God and Natural Disasters

 

We all have our opinions on natural disasters especially if it affects us directly, even christians who have lost their homes from earthquakes or hurricane might ask this question.....did God create this natural disaster? was it meant to affect me? did God forsake me? Natural Disasters occurs in various degrees of destruction which includes earthquakes, floods, landslides, hail storms, sinkholes, wildfires, and deadly tornadoes. Jamaica in recent years has seen a rush of disasters as hurricanes, fire and drought conditions. And these catastrophes are not in Jamaica alone, but happening around the globe.Various reasons are offered to explain the phenomena. Some argue its global warming. Others say it's always been this way and the natural cycle of things, it's only that the reporting is much better today and we hear about these events more often. Still, anyone with a little age and experience, or any one simply willing to carefully consider matters, finds it a bit hard to believe that what's been occurring of late is merely the natural cycle of things. The succession and intensity of these incidents have rightly caused people to sense something isn't right in the earth, and the scientific data alone can't effectively elucidate the cause.

In the Old Testament describes a time much like our own, when the people of Israel were wondering why so many natural calamities had befallen them. Like many in our own day, they had considered every possible cause but God. Certainly such explanations for the string of latest natural disasters, despite the fact that many of them have been apocalyptic in type, would soundly be rejected by most today  people who would never agree that God was somehow responsible. God is too loving, too kind, too compassionate, too gentle to ever do such a thing, they say. Natural disasters are not in themselves evil or a failure of God. A classic example of this is earthquakes. An earthquake causes massive damage to humans and can result in extreme losses of life. The fact is, however, that earthquakes are a part of the processes that keep the earth living and suitable for life. Land masses wear down with time because of rain, snow, freezing, heating, glaciers, landslides, and gravitational forces. If there were no forces that lift the land to replenish the worn away parts, after a while all land on the earth would be under water. Because the earth is liquid inside, land is constantly being lifted to replace the land that is worn down. Man's problem is that rather than understanding these processes as natural and beneficial, we tend to worship the forces and ignore the common sense lessons all around us. If you build your house in flood prone area you have no complaint when flooding occurs. People continue to ignore the warnings of nature and the lessons of the past. The results are frequently catastrophic. Draining wet-lands, building huge structures that alter climate, and placing massive structures over fault zones in the earth have resulted in tragedy for humans. God placed humans on the earth with instructions to take care of the earth  to dress it and keep it (see Genesis 2: 15). That means not to abuse the earth, but to use it wisely and carefully. In this way we can be at peace with our environment. Western civilization has too often allowed greed and selfishness to be the guiding force. Instead we need to have a love for what God has created and a desire to take care of it and live at peace with it.