There have been other earthquakes. One in Tangshan, China, in 1976 killed over half a million people. On 26 December 2003, a devastating quake in Bam, Iran, killed some 26,000. There have been more destructive events - it is estimated that three million people have died in the war in the Congo. Where is God in all this, and how do we respond?
On All Saints' Day, 1 November 1755, a massive earthquake and tidal wave destroyed much of Lisbon. It was the middle of the Age of Enlightenment, after Leibniz had proposed his theories - that the world was rational and harmonious, a reflection of God its Creator, the best possible product of God's creative genius.
Voltaire, in Geneva when news of the Lisbon earthquake came in, is said to have thrown aside his copy of Leibniz at hearing of the event, and in his tale Candide, written shortly afterwards, ridiculed the idea that "all was for the best in the best of all possible worlds." And the young Goethe reflected that God, by destroying the just along with the unjust, had "in no sense acted in a fatherly way."
But before the Enlightenment, nobody would have seen the issue in this light. The last verse of Genesis 1 recounts how "everything God had made was very good." Yet only since the Enlightenment have people tried to paint a picture of a morally "good" world, and only since the Enlightenment have other people rejected this picture (and, sadly, often rejected God as well) with the realization that not all things are bright and beautiful, not all things are wise and wonderful. But God is Lord not just of the sunlit beach, but of the tsunami as well.
For the writers of the Bible, God is in control of everything, of parching drought, of refreshing showers, of beating hail, of destructive floods. When the Psalms complain that the righteous are suffering, it is not because of natural disasters. It is because of the actions of the unrighteous. And God's power, although Jesus can still the waves with a word, is shown more clearly in saving the righteous from the unrighteous. (Indeed, God's greatest act of power, saving the unrighteous from themselves, through the Cross, looks to us almost a sign of weakness.)
The Bible has a response to the question of where God is in this. It is the response of Job 42:2-6. God is there. God is always there.
For in the natural world, growth and life inevitably entail decay and death. The Earth's fragile crust inevitably yields to tectonic forces. But God is there in all of this. God knows our suffering. Tsunamis, earthquakes, floods cause pain and grief, but they are not evil. War and exploitation are evil, but God is with all who suffer, from natural disaster or from the wickedness of humanity.
What can we do? Unlike Bam, or Tangshan, or Darfur, the tsunami has touched people's hearts, as did (for the British) the landslide at Aberfan, or the death of the Princess of Wales. Unlike these last two, here we can all help those who still suffer, who have lost loved ones, livelihood or home.
But even more, we can be led to think more deeply about the long-term answer to suffering, to natural disaster, to famine. Many of the countries affected are not rich, and lack the infrastructure to handle the aid which we give. There are no easy answers, and God is not going to swoop down and provide a solution. As in the past, God wants to work through us, as God's partners, in seeing the suffering of God's children (young and old!), and in standing beside them in their need.
HD