Lesson 20: How Does God Operate in this World 2
Bob offered a pretty thorough list of answers to our question and then refutations of each. There are certainly passages throughout the Bible describing God’s participation in natural events. However, Jesus, our ultimate standard, agrees with our readers who refuse to see God using natural disasters to punish or teach. (Luke 13: 1-5, Matthew 6: 43-47, John 9: 1-4) Passages, such as Job 38, 39, warn human perspective can not comprehend what is involved in God’s care for the entire creation. But maybe most relevant, the Bible just about always looks at things from the view point of those who suffer. It certainly can appreciate when Voltaire exposes the naivety of Leibnitz’ theory that we live in “the best of all possible worlds” by writing about real-life tragedies in Candide.
The discussion forced me to look at some other critical questions: 1) Is the modern issue really about whether God is fair? We use scientific law to look at natural events, leading often to confining God’s actions to “miracles” that break those laws. Anne, Myron, and Bob observed that this forces us to ask about the fairness of miracle as well as disaster. Why help some and not others? Does it help to remember the Bible does not talk about “miracle” but infrequent mighty acts that are signs or promises that God will overcome the sufferings we experience in blindness, lameness, poverty, sin, death, and natural disasters, in the future Kingdom of God. The modern concept of miracle is downright crass by biblical standards.
2) Is it helpful to observe that “God’s plan” to which Bob and Anne referred, deals with the history of salvation, not an explanation of natural events? It is concerned with history more than nature. Don leads the way when he describes it as God’s promises to rescue a suffering world. The plan is as much about hope for the future as God’s actions in the past and present. The evil we experience in our world is an “obstacle” to the fulfillment of God’s will. In other words, natural disasters play no significant part in the Bible’s plan.
3) That leads me to ask if “How does God operate in evil human actions?” is a more critical question. I find people have more questions about God when they see human actions of unbelievable evil, such as the holocaust, 16,000 people starving daily, and 180 million people killed in 20th century wars. I wonder if modern people often focus on scientific puzzles to avoid facing moral ones. There is nothing we can do about the former; we are called to action in the latter. Religion addresses the moral response to natural events, not the cause. As Don observes, now we can speak about God acting in the presence of his followers. James Carroll makes the same point in his article about the Haitian earthquake when he concludes the least we can say is a loving God is involved through the loving acts of human beings. The blog that follows the article is a good expansion of our discussion.
4) And finally I am forced to consider Myron, Bob, and Anne’s question about what all this says about our prayer life.
I would be very interested to know your response to any of my 4 questions. For that matter, it would help me to hear other issues the original question raises for you.
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