The recent activity in Sudan has had the sane world reeling in incredulity. An English woman out there teaching allowed the kids in the class to name a teddy after the Islamic prophet. Someone snitched and she was arrested and jailed. On hearing the jail sentence there was a demonstration calling for her execution. One can only ask, what kind of people are these? The answer is, devoted. They are devoted to their religion. Whatever your opinion of their religion, you have to agree that they are devoted to it.
Contrast that with Christianity. Surely the most maligned, defamed and blasphemed name ever is Jesus Christ. Imagine the ridicule if someone like me were to go to a police station and complain that the name of our prophet had been blasphemed on the TV, or in the movies. I'd be laughed at. After all, the name of my Saviour, the Son of God, Jesus Christ is blasphemed openly every day and no one cares. Well, Christians don't take to the streets crying for blood do they? We don't protest or threaten violence...We don't have to because the Bible says, "At the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow." and, "Vengeance is mine," says the Lord, "I will repay." Blasphemers beware.
Saturday 1 December 2007
One of the big questions
There are some questions that Christians are asked with monotonous regularity. One of them is: "Why does God allow tragedies?" There is, of course, no one answer that fits all, but let's take one case in point and see where it leads us.
A few years ago there was a terribly tragedy, Tsunamis hit several coast lines and many hundreds of thousands of people were killed. We were all glued to the news at the time sympathising with the victims and their families. Everyone was moved deeply at the immensity of the disaster. God's heart is always the first to break at such things, but he still gets the blame.
So why does He allow it? It's like this: God sees the bigger picture, we don't. To stop the waves He would have had to stop the earthquake, because the quake caused the waves. To stop the earthquake He would have had to stop the movement of the tectonic plates, because earthquakes are caused by the plates grinding against each other under tremendous pressure. To stop the plates moving He would have had to stop the volcanic action beneath the earth's crust which forms the plates and pushes them apart. To stop the volcanic action He would have had to get rid of the heat that melts the rocks before they are squirted up and onto the sea floor. To get rid of the heat He would have to cool the earth's core so that it did not produce heat. This effectively kills the planet which effectively kills every thing on it, which means all of us. Now aren't you glad He didn't intervene.
Our earth is like a machine, tinker with one part of it and the consequences will almost always be catastrophic.
A few years ago there was a terribly tragedy, Tsunamis hit several coast lines and many hundreds of thousands of people were killed. We were all glued to the news at the time sympathising with the victims and their families. Everyone was moved deeply at the immensity of the disaster. God's heart is always the first to break at such things, but he still gets the blame.
So why does He allow it? It's like this: God sees the bigger picture, we don't. To stop the waves He would have had to stop the earthquake, because the quake caused the waves. To stop the earthquake He would have had to stop the movement of the tectonic plates, because earthquakes are caused by the plates grinding against each other under tremendous pressure. To stop the plates moving He would have had to stop the volcanic action beneath the earth's crust which forms the plates and pushes them apart. To stop the volcanic action He would have had to get rid of the heat that melts the rocks before they are squirted up and onto the sea floor. To get rid of the heat He would have to cool the earth's core so that it did not produce heat. This effectively kills the planet which effectively kills every thing on it, which means all of us. Now aren't you glad He didn't intervene.
Our earth is like a machine, tinker with one part of it and the consequences will almost always be catastrophic.
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