Why Drought in the Southwest and Blizzards in the Northeast?

 By Curtis Pugh

            At this time Americans are experiencing severe drought in the Southwest, extreme cold with record snowfalls in the Northeast and the continued prediction of increased numbers of tornadoes in the Southeast. Some scientists place the blame on global warming. They have a history of predicting first one thing and then another. Some years ago scientists told us we were facing another ice age, but now worldwide warming. Formerly scientists predicted victory over infectious diseases, but now some are recurring and new ones have showed their ugly heads. Political scientists prophesied world peace through the League of Nations first and later the United Nations, but there is no peace. It seems foolish to place our confidence in the scientific community.

            The Bible tells us the cause of such calamities as we now see. The cause is sin. All of creation remains under God's curse because of Adam's sin. Added to Adam's sin are the accumulated sins of each succeeding generation. We are experiencing the natural consequences to sin. Such consequences include suffering and loss – even death. Let me illustrate: let us say that a man gets drunk and gets into his automobile. Due to his drunkenness (a sin) he is involved in a wreck resulting in the loss of a leg. Will God forgive him his sin? Perhaps. Will God undo the consequences of his sin and create a new leg for him? No. He must live with the consequences of sin: in this case of his own personal sin. The cause of suffering whether it be drought, blizzards, tornadoes or whatever is sin. God is just. He must punish sin. His just nature demands it. “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap,” (Galatians 6:7). Amos 3:6 says, “...shall there be evil [physical evil such as diseases] in a city, and the LORD hath not done it?”

            Peter makes the consequences of sin clear in 1Peter 4:17: “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?” God uses bad things to chasten His people, saying: “As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent,” (Revelation 3:19). But if you think things are bad now, just wait until God turns His judgment on “them that obey not the gospel of God”!  What shall the final end be of those who reject the gospel first preached by John the Baptist and then by the Lord Jesus Himself and later His apostles? Will you escape? Peter proclaimed about Jesus Christ that, “...there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved,” (Acts 4:12). If men and women will be saved it must be through repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. He bore the just penalty for sins on the tree. Is He your substitute?