Natural Disasters and God's Judgement: God Loves Houston, Texas!

As I sit and write this at 10:30 am on Tuesday, August 5, tropical storm Edouard is dumping rain in the Houston area. While some of the rainstorms are strong, and there has been some localized high water, we've yet to experience the high winds, damaging tornadoes, and widespread flooding that many tropical storms and hurricanes deliver. While we're not out of the woods yet, the prognosis is looking good.

That's not what we were hearing even twelve hours ago. Then the eye of the storm was bearing down on Galveston, the possibility was high that Edouard would turn into a category one hurricane, and all of the Houston area was expected to be on the "dirty" side of the storm (to the right of the eye as viewed from its direction of travel). And then somehow things changed during the night. Edouard began to veer northeast of its projected path; it didn't gain the strength it was expected to; and most of Houston ended up to the left of the eye, with weaker winds and rain.

Houston must be doing something right, because God certainly loves Houston, Texas!

That probably wasn't the case back in 2001. Then tropical depression Allison dropped nearly 40 inches of rain in the Houston area, leaving over 30,000 people homeless, killing 23 people in Texas (47 people overall), and causing well over $6 billion in damages. Whatever Houston residents had been--or hadn't been--doing, God was not shy about letting Houston know in June of 2001 that he wasn't very pleased with them.

Then along came hurricane Katrina in 2005. Suddenly thousands of evacuees from New Orleans and other parts of Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi came to Houston, left homeless and devastated. Houston took these people in, gave them food, shelter, and a hope for a new beginning. Houstonians opened their hearts and their wallets to help. And what were the results?

Hurricane Rita was bearing down on the Houston area in August 2005, mere weeks after Katrina. Unexpectedly the category 3 hurricane turned to the northeast, making landfall at the Texas/Louisiana border and sparing the city. In August of 2007, tropical storm Erin made landfall on the southern coast of Texas, literally skirting the Houston area after changing its direction of travel from northwest to northeast. Humberto formed directly south of Houston in September 2007, became a hurricane in less than 18 hours, and slammed into High Island, Texas, just east of Houston, again sparing the city. Now add Edouard to the list.

Four storms that could have caused major devastation for the Houston area. Four storms that miraculously changed direction and spared the city. Four storms that ended up doing about as much damage as your average rainstorm.

Does God really love Houston, Texas?

I could certainly make a case for it, based on the data presented above. On the flip side, I could say that God was punishing the people in the cities and towns where these storms did wreak havoc, and, by implication, any other locale where natural disasters like fire, flood, and earthquake ravage society. (People in California and the Midwest must have done something really, really bad to piss God off these past few years.) But is it logical?

What about locations that are affected by these natural disasters where people do not live? Who is God punishing when a typhoon wipes out an uninhabited island in the south Pacific? Perhaps it's the animal life that's becoming so greedy in its hunting and exterminating other species for food that it forgets there's a balance in life that must be maintained. Or maybe they eat too much grass and expel too much methane into the atmosphere after dinner, contributing to global warming? There must be a reason, surely. Things don't happen just because they're a part of the cycle of nature.

And how do we account for those areas that are not affected by such disasters, even though we know that the residents are not known for their strong moral compass? Las Vegas, Nevada hasn't been swallowed up into the earth. Washington DC is still standing. And countries all over the world that are full of corruption and internal strife still exist. These modern-day Sodoms and Gomorrahs go on with life as usual, with no hand of God moving down to use the forces of nature to warn them to change their ways.

Before some of you start picking up the literary version of stones, let me assure you I'm a believer, and I do indeed believe that God uses circumstances to change the ways of his people. But for anyone to assume that bad things only happen to people as punishment from God is the highest form of arrogance and pride. That person is putting himself at the level of God, believing he can know what God thinks and why God does what he does--and that, friends and neighbors, is called blasphemy. Besides, if you make that assumption, what are you going to tell your friends when it's YOUR house that's flooded, YOUR business that's been burned down, YOUR family that's now homeless because of an earthquake or landslide? What the heck have YOU been doing wrong? Come on, 'fess up, share your sins!

So I'm going to thank God that he has again spared Houston, Texas, from another potentially devastating natural disaster. And instead of worrying about whether or not God loves Houston, I'm going to thank him for loving me.