I answered that question. When someone asks a question when they are apparently not interested in an answer then we call that a “rhetorical question.” It means the question is asked for the sake of rhetoric alone – in this case to make all about what God can do rather than what God actually does do. God CAN do a lot of things which He does not do. God can strike you dead by lightning right this minute, but that does not mean He will do so. Not everyone is so obsessed with power and control that they will grasp for any power they can get their hands on – indeed this is typically the behavior of those who feel they have less power and control over things.
Whether He controls it 24/7 I can’t say but when you say His miraculous use of the weather for blessing or judgment you need to realize that blessings and judgments can last for a very long time. With Joseph it was 14 years, Elijah it was 3 ½ years and if Israel would have stayed faithful indefinitely He would have blessed them in the same manner.
As usual my issue is with people who turn the accounts of God’s interaction with man into ANE thought, customs or ect. By saying He does not control the weather or only once in a millennium, is declaring what He said in the scripture is a lie or is made up by man. It takes away the glory that belongs to Him.
When Elijah commanded the rain to stop it covered a very large area and affected multitudes of people for 3 ½ years. This increases my trust in God to see how he answered Elijah’s prayer. Not a one moment, one location miracle but the continuous workings of our Sovereign Lord of all creation. Doesn’t that just boost your faith? Meditate on that, let it sink in. Read the other scripture references if you haven’t. Don’t try to defend yourself or prove me wrong, just read the scriptures and let them overwhelm you. God has always been intimately involved with His creation from, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” to this very moment. If He is not, then what good is trusting Him and presenting our request to Him. Many requests that we make of Him will involve Him being intimately involved within us and with others and with His creation.
James 5:16- The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective. 7 Elijah was a man just like us. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. 18 Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops.
Wouldn’t you get in trouble in the secular workplace by giving Christians preferential treatment and not hiring, say, Jews?
Another problem I’m seeing with God as the weather god is that climate change is causing extreme weather-- more intense and dangerous hurricanes, floods, etc. Shouldn’t we be working to stop climate change, or is that God dialing everything up?
In this present time, God does not get the glory He deserves. I answered according to what is righteous and true and the way it should be. It would be proper for all of humanity to give glory to God all the days of their lives.
Those of use who love Jesus are just sojourners in this life. This is not my true home. I’m looking for a city who’s builder and maker is God.
I was crucified with Christ and risen with Him so my citizenship is not of this world.
I have no idea or conviction if the climate is changing any more than other times in mankind’s history and if it is, I don’t know if it’s because of what mankind is doing. If you truly believe it is and it’s your fault than you should follow your conviction and do everything you can to help stop it. I have no problem with that.
I do know that it won’t be humanity that destroys this planet, it will be God.
2 Peter 3:3 First of all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. 4 They will say, “Where is this ‘coming’ he promised? Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.” 5 But they deliberately forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens existed and the earth was formed out of water and by water. 6 By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. 7 By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. 8 But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. 9 The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. 10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare. 11 Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives 12 as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat. 13 But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness.
I may have missed a portion of the point you were expressing. When you said, “Another problem I’m seeing with God as the weather god”. Are you saying that the fact that God controlled the weather in the situations with Joseph or Elijah or other times He said He did, is a problem for you? If so, why is it? If your not, then I may have taken away more from that statement then you meant.
Do you have a problem with the fact that God declared He controlled the weather at different times in history?
Your prayer is answered. We have. He has. We have taken off the fundamentalist, textist, literalist, irrational, ignorant, dark, cracked, scratched glasses of a carnal mind and can see God as He is. May you receive the blessing you seek for others.
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Martin, Do you have an issue with the fact that God specifically controlled the weather in both Joseph’s or Elijah’s situation or in reference to the quote below? I bring these up specifically because they are situations where it is obvious the scripture says He did. I am trying to differentiate between your belief about those and the opposition you may have towards my general views on God or scripture in general.
Christians here have probably largely signed on with thinking God is in charge of (controls) the weather. I think what many of us are trying so hard to tease out of you is: do you think that natural descriptions of weather processes can also be accurate, useful, and even ‘complete’ as far as they go in describing why weather does what it does? … more specifically, are you able to see that these ‘natural’ descriptions of weather can coexist with (and in no way be contradictory to) the assertion that God sends it?
Any time we get whiffs of “either / or” thinking around here, the red flags go up - and you’ve been surrounded by a palpable aroma of that kind of thinking. Hence our curiosity to test our olfactory accuracy here. 
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Thanks for the response Martin. Reading gother posts you have made caused me to wonder if you believed the patriarchs and prophets were real people. So just to clarify, do you believe they were real people and are the scriptures speaking historical facts about them? I’m trying to understand some peoples beliefs.
Good post Mervin. I’ll get back when I’m not working. Hard to post on a phone. Thanks.
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Enjoying the conversation. Just wondering, is some of our division of God’s control of weather a modernist artifact? We tend to divide things into natural and supernatural categories, whereas ancient people held that God controlled it all. When there was drought, it was always brought about by God, not El Niño. How does that work into how control of weather is written about in the OT? In the NT, I think Jesus calming the storm is an illustration of his deity in the same respect.
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More thoroughly spelling out the questions might help here. The Bible portrays God as sovereign over all that happens, including the weather. But it also makes it clear that ordinary patterns of natural laws apply in the vast majority of situations. This also connects to the predestination-free will spectrum.
I agree. But when the human author wrote of seven years of plenty and seven years of famine, even though explained in modern terns as a natural weather cycle, would he have not said “God will send…”. It is difficult to discern whether it was God’s expressed desire that there be a famine vs, God’s permissive will that it would happen as a result of natural weather patterns, and through it he would use Joseph’s circumstances to preserve his family.
By the way, I had to google paleomalacology. So good to have your input! My confirmation of an old earth as a teenager growing up on a farm near Lubbock was the wonder at seeing mollusk shells pumped up from about 400 ft down in the Ogallala formation when we drilled an irrigation well. Still have them, in fact:
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And this is a good example of one of my main points in this thread. The scripture is clear it is God who has planed it and will execute it and you wonder about the human author and natural weather patterns.
Why the wondering or questioning? God gave Joseph the interpretation. God said He will do it soon. God will execute His sovereign will and control nature to do His bidding. This is an either or situation. Either God personally did it as He had firmly decided or He didn’t. It’s either Thus Sayith the Lord or not.
So, how do you apply that to weather today? Does God personally direct where hurricanes hit?
My point is that God is doing it whether through predictable weather patterns or outside of what we consider natural law, and the wording would be the same to the original author. Do you believe God works through established rules of nature or do you feel he is limited to intrusions in the natural order of things? Is there a need for such a separation?
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