Fireballs, meteors, explosions, and mayhem. And these are only the warnings

There have been quite a few explosions, meteors and fireballs this week. Commentary after the news blurbs. First, the aerial events. There have been three meteors and two asteroids hitting or nearly hitting earth this week:

Meteor streaks up Mex-Cal coast
Residents from Mexico to Long Beach California reported seeing a white or green fireball this morning just before dawn. The Coast Guard and others received many reports of the sighting. The crew of the USS Sterett, based off San Diego, saw it too. It was a meteor, and because of the clear skies, it was visible for a long way. Many were stunned at how long the sight lasted.

Two asteroids whiz by earth
"Two small asteroids that were discovered on September 5th by the Catalina Sky Survey near Tucson, Ariz., whizzed past the Earth on Wednesday. While the two asteroids passed within the moon's orbit, they didn't pose a threat to our planet. These types of near misses happen quite frequently—and even if something this small were to hit the Earth, it would break apart in the atmosphere and burn up before it hit the ground. Larger asteroids, however, don't burn up—such as the famed Tunguska event where an estimated 200+ million-pound space rock entered the atmosphere of Siberia and detonated in the sky producing a fireball, releasing energy equivalent to almost 200 Hiroshima bombs."

In the blurb above here's what gets me: the two asteroids that appeared were inside the orbit between the moon and the earth. They appeared suddenly, without having been spotted from afar, first. Isn't anybody watching these things?

Colombian meteorite sparks confusion
The Colombian media is going wild with speculation over a "giant fireball" that crashed into the earth in the Andean nation's central Santander department. Andina.com reported that Bucaramanga Mayor Fernando Vargas confirmed that the phenomenon was a meteorite which left a crater 100 meters in diameter where it crashed in the San Joaquin municipality in Santander. "Something happened, but we aren't clear about what it was, there is a lot of speculation. I myself hear the noise and I thought it was a bomb," Serpa told W Radio.

A day later, a second alleged meteor hit Colombia:

Second Explosion Under Investigation in Colombia
BOGOTA – Authorities are investigating whether a second explosion heard on Monday in the vast area of the southwestern Colombian province of Valle, similar to one heard a day earlier in the northeast, was caused by a falling meteorite. The explosion was heard in the municipalities of El Cairo, Versalles Toro and El Dovio, in the northern part of Valle del Cauca. A powerful explosion was heard and then “the earth seemed to shake,” the area police commander, Col. Nelson Aceros, told reporters. He recommended that people near the place of impact take precautions. The emergency response network in Valle was activated to try and establish the origin of the phenomenon and the consequences, though the authorities have reported no damages. Local residents are alarmed, and apparently people “after seeing the bright light heard an incredibly powerful explosion that shook the earth,” Versalles Mayor Jorge Hernan Gomez said, citing eyewitness accounts. At first “we thought that it was an airplane that crashed, but that idea was dismissed,” the mayor said.

Now, the explosions. A major gasline exploded in San Francisco (San Bruno) killing 4. Two oil rigs exploded in the Gulf of Mexico off Louisiana this week.

San Francisco gasline explosion kills 4:

Henry Sanchez was driving home from his three kids' back-to-school night at a nearby school when he approached the intersection of Claremont and Glenview. He looked through the windshield where just a few blocks ahead of him a flash of flame crossed the sky, followed by a deafening explosion. His three kids were at home doing homework - and located directly on the other side of the fireball, which seemed to reach 100 feet into the sky. Local residents said they felt an explosion followed by a fireball that soared hundreds of feet into the air. “We heard what sounded like a plane, then all of a sudden an explosion,” Carmann Robbins told KTVU.

Two oil rigs exploded this week in the Gulf of Mexico. One was in operation and emitted oil, the other was not in operation. The causes are under investigation:

An oil platform explosion overnight in the Gulf of Mexico forced the crew to jump into the sea and threatened further damage to waters still recovering from the BP disaster.  It was the second such disaster in the Gulf, but this time there was no leak and no one was killed. Fire engulfed the offshore platform 160 kilometres south of the Louisiana coast shortly after 9am (midnight AEST) and massive plumes of grey smoke billowed into the sky as rescuers rushed to fish out the workers. No cause for the explosion has been established. 

On to the fires. Detroit is burning.

Detroit fire chief: 'I haven't had anything like this in 20 years'
[B]blazes jumped from house to house, garage to garage, displacing families, disrupting neighborhoods and stretching thin the Detroit Fire Department on Tuesday. "I haven't had anything like this in 20 years," said Detroit Fire Chief Gregory Williams, a 36-year veteran of the department.

Boulder is burning.

Will Esposito describes an otherworldly scene after a wildfire tore through a canyon in the Colorado foothills: Some houses in his neighborhood burning while others stood intact, a propane tank shooting flames into the sky, and an eerie quiet interrupted only by firefighting helicopters and airplanes.  About 3,500 people have been evacuated from about 1,000 homes since the fire broke out Monday. Firefighters say mapping now shows the blaze is burning on 6,168 acres, or about 9 1/2 square miles. No injuries have been reported. The cause is still under investigation.

Imagine sitting in your living room and hearing such a loud explosion. That happened to me this summer and I'll never forget it.

I was sitting in my living room on a quiet summer day, the windows open, and reading with my two kittens purring contentedly next to me. Suddenly that peace was shattered by the loudest sound I'd ever heard. An explosion, a crackle, and another explosion. I saw smoke and a fireball. My cats disappeared and I blew out of the house like a shot. My first thought was someone had bombed the school across the street. I saw ashes drifting down from the tree 30 feet from my living room, and the electrical wires were aflame. A transformer had blown. Situated only 50 feet from where I had been sitting, the explosion was tremendous and my heart didn't stop racing for a long time.

Imagine the horror of the folks who escaped from the gasline explosion in SF. Or the fear and awe of the folks seeing the fireball streak long and low across the California sky. Or the confusion of the Colombian people seeing the fireball and then hearing the explosion. What were their first thoughts? A missile? A bomb? A terror attack? These times are uncertain and terror is everywhere. It is part of the end times, where God is pulling out our security blankets from under us and causing our carnally secure equilibrium to become upset. As we live on earth now, it is like walking on a log in a pond. It doesn't take much for us to tumble. From the earth beneath us quaking and exploding, to the skies aflame with fireballs, explosions, meteors and asteroids, to everything in between becoming unstable (finances, family, labor) it should be making us look UP to the One whom gives all stability: Jesus. Did the photos above of the explosions and burning didn't at least make you wonder? Don't you think this is not normal? Did you pause, and think of the end times and what it means for us all? It means the destruction of all we know. For Christians, this is a happy thought, because "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change and though the mountains slip into the heart of the sea; though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains quake at its swelling pride. Selah. The LORD of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our stronghold. Selah. (Psalm 46:1-3,7).

For non-Christians, though, it likely means terror. Non-believers are like the guys on the log, either tumbling or about to tumble...into what? Nothing. If you do not believe Jesus died for your sins and that you need forgiveness of them, I hope that the signs that we are seeing before the rapture will convince you to at least think about where you are going after you die. It has been a miracle that no one died in the Christchurch 7.2 quake. It was amazing that only 4 died in the horrific fireball that devastated the neighborhood of San Bruno. It was mercy that no one was killed in the Detroit and Boulder fires so far. That is because judgment has not begun yet, it is warnings only. But when the judgments start after the rapture, about two-thirds of the people on earth will die. These deaths begin with the opening of the 4th seal. "And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth." (Rev 6:8) It literally will be HELL ON EARTH. You will be seeing a lot more of the above, and there will be deaths.

You can escape that by asking Jesus to forgive your sins. "Be always on the watch, and pray that you may be able to escape all that is about to happen, and that you may be able to stand before the Son of Man." (Luke 21:36)