by Rubel Shelly
The World Health Organization estimates that well over 500,000 persons have been injured and are in need of medical care across several Asian nations. A 9.0-magnitude earthquake and the tsunami that resulted from it devastated regions of Thailand, Sri Lanka, India, and other countries in the region.
At this writing, the death toll is over 150,000 and rising. Thousands upon thousands of people are missing, and many of them will never be accounted for.
There is a thread of human thought that traces all such disasters to the wrath of God. And there is the common term in legal documents that designates all such natural calamities “acts of God.” Jesus referenced this way of thinking in order to disclaim it.
When people asked the Son of Man about the murder of some Galilean Jews by Pilate’s soldiers and the deaths of 18 construction workers, they appear to have implied both groups died by divine wrath. Jesus replied by challenging the notion that the unfortunate people in question were any worse than the people asking him about their fate (Luke 13:1-5). Some people are just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Awful accidents can happen at construction sites.
The devastation of December 26, 2004, was not divine judgment. It was the sort of natural disaster that occurs in a world operating under natural law. A planet with a hot core and a cool surface experiences expansion, contraction, and plate shifts. Earthquakes, torrential rains, droughts, wildfires, construction accidents, vehicle crashes – all are random events in nature that can produce great devastation and also elicit godly compassion.
The reaction God wants from his people in times of suffering is less debate about the reasons for it than help to its victims. I like the way Eugene Peterson translates the episode involving a blind man at John 9:1ff. When Jesus was in the vicinity of a beggar who had been blind from birth, the disciples asked, “Rabbi, who sinned: this man or his parents, causing him to be born blind?” Do you hear their assumptions? Their less-than-compassionate misgiving?
“You’re asking the wrong question. You’re looking for someone to blame. There is no such cause-effect here,” said Jesus. “Look instead for what God can do.” And he proceeded to give the man his sight by a miracle of healing.
We can discuss a theology of suffering in more detail later. For now, however, let’s listen to Jesus: Look for something God can do through your compassion for tsunami victims, your neighbor who is dying, or a friend who can’t work because of a car accident. Don’t ponder and debate. Assist! Serve! Relieve!
I hope you will be in position to contribute some money to relieve the suffering in Asia. A few of you might even be able to go there to help personally. In the meanwhile, be alert to the person you will encounter today who needs your help rather than your theological musing.
