This was the question a friend of mine was asked this week. For lack of better terms, social media is “flooded” with “fiery” observations and comments concerning the non-stop onslaught of disasters about whether this is some like of ‘judgement”. Whether they are human caused or as Insurance companies call them, “Acts of God” is clearer for some than for others. I have always wondered about Insurance companies suddenly acknowledging God at such times. Is this a way to tell us, “Look, we don’t have to pay; it’s not our fault; it’s God’s fault; ask Him for restitution of property!”
Going over the unbridled comments on FB, one things seems to be sure, that it is at such a time people do stop looking down at their digital devices and start wanting to take a look inside themselves as well as up! While the social media rhetorical venum is already toxic when observations are mixed with the already acrimonious politics of the day, it is fatal when it is mixed with religion. A sad state of affair where instead of joining the ranks of the brave dedicated people who fight the waters and the flames, they sit home placing blame at the other denomination, or political party, and/or God. While my wife and I were on the road this summer, we dodged a very bad hail event that could have destroyed our car, much of our equipment and put an end to our tour. With one less vehicle, it would have also rearranged our lives and finances for the worst. We decided to leave the freeway at the last minute just because my wife was hungry. Then while at the restaurant, we get a weather alert of hail as big as softballs right in the direction we were going, at the time we would have been there. As we passed by later, we saw about 25 cars with shattered windshields, and two overturned semis. In the middle of summer, they were cleaning the roads with snow-plows. We felt very honored to have been spared and thank God for it. But my wife kept asking the question, “Why? These people also have lives to get to. They have families; children; jobs; financial issues. There are also in the mix people who do well by God. So why were we spared?” These are valid questions. Some try to simplify the answers by saying that God spares people because their job for Him is important; that He loves them; or they are part of the right political party and/or religious affiliation. They feel that God favors them because of a certain sense of righteousness that they have. These are very dangerous conclusions because it implies personal goodness while deducing that others are villains. As we do that, we lose the sense of compassion to help others feeling that they get their just dessert, but we indulge ourselves in the delusion that we are sort of righteous chosen ones while the others are bad. These are erroneous conclusions that are against many biblical injunctions.Why God does things, we are not able to always tell, but it is not our job to tell anyways. We’re We say don’t get a say in it. Our job is to come to the rescue of those around us who need help. "Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you. (Mat 7:1-2) I have travelled all around the word and lived with people of many different colors, religion, and political views. I do not think that we have within us the ability to rightly discern who is just and who is unjust; who is punished for sin or who like righteous Job is being tested. We certainly can’t define it by people’s religions or politics. I have witnessed with my own eyes the words of Jesus, the only wise judge who knows the depth of the heart of man, He who judges true righteous judgments, not by what his eyes see, or decide disputes by what his ears hear, (Is 11:3); discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart (Heb 4:12); and who says that His Father makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. (Mat 5:45).
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