I wrote this the week of the earthquake in Haiti, but I think it still applies today.
Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the
Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. Jesus
answered, "Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all
the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you, no! But
unless you repent, you too will all perish. Or those eighteen who died
when the tower in Siloam fell on them—do you think they were more guilty
than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no! But unless you
repent, you too will all perish."
(Luke 13:1-5)
In this passage the people are asking Jesus why bad things happen.
They refer to some disasters that took place in which several people
were killed, and they think that these bad things happened to these
people because they had done something wrong. But Jesus doesn’t go along
with that. He says, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse
sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I
tell you, no!” We should not think that every bad thing that happens is a
punishment from God, or that people who go through bad things are going
through them because they have done something wrong. Bad things happen
to everyone, whether or not they’ve done anything wrong.
Jesus then points out to the people that since they have such an
interest in death and punishment for sins, they ought to examine their
own hearts to see if they are ready for death, and they shouldn’t think
poorly of other people who have died or have had bad things happen to
them, because the people who had been tragically killed were no worse
than anyone else.
Something else of interest in this passage is the use of the number
eighteen. There were eighteen people who died when the tower fell on
them. A few verses later the gospel writer records that there was a
woman whom Jesus healed who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen
years. It is interesting that the number eighteen is used twice so close
to each other and yet seemingly having nothing to do with each other.
The gospel writer, however, may be trying to make a point with these
numbers. Six and six and six add up to eighteen. Therefore, six, six,
six is used to describe both the disaster of the tower collapsing as
well the woman being crippled by a spirit. The spirit is obviously an
evil one, and the fact that the number of years the woman was crippled
by the evil spirit is the same as the number of people killed in the
disaster may indicate that this disaster was not some sort of divine
punishment but rather the working of the devil himself.
The number seven is also used in the story. Jesus heals on the
Sabbath, the seventh day of the week. This is fitting since the woman
had been “bound by Satan” for six and six and six years. Jesus says that
it only makes since that she should be healed on the seventh day.
The point of all of this is that we shouldn’t think that the people
who have bad things happen to them or who die in disasters (like the
people in Haiti this week) are any worse than anyone else. And we
shouldn’t say God is punishing someone, because a disaster may not in
fact be an act of God, but of the devil. And we if we really want to
know God we shouldn’t be confusing Him with His enemies.
