Why Katrina II?
October 10, 2005

As I watched the evening news last week from my hotel room in Plano, Texas, I saw miles of cars creeping out of Houston to avoid the wrath of Hurricane Rita. The next day the hotel was packed with evacuees who had made it to the Dallas’ suburb. Katrina and Rita formed a one-two punch that ravaged the Gulf coast. New Orleans stands as a ghost town. Smaller towns are nothing more than piles of rubble. Untold thousands have lost their homes and jobs. Others have lost their lives or loved ones. Such natural disasters surface the question: If God is loving, why does he allow so much suffering?

Several truths help answer that troubling question. First, according to the Bible, it’s not God’s desire for anyone to suffer. He created a world without suffering and has prepared a future place where there will be no suffering. In Psalm 9:9-10 we’re told, God is “a stronghold for the oppressed and a stronghold in times of trouble.” Jesus said, “I have come that they might have life . . . abundantly.” In Revelation 21:4 God promises, “He will wipe away every tear from their eye.”

Second, although God created the universe without suffering, he also gave man the freedom to reject him (Genesis 3:1-3). Love requires the ability to choose. Nobody can have a loving relationship with a wife, husband, child, or friend unless that person has the free-will to choose love or rejection. If God had created us without the ability to choose, we would also be creatures without the ability to love.

Third, man rejected God. The consequence of this choice hurled the earth into a reality that included disease, disaster, and suffering. Ultimately, God isn’t responsible for human suffering, man is (Genesis 3:17; Romans 5:12; 8:22). The fall recorded in Genesis 3 affected not only the spiritual condition of the universe in which Adam lived but the physical world as well.

Of course, upon hearing this, some people ask why God doesn’t just remove sin and evil from the world and thus the source of all suffering. Hmmm. If God were to do that—nobody would be left on the planet.

While God isn’t the cause of human suffering, and while he won’t remove the cause of suffering until a future date, he does offer us his comfort and strength when we suffer. God does this not only to strengthen us, but so that we can wrap the blanket of his comfort around others who suffer. Paul put it this way, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, 4who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God” (2 Corinthians 2:3-4).

When we suffer, instead of shaking an angry fist in the face of God, we should open our arms and receive his comfort. When others suffer, we should allow God to use us to extend his kindness and comfort.