Disaster and the Lord (Part 2)

In our previous post, we looked at the biblical foundations for believing that God is sovereign in disasters. We saw that God causes disasters and that he blesses covenant obedience and curses covenant disobedience. We further saw that even nations outside of Israel were expected to obey his law, and were held responsible and punished for egregious breaches.

Does Disaster Always Equal God’s Curse?

Does this mean that all disaster is a result of God’s curse? Emphatically no. Scripture explores this issue at the personal level. For example, we have the case of Job, a righteous man who suffered disaster at the hands of Satan, because of a cosmic bet between God and Satan. Furthermore, Jesus himself warns against this kind of thinking. When his disciples asked if the blind man or his parents had sinned that he was born blind, Jesus replied that it was neither of those reasons. Rather it was that the “works of God might be displayed in him” (John 9:3).

On another occasion, Jesus was asked about some Galileans who had evidently been killed by Pilate while they were offering sacrifices. Jesus asks whether these Galileans were worse sinners than all the others that they died in this way. He explicitly says “No”. He then mentions a tower that fell and killed some people in Siloam. Were these who died worse than others? No! Jesus then uses the events to highlight the importance of repentance. He says, “Unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.” (Luke 13:5). I suspect strongly, and I think the context supports it, that this repentance is acknowledging their Messiah and avoiding the covenant divorce judgment that would be the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70.

In the rest of the New Testament, we are encouraged to expect suffering as part of the Christian life. For example, the apostle Peter reminds his readers that they ought not to be surprised by the fiery trial they are going through (I Peter 4:12), Paul tells Timothy that all who desire to live a godly life will suffer persecution (2 Timothy 3:12), and the apostle John, of course, spent much of Revelation encouraging a church that would soon suffer the wrath of a diabolical state.

Three things to learn

So where does this leave us? There are three things we can say about suffering and disasters. To begin with, we must recognise that disaster and suffering is God-ordained and therefore not random. We don’t live in a Darwinian world of randomness. There is a sovereign God on the throne. Secondly, we know that God uses disasters and suffering in a variety of ways. On a national level, suffering is often linked with national sin and idolatry. On a more individual level, things can be more confusing. Suffering may or may not be the result of personal sinful choices. Sin after all is social, and in society, the effects of sin ripple outwards like the disturbance a stone causes on the smooth water in a pond. Who suffers from the philandering husband who fails to father his children? He will. His wife and children will. And the ripples will spread out from there. Thirdly any kind of disaster or suffering ought to drive people toward God. For the unregenerate sinner, a disaster or personal suffering ought to drive him to repentance and the giving up of idolatry. For the believer, it ought to drive him closer to the Father who is His ultimate good.

Sin is Social

You don’t have to travel far either in the real world or the internet realm to hear a modern man or woman assert that they are OK with an adult choosing to do with their body whatever they want to do. Thus if an adult man wants to sleep with another adult man, that’s OK. If he wants to have his genitalia removed, take hormones and have bits added to him, that’s fine too. If he wants to be involved in polygamy, that’s not a problem. The individual reigns supreme, as long as he doesn’t hurt anyone else. Unfortunately, comments like these can even be heard from Christians – which shows how thoroughly secular pluralism has infected our thinking.

A Christian response should be, “What do the Scriptures teach?” They teach that we are not just free-floating individuals. We are social beings. Yes the individual matters, but we are all interconnected. This is seen in the truth that we are literally all connected. We are all descendants of Noah and through him of Adam. We are further connected by the design of the world. God has so made the world, that we cannot live without each other. I cannot build, or do electrical work, or conduct surgery. I need others. This pattern is also seen in the moral design of the world.

So what ethical implications does this connectedness have? It means that all sin is social. Sin is never just individual. No matter how small, it has ramifications for society through the web of relationships that it impacts. The classic case of course is in our representative head Adam, whose sin caused all of his descendants to be caught up in its effects. Another case in Scripture is the story of Achan whose disobedience to God caused his own death, the death of his family, and the deaths of 36 other Israelite men. David’s sin with Bathsheba led to the slow trainwreck of his family. Solomon’s sin of marrying foreign women and going after their gods had geopolitical implications that caused suffering and misery for centuries to come.

Sin is social. This truth is denied in the statement, “He can do what he wants as long as he doesn’t hurt anyone.” Sin always hurts society. Fatherless homes have an impact. Homosexual unions have an impact. This is why Mosaic law dealt with things in a way that seems more than harsh to us. Adultery was punishable by death. Why? Because the impact on society of this sin is horrific. It doesn’t just hurt the rejected spouse and their children. The effects of sin ripple out through our social connections. So as moderns, we think we are over the barbarity of such responses to adultery. Yet our ‘mercy’ is truly cruel. In our ‘kindness’ we allow and promote behaviour that leads to more crime, more teenage promiscuity, a mental health epidemic among teens, and a high rate of suicide. We all have to live with the effects of that kind of society.