Mount Usu, Volcano

Snow-crowned and beautiful, Mount Usu towers above the little resort towns of Date, Sobetsu and Abata — hot springs resorts — on the island of Hokkaido, Japan. Most northerly of the islands, Hokkaido is a center for winter sports with its forested mountains. But, lovely though it is, an ominous little plume of steam rises from the center of many of its mountains.
One such is Mount Usu. Under the snow and ice, a fire burns, and a not-so-sleeping volcano threatens to erupt. Wise in the ways of volcanoes, the Japanese authorities evacuated thousands of residents from the danger zone at the time of the most recent eruption.
There will undoubtedly be another eruption eventually. How many lives may be lost in that one? Hopefully none. They will have seen the danger and acted prudently.
A particular danger is the possibility of a mudslide as snow melts on the sides of the mountain. A previous mudslide killed seventy-nine people, and there are many, many more inhabitants in the same area now. In Colombia, South America, an eruption sent mudslides racing through a town and killed almost 25,000 people. There was little warning then and no evacuation ordered. Lately, in another South American country, the mayor of a large city was quoted as saying that “the people  .  .  .  will have to learn to live with unstable volcanoes.”
We, too, seem to be living with an “unstable volcano,” a volcano of violence that erupts with little or no warning and in places considered safe. We are careful, we take precautions, but we cannot conceal from ourselves that “the earth [is] filled with violence” and that “the wickedness of man [is] great in the earth” (Genesis 6:3,53And the Lord said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years. (Genesis 6:3)
5And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. (Genesis 6:5)).
Thousands of years ago, when the evil in the world had become great, God sent the great flood to destroy all the wicked ones. Since then He has promised that the world will not be destroyed by water again, but that the next judgment will be by fire.
Like the volcano, the warning rumbles can be heard, the rising smoke can be seen, and the time of the end of the day of God’s grace is approaching. Have you listened to the warnings and found a place of safety? There is only one certain refuge; it is found in Romans 10:9: “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.”
Saved from what? Saved from the wrath of God that is soon to fall on this wicked world. And that is only the beginning! Saved for all eternity in God’s place of light and love, saved with joy and happiness forever, saved to so much that we can’t even imagine it all now — SAVED.