Are earthquakes and tsunamis 'acts of God'?
Originally appeared on spirituality.com
They are sometimes referred to that way—are they the results of God’s thoughtless impulse or even indifference toward man’s existence?
Though not everyone, many people would respond to those questions with an emphatic, “Of course not!” I would, too. Why do I feel so strongly that way? My answer is based on what I’ve learned about God—what God actually is like, how God treats His creation. The Bible contains chapters upon chapters, books upon books, that reveal God’s good and affectionate nature. As one reads the Bible through, it becomes clear that it is a wonderful record of countless loving acts and actions of God.
Instead of acting as some sort of distant, capricious deity, God actually takes pleasure in expressing goodness and joy in His beloved creation. Jesus said, “Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom” (Luke 12:32 ).
Just because we’ve been in a storm or fire doesn’t mean that God doesn’t love us.
Jesus’ record and example give us a much clearer view of God’s good and tender nature. The Bible records a time when Jesus was with his disciples in a ship on the sea. A great storm came up. The people there must have been terrified. What was Jesus’ response? “And he arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace, be still. And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm” (Mark 4:39 ).
If a violent storm were an act of God, Jesus would have been defying God’s will by wanting it to stop. If God had actually sent the storm, Jesus, the person more in tune with God than anyone else in history, would have, of course, welcomed it and the damage it might potentially do. Yet, that’s not what happened. Through the power of God, “the wind ceased, and there was a great calm.”
Just because we’ve been in a storm or fire doesn’t mean that God doesn’t love us. As incredibly challenging as fires, floods, hurricanes, and earthquakes seem to be, they can be opportunities to witness, not the anger of the Lord, but the incredible love of God. Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, gave this encouraging statement: “My faith in God and in His followers rests in the fact that He is infinite good, and that He gives His followers opportunity to use their hidden virtues, to put into practice the power which lies concealed in the calm and which storms awaken to vigor and to victory” (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 204 ).
I love the fact that God is infinite good. “God is love,” says the Bible (I John 4:16 ). God has nothing to offer His creation but goodness and love. No person, no event, no storm, fire, or earthquake can separate us from God at any time. Toward the end of the Bible, the love of God—and the oneness of God and creation—is clear. The Apostle Paul wrote, “I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God” (Rom. 8:38, 39 ). We are God’s, divine Love’s, cherished idea and expression. God and His expression aren’t, can’t be, separated.
The status of divine Love includes solidity, wholeness, and permanence. To realize this, even just a little, is effective prayer. It brings the power of God to bear on your thought, which governs life and experience. Because it is God who truly acts in man and the spiritual universe, God, then, is always acting in us, through us, all about us. In Japan, and on every country on earth, we bask, not in indifference and superstition, but in the steady love of God. The Bible says, “Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it” (Song of Solomon, 8:7 ).