China's Agony

In March last year, under the heading Guatemala - Why?, we commented on the disastrous earthquake which occurred in that region and the trail of devastation and death it left. The dimensions of the catastrophe were appalling indeed, but by all reports the earth tremors which rocked the Chinese city of Tangshan on July 28 were even more severe. Tangshan, with its population of over a million, lies about 100 miles east of Peking.

Official information on the disaster has been minimal. The full toll in lives and damage may never be revealed. In keeping with Chinese government policy such events are not unduly publicized, and outside offers of help have been refused because the Chinese suspiciously regard them as interference. Gradually, however, eye-witness accounts by foreign travellers filter through the security screen.

Estimates of the loss of life in the Tangshan region vary from tens to scores of thousands. Following the initial disaster further earth tremors were forecast by seismologists and on government advice seven million Peking residents left their homes and at this date (Aug.11) are still camping out on earthquake watch. Apparently the populace remained serenely calm; there was no panic.

Relief measures on the massive scale characteristic of Chinese planning and thoroughness were quickly under way. The magnitude and complexity of the task facing the relief force appears at this distance insuperable. According to one foreign eye-witness an entire hospital and a crowded train disappeared when the ground opened beneath them. Torrential rain is now an added hazard, and epidemics due to overcrowding and inadequate sanitation are becoming a serious worry to the medical teams.

There are extensive coalfields in the Tangshan area and there were fears that thousands of underground workers would be entombed. It has now been officially disclosed in the Chinese People's Daily, however, that 10,000 miners threatened by rising water after the earthquake occurred escaped to the surface through emergency air shafts and that the collieries are now in production again.

We endeavoured in March last to view such 'natural' disasters from a Christian standpoint and to suggest certain Biblical principles we may apply to them. With our present restricted knowledge we should be on guard against hasty, cut-and-dried conclusions. Nor should we be complacent, but rather bow in reverence before the righteous Judge of all the earth knowing that His judgements are unsearchable, and His ways past tracing out (Rom. 11:33). To some of His critics our Lord gave a solemn warning against submitting calamities of this sort to mere human reasoning:

"... those eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and killed them, think ye that they were offenders above all the men that dwell in Jerusalem? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish" (Luke 13:4,5).

These are words that we, too, should keep well in mind lest, like Job, we darken counsel by words without knowledge (38:2).

It is wise to remember that calamities like the one we have been discussing, which numb our spirits and incite our compassion, are part of the wider problem of human suffering with all its apparent injustices and inequalities. For different reasons, by different means, and for different ends God chastens both the just and the unjust. In His inscrutable wisdom He deals with peoples and nations, with sinners and saints. The suffering saint rests in the assurance that God is in control and can sing in triumphant faith,

"He sitteth o'er the waterfloods,

When waves of sorrow rise;

And while He holds the bitter cup

He wipes the tearful eyes.

He knows how long the wilful heart

Requires the chastening grief,

And soon as sorrow's work is done

'Tis He who sends relief."

unknown | Sept 1976
Comment By Torchlight