And Jesus answering said unto them, Suppose ye that these Galilaeans were sinners above all the Galilaeans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Or those eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish (Luke 13:2-5---KJV).
Of course the tragedy resulting from the Indian Ocean earthquake and the subsequent tsunami is shocking and may move many in the Western world to want to draw closer to Christ. The television images of death and destruction, the unprecedented scale of the destruction reminds us that we are fast approaching the events Prophecied by Jesus that are to usher in His Return.
Some would say these tragedies are occurring and will continue to occur because of our sins, and they are indeed correct to a point. In general, sinning ignorantly is basically a sin of the category that causes one (or a peoples) to deprive themselves of the benefit of the Beneficent God. That same God will not force his benefits upon us, but gives according to our demonstrated wants, although in certain situations that pertain to His overall Plan of Salvation He Imposes benefits.
For instance, although Old Testament Israel really didn't want to leave Egypt, God Caused them to anyway because His plan was to establish the Church In The Wilderness, a great nation, a lineage for the Christ, and an eventual worldwide preaching of the Gospel, all of which started in the Exodus imposed upon Israel, and ends in the prominence and ultimate demise of the Anglo-Saxon peoples, who have been in the lead of preaching a worldwide Gospel by virtue of its media power.
Sinning in ignorance is sin, but never-the-less, it is not a coincidence that those who happen to ignorantly worship idols suffer the most during natural disasters or other tragedies such as catastrophic accidents or war and conquest. A people cannot receive (protection, victory, prosperity) what they do not want, and for now, if we don't want it, God is not going to force it upon us. But He does give us what we choose, and if we choose to worship the Dragon (whether directly, i.e. idol worship, etc., or whether indirectly by the worship of the self), we become subject to the Dragon's desire to hurt us.
But to whom much is given, much is required (Luke 12:47-48), and we in the West have been given much. Yet, from our churches to our universities we have slowly rejected God and ensured that we will be Beaten with many more stripes than the heathen. You have seen the way the heathen suffers; how do you think that we in the West shall suffer, and why?
Even though we of the West don't have our foundation in the worship of idols, we have since not only began to worship idols, destroy nations and kill the innocent (which are things that God hates: Matthew 21:52, Proverbs 6:16-17), sacrifice our children to the god of Self (Baal), run around naked and above all we have even denied that there is a God and have thought that we are gods---what shall our punishment be??? Well, we have seen some examples of what is to come in many a very prominent news report, and ultimately since we have become slaves to sin, slavery is also in our future. Not only will we suffer the same things that the heathen suffers, but we will also suffer as those whom have known their God and rejected Him. Thus, we should repent, because those who have once rejected Him but repent go into the Kingdom before those who have once accepted Him and later reject Him (Matthew 21:28-32).
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