RomanRyan1088:
Today, my brother told me that he thinks that what happened in Asia was sad. Then he asked me, How could God, this all loving being, allow this to happen. I said that God allowed this to happen so that a greater good could come outta it. Then he said, “What good is there, 1/3 of the people killed where kids”. I sat and thought a little bit, then said to him, “Maybe you have the wrong idea of God”. He looked kinda puzzled. I said do you remember Sodom and Gomorrah?" He said “Yea, I do”. Well God i’m sure loved them people just as much as he did the faithful Jews, but they were sinning badly, so God destroyed the cities. Then I said something I dont think i should have. I said “The Tsunami happened in Asia, the people there are mostly Buddhist, Hindu, and Islam. Maybe that was Gods was of making them realize that there are not in good sights with the one true God”. Now I need advice what a good answer would be, cuz oI don’t thin that cut it, any help would be deeply appreciated, I’m sorry if I offended anyone. .
Hey RomanRyan1088!
You have done the best you could, but I think you will have to explane some more. Here are some thoughts of mine: God permits evil to happen, but that doesn’t mean that it cannot come something good out of it.
One of the evil things I have had trouble to understand is the try to wipe out the jews in WWII (I have visited Auswich, and I can tell it was far more dreadful to visit the place than to see it from some TV-moovie. I didn’t sleep for two weeks afterwords). Why could God allow someting so gruesom to happen?
Karl Stern, the jew that converteted to catholisism in the middle of the WWII, thought that his mother and other realtives that died in the consentrationcamps were in Heaven! (It’s about meeting Jesus in the moment of death for people of other religion that didn’t learn about Him and his saving misions).
There have been other catastrophic plagues like the abscess-plague in Europe in the beginning of 1300 (popuarly called the Black Death). More than one third of the population died.
There were the volcanic eruption in Napoli in Italy that burried the whole town (all died) and so on …
God allows evil to happen, but we, humans, can’t always understand why.
Why do children die? Perhaps God want a lot of children to have everlasting life in Heaven? May be He wants all agegroups to be represented there? May be the children in Heaven are there to chere us all up!
I think that you have to talk to your brother more than once about this tragedy. You have to balance it, the good things (poor children going to a much better Heaven, people that converts, stop sinning and become christians), the warning aspect (don’t focus on other religion, but on that among all the families that were on vaccation there, also some loners had gone to sin (Tailand and all the focus on sex).
Tell him that this is a time were we all are tested. Do we help with money or not? Do we think about that our time here on earth are not going to last forever? Are we prepared to meet God?
One thing to be remembered is that God never leaves us. He stands by our side when we are happy and when we suffer! We are safe in “the arms” of God!
The most important thing is that your brother doesn’t loose faith in a loving God!
Hope you can use some of these thoughts. Take your time and be prepared for talking about this over and over again.
Blessings!
G.Grace
