On what day did God create tornadoes?

"We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen ..."
—The Nicene Creed

Why did God ever create tornadoes? That has to be on the minds of millions of people who have witnessed, even vicariously, the destruction left across Alabama and much of the South by this weeks' killer tornadoes. More than 200 people died senselessly as air masses collided into a roiling, rotating, whirling wind that hit puny man-made structures and towering trees with a power that seems unimaginably evil but that is, in fact, natural. America's heartland is where tornadoes are born, where warm, moist air from the Gulf of Mexico collides with cold, dry air from Canada, and the concentrated power of gentle winds unleash a destruction that rivals the combined power of the world's military arsenals. It is a scientific phenomenon that we have learned to study and predict. Heartbreaking images and the awful facts of shattered lives are scattered behind these fast-moving funnels of destruction, leaving survivors and distant observers to wonder why.

If we believe, as we proclaim in the Nicene Creed, that God is, indeed, the creator of all things, visible and invisible, good and bad, then these deadly tornadoes were, like us, the creations of God. And though we might wonder why God ever created an evil person, the creation of such a destructive weather phenomenon seems among the most unfathomable of mysteries. The problem of evil has vexed theologians for ages. How can a loving God allow such tragedy and such evil to exist, even in an imperfect and sin-scarred world? This week, especially, as we see the images of the arbitrary destruction of powerful tornadoes that scrape away everything along their paths while leaving nearby structures unscathed, the creation of such destructive and tragic phenomena seem more like the work of whimsical Norse or Pagan gods than of the loving Judeo-Christian God.

As in any tragedy, it would be wrong and theologically flawed in the wake of these deadly storms to say, "It's God's will." The loving God of Scripture, willing to sacrifice his Son for the salvation of mankind, does not choose tragedy over life or grief over happiness. But even this understanding does not settle the question of why God created a world in which tornadoes, hurricanes, lightning and earthquakes shatter the lives of the people He loves.

I find some reassurance in the experience of the prophet Elijah, who stood at the mouth of a cave and witnessed the presence of God, not in the whirlwind but in a soft whisper:

"Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. ¹² After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. ¹³ When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave."
—I Kings 19:11-13.