Does God Truly Reign?
Psalm 47 highlights something called the “sovereignty of God.” God’s sovereignty has to do with God’s power over and through creation. For instance, the Psalmist writes, “God reigns over the nations, God sits on His holy throne” (Psalm 47:8). This verse, and many like it in the Bible, begs the question: If God is so sovereign, then why did that building collapse in Miami (9 dead, 152 still missing after building collapse in Miami: What we know Monday (msn.com))?
The relationship between God’s sovereignty, human free will, and tragedies is sometimes a tricky thing to navigate. It doesn’t make sense that a loving God will allow such suffering. Many Christians over the years have tried to explain why bad things happen to innocent people. They have basically landed on two main answers. One answer proposes that God controls all history down to the minutest details, even suggesting that God is the author of the evil that we experience in the world. Supporters of this view believe that God lets everything happen in order to gain glory for himself—even the bad things that we cannot understand. Supporters of this view would suggest, for instance, that the building collapse has something to do with God’s plan either that we do not understand or was enacted as punishment of some underlying sin among the people who lived there.
Another answer suggests that God is more relational in his nature, meaning that God is active in our lives but not manipulative. In other words, God does not act in arbitrary, random ways which are based on his unfathomable whims. A great theologian named W.T. Conner sums it up well: “Some things cannot be done because they are inconsistent with the order that God has ordained for the world.” For example, God cannot and will not do things which are against his character and nature. God’s power then is not sheer force. It is both righteous and loving. We could even say that God can limit his power to make room for the freedom of people to embrace or resist him. I opt for this view.
But how does this help us understand better what happened in Miami? Consider a similar situation which we hear about in Luke 13. During the lifetime of Jesus, a tower fell and killed eighteen people in a section of Jerusalem called Siloam. Jesus used this tragedy as a way of explaining the relationship between God’s sovereignty and human beings. He offered that the people who died in the tower collapse were not worse sinners than anyone else. Nonetheless, tragedy, death, and sin go hand in hand. The tower collapse was a reminder that we must all repent before a holy God no matter who we are.
Perhaps Jesus’ interpretation of a tower collapse in his day sheds a lot of light on what happened in Miami. God did not arbitrarily choose to make the building collapse there so that he would somehow get maniacal pleasure from sinners’ pain. Towers unfortunately collapse because we fallen human beings cannot perfectly construct and maintain buildings. In fact, it is biblically more relevant to suggest that God grieves right alongside us when such unfortunate and horrible things happen. Since we are all sinners, it is not our place to assess blame but to ensure that we bow before a holy God, grieve with the victims, repent of sin, and walk humbly since this life is so topsy-turvy and unpredictable. Life is random and tragic, but God is not. Therefore, while we have time today, let’s get right with the Lord. For God does reign and will have the last word.