“THE
FINGER OF GOD”
IN JUDGMENT
During
the winter of 2013/14 and especially just after Christmas, the
While most observers attributed the flooding to climate
change, David Silvester,
a UKIP councillor in
But what are we to make of the argument put forward by Mr Silvester and others?
Are we justified in seeing the hand of God at work in natural disasters,
or are we called upon to focus instead on showing sympathy to those who are
suffering? In a sense, we can do
both, but we must be very careful in how we approach the whole issue. Firstly, practical help needs to be
given to those who are affected by natural or other disasters, and Christians have a responsibility to be good
witnesses by showing compassion and offering assistance.
When we come to consider the vexed issue of the possibility of
God sending judgement through natural disasters, we are in controversial
territory - especially in today’s secular world - and, as in other areas
of Christian witness, it is all too easy to come across as harsh, uncaring and,
indeed, judgmental. However, while
we approach the matter with caution, it
does seem clear from Scripture and history that God can and sometimes does send
judgement upon individuals, societies and nations who rebel against His Word
and His laws. In the Old
Testament, His chosen people of
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[PART 2]
Foot and Mouth Crisis
[Preached at the outbreak in 1865 by J. C. Ryle, M. A.]
Look at the
words which form the title of this booklet, and consider them well. They were spoken by heathen men more
than three thousand years ago. They fell from the lips of Egyptian magicians
when one of the famous plagues came on the
There is an evil among us that demands our serious
attention. It forces itself on our
notice, whether we like it or not.
It has seized the nation by the throat, and will have a hearing. That evil is THE FOOT AND MOUTH EPIDEMIC.
It is a heavy calamity.
Myriads of cattle have already died. Myriads more seem likely to die. The loss of national wealth,
and the injury of private interests are something fearful to contemplate. It is as bad as if gold and silver were
snatched from us and thrown into the sea.
A vast amount of property is clean gone and cannot be restored.
It is a wide spread calamity. There is hardly a county in
It is a perplexing calamity. No medicines, or remedies, or modes of
treatment, appear to have any effect on the disease. After all the discoveries of science,
after all that has been written by learned doctors, the skill of man is
completely baffled. Even our
statesmen and rulers seem at their wits’ end. With all the accumulated wisdom of the
nineteenth century, we have found a foe that entirely beats us. The curse of helplessness seems upon the
land.
Now I wish to speak of the cattle plague as a minister of
Christ. I wish to draw attention to
one or two things which, amidst the anxieties of the crisis now upon us, appear
likely to be forgotten. Let members of Parliament view the cattle
plague from the political side. Let
physicians and men of science
propound their theories of prevention and cure. I find no fault with either one or the
other. I only ask leave to offer a
few thoughts on the whole subject as a
believer of the Bible, and as a Christian.
1. Let us consider, in the first place, whence
does the cattle plague come?
I answer, unhesitatingly, that it comes from God. He
who orders all things in heaven and earth,- He by
whose wise providence everything is directed, and without whom nothing can
happen,- He it is who has sent this scourge upon us. It is the finger of God. I shall not spend
time in proving this point. I refer
any one who asks for proof to the whole tenor of God’s Word. I ask him to mark how God is always spoken of as the governor and manager of all things here
below, from the very least to the greatest. Who sent the flood on the world in the days of Noah? It
was God. (Genesis 6 v 17) Who sent the famine in the days of Joseph? It
was God. (Genesis 41 v 25)
Who sent the plague on
I count it mere waste of time to dwell much on this
point. I cannot understand how any one can be called a believer of the Bible
who denies God’s providence over this world. For my own part, I believe thoroughly
that God is not changed. I believe that He is governing all things on earth as much now as He was in the Old
Testament days. I believe that wars, famines, pestilences, [floods, earthquakes, snow storms], cattle plagues, are all His instruments for carrying on the government of this world.
And therefore when I see a scourge like the cattle plague - [or any
of the afore mentioned] - I have no doubt whatever as to the
hand that sends it. “Shall there be evil
in a city,
and the Lord hath not done it?” (Amos 3 v 9)
It is the finger of God.
Can any one give a better account of the cattle plague? If he can, let him speak out like a man,
and tell us why it has come. To say
that it originated in another land, that it is not a new but an old disease, that it has done great harm in days gone by, - all
this is evading the question. I ask
to be told why it has come upon us now ? How and in what way can the outbreak
be accounted for at this particular
period? What possible causes
can be assigned for it that have not existed for hundreds of years? I believe these questions cannot be
answered. I believe that the only
cause that we must come to as last is, the finger of God.
Does any one regard my assertion as absurd and
unreasonable? I have no doubt that
many do so. Many, I suspect, think
that God never interferes with the affairs of this world, and that pestilences
and cattle plagues are only the result of certain natural laws which are always
producing certain effects. I pity
the man who thinks so. Is he an
atheist? Does he believe that this
wonderfully designed world came together by chance, and had no Creator? If so, he is a very credulous
person. But if he does believe that
God made the world, where, I ask, is the
absurdity of believing that God governs the world?
If he allows that God framed
the universe, why not allow that God manages
it? Away with this modem
scepticism! It is offensive and
revolting to common sense. They are
not to be heard who would shut out the Creator from His own creation. He who made the world at the beginning by the finger of creating wisdom,
will never cease to govern the world by the finger of His providence, until
Christ comes again. This
cattle plague is the finger of God.
Does any one pretend to say that God is too loving to send us
such a scourge as this, and that it is wrong to suppose that anything evil can
come from Him? I pity the man who
can argue in that way - Has he children?
Does he never correct them? If a wise and sensible man, I have no
doubt that he does.- But does he hate them because he
chastises them? Does he not show
the highest love by checking them when they do wrong? And shall not our Father in heaven do
the same? Yes: indeed! God does not hate us: He is a God of
mercy and love, and therefore He keeps up His providential government of
mankind. There is love even in this
fell scourge which is now upon us.
The cattle plague is the finger of a wise and loving God.
2. Let us consider, in the second
place, why has the cattle plague come upon us?
I answer that question without hesitation. It has come upon us because of
our national sins. God has a controversy with
The sins of individual men and women are often not reckoned
for while they live; but this is because there is a judgment day yet to come. In that day “every
one of us shall give account of himself to God.” (Romans
14 v 12) For
nations there can be no future judgment day. The
sins of nations are reckoned for in time.
Special sins and corruptions in a nation call for special
chastisements. I believe that this
cattle plague is a special national chastisement on
The teaching of the Bible on this
point is to my mind plain, distinct, and unmistakable.
Let any one who doubts it read
what God says about
Does any one ask what the special national sins of
(1) The first national sin I will name is covetousness. The excessive love of money, and the desire to be rich in this world, are
what I mean. Never, surely, was there such a race for
riches as at the present day. To
make money and die rich seems to be thought the highest virtue, and the
greatest wisdom. Yet God has said “Covetousness is idolatry,” and “The love of money is the root of
all evil.” (Colossians 3 v 5: 1 Timothy 6 v 10)
(2) The second national sin I will name is luxury and love of pleasure.
Never, surely,
was there a time when people ran so
greedily after excitement, amusement, and gratification of their senses. The many are “lovers of pleasure more than lovers of
God.” (2 Timothy 3 v 4) (3) The
third national sin I will name is neglect of the Lord’s
day.
That blessed
day is rapidly becoming in many quarters the day for visiting and pleasure, and
not the day of God. Yet Sabbath-desecration was specially one of
the sins which brought down God’s judgments on the Jews: “My sabbaths they
greatly polluted.” (Ezekiel 20 v 13: Nehemiah 13 v 18)
(4) The fourth national sin I will name is drunkenness.
The quantity
of intoxicating drink needlessly consumed every year in
[* Note.
Those Bible teachers, who are of the opinion that these words refer to
“eternal
life,” “eternal salvation,”
or a Kingdom in Heaven
- as a bodiless spirit, before our Lord’s return to this earth and the
time of Resurrection (1 Thess.
4: 16); -
or any other mode of interpretation or spiritualizing process, which denies
Messiah’s rule for “a thousand years” upon this earth;
or by suggesting “the kingdom of God”
as nothing more than Christ ruling in the hearts of His redeemed people! - should
take a closer look at the context in which they are set; and the description of
the people being addressed by the inspired Apostle – those “that are within!” the Church - not those “without” (1 Cor. 5: 12)!]
(5) The fifth national sin I will name is contempt of the seventh commandment. In town and in country among rich and among poor, the tone of
feeling about purity among the young, is at the lowest
ebb. Yet God has said, “Let no man
deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God.”
(Ephesians 5
v 6)
(6) The sixth national sin I will name is a growing tendency
to look favourably on [false doctrines, within both the Protestant and] the Roman Catholic Church. The very Church which burned our martyrs three hundred years
ago, withheld the Bible from our people, trampled on our liberties, and to this
very day puts the Virgin Mary practically in the place of Christ, is favoured
and trifled with by thousands! A
judicial blindness seems coming over us. The line between toleration and favour
appears clean blotted out. The
great desire of many is to “go
back to
(7) The last national sin I will name is the growing
disposition to scepticism and infidelity. Little by little, men in high places are ceasing to honour
God. Year after year the Bible is
more openly impugned, and its authority impaired. To believe the Bible was once a mark of
a Christian. In the present day an
English divine dares to call himself a Christian, and yet boasts that he thinks
much of the Bible is not true. Nothing, I am thoroughly persuaded, is so
offensive to God as to dishonour His written Word.
I believe firmly that these things are crying to God against
To say that we are not so bad as some
nations, and that the sins I have named are far more abundant in other
countries than in
I might easily enlarge on the points that I have
mentioned. I purposely abstain from
doing so. I am anxious to make this
booklet as short as possible. To effect this, I content myself with supplying little more
than seeds of thought, which I hope may spring up and bear fruit in many
minds. It only remains to offer a
few practical conclusions.
3. What does the cattle plague summon every one to do?
In answering that question, the reader will distinctly
understand that I only write as a Christian minister. Let politicians make the best laws they
can to meet the present emergency.
Let medical men use every possible means to arrest the disease, and
patiently try every remedy. Let
practical agriculturists neglect nothing that may be available to prevent
contagion, to diminish liability to infection, and to “stamp out” the plague when it arises. But my standpoint is that of the
Bible. In the light of that book I
raise my concluding question. What
shall we all do?
For one thing, let us all consider our ways. It is an age of hurry, bustle, restlessness, and fast living.
Railways and telegraphs keep everyone in a state of unhealthy excitement. Now surely it would be well, when the
hand of God is stretched out against us, if we were all to sit down and think a
little. Are we not all over
For another thing, let us all humble ourselves before God, and acknowledge His hand. Alas, we are a proud, self-conceited
nation! We are too apt to think
that we English people are the wisest, and greatest, and richest, and bravest
people in the world. We are sadly blind to our many faults and
sins. Surely when God’s
hand is so plainly stretched out against us, it is high time to give up this boastful spirit. If there is anything that God hates, it is pride. It is written, “Pride do I hate.” “Pride goeth before destruction.”-
“I am
against thee, 0 thou most proud.” –
“This was
the iniquity of Sodom, pride and fullness of bread, and abundance of idleness.”
- “Those
that walk in pride He is able to abase.” – “He that exalteth
himself shall be abased, and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.”
(Proverbs 8
v 13; 16 v 18; Jeremiah 1 v 31; Ezekiel 16 v 49; Daniel 4 v 37;
Matthew 23 v
12)
For another thing, let us each individual endeavour to
break off our own besetting sins, and to amend our ways.
It is easy work to find fault with Government, and to
blame others when we are in trouble. The better course is to look within at
ourselves, and try to do our own part to make things better. The
sins of a nation are made up of the sins of a great number of individuals. Now, if every individual tries to amend
his own life, and to do better, the whole nation will soon improve. The city is soon clean when every man
sweeps opposite his own door.
For another thing, let us each use any influence we have to check sin in others. The power that parents, masters,
mistresses, and employers have in this respect is very great. If all such would exert themselves to
check Sabbath-breaking, excess of dress, idleness, drunkenness, and breaches of
the seventh commandment, it would be an immense gain to the general condition
of the nation. Influence over
others, we must never forget, is a talent for which we must one day give
account. There are thousands of
parents and employers, I fear, who completely bury this talent in the
ground. They allow those under them
to run into sin, and, like Eli,
never reprove them. It is written, “His sons made themselves vile, and he restrained
them not.” (1 Samuel 3 v 13)
For another thing, let us each lay ourselves out more heartily to do come good in the world. It is a melancholy fact, that the
increase of alms-giving in
Last of all, but not least, let us each resolve to offer special prayer to God for the removal of the [spiritual blindness
and] judgment now upon us. Whatever else we do, let us pray. The Word of God encourages us to
it. “In everything by prayer
and supplication let your requests be made known to God.” “Is any
afflicted, let him pray.” – “If I send pestilence among my people;
if my people, which are
called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and
will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.” (Philipians 4 v 6;
James 5 v 13;
2 Chronicles
7 v 13, 14) The presence of
our Lord Jesus Christ in heaven at God’s right hand invites us to it. He
that died for sinners on the cross is sitting there to be the sinners’
Advocate and Friend. He can be
touched with the feeling of our infirmities, and knows the trials of our
earthly condition. - The examples
of Scripture warrant us. The men of
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