Faith and Disasters

The devastation of Helene, per predictions, will be compounded by the coming devastation to Florida of Milton. And, as I write, it is the anniversary of Black Saturday when Hamas attacked Israel. Disasters caused by weather and human evil confront us often, but it now seems more intense than we usually experience them.

We were sleeping soundly in the early morning of January 17, 1994, but that suddenly came to an end as our house started shaking at 4:31. In the days following the Northridge earthquake, people were trying to make sense of the disaster. Some confidently proclaimed that the earthquake happened because Northridge was a center of pornography, God punished it. I might add, He did so along with millions who had nothing to do with pornography! Such compassionless certitude was rightfully ridiculed and rejected. Yet, how do those of us who have faith in God understand disasters?

We don’t know when the book of Joel was written, but we know what prompted the prophet’s message. It was prompted by a disaster. The disaster came with a horde of locusts. Those of us in urban and suburban America will have trouble appreciating just how devastating locusts can be (1). Billions of these flying, crawling insects strip vegetation bare. Not only are fields laid bare of human foods, but flocks and herds starve.

In powerful poetic verses, Joel describes the locust invasion as an enemy army, destroying the land and its people. What were the people of Judah to do in light of this disaster? In chapter 2, Joel gives the answer:

“Even now,” declares the Lord,
“return to me with all your heart,
with fasting and weeping and mourning.” (Joel 2:12 NIV)

Was Joel telling the people of Judah that the locust came as God’s direct punishment for their sins? I don’t think that was Joel’s point, any more than it was Jesus’ point when He was told of the slaughter of Galilean worshipers by Pilate, or as He reflected on the death of 18 when the Tower of Siloam fell. In both cases, He said that those who died were not worse sinners than others. Yet, He did say about both cases, “I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish” (Luke 13:3, 5 NIV).

I believe what Joel and Jesus were both saying is that we live in a world in which disasters happen, and we need to be right with God, through repentance. Put another way, disasters are the very time we turn to God. Better yet, before disasters strike, we should repent and return to God with all our hearts.

Further, for Joel, we turn/return to God in urgent prayer, for He brings deliverance (2:15-17). God will scatter the locust, and He will replenish the land with grain, wine, and oil (2:19-20). We turn to Him, not because nature is resilient, but because God is faithful (2:23). In the present, God is an ever-present help.

Yet, in this very chapter, Joel raises his vision to a more distant future:

28 “And afterward,
I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your old men will dream dreams,
your young men will see visions.
29 Even on my servants, both men and women,
I will pour out my Spirit in those days. (Joel 2:28-29 NIV)

Peter took Joel’s prophetic words to describe the Spirit’s coming on the Day of Pentecost. We live now in Joel’s “afterward.” The Holy Spirit is now God’s Presence with us before, in, and after disasters. His Spirit is our guarantee of a future even beyond this life, where disasters will never come.

In the midst of all our disasters, we can sing the words of Psalm 121:

7 The Lord will keep you from all harm—
he will watch over your life;
8 the Lord will watch over your coming and going
both now and forevermore. (NIV)

Tim Kelley

(1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bx5JUGVahk