The Promise of God

by Maurice Pujol
Published September 16, 2006

It is difficult not to recall the events
of one year ago in New Orleans and along the Gulf Coast. Hurricane Katrina ripped apart the lives of hundreds of thousands of people, making its name as the worst natural disaster ever to occur on U.S. soil.

New Orleans at first seemed to survive -- however barely -- the storm that shredded the Mississippi Gulf Coast, but the accompanying surge took its toll. Earthen and steel walls that lined several drainage canals in the city were overwhelmed by a swollen Lake Pontchartrain. Eventually, about 80 per cent of the “city that care forgot” was underwater.

This tragedy became a national, even international, news story, as a couple of hundred thousand people remained stranded in the flooded city. It was a human tragedy of epic proportions, one no one ever expected to see in this nation. Up until then, with the exception of Sept. 11, 2001, things this bad always happened “somewhere else.”
For me, it was especially personal. The neighborhood I had grown up in, the schools I had attended, the familiar landmarks I had passed hundreds of times -- all of these were flooded for the first time, even though New Orleans is no stranger to hurricanes. The people who stayed were probably like the many who had stayed in the past. They didn’t want to leave their homes, and they had survived the worst nature had dished out, at least until August 2005.

Had I still lived there, there’s a good chance I would have stayed because that’s what we always did when I was growing up. We rode out the storms and guarded our stuff, even though we went without electricity for days on at least two occasions. During Hurricane Betsy in 1965, we lost the roof of our house and both family cars (because the roof ended up on them).

Getting out of Katrina’s way wasn’t an issue for me, though, because I had “evacuated” 31 years earlier. During the Labor Day weekend that followed Katrina, I met a group of people from Louisiana through a mutual friend. My friend and his family, along with these other families, “rode out” the storm in the Destin area in Northwest Florida.

Most of these families attended the same church, which was wiped out by the floodwaters, and all of them had lost something to Katrina. Some had lost everything, including home and business.

These were not poor people stranded, waiting for the government to get them out of there. These were not evil people upon whom God’s judgment had fallen. These were just regular folks, working and taking care of their families, caught up in one of our nation’s worst tragedies. They were believers who praised God in the midst of their suffering and held on to the faith that somehow He would see them through it.
And that’s the story I want to tell -- not about the Destin group, but about New Orleans and about what God’s judgment will mean to the entire world. To outsiders, New Orleans has been depicted with a lot of stereotypes. Sadly, my hometown deserves some of the labels.

Probably too many people pay more attention to food and drink than to helping others improve their quality of life. Probably too many focus on “letting the good times roll,” rather than ordering their lives around a deep faith in God.

But not everybody in New Orleans is like that. In fact, a lot of people aren’t. There are thousands upon thousands of regular people, people you won’t see on the Cops television show Mardi Gras special.

Sure, there’s a dark underbelly of crime and corruption -- as in any major city -- and a history of evil that dates back for centuries. But New Orleans is also a city full of churches and praying people, some who attend Catholic Mass on a daily basis as they petition God for His guidance and protection.

Though its Catholic tradition is strong, the faith community in New Orleans is as diverse as its cultural history. It’s all part of a grand mixture that makes the city unique in so many ways.

I’m saying all this to make an important declaration before I continue: New Orleans is a place with good people and bad people, with proud traditions and some history it should be ashamed of, no better and no worse than a lot of other places.

I love New Orleans as powerfully as anyone loves the place where he or she was born and raised. I spent the first 23 years of my life there and received all my education there. In spite of the sins of my past and mistakes I made along the way, many of the values I hold today were forged during my formative years in this great city.

Though still devastated by Katrina, New Orleans will rebuild and will become a thriving city once again. It will still be a place with good people and bad people, proud traditions and some skeletons in the closet.

However, when we study events and try to understand their significance, we have to look them soberly and squarely in the face, in the light of God’s revelations in the Bible. Something different has been happening in the 21st century. Unprecedented events are becoming commonplace. Natural and manmade disasters are intensifying, occurring more frequently then ever, and shaking the entire world.

God is trying to talk to us, perhaps issuing a final series of warnings before He judges sin once and for all. I’m not prophesying “gloom and doom” here, for news like this should be exciting for all believers. It’s not that we want to see bad things happen to anyone or that we want to say “aha” when sinners get what’s coming to them.

In fact, sincere believers would like to see everyone turn to Jesus before the Day of the Lord. When the Holy Spirit takes up residence in your heart, you develop great sympathy for everyone. You don’t “look down” on sinners anymore because, in them, you see only a person trapped as you once were. You see someone who needs to be set free through faith in Jesus Christ. You see someone who could very well be you, if not for the grace of God.

Though people would like to think otherwise, there is not a glowing, happy future in store for everyone. In fact, the Bible tells us that many more people will continue to reject God, rather than turn to Him during the coming judgments.

And that is sad. Faced with the prospect of eternal damnation, sure and swift judgment staring them in the face, so many people on earth with hardened hearts and seared consciences will die in their sins, defiant to the end. In the Book of Revelation, we get a picture of people fleeing from God, trying to find a place to hide, a place that doesn’t exist.

God’s Word, however, is given to us for edification and instruction. The Bible is crammed with passages that build us up in our daily faith walks, but there are also many warnings posted along the way. No matter what happens to the rest of the world, you don’t have to be one of those who cringe at the thought of God’s judgment. You can be one of those who look forward to the return of Jesus with joy and excitement. You should be one of those who witness to the truth of God’s Word and lead others to Christ before it is too late for them.

All that being said, pay attention to the signs. God is no longer issuing gentle warnings. A hardened, materialistic world has so forgotten Him that He is taking His intervention in human events a step higher. God isn’t doing this, as some conceive, like some angry old man who wants to punish a group of rebellious children.

What we’re seeing are examples of divine love, the “tough love” necessary to get the attention of children who won’t respond to anything else. In the latter half of the 20th century, these snapshots of God’s judgment were frequent and sometimes very intense. Major cultural upheavals occurred around the world, and the number of natural disasters recorded was greater than at any other time in history. In fact, Billy Graham pointed out in the early 1990s that more earthquakes had occurred in the 15-year period prior to then than all of those listed since man started keeping records of seismic disturbances.

Now we’re in the 21st century, the seventh millennium in terms of the Bible’s recorded history of mankind. The new century, just a few years old, is making the past century look like just a warm-up session. We entered this period with great anxiety, with fears about the “Y2K” bug shutting down computers worldwide when the calendar turned over to Jan. 1, 2000.

Of course, this didn’t happen, so everybody went their own way after this, back to ignoring God and His Word, back to calling evil things good and good things evil. Natural disasters continued to happen around the world, earthquakes and tornadoes, storms and wildfires; but hardly anyone took notice.

The entire world, especially America, was stopped in its tracks on Sept. 11, 2001, when a group of Islamic terrorists carried out a plot designed to destroy the American economy. The date “9-11” was significant for many reasons, somehow important to the suicidal terrorists, also the designation for “emergency” in our phone system. But it was also around the time of the Jewish Feast of Trumpets, a season that may hold great significance in future prophetic events.
Approximately 3,000 people lost their lives on 9-11, and the gauntlet was thrown down for a great clash of civilizations. This is an ancient conflict which traces its roots back to the beginnings, when Isaac and Ishmael, two offspring of Abraham, were set at odds with each other.
In December 2004, a large portion of the world was affected by a tsunami, a giant tidal wave caused by a major earthquake at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. Thousands of people died and many communities destroyed by this great wall of water.

Also in that year, wildfires dotted the landscape in the American West, and four hurricanes devastated nearly all of the state of Florida. Then, the big storm came in August 2005, when Hurricane Katrina hit a major American city like a nuclear bomb.

To say that these events are somehow expressions of God’s judgment, or foreshadowings of the real serious judgment to come, sets a person up for some very sharp criticism. In fact, a prominent evangelist made such a statement after 9-11, and he was pounced on with great fury both by the secular and by the religious community. He was accused of being so insensitive to the grief being faced by all the families of those who were slaughtered through no fault of their own.

What sort of God did this man serve, some asked, that he could insinuate that a terrorist attack was an instrument of God’s judgment? Of course, the evangelist later apologized for being insensitive, but I think he may have been misunderstood. Perhaps his critics were being a little overzealous.

The Bible records many instances of evil people being used to accomplish God’s purposes, even to punish God’s people for their persistent refusal to repent of their sins. Two examples that immediately come to mind are the destruction of the Northern Kingdom of Israel by the Assyrians and the subsequent destruction of the Southern Kingdom and its capital, Jerusalem, by the Babylonians.
The vast majority of Israelites had grown so hard-hearted and so steeped in sin that God finally quit warning them and took decisive action. He allowed two pagan empires to be the instruments of His judgment, but it all happened to accomplish the greater good of cleansing His holy remnant and drawing the faithful closer to Him.
Jesus told His disciples of a time that would precede the Day of the Lord: Then he said to them: “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be great earthquakes, famines and pestilences in various places, and fearful events and great signs from heaven.” (Luke 21:10-11)

A period of time would pass, Jesus said, and then there will come a final move from God: When you see Jerusalem being surrounded by armies, you will know that its desolation is near. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, let those in the city get out, and let those in the country not enter the city. For this is the time of punishment in fulfillment of all that has been written. (Luke 21: 20-22)
Some commentators say this prophecy was fulfilled with the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 AD, but this interpretation does not account for other statements Jesus made in this same passage. Jesus was giving His disciples a glimpse of the great panorama of centuries to come, with a promise of God’s sure judgment at a time that only God would determine.

One key point of this passage, as well as Matthew 24, is that the faithful would be able to recognize the signs of coming judgment and know that it is near, though no one knows the exact date.

The other key point, and this is most important, is that the faithful would be taken care of during these tumultuous times.

“There will be signs in the sun, moon and stars. On the earth, nations will be in anguish and perplexity at the roaring and tossing of the sea. Men will faint from terror, apprehensive of what is coming on the world, for the heavenly bodies will be shaken. At that time they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. When these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” (Luke 21:25-28)

>From the world’s viewpoint, this is not a pretty picture. God never said there would come a time when all the “good” people would experience nothing bad and all the “bad” people would lose everything in war or to a hurricane. He said when judgment falls, it will affect everyone. The homes of both the just and the unjust would be destroyed; everyone’s lives would be turned upside down.

But here’s the great promise for the faithful: The unjust will have nowhere to go, while the just will be delivered. As always, as it has always been for God’s people, He will never leave us nor forsake us. Those who turn to the Lord during their time of tribulation will live to see His deliverance, will rise again surrounded by His blessings.

Was 9-11 an expression of God’s judgment? Was the virtual destruction of New Orleans the same? Perhaps so, perhaps not. But if we take the Bible at its word, as God’s authoritative Word to us, it’s possible that these tragic events are divine warnings, “wake up calls,” if you will. It saddens me very deeply to think that He would choose my hometown as one of the places, for I know personally that many good and faithful people were affected by this event. The rain, literally, fell on the just and the unjust, just as the floodwaters rose around them all.

I am just a writer and a lover of God’s Word, and I’m certainly not qualified to tell anyone about what God’s judgment may or may not be. But something is definitely going on in the world today, and it’s qualitatively different from anything that has happened before.
I earlier mentioned the Feast of Trumpets and its significance in prophetic events. The 9-11 terrorists may have unwittingly operated according to some divine schedule, since they struck around the time of this observance.

The Jewish people call this feast Rosh Hashanah, which literally means “head of the year.” It is the beginning of the civil year, in contrast with the religious year, which starts with Passover. The 10-day observance culminates with Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.

Tradition holds that Rosh Hashanah celebrates the anniversary of the creation of the world, a day when God takes stock of all of His creation. During this period, God’s people are supposed to meditate on their lives and to prepare themselves for the Day of Atonement. During the daily prayer service a ram’s horn, or shofar, is sounded.

This feast starts on the first day of the Jewish month of Tishri, which may be anytime from Sept. 6 to Oct. 5.

Now, God doesn’t do anything by accident. There is nothing left to chance, because there is no such thing. September is a very significant month.

Some scholars believe that Jesus was actually born in September, even though Christians traditionally have celebrated His birth in December. Among their considerations are the weather and the time of year when Rome called for a census for tax collection purposes.

Just as Jesus rose from the dead during the time of Passover, many believe that He will return for His church during the time of Trumpets. If His first coming actually occurred around this time, wouldn’t it be just like Him to return during the same season? As the shofars are sounded at various places in the world, an ancient sound that has occurred for thousands of years, it could very well be that mankind’s Messiah, the Savior of Jews and Gentiles alike, will make His re-appearance: For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. (I Thessalonians 4:16-17, emphasis mine)

In the meantime, what are we believers supposed to do? God has blessed us with the spiritual discernment to recognize the signs of the times. We may not know the exact date and hour of the rapture, but it will certainly be no surprise when it happens. The buds have sprouted, the world is being shaken, and everything is in place.

The stage has been set; we’re just waiting for the cast to appear.

Our job during these times is the one assigned to us long ago by our Lord and Savior. We are to carry out the Great Commandment and the Great Commission.

We need to continue loving God above all else and to love our fellow men as well as we love ourselves. When God shakes the world with His warnings, people will be displaced and lives will be shaken. Those of us who are able need to help the victims of these disasters. We need to reach out to hurting people, wherever they may be, and to help them restore order in their lives.

This will give us the opportunity to fulfill the Great Commission. When we touch others, through our finances or through our direct help on a mission trip, we have the opportunity to express our faith. When we give or when we do, we should emphasize we are acting in Jesus’ name. We should emphasize that He is the only hope for this world.

Material things come and go. We acquire possessions, and we lose possessions. We make money, and we lose money. We live in the blessings of divine health, and sometimes we have to face sickness. In short, things can change in an instant.

But God’s Word never changes. God’s promises are always kept. We should neither faint nor falter when the bad times come, for our strength is from the Lord. It is this message we need to pass on during these prophetic times.

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