakes a relevant feature of latter day events worth observing, we should take them seriously as well.
- https://www.forbes.com/sites/
jimdobson/2025/02/07/ santorini-earthquakes-create- panic-in-greece-as-locals- fear-volcano-could-erupt/ - https://www.bbc.com/news/
articles/ce8jlm6rm9qo - https://www.foxweather.com/
extreme-weather/rancho-palos- verdes-landslide-risk-erosion? dicbo=v2-6Y4oVFw - https://www.foxweather.com/
extreme-weather/major- earthquake-shakes-caribbean- islands-watching-tsunami- potential - https://apnews.com/article/
caribbean-cayman-islands- earthquake- 5c816851844ad3f3319f1194536b99 11?user_email= 1bb5bae2fa018f8f383f58bb0f5029 8e01b91f994fbe23068ed7dcf86c4c 9509&utm_medium=Morning_Wire& utm_source=Sailthru_AP&utm_ campaign=MorningWire_Feb9_ 2025&utm_term=Morning%20Wire% 20Subscribers
