I am praying for their safety and for protection. What I am not praying for is for God to change His mind about sending the storm. Why not? I don't believe He's sending it. Two days ago I wrote an Unshackled Moment, Just Keep Seeking - or Why I Believe, about how I grew to doubt my faith and walk away from Christianity, exploring many beliefs before returning to the truth of Jesus. During the beginning years of my distancing myself from God came my first experience with wondering about hurricanes and other natural disasters as Acts of God. Around the same time that I looked up at the beauty of the night sky and told God, "if it hurt so much to be Yours, then #$()&*(@ You," the question of God and disaster came to the forefront of my thinking.
In other words, sometime when I was around 14 I began to question if God's judgement or carelessness could be found in the path of a hurricane, although I don't remember exactly and don't feel like looking it up. Sorry, I'm still sick. To be honest, I'm being lazy, because I am feeling lethargic and drained as well as miserable from the lingering cold I have, but I doubt the info would be hard to find. Whichever hurricane it was, mid-80s, is forever linked with Pat Robertson, at least in my mind. I'm sure there are others for which the association is there enough to find results in the vast expanse of Google. But here's the basics of what I remember.
There was a hurricane heading into Virginia Beach, which is where Robertson's house and television cooperation known as The 700 Club is. He prayed, on air, for the hurricane to turn and spare them and the studio, encouraging viewers to pray along with him. Lo and behold, the hurricane turned. Robertson shouted miracle and the praises of God for answering his prayer. And I wondered.
You see the hurricane didn't just turn, go back out to sea and die. It went north into other states, destroying much and killing a few people. I remember that, because it was a particularly destructive storm. Did God not care about the people northeast of Virginia? I felt sure that many of them were praying too as the storm came down on them. Were there prayers less than? Did God spare The 700 Club and care enough to exert force on a storm and not care enough to make sure that it didn't kill others? Why not send the storm out to sea if He were going to alter it at all? Was the storm God's judgment like some fire and brimstone junkies were saying? After all, even the news called it an act of God.
Now technically, for insurance and legal purposes, an Act of God is anything that occurs outside of human control, meaning if we can't figure out a way to make a person responsible and accountable we'll blame God. The problem is that with this idea and practice, we contribute to the idea that God is out there using natural disasters to commit mass murder. Or He could be personally out to get us as a tree falls on our car and the insurance calls it an act of God, blaming Him for the damage and absolving us of the responsibility of not parking under a dead tree.
Now of course there are times in the Bible where God has used the earth against itself. But to start screaming that every storm is sent from God because of the wickedness on the earth is ridiculous and knee-jerk superstition. First, if that were the case, there would never be a break. There aren't nearly enough storms, earthquakes, volcanoes, etc. to punish humanity for its wickedness. The price we owe is death, for all of us. If the asteroid from the film Armageddon were about to hit us, maybe the argument would be valid, especially since there would be no real way to divert or destroy an asteroid like that. But God's response to our sin and the debt of death we owe was to let Jesus pay our bill. He's not out there picking us off with lightning bolts. He's calling us to the cross and relationship with Him.
Jesus said that He came to give and bring life. He said the devil's aim is steal, kill and destroy. But I don't even believe that Satan is causing hurricanes to destroy our coasts. I believe the earth is under a curse and that is seen in nature as well as in our natural tendency to be selfish. I do think it is important to remember when it came to examples of God's judgment these people like to pull from the Old Testament that there was no righteous remnant. Noah and flood? One man and possibly his family walking with God...in the world. Sodom? God couldn't find ten people. There is not a city in America that doesn't have more people than that loving God. God has always relented judgment on the many because of the faithfulness of the few. To claim natural disasters are His judgment is to declare the faithful not to be.
There are lots of things beyond our control that shouldn't be attributed to God. I hate calling anything bad we don't like, understand or can't control an Act of God, or the hand of Satan either for that matter. There is a supernatural, and it does effect us, but there are earthquakes because of tension between the earth's plates and possibly some stuff that humanity is doing. Not everything we don't understand or can't control is supernatural. We need to stop acting like superstitious ancients looking for our version of the sacrificial virgin every time the wind blows. It's evil. Hurricane Katrina was not the fault of God, or the devil or gays in New Orleans. From time to time weather patterns result in a storm of this nature, and people decided a long time ago that it would be a good idea to build a city in a swamp on the coast below sea level. Cause and effect.
But as my wife passionately reminded me last night, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if I'm wrong about the above, or if you believe differently. As long as we're arguing, debating, or even focusing on who's to blame for the storm and whether our nifty computer programs used to show a storm's strength actually prove Hurricane Matthew is demonic or nature's nod to Dr. Seuss and the upcoming Christmas season (it looks like the Grinch to me), we have our attention on the wrong things. What matters about Hurricane Matthew and everything like it is not these things, but the people in Haiti and other places it's been who are trying to pick up the pieces and are grieving loss, the people in the Bahamas right now being beaten by the storm and who are fearful and in danger, and my Amanda and everyone else in the path who are fleeing or hunkered down waiting on edge for the winds to blow. We need to be praying for them, all of them, the sinners and the saints. not arguing about other stuff.
God is a personal God. Repentance is a matter of the heart. God has no desire that any should perish but calls out with love and offers comfort to all, and all means ALL. There is no one who is disqualified from the work of Christ because of any label anyone puts on them or any behavior they engage in. Every beautiful sunset and rainbow as well as every hurricane and tree falling on a car, in other words, every good event and every bad one, is opportunity for us to respond to it by drawing closer to our Creator. He can work even the disasters in nature and our lives for our good. Jesus cared about the condition of the hurting and the afraid. Let's be like Him.
Today and in the days to come let's not argue cause and effect but rather pray for those effected by the storms of life, regardless of the type or size of the storm. Jesus said to care for the prisoners, but never said anything about doing so just for the innocent ones. We are all guilty. We all deserve judgment. So let us visit the prisoners of pain and fear and brokenness from our prayer closets and remember the refuge of the cross offered to all. The acts of God we need to concern ourselves with are His act of sacrifice and love made manifest by Jesus on the cross, His fighting for us made manifest in the intercession of Christ on our behalf, and His act of compassion and care for the captive, the broken and the sick made manifest by the very life of Jesus, and we can join His act through prayer and service. not bickering and judgment.
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