Is God Punishing America?

by Kenneth Ryland

Right now many Christians are asking that question. Was the September 11, 2001, terrorist attack on the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon the result of God's judgment against the United States of America?

Two days after the attack a fierce debate erupted among Christians over public remarks made by evangelist and broadcaster Pat Robertson and Pastor Jerry Falwell on Robertson's popular TV program, The 700 Club. Dr. Falwell stated that the American Civil Liberties Union, abortion providers, gay-rights proponents, and federal courts that banned school prayer and legalized abortion, lifted divine protection from America and led to this grisly terrorist attack that killed more than 5,000 people. "I point the finger in their face and say, `You helped this happen,' God continues to lift the curtain and allow the enemies of America to give us probably what we deserve."

Pat Robertson, agreeing with Falwell's remarks, said the terror attacks occurred because Americans have insulted God and lost the protection of heaven. Later Robertson issued a written statement defending remarks made by him and Dr. Falwell, stating: "We have imagined ourselves invulnerable and have been consumed by the pursuit of health, wealth, material pleasures and sexuality. It [terrorism] is happening because God Almighty is lifting his protection from us. We must come back to God as a people. We have a court that has essentially stuck its finger in God's eye," Robertson wrote. "We have insulted God at the highest level of our government. Then, we say, `Why does this happen?'"

Immediately after the remarks were made by Falwell and Robertson, high profile religious and secular personalities began issuing public statements decrying the "horrible" and "fanatical" remarks. Some even stated that the hatred inherent in the remarks of these two preachers was worse than that of the terrorists who had just killed over 5000 Americans.

As easy as it would be to slough off the remarks of these two popular American preachers, in my private conversations with Christian friends, almost all agree that God is very displeased with our nation for abandoning the Christian principles on which our nation was founded, and that we, the self-seeking and self-indulgent people, were in some degree to blame for angering God to the point that He refused shield our land from these terrorists.

One thing is for sure: The terrorist attack of American civilians has forced Christians throughout this land to wrestle with issues of much greater importance than the petty doctrinal differences that often keep us at each other's throats. We were forced to come face-to-face with the real life-and-death issues of our faith when we sat in front of our televisions, stunned by our own vulnerability and the fragility of life itself.

Has the Judge of all nations brought His judgment on America? Does the divine Ruler of the Universe still bring affliction on nations? The record of the Hebrew Scriptures is very clear that nations of the past were judged and punished by God in their time of existence. There is no afterlife judgment for nations as there is for individuals. Israel of old and America of today are merely temporary, worldly social structures for specific times in history that serve as a stage for God and His people. When such social structures bring shame to the name of God, He punishes them and then abolishes them if their people en masse do not repent. Rome is no more. Spartan Greece is no more, and the Ming Dynasty has ceased to exist. It is people - not nation states - that God seeks to save, and nations are judged and punished by God when by the overflowing of their sins they interfere with the will of God to bring salvation to the earth - at the same time, bringing discredit to His name. Often, tragedy is allowed to serve as a warning for the people of a nation to repent and change their wicked ways.

What galls modernists most in our post-Christian culture is the thought that any of us might be guilty of anything, for guilt is seen as the "sin" that Christianity has foisted on society, and Christianity is viewed as the mother of the worst of all sins, "intolerance," the unwillingness to accept that other religions are just as "valid" as Christianity. To the priests of our newly liberated humanist society (the psychiatrists, psychologists, and liberal theologians) there is nothing for Americans to repent of except the guilt they feel because of the lingering influence of Christian morality.

I believe Pastors Falwell and Robertson were right in telling Americans that we the people of this nation must repent of our sins because our sins are an offense to God Almighty. There was a time in the history of our nation when our presidents and other national and religious leaders routinely called on the nation to repent before God. Read George Washington's Thanksgiving Day proclamation a few pages over from this editorial. President Washington called on Americans to seek God's forgiveness as did many other presidents throughout our history. The real aberration in our history is now, when we believe we have nothing to repent of -- that it is more important to avoid offending the sensibilities of pagans and the enemies of Christ than it is to seek God's favor and blessing through repentence. We have truly put ourselves and our children in mortal danger.

--Kenneth Ryland

TSS

November - December 2001 The Sabbath Sentinel