Earthquakes and Economics

For two millenia, every time a natural or social disaster hits the "Chicken Little theologians" come out of their hen houses and pronounce that the "sky is falling." The newspaper headlines announce a local crime and they pronounce "the end is near." They sputter and mutter how the world is getting worse. Forget that throughout human history many national religions publicly practiced human sacrifice and were in an almost constant state of open warfare with their neighbors while plagues and disease periodically wiped out a significant percentage of the population until modern times.

"This is a happy time we live in. A certain race of croaking souls who are never pleased with anything are always crying out about the badness of the times. They cry, 'O for the good old times.' Why, these are the good old times. Time is never so old as it now. These are the best of times." ~C.H. Spurgeon from his sermon, Prayer-the Forerunner of Mercy

The light of the Gospel has been revealed to this world and is spreading through God's redemptive plan for His creation. The sinfulness of man is but a whisp and a vapor in comparison. There's no need to rip away a handful of verses from Revelation and news, taking them away from the context of the Gospel, and strangle and twist the truth out of them to fashion a bow-tie of madness around one's neck, suffocating the ability to reason.

We should all stop praying for ease and decadence, instead embracing our Refiner's fire as He burns away the idols of this world we turn to for contentment. Christians have commonly developed their finest qualities while being persecuted and through suffering. Pain is the alarm clock that wakes us from our lazy slumber.

...if we know anything of growth in grace and desire to know more, let us not be surprised if we have to go through much trial and affliction in this world. I firmly believe it is the experience of nearly all the most eminent saints. Like their blessed Master, they have been men of sorrows, acquainted with grief, and perfected through sufferings (... See MoreIsa. 53:3; Heb. 2:10). It is a striking saying of our Lord, "Every branch in Me that bears fruit [my Father] purges it, that it may bring forth more fruit" (John 15:2).

It is a melancholy fact, that constant temporal prosperity, as a general rule, is injurious to a believer’s soul. We cannot stand it. Sicknesses and losses and crosses and anxieties and disappointments seem absolutely needful to keep us humble, watchful and spiritual–minded. They are as needful as the pruning knife to the vine and the refiner’s furnace to the gold. They are not pleasant to flesh and blood. We do not like them and often do not see their meaning. "No chastening for the present seems to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness" (Heb. 12:11). We shall find that all worked for our good when we reach heaven. Let these thoughts abide in our minds, if we love growth in grace.

When days of darkness come upon us, let us not count it a strange thing. Rather let us remember that lessons are learned on such days, which would never have been learned in sunshine. Let us say to ourselves, "This also is for my profit, that I may be a partaker of God’s holiness. It is sent in love. I am in God’s best school. Correction is instruction. This is meant to make me grow." JC Ryle, Chaper 6: Growth from His book "Holiness"