Details: Israel, Abortion, and Homosexual Agenda Converge with Ivan

Are you really saying the hurricanes and these events are connected?

These things would have happened anyway -- hurricane or no hurricane. Most of them were already in the making before the hurricanes.

 

Just because things happen around the same time does not mean they are connected. This is called magical thinking when there is no logical connection.

I could eat oatmeal for a week for supper and then find $20 on the sidewalk. Did eating oatmeal for supper make that happen?

You can look at any number of events happening around the same time as other unrelated events and try to say they are connected. This is the belief behind astrology -- that the position of the planets at the moment of birth is not accidental but is reflective of your life and purpose. Or if you choose certain tarot cards to lay down, they will fall in accordance with what is going on in the person's life.

I bet we could find a series of events like the above with no hurricanes.

 

LadyEagle, I certainly hope you're not trying to connect the events to the hurricanes. This is really warped logic.

 

I could make lists of similar misdeeds involving the governments of countries in my neck of the woods. Nonetheless you will be hardpressed to find big earthquakes, hurricanes or other natural disasters striking overhere.
Well...

There was this huge flood devastating Zeeland in the early fifties, but the only thing the locals had done wrong was embracing the local equivalent of KJVO-ism. And although Pensacola Christian College was hit by a hurricane I don't believe in that connection.

 

Birthpangs are related, but not to each other.

 

Not agreeing with you is not scoffing at the judgement of God. We know God's judgement is real.

 

LadyEagle
"I believe God has removed His umbrella of protection on this nation because of our ungodliness"
"
I'm pretty sure that you think my country is decidedly more ungodly than yours. Nonetheless no hurricanes, or other disasters have come this way recently.

 

The "umbrella of protection" comes from Bill Gothard -- see the Gothard thread. That concept is not in the Bible. There is no evidence that the U.S. has an "umbrella of protection" or any other form of protection from God.

The judgment on the wicked in Noah's day was announced clearly to Noah so the ark could be built. The judgment on Sodom and Gomorrah was announced clearly to Abraham and Lot and his family were saved. The plagues on Egypt followed warnings by God to Moses and Moses to Pharoah. Those were specific acts that led to the exodus.

These judgments were announced by God specifically and personally ahead of time to someone in the OT. There is nothing like that I see in the NT. Many passages say that God's wrath is coming at the judgment, the "Day of the Lord."

 

[Part of this may show up twice -- I tried to post and it didn't take but I see that I am supposedly the last one to post though I don't see the message. ]

The umbrella of protection idea comes from Bill Gothard -- see the Gothard post. I don't think there is any evidence that the U.S. has an "umbrella of protection" from God.

The destruction of the flood and Sodom and Gomorrah, and the plagues on Egypt, were all announced by God specficially beforehand to somebody. This is not the case with these disasters.

I didn't say you were doing tarot or numerology, but the principle is the same: seeing a connection between unrelated events without any evidence there is such.

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<I did not post twice delibrately but the computer or the BB board messes me up sometimes>

Rest of post:
To make a connection against a disaster and God's judgment is something Jesus taught against in the case of the tower of Siloam. People were thinking the destruction of this tower happened because the people who died were sinners.

When there is no evidence of why a natural disaster occurs, I don't think we should say that X happened because God is judging us or them or whoever. God allows these things, of course, but we are in fallen world and these natural disasters are a result of that.

 

True, but I think it's a unrighteous for a person to allege with certainty that the events of the OP are God's judgement. Equally unrighteous is the person who accuses those who disagree with the OP as scoffers.

 

Fear not. I wasn't pointing the finger directly at you. I was being general. Sorry if you took it differently.

True, but the preachers reaching on our imminent destruction are no more scripturally accurate than those who refuse to preach on God's judgement. Besides, God's judgement on persons doesn't work in this manner. An unbeliever who sins receives the God's judgement in the form of an eternity in Hell. A believer who sins receives judgement from God in the form of God withholding His blessing and favor from that person.

 

I think you've heard the term "umbrella of protection" because it's been around a long time and has spread from Gothard into the church via his numerous seminars. Let's look for a Biblical basis for it -- there isn't one.

I don't think whether we abandon Israel or not has anything to do with what happens to us. Sin will increase -- the NT tells us that. Well, it's happening.

I do think that there are ungodly people in the U.S. and everywhere else. I also believe our laws were from Judeo-Christian principles. But I don't think we were ever a "godly nation." We paid lip service to God and had an external morality but that does not mean we necessarily were godly. Sin has increased here as it has in all western countries. Many of them were once "Christian" countries with Christian kings, etc. Does that mean they were Christian? No, only that they officially recognized a Christian church as the official religion and many people automatically joined it.

I agree that there is more immorality here -- I have no argument with that. But I do not connect hurricanes to it.

 

How do you know it is God's judgment on sinful man? It seems to me that it was very clear in the Old Testament as we had a prophet of God who spoke the words of God ("Thus sayeth the LORD") bringing judgment on the nations that were in rebellion to him. Do you consider yourself a prophet of God? Furthermore, there were several people who had horrible things happen to them in the Old and New Testaments such as Job and the Blind man. They were also confronted with the idea that perhaps God was judging them because of their sin (and thus, the opposite should be true that if you are prosperous and without troubles, then God must be blessing you). This sort of heresy has carried through today with folks like Ken and Gloria Copeland and the whole Faith (name it and claim it) movement of TBN (The Blasphemy Network). The people making these claims then were wrong and they are also wrong today. My wife's twin brother died of MD. Was that also God's judgment? How about the Holocaust? What about if a tragic accident happens in a church bus? I think we should be very careful about what we attribute to God as being his intentions unless we are 100% sure that we are God's prophet and that we know what his message is.

Joseph Botwinick