Who is to blame for the Central Texas floods?

Last Friday morning, several storm cells merged and then stalled over Kerr County in Central Texas. As a result, an entire summer’s worth of rain fell in some areas—a one-in-one-hundred-year rainfall event for the region. The Guadalupe River, which runs alongside several summer camps, rose from about three feet to thirty feet.

A flash flood emergency was issued at 4:03 a.m., but the darkness of the night made it difficult to see rising water levels. Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly said the area floods frequently, but officials “had no reason to believe that this was going to be anything like what’s happened here. None whatsoever.”

Nonetheless, critics are implicating the Trump administration, Texas state officials, local officials, and the National Weather Service in the disaster. 

Three reasons we assign blame after tragedies

When tragedy strikes, it is never long before people begin looking for someone to blame. Why is this?

One positive reason is to prevent future tragedies. If storm detection technology and early warning systems can be improved, lives might be saved when future floods strike. Obviously, we should always strive to get better at protecting ourselves from natural disasters.

A second element is that politics are now a constant factor in nearly every dimension of American society. Many in our post-Christian culture have replaced consensual morality with political “solutions” they advocate through partisan tribalism. If floods strike in “red” states or wildfires in “blue” states, we can expect partisan politicians and media to leverage them for political purposes.

A third factor is our innate desire to control the future. If we convince ourselves that people could have prevented the July 4 floods, we can convince ourselves that people can prevent future floods. I have known parents who lost children and blamed themselves for years to come. Their reaction is not just grief—if they admit that they could not have prevented their child’s death, they are tacitly admitting that they cannot prevent the deaths of their other children.

Religion is often used for this purpose. The many altars I have seen in Ephesus and Athens attest to the transactional religion of their culture—sacrifice to the god of war so he will protect you in battle, and so on.

Christians are by no means immune. When our oldest son was diagnosed with cancer, I was surprised at the subliminal anger I felt toward the Lord. I had prayed for my son’s welfare from the moment we knew he had been conceived. My theology taught me that such prayers are no guarantee, that “in the world you will have tribulation” (John 16:33). Nonetheless, I realized that I had felt I had done my part for my son, but God had not done his.

“The way to pay for the priceless”

In the face of an unpredictable and uncontrollable future, we have three options.

One obvious response is to double down on ourselves, to try even harder to exert more control over our lives and world.

In my latest website article, I note David Brooks’s argument that we need an “education in morals” that “involves the formation of the heart and the will as much as the formation of the rational mind.” His appeal is commendable, but I responded in the words of the famed psychiatrist Karl Menninger: Whatever became of sin? Fallen humans cannot transform human hearts, which is why the gospel is so vital to our flourishing. Nor can education control the future, which is why we must trust our omniscient and omnipotent Father.

A second response is to abandon hope, choosing nihilism and chaotic existentialism in its place. However, as researchers continue to demonstrate, hope is crucial for mental health, resilience, and meaningful lives.

This is why our best way to face a perilous future is to work as God works. When we submit to his empowering and follow his leading (Ephesians 5:18), we join him as he advances his providential kingdom in our fallen world.

• When the priests stepped into the flooded Jordan river, its waters “were completely cut off” and the entire nation crossed over into their Promised Land (Joshua 3:14–16).
• David testified, “I pursued my enemies and overtook them” because God “equipped me with strength for the battle” (Psalm 18:37, 39).
• Paul could say of himself, “With toil and labor we worked night and day” (2 Thessalonians 3:8), but he knew that he worked “with all [God’s] energy that he powerfully works within me” (Colossians 1:29).

In each case, as they worked, God worked.

Our best response to our Father’s grace is to pay it forward. As G. K. Chesterton noted, “The way to pay for the priceless is to live lives worthy of the gift.” Then God anoints those he appoints and equips those he calls. As Martin Luther observed, “Good works do not make a good man, but a good man does good works.”

“The one purpose worth living for”

Ask God how he wants you to join him in responding to suffering in the present and fears for the future. With regard to the Central Texas floods, be especially mindful of people you know who have previously lost children. As my wife wrote in her blog yesterday, they are reliving their tragedy once again in these tragic days.

And remember that our ultimate purpose in life is not to be happy or healthy, but to experience personally the God who made us. Brother David Vryhof of the Society of St. John the Evangelist in Boston is right:

“The one purpose worth living for is the end for which we were created, namely, to know God, to love God, and to serve God.”

To this “end,” let’s close with a reflection by Frederick Buechner that speaks honestly to our questions and pain but then offers a word of transcendent hope. Preaching at the 200th anniversary of the Congregational Church in Rupert, Vermont, Buechner quoted Psalm 23 and commented:

“I shall not want,” the psalm says. Is that true? There are lots of things we go on wanting, go on lacking, whether we believe in God or not. They are not just material things like a new roof or a better paying job, but things like good health, things like happiness for our children, things like being understood and appreciated, like relief from pain, like some measure of inner peace not just for ourselves but for the people we love and for whom we pray.

Believers and unbelievers alike go on wanting our whole lives through. We long for what never seems to come. We pray for what never seems to be clearly given.

But when the psalm says “I shall not want,” maybe it is speaking the utter truth anyhow. Maybe it means that if we keep our eyes open, if we keep our hearts and lives open, we will at least never be in want of the one thing we want more than anything else. Maybe it means that whatever else is withheld, the shepherd never withholds himself, and he is what we want more than anything else.

What—or whom—do you “want more than anything else” today?

Quote for the day:

“The depths of our misery can never fall below the depths of mercy.” —Richard Sibbes (1577–1635)

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