I Caused the Earthquakes in Japan

The recent earthquakes in Japan create uneasiness in my life. The
world is unstable or so it seems. And upon occasion I hear others ask
why is the world out of sync? Why doesn't God do something? Why the
starving, the victims of... ?

The Bible tells a different story if we chose to hear it. It is a
story that makes sense and gives us hope but to hear it we must be
willing to lay down our limited views and narrow thinking and enter
that story. Here it is:
1) God created the world and it was good (Genesis 1).
2) God enjoyed people and people enjoyed God. We are the crowing
creation. To be human is not to err, it is to be made in the image of
God. Being human is a good thing!
3)With sin the world was put out of sync (Genesis 3). Snakes became
crawlers, marriage was messed up and weeds entered the world! I get
it! Adam messed up my lawn! It's his fault.
4)When sin entered the world (creation) got out of sync and has been
out of sync. Everything was marred. Everything! The world has been
existing out of sync since Genesis 3.
5)I may think that still God could change it and in fact He is. Just
not the way we would do it.
6)It might even occur to me that God should change it, put it back.
But the problem is that not only has Adam sinned and got everything
out of sync I have as well. So my life has contributed to this out of
sync world. One scholar responded to an editorial, What is wrong with
the world?" He wrote back, "I am!"
7)So what is wrong with the world and what happened? We did. We
happened and that messed it up.
8)God is about making it right but instead of beginning again with a
creation I could get off sync again He is beginning with me! And
you! Our sin messed it up but His righteousness in me is the critical
turn. As Romans 8:19-20 says, creation has been groaning for a new
start (our revelation as sons of God).

We caused the earthquakes. We did. But thru His grace we can be the
healers of many in crisis. Through his making us whole we can become
people who move in righteousness and move toward the broken world and
begin the restoring to wholeness.

We happened to the world. But He happened to us. And now we can
happen to the world again, only this time thru His power and wisdom.
And we can restore the world because we have been restored first. We
happened. But He happened. What a cool story!

Theology and History

I am intrigued as I read through the Bible, especially I and II Kings
(like II Kings 17:7). History seems to flow as we always have known
it. Nations fight, people are captured, and on and on. But the Bible
has a different take. History moves at the moving of the Lord.
Nations fight and people are captured. But all of this is simply
plays into the promises and warnings of the Lord. God is moving and
acting even in history.

To be living in the time of II Kings would mean I would have been
captured, deported, confused. I would have wondered where God is, why
this is happening, etc. But likely I would not have realized that my
sin brought this about, mine and many others.

History is not free flow and left to the whims of even the most
powerful. They always play to the hand of God. Always! History moves
us toward the realization of God's kingdom and in the process reveals
to us more of what that Kingdom must be like.

That doesn't mean that I can just allow everyone and anyone to condemn
me attaching a painful time to sin. It does mean that God's Kingdom
has come and all of the pieces of life that seem out of control and in
the hands of the powers that be are not. He is in control and is
working His plan. Though it may be hard to see in the moment, God is
in control and the world is not just happening. Behind history we
will find the hand of God taking even the battle over power, even
abuse, even hurtful things and working them toward an end. He is the
God of history.