Where is God at times like this?

Wow! The reports on the destruction caused by Hurricane Katrina are unbelievable. I've been to New Orleans a number of times and I love that city. Now I wonder how long it will be before I am able to visit there again. I have friends who live there and were able to evacuate to Baton Rouge. They still got hit by the storm, but it was not as bad, and at least there they are above sea level.

I also have friends who live right on the beachfront in Biloxi. They decided to stay and "ride out" the storm. We have not been able to contact them...most likely their home was damaged badly, if not destroyed. So we are worried about them.

When natural disasters like this occur, people often want to ask why God let's things like this happen. And certainly the world has been through a lot this year - remember the Christmas Day tsunami in India and southeast Asia last winter. So that question about God is a tough one. Personally, I think it's the wrong question to ask. For me a better question is, "Where is (or was) God while this was all happening?"

In the Hebrew Scriptures Elijah looked for God in a great wind, an earthquake, and in fire. But where he found God was in silence (see 1 Kings 19:11-13). In other words, God was present all along but Elijah just didn't recognize it. You might say Elijah was looking for God in all the wrong places.

I have to admit that I usually forget that God continues to be with me providing support during the storms of my life, and I forget to look for him in the silence of my own heart at those times.

So learning from the story of Elijah, we can conclude that God was present in the midst of the hurricane, but the hurricane was not God, was not caused by God, and was not God's way of sending us any kind of message. Instead we must ask how God is present amid such power and destruction.

I don't believe God sends disasters to teach us lessons. Rather, disasters happen because we live in an imperfect and unpredictable world. It is a world that God has created and then given freedom to follow the laws of nature. That does not mean that God has now abandoned the world. But God has chosen not to force himself upon us. God calls us to himself, but leaves us free to answer or not; to seek his help or to try and rely solely upon our own limited resources.

Thus when "bad things happen to good people" I try to look for ways to turn those misfortunes into blessings. There's a good book (you must have known I was getting around to another good book!) called Blessing Life's Losses: Letting Go and Moving On by Joan Guntzelman (Liguori Publications, 2004). Here's a prayer the author offers that seems very appropriate for the current situation:

Living God, you have created the whole world as my home. Help me to find you here. Send your grace so that I may grieve over the loss of what home had been, let go of it, and know that I am never without a home in your love.

All I can add to that is "Amen."