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Calamities! Disasters! Earthquake! Plane crash! We are all familiar with news headlines reporting natural and man-made disasters.<\/p>\n
Do I have to enumerate the powerful tsunamis that hit Indonesia and many other countries? What about the combined natural disaster and man-made disaster in Fukushima, Japan? The combination of powerful earthquake causing a deadly tsunami and nuclear reactor breakdown give chills down our spine, just thinking about it. And then of course, we all know the Typhoon Haiyan or Yolanda that hit the Visayas recently, demolishing 90 percent of the entire city of Tacloban in Leyte, Philippines. In America\u2019s worst natural disaster, nearly a million people were displaced by Hurricane Katrina. Tens of thousands were stranded without power, without food, without drinkable water, without sanitation, without medical services, without police. The worrisome part is the realization that more of these will come.<\/p>\n
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I am very familiar with disasters. I was in the Philippines when the 7.7 on Richter scale earthquake hit the island of Luzon in 1990. I was only a few miles away from the volcano, Mt. Pinatubo when it exploded in 1991. At that very moment of explosion, I really thought my family and I will die buried like those in the ancient city of Pompeii. I have seen with my own eyes how the deadly lahar (volcanic debris in boiling mixture of ash, mud and rocks) demolished bridges, houses and villages. A large portion of our own barrio in San Fernando, Pampanga was buried by the lahar. The house I was born and brought up is no more, totally buried under. And of course, in our country, the Philippines, we run out of the alphabet letters in naming the typhoons each year. As a young boy, I remember standing in a long line in chest deep flood water for relief goods being distributed by the USA military personnel from Clark Air Force Base.<\/p>\n
Recently, we have been seeing man made disasters. Two Malaysian Airlines. One went missing. One was shot down in the Russian and Ukrainian border. These results to hundreds of lives being lost. We also have the non-stop wars between nations and ethnic groups.<\/p>\n
How do we respond to these? What does the Bible teach us regarding disasters?<\/p>\n
One tragedy piled on top of another to make them all worse. If only the city had been built in a better place. If only the people had built better levees. If only they had evacuated before the hurricane hit. If only the government had acted quicker to bring food and water, and to transport the refugees. If only\u2026<\/p>\n
And here is the first question often asked: Where was God?<\/p>\n
All sorts of human decisions contributed to the tragedy, but it was nevertheless a natural disaster \u2014 nature gone awry \u2014 an \u201cact of God.\u201d Where was God when the typhoon hit land? Where was he when the levee broke? Where was he when people were trapped and drowned in evacuation centers when the storm surge came bringing with it seawater that rose too high? Tough questions.<\/p>\n
And here is a direct answer. God was there, on the ground, in his people, suffering along with them. When one part of the body suffers, Paul said, every part suffers with it (1 Corinthians 12:26) \u2014 and that includes the head of the body, Jesus Christ. He suffers with us. He feels for us. <\/p>\n
God loves his people \u2014 he loves even the people who do not believe in him \u2014 he loves them enough to send his Son to die for them. When we grieve, he grieves, too. When we suffer, he suffers. That\u2019s what we read in the Bible.<\/p>\n
God is big enough and powerful enough to do something about it. Sometimes he intervenes, and we hear stories of miraculous intervention \u2014 but often we do not. Maybe the hurricane could have hit harder and stronger than it did, but still, it killed many people. God could have stopped it entirely, so that it didn\u2019t kill any people at all, didn\u2019t cause any property damage at all, and yet he did not. Why?<\/p>\n
Whether the disasters are small or large, why does God let them happen? Frankly, we do not know the complete answer. The Bible does tell us that when sin entered the world, God said that nature itself would work against the people. \u201cCursed is the ground because of you\u2026. It will produce thorns and thistles\u2026until you return to the ground\u201d (Genesis 3:17-19). When the first people sinned, nature itself went awry \u2014 and nature will win over every person, and every person will return to the dust from which they came (v. 19). Old age will strike \u2014 unless something else does first \u2014 and nature will have its say.<\/p>\n
Paul says that creation itself \u201cwas subjected to frustration\u201d (Romans 8:20), and it waits for the day when it \u201cwill be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom\u201d (v. 21). Frankly, we do not know how physics would function without \u201cdecay\u201d of some sort, and we do not know how God will fix the problem. But we do know that there is something wrong with nature, caused by sin, and God had chosen to allow that \u2014 even with the difficulties it causes, even though those \u201cdifficulties\u201d are sometimes huge disasters that kill thousands of innocent people. Sin often affects innocent people, and sin has somehow affected nature itself.<\/p>\n
We may pray for the day when \u201cthe times comes for God to restore everything\u201d (Acts 3:21), but we still have to live in the world gone awry.<\/p>\n
Jesus saved his disciples from a natural disaster \u2014 the storm on the sea of Galilee. He saved Paul and his companions on a storm-caused shipwreck near Malta. But nature still had its way, for they all eventually died. Many were killed by evil people, others by disease (another example of nature gone awry), some by old age. God allows nature to take its toll. Not forever, not permanently, but God still lets it happen. Someday, I suppose, we will see how magnificent the plan is, but for now it seems quite messy.<\/p>\n
Jesus talked about a natural disaster in one man\u2019s life. Who sinned, the disciples asked: this man, or his parents? Neither one, said Jesus (John 9:1-3). Not all problems can be pinpointed to a particular sin. It\u2019s just that nature doesn\u2019t always work the way it is supposed to, and for this particular man, the result was a disaster in his own life. Jesus fixed that particular problem, but most of the time, he allows his people to suffer the consequences of a world messed up by sin, where even the forces of nature work against us.<\/p>\n
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<\/a>Jesus talked about another disaster in Jerusalem: the tower of Siloam fell and killed 18 people. It was not a natural disaster, but a disaster nonetheless, a tragedy that killed innocent people. Jesus did not spend time blaming the engineers or the builders. Instead, he turned to the audience and said, \u201cUnless you repent, you too will all perish\u201d (Luke 13:4-5). Take that disaster, and instead of blaming somebody, examine yourself. Get your priorities in order, and the chief priority is your relationship with God.<\/p>\n