Hurricane Katrina

God & Katrina, an editorial from AgapePress.

I know from experience that if you suggest “divine wrath” for any kind of natural (or unnatural) disaster, people are quick to hide behind the general excuses. “What about those who were innocent of the sins you claim?”, is perhaps one of the most common.

So it must be said, that “all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.” All of us are tainted with sin, and even those who are guilty of such “small” sins as lying are guilty of the whole Law.

The judgment that we all deserve is eternally worse than what a billion Katrinas could do to our cities. And it is an act of mercy that God withholds such judgment for so long, giving us space to repent. Those judgments which He does allow in this world are given to not only punish our sins, but also to bring people to a point where they will realize that they do need God. Giving people an abundant life here on Earth–even if they know it is directly from the Almighty–will not result in the people living a holy life. Abundance here will draw people away from God, not push them toward Him. This has been true since the Israelites, despite being freed from Egypt and given the land of Canaan, preferred the pagan idols to their living Lord.

21 thoughts on “Hurricane Katrina”

  1. Are you saying that your religion thrives on misery and suffering, and that these things are actually good for your religion?

    PS. Agape Press said of Katrina that “God is speaking”. But Katrina flattened not just New Orleans but also the whole Gulf Coast including other parts of Louisiana and Mississippi. Louisiana is #1 in church attendance and Mississippi isn’t far behind. Louisiana also leads the way in homophobia, banning not just gay marriage but all gay civil unions last year by a whopping 78% majority vote. So if “God is speaking”, could it be that what he’s saying is not actually what the people at Repent America think he’s saying? ;)

  2. Are you saying that your religion thrives on misery and suffering, and that these things are actually good for your religion?

    All things work together for good to them that love God and are the called according to His purpose.

    Oh, and per your comments about the AgapePress article, glorious in His sight is the death of His saints. No Christian who understands fully what he has received fears death, and if life is lived right, the Christian would be ready at any moment to go home. I am currently reading an account of a Christian who lived thirteen years under intense violence and persecution, longing for death everyday but never receiving the release. America has us spoiled and has caused many to love this world more than the next. Such is a sad condition to be in. And whether I fall asleep in Christ today or 70 years from now, I am ready. I envy those believers God brought home using Katrina. They are finally and forever happy.

  3. Hmmm, interesting. I suppose that kind of attitude is the only one that you can have, given your particular beliefs. If you viewed death as a dreadful thing rather than a glorious “release”, you would have a moral quandary to face by worshipping a deity with as much blood on his hands as your God is supposed to have.

  4. Seems easy for you to give Him credit for death and what you view as negative; hardly ever see those who don’t believe saying something along the lines as “a deity with as much life and blessings given freely as your God is supposed to have.”

    Curious.

  5. Seems easy for you to give Him credit for death and what you view as negative; hardly ever see those who don’t believe saying something along the lines as “a deity with as much life and blessings given freely as your God is supposed to have.â€?

    Curious.

    So if you knew somebody in real life who axe-murdered a dozen families but also went around saying some really neat things, you would focus on the good things he said and ignore the fact that he was an axe-murderer?

  6. An axe-murderer has no claim to the lives of his victims. He neither gave them or sustained their lives.

    “The Lord giveth; the Lord taketh away,” is a phrase I’m sure you’re familiar with. It is true. From the outer reaches of the Universe to the inner depths of our hearts, all belongs to Him. That includes our own lives. Whether He wants that life to exist here or is ready for it to pass into an eternal reality, that is His choice.

    When anyone dies for whatever reason here on Earth, it is a very safe assumption that it is equivalent to God saying, “Your time on Earth is done; your time of judgment has come.”

    It is also reasonable to assume that anyone who dies without having accepted the Gospel has been given ample opportunity to respond to the light God has given. Admittedly, that light varies greatly. The final judgment will be fair in that regard.

  7. Care to explain why making something gives you the right to be cruel to it?

    You’re a Star Trek fan; in Star Trek, Mankind created Data. Does this mean that Mankind is allowed to be cruel to Data?

  8. Mankind has never “created” anything, to be exact. We simply rehash what the Creator has given us to play with. As such, no, we ought not be cruel to what belongs rightfully to Him.

    However, it is interesting that most of us drive cars, which (though it sounds silly) are quite cruel to flying insects, as my windshield can attest to. If it is wrong for the Almighty to take the lives or otherwise control the lives of us (who are farther removed from Him than an insect is from us, if solely for the reason of sin), why is it not wrong to destroy countless insects for the sake of moving us from here to there? What’s not cruel about that?

  9. Mankind has never “createdâ€? anything, to be exact. We simply rehash what the Creator has given us to play with. As such, no, we ought not be cruel to what belongs rightfully to Him.

    You didn’t answer my question. Why should the act of creating something give you the moral right to be cruel to it?

    And the act of rearranging materials is creation. You create a sand castle out of a pile of sand. The fact that the sand already existed does not mean that you did not create the sand castle.

    Interestingly enough, on that note, nowhere in the Bible does it actually state that there was nothingness before Genesis. It states that God created the Heavens and the Earth, but if you want to take that fairy tale seriously, that does not preclude the idea that raw material already existed for him to work with. It just wasn’t formed into the Heavens and the Earth yet.

  10. “All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.” John 1:3

    Either God created all things or there were things before and exclusive from “all things.”

    And besides, even if God used pre-existing material, the fact that He could form it with ease into a sun or a planet or even life still makes Him vastly superior to us, if not closer to a Q than Jehovah.

    However, the verb “create” used in Genesis 1:1 is a variation which refers to creation ex nihilo, or from nothing. The verb is exclusively used for creative acts by God.
    http://www.bcmmin.org/create.html

    A different verb is used in Scripture when referring to making something out of something else.

    Biblically, there is a vast difference between “create” and “make.”

  11. And besides, even if God used pre-existing material, the fact that He could form it with ease into a sun or a planet or even life still makes Him vastly superior to us, if not closer to a Q than Jehovah.

    I know this is going to sound repetitive, but I’m still not hearing an answer: why does “superior” equal “moral right to be cruel”?

    As for your semantic arguments about “creating” versus “making”, you are just acting like a lawyer now. The fact that the Hebrews assumed divine creation to be “from nothing” does not mean anything more than you assuming it had to be “from nothing”.

  12. It is not a question of ‘superiority’ or ‘moral right to be cruel.’ It IS a question of ‘holiness’, ‘standards’, and His immunity from inquisition. Ironically, speaking of His judgment Romans 11 says “how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!”

    I believe that God controls weather. I believe He is in full control of Katrina. Did God ever say that Christians would not ever be afflicted by weather? No. Does God ever promise that they won’t die tragically? No. Does God ever promise that a piano wouldn’t drop on their heads? No.

    Does bad-weather, tragic death, or death-by-piano-on-the-head mean that God is like a big kid burning ants with a magnifying glass? No. The Bible pronounces death upon all of mankind. For those who have not trusted Christ there is a physical and spiritual death pronounced upon them. For the Christian, Christ has removed the sting from death. Death has no more dominion over the Christian, it is but a sleep from which awaking is Christ-likeness, and the promise of eternal companion-ship with Christ in glory. For the Christian there is no spiritual death, and for those who are alive when the rapture occurs (and, yes, I strongly believe you and I will both be around to experience it) there will be no physical death.

    There are only two types of people in the world. There are those who have accepted Christ and those who have not.

    For those who have not accepted Christ, God is perfectly justified in judging since they are condemned already because they have not believed on the name of the Son of God. The Bible says that the wrath of God abides on them. Is God justified in judging an immoral people on the basis of His morality? Perfectly.

    For those who have accepted Christ, there is the promise that we will not experience trial beyond which we are able by His grace to endure. The Christian has surrendered his life to Jesus Christ. We are not our own, we are bought with a price. We belong completely to God, for dispositiong as He will. The Bible says that ‘no suffering for the present seems good’, but we are assured that He is working all things together for good.

    If God can speak to 1 person through Katrina and lead them to faith in Christ, would it be worth the while and inconvenience it was to each Christian in the American south? It certainly would be!

    The bottom-line is this, until you KNOW God, there is no way to understand Him or His ways.

  13. In other words, God is always right no matter how cruel he is … because he says so. I take it you do not believe in any universal concept of morality, then? I find it curious how many Christians talk about “universal morality” until you point out that true universality would mean that the rules would apply to God too. Then all of a sudden you discover that they [i]don’t[/i] believe in universal morality. They [i]don’t[/i] believe in a universal code of right and wrong.

  14. To expect God to abide by the same “code of conduct” as we are to live by is as ridiculous as asking an antelope, honey bee, or cancer cell to live by the same moral laws as we do.

    As Brandon said, “until you KNOW God, there is no way to understand Him or His ways.” He is above us, His thoughts are beyond us, His ways are unsearchable.

    We have but His promises to go by, and for the Christian (those who love the Lord and are the called according to His purpose), we know that all things work together for good. That He is willing to end life here on Earth is testamony to the fact that life continues long after it “ends” here on Earth. If Earth was all that there is, then yes, it would be intolerably cruel for God to end lives here so often (or at all, for that matter).

  15. To expect God to abide by the same “code of conductâ€? as we are to live by is as ridiculous as asking an antelope, honey bee, or cancer cell to live by the same moral laws as we do.

    So you are saying that God is too unintelligent to understand morality, like the antelope, honey bee, and cancer cell? Certainly, if antelopes were intelligent enough to understand morality, we would expect them to obey it.

    Face facts: you reject universal morality. It is, in fact, the very core of your belief system to deny the concept of a universal right and wrong, because at no point are you willing to acknowledge that there should be any independent standard of right and wrong applied to God.

    Funny how I hear so many Christian fundamentalists talking about universal morality, and yet they actually reject it.

  16. Universal morality is very much a fact–every human will be judged according to the same standard–that of God.

    However, while it is sin for a human to take another human’s life, where does God declared, “I shall not kill” as a Law. He is the Law-giver, and He said, “Thou shall not…” He gives, and He takes away. And we’d be foolish to try to judge Him for it.

  17. So in other words, you define “universal morality” as “universal for everybody but God”. That is [i]not[/i] universal morality. I suggest you try looking up “universal” in the dictionary.

  18. “The Lord giveth; the Lord taketh away,” is a phrase I’m sure you’re familiar with.

    So, the Lord is an indian-giver? That is what you’re saying. See, when you give something, you relinquish all rights to it, and let whoever you give that thing to do whatever they want with it. Are you saying that life is actually a freakin’ rental?

    I envy those believers God brought home using Katrina. They are finally and forever happy.

    I’m wondering what kind of life you lead to think of death as a release.

  19. “I’m wondering what kind of life you lead to think of death as a release.”

    My life isn’t bad at all, Darth. I have a great wife, decent job, great hobbies, great friends, and a great family.

    But if Heaven is Heaven, then it will be infinitely superior to the here and now. To wake up without asthma, allergies, scars, bitter emotions of hate and jealousy and disappointment… Well, yeah, I’d consider that a release.

    As said in “Peter Pan”: Death is the greatest adventure.

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