Our God is an awesome God! I was thinking about the recent calamities throughout the world a bit ago and wondering at the terrible natural disasters that have been tearing it apart. Often we react only to the events that have a human impact (Just a few examples include the Joplin tornado, the Japanese tsunami and the Haiti earthquake) while the bulk of occurrences may go unnoticed or at least only given a cursory foot note in history. Why? Because we put no significance on issues that don't disrupt humanity. I say disrupt rather than death toll because even those that have no significant mortality rate (the Virginia earthquake, for example) will still be news worthy simply because it disrupts the day to day lives of a large portion of our human community.
But if we took a moment and considered the sum total of all natural events that have an impact on the world around us we would be surprised at the results. The world seems to be tearing itself apart at the seams! But when i think of all these things I am not frightened but humbled before our awesome God.
In philosophy class the teacher asked a question one day, "If God is a God of love then how can He allow these evil natural disasters to take place?". While there may be many answers to this question I would like to address just two that are actually just one approached from two directions.
First we must look at the history of creation and man. Before man God created all the earth and set it in motion to work in the ways that it was intended. When God creates something it is set to function in a way that benefits that creation. "Disasters" are a way to revive and reinvigorate nature. Think of a predator and how they work to keep overpopulation down among the animal kingdom by design disasters have the same effect on the planet around them.
With this in mind we must Remember that when God created man He placed him in the Garden of Eden. (Gen 2:8, 2:15) This was a separate place set aside for the habitation of man. In it God made provision for the delicate life of man to be protected and provided for. When man intentionally disobeyed He took his own life into his hands, rejecting the protection God had afforded him from conception to deal with the Good and Bad around him as he saw fit. That is a by product of the knowledge of good and evil you must then not only deal with the good but also the evil in life. So man on the face of the earth was never the intention for us. Natural disasters are intended to maintain the balance of earth and by man's own choice we set ourselves in the path of those events by acting in sin and therefore being where we never were intended to be.
The natural world also reacts to it's Creator in a mysterious way. We all have a master whether we choose to acknowledge Him or not. All of creation declares His glory (Psalms 19:1) and even the world would praise him if there were none to voice his praise (Lk 19:40). The earth is subject to it's creator and at the drawing of Him the earth trembles! I have been wrapping my mind around that concept for a few weeks now. That even the world trembles in the presence of God.
My favorite Psalms is 97. "the Lord reigneth let the earth rejoice" (vs 1) What an awesome God all of the earth is swooned in His presence. "the earth saw and trembled. The hills melted like wax at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the Lord of the whole earth." (vs 4,5) So when the earth rejoices with tremblings and shaking's it makes my heart rejoice, not for the disruption of humanity, but that the earth is letting me know "We are in the presence of the Creator. GOD IS HERE!"
Again we must point out, man is in the path of destruction often because of the choice our forefathers made and the line of sin but the presence of Man doesn't trump the presence of earth's creator it will continue to worship God in the only manner it can!
So we see that man, not God, by his evil works (disobedience, sin) has placed himself in the path of the workings of the earth one day God will remedy this state of man. That day is at His return and the establishment of His kingdom which heralds in an age where no tear will be shed!
God Bless have a wonderful day and rejoice in the presence of the most high God that surrounds you!
[Clarifying Sumation: I don't believe Natural disasters are God's judgement on individuals or communal sins but a result of man's intial sin i.e. Adam and Eve's decision to disobey, which cast us out of the Garden of Eden and into the natural convulsions of the Earth.]
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