Japan Two Years Later

Japan marked the second anniversary Monday of the devastating earthquake and tsunami that left nearly 19,000 people dead or missing and has displaced more than 300,000. At observances in Tokyo and in still barren towns along the northeastern coast, those gathered bowed their heads in silence marking the moment, at 2:46 p.m. on March 11, 2011, when the magnitude 9.0 earthquake — the strongest recorded in Japan's history — struck off the coast.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said that the government intends to make "visible" reconstruction progress and accelerate resettlement of those left homeless.

"I pray that the peaceful lives of those affected can resume as soon as possible," Emperor Akihito said at a somber memorial service at Tokyo's National Theater.

As I watched video clips replayed on the news, I wondered about natural disasters. God could have created any kind of a world He wanted. Why did He create a world that included tornadoes, drought, tsunamis and other natural disasters which insurance companies label, “acts of God”?

After God created our world He pronounced it more than good.
Genesis 1:31 God saw all that He had made, and it was very good.
No natural disasters.

The world became a hostile place after Adam and Eve sinned against God.
Genesis 3:17
To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’
“Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat food from it
    all the days of your life.”

I believe the world God created and wanted was altered because of human rebellion against God. The insurance companies should correctly label natural disasters as, “acts of humans” instead of “acts of God”. The apostle Paul writes about the condition of humankind and all creation.  There is coming a day when our world will be set free from this curse by God.

Romans 8:20-21
For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.

Until then, pray for Japan’s rebuilding and call upon God for protection in our hostile world.

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