Why does God allow natural disasters, i.e. earthquakes, hurricanes, and tsunamis?

"It is man who is of course responsible for the blight of sin upon creation — thus man, to have glory, must first be the subject of grace. But the creation did not of its own accord — 'not willingly' — 'become subject to vanity': it was not a moral question, as with man, but because of man's sin all creation has suffered; it is 'by reason of' man, 'who has subjected it.'"

"The creature is in the state of misery and corruption which results from the fall, and will be so until the sons of God are manifested in bodies of glory."

"It was not by the will of the creature that it became subject to vanity, but through the folly of man."

"Those who reject the fall impute all the misery of a groaning creation to natural causes, and, in their folly, imagine they can remove the misery by their own efforts. We know that from the fall until now the creation groans and travails in pain, and will do so, until the manifestation of the sons of God."

"The whole earthly creation lies under thralldom. The usurper still holds sway; the ravages of sin and death continue. Its decayed estate did not come upon it by some act of its own, or by some weakness or evil inherent in matter, as some would teach; but by reason of Adam's will exercised in defiance of God. Adam was its constituted head, its intelligent link with the Creator. Just as the snapping of the first, or top link of a chain involves every link in its fall, so the fall of Adam brought about the fall of all creation."

"Nor does the Lord, to Whom all belongs below as on high, need the apology of man to justify His permission, any more than for the sickness and death, the plague and the famine, the tempest and the earthquake, which He employs providentially in this fallen world. To what purposes of grace does He not turn every one of these inflictions for such as hear His word."

"Men are apt to dwell on shocking events, and to measure the guilt of the victims accordingly. ... But our Lord in answer corrects their own thought of exceptional guilt in that case, and solemnly warns them that, except they repented, they should all perish in the same way. Nay more, He points to the eighteen men, not slain by an unfeeling and truculent Roman, on whom the tower of Siloam fell. Yet were they debtors beyond all the men in Jerusalem? On the contrary He repeats, 'Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.' This is God's voice to sinful man in the present disorder of the world. Man is no competent judge of the tangled scene; but he is loudly called through such events to judge himself before God, in short to repent."

"For what is any judgment in providence compared with the everlasting judgment of God?"

"As to why God, knowing all that would ultimately be involved, ever created Satan or man, and why He permitted evil to ever invade any part of His fair creation, Scripture is silent, and we know nothing."

"After all, these are matters which lie beyond the reach of finite minds. Is it likely that God would reveal to us such secrets of His high and eternal counsels as must lie on the plane of infinity? If He did, should we be any the wiser? No! It is well for us to call a halt here and say with the Psalmist, 'Such knowledge is too wonderful for me: it is high, I cannot attain to it' (Ps. 139:6)."

"But we do know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to purpose. Is this the wholehearted expression of our souls? Every Christian certainly agrees with the truth here, but how many Christians enjoy it as a real, practical power over the soul, and therefore rest fully in the unceasingly operative love of God toward us?"

"We are passing through a world from which Christ has been rejected — a world of vanity, sin and sorrow. The effect of knowing God as our Father, and the blessedness of the scene of glory to which we are going, only gives us a deeper sense of the sorrows and miseries of the world we are passing through. But the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glories that are coming. The sufferings are passing, the glories are eternal."

"Creation has been subjected to vanity. The cause of this subjection is to be found not in that which is thus suffering, but in him upon whom the creation was made dependent as its appointed head. Adam's sin ruined the creature. But this is not a hopeless ruin. Glory and blessing were the intent of Divine counsel in framing the worlds by the Word of God. If the first man's sin has wrapped the creature in the shroud of vanity and death, the power of redemption, in the person of the second man shall, in due time, turn the shadows of death into the morning-light of a cloudless day of blessing and of joy."

"When the children of God step into their glory, then into the liberty of that glory the whole creation will step with them. Then there will be the proclamation of 'liberty throughout all the land to all the inhabitants thereof.' Then will the forfeited land be redeemed. ... It will be the true and final year of Jubilee."

"By His death He glorified God about the whole question of sin, going beyond the fall and need of man, and reaching out to the whole creation, laying the basis for its redemption and deliverance from the bondage of corruption, and putting it finally beyond the reach of the defilement of sin in the power of the Holy Ghost."