I was asked the question, “Did God bring this pandemic to teach us a lesson?” I replied, “Absolutely not.”
It’s been a frequent assumption over the ages by some people, that when disaster hits a group of people, they must be the target of God’s wrath for some type of evil they have indulged or represent. This type of thinking is what I call, “old theology.”
By “old theology,” I’m talking about old worn-out concepts of God that are not current with Jesus Christ’s teachings about God as a God of Love.
Jesus did not teach a God of punishment. He taught a God of Love. When suffering people came to him for help, Jesus did not condemn them to oblivion for their errors. He condemned any sin and saved them from their suffering. He loved them, freed them and healed them.
Suffering in the world is never caused by God. It’s an opportunity to prove that God is present to take away suffering and restore harmony. As Christianity teaches, by living and understanding the Love of God, we can overcome evil with good. We can conquer pandemics, plagues, and other disasters.
When our neighbor is hit by tragedy, the occasion is not to point a finger of blame. It’s a call on our compassion to come to their aid with love that helps and heals.
God never causes bad things to happen. God causes only good things to occur.
God is Love!
Thank you
This is good! Thank you.
Thank you❣️This has always been my understanding and I am so very grateful to know it is the truth.
If God is love, what can he punish us with? LOVE
Evan: Thank you for being a Rock!
Thank you for your obedience
to divine Principle, Love, Mind, Truth!
Thank you for being God’s idea, man!
Thank you for your continual reminders
that we all are, too!
Thank You, God, for giving us Evan!
Thank you so much for today’s timely and excellent message. It just occurred to me to look at the list of upcoming Bible Lesson Subjects, and the order made me smile: The last week of May is “Ancient and Modern Necromancy, alias Mesmerism and Hypnotism, Denounced” … then in June, “God the Only Cause and Creator”, followed by “God the Preserver of Man”. Of course!
Yesss, thank you God, you have given us Evan. For what i am very grateful, as well!
And I am grateful, we all are God’s loved and inspired ideas, who can pray to be obedient to God.
Relating to today’s toppic I remember an incident in the Bible with the blind man, being blind from birth on. The people thought that the parents have sinned which God punished. But Jesus said, that neither the blind nor his parents have sinned, rather this is to glorify God, and immediately Jesus healed the blind so that he could see clearly. Through Jesus’ healings he always glorified God. So with each healing we accomplish and with each error we are overcoming we glorify God and witness of God’s omnipotence and everpresence!
Thank you Evan for your lovely presents of comfort and healing inspirations you give us daily!
Uta, I was thinking of the same story as I read Evan’s explanation. In reality, there is no sin, no disease, no death. So that only leaves glorifying God,
Thank you Uta for including a Bible account that supports Evan’s timely and needed blog. Nicely put.(=
Thank you for addressing this belief of God punishing man with disease as old theology, outdated, and without any validity. God loves His creation and tenderly cares for it. Annette’s comment about the subjects in this month’s Bible lessons reminds me: I jumped ahead to read the May 31st lesson because of a friend’s suggestion, and just want to say: it is a POWERFUL healing lesson for the pandemic. Disease is “utterly cut off” ( Nahum ,Golden Text) by the understanding of God’s ever presence and all power. Blessings on your day, everyone.
Thank you Grace for passing on the suggestion to read the May 31 Bible Lesson. Looking forward to reading it. (=
Evan,
When you give us a truth to work with, I enjoy reading articles in the Sentinel and Journal to learn more and then share the article. Thank you again for a wonderful thought to start the day with! 🙂
“Understood spiritually” by Mary H Mc Aloney
https://sentinel.christianscience.com/shared/view/1xpc4zz7zda?s=e
Thank you, Kirsten, for sharing the article. How punctuation changes the meaning!
And not just punctuation because Evan is showing us the inspired word of the Bible. Imagine reading the Bible and thinking God punished people and how that would make one feel, especially during a pandemic or if working with a personal challenge. 🙁 How wonderful to know that God loves us all and to interpret life based on Love instead of fear, hate, punishment, etc. How freeing! How wonderful to even start to understand how loved we all are! 🙂
I was thinking how sometimes error can ‘gather steam’ and how something like this is not from God but rather error self destructing. God is as always, world without end
Thank you Evan. And thank you for posing that article Kirsten. For me this is about understanding that is in our weekly bible lesson, God is not both good and evil. God is not the polar opposite of a continuum between a Satan at one end and Himself at the other and we being some place in between these polar opposite. That thought would reduce God to the level of the polar opposite and would rob us of the true spiritual meaning of grace in divine principle.
Very good !
Thank you, and all.
I love the image Evan has used of our earth as a heart, radiating light
Thank you Evan for your daily inspirations! God is Good…Always! There is nothing that can enter into our thought or the world’s thought that is not good. We must be persistent in knowing who we are as the perfect children of God…Always!
GOD IS LOVE. From this it so naturally follows that the only thing we can receive from God is Love. The nature of God is to love us and free us from suffering and never to bring any calamity upon His children.
Let’s understand God and His love for us. This understanding will enable us to overcome all fears and overthrow the pandemic, which will disappear into its native nothingness.
Thanks Evan for this understanding.
I am so grateful for SpiritView and its dear author, Evan! Thank you so much for sharing your absolute clarity! Also want to thank the people who comment, one and all, SpiritViewers.
With love to all.
Thank you for addressing this false belief. I have been thinking about it and how to talk to people about it when it comes up.
So have I. Thank you, all!
I understand that God never meant for any of His children to suffer from any disease or sickness or pandemic of any sort. Remember, Jesus told the cripple guy “rise up and walk” and basically repeated that same instruction to Lazarus. His message is found throughout the gospels, through the messages of his disciples and followers. Please stay safe. This pandemic will pass.
Dear John, all are truly safe in the everlasting arms of Love. The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. Right here. Right now.
Some books in the Old Testament imply that God
Sent calamities to punish people for their sins. Jesus
Destroyed this error of belief .God’s ever present goodness
Still must be demonstrated and Evans clear recognition
that God never created evil of any kind certainly clarifies
The fact of being . John 1. Days NOW are we the children
of God …….. to recognize this is our only true experience and
blessing. Thanks Evan for your clear understanding!
Thank you, Evan, and all.
Thank you!
Wonderful blog Evan. Love the “heart” photo on top. You certainly come up with the most fitting photos for all your topics. Lots of love put into making each selection. Thank you all for your comments.
Evan
Although my girlfriend and I are of different faith mostly because of church doctrine, we both believe in the same God. She emails me the Spirit view frequently which I enjoy reading. However, I definitely disagree with you on this one article. In the book of 1 Kings chapter 9 verses 1-9 The Lord actually speaks to King Solomon. Even in the time of Moses when taking his people out of Egypt and the promise land issue, God spoke to him and allowed the disobedient followers to die off and allowed the new generation to enter the promise land. I guess this could be considered “old theology” but it is also truth.
Hi Tom,
Yes, the Old Testament does make statements like you mention. It also speaks of a “God of wrath.” If one were to literally interpret the Bible, there are many contradictions. But I have found it helpful to looker deeper, into the spiritual evolution of thought found in the Scriptures.
The Old Testament writers interpreted events from their understanding of God at that time. And at that time, many of the believers believed in a “God of wrath,” so they attributed the plagues, etc., to God. But Jesus came along later and taught a higher concept of God, as a God of Love. And as recorded in the New Testament, believers were to follow the teachings of Jesus Christ, and see them as superseding what had been taught by the old-time prophets. And today, Christian Science does the same, teaching one to worship a God of Love that wills only love for all of creation.
That is what I believe as well and thank you for stating it so clearly for others to understand. It really shows the importance of recognizing Jesus and how he demonstated LOVE!