Jeremy L. Berg

“He had hardly finished speaking the words when the ground suddenly split open beneath them. The earth opened its mouth and swallowed the men, along with their households and all their followers who were standing with them, and everything they owned. So they went down alive into the grave, along with all their belongings” (Num 16:31-33).

I used to read these passages and think the descriptions of the earth swallowing men, their families and everything they owned, so primitive and laughable.  The jaw-dropping photographs from Guatemala this weekend make the Bible’s description sound very accurate.

Here’s a link to more photos and an excerpt:

A sinkhole is a natural depression caused by the removal of underground soil by water. Usually, it happens when the substrate is formed by limestone, carbonate rock, salt beds or any other rock that is easily eroded by water streams. The process could be slow, but sometimes the land just cracks open without notice. In this case, it happened suddenly, swallowing an entire house. The cause: Massive underground water torrents created by tropical storm Agatha.

Sinkholes’ size ranges from low terrain depressions to hundred of meters. Unlike the similar sinkhole that killed two teens in 2007, there seems to be no victims. At least one local newspaper is reporting one person dead, but the authorities have not confirmed it. Some neighbors claim that a whole three-story building and a house fell into the hole.

Please pray for the people of Guatemala with all the storms they’ve had.  Pray specifically for my good friends Seth, Leslie and Natalia, who are missionaries serving with Students International in Guatemala.