What Does the Bible Say About Pandemics? - Has God Ever Punished People With Sickness?

The Bible reports a few occasions when God used sickness to punish people.  For example, he caused some individuals to have leprosy.  (Numbers 12:1-6; 1 Kings 5:20-27; 2 Chronicles  26:16-21)  However, these isolated incidents were not indiscriminate pandemics that spread to innocent people.  Rather, such events were specific judgments on individuals who had clearly rebelled against God.  


Note: Miriam, Moses' and Aaron's sister was one of them.

Are Today's Pandemics Punishment From God?

No.  Some people claim that God is using pandemics and other sicknesses to punish people today.  However, the Bible does not support that claim. Why not?

For one thing, some of God's Worshippers-both past and present-have been plagued with sickness.  The faithful man Timothy, for example, suffered "frequent causes of sickness." (1 Timothy 5:23) But the Bible does not say that this was a sign of God's disfavor. Likewise today, some faithful servants of God become sick or contract diseases.  Oftentimes, these individuals were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. -ECCLESIASTES 9:11.

Moreover, the Bible teaches that God's time to punish the wicked has not yet arrived.  Rather, we are living "in a day of salvation"-that is, a time when God is extending a warm invitation to all humans to draw close to him and be saved.  (2 Corinthians 6:2) One way he extends that invitation is by means of a global preaching work with a positive message-the"good news of the Kingdom." (Which is the true knowledge of the Bible that  you don't get a other churches, but just get tradition, not the true God) - MATTHEW 24:14) 

Note: The churches other than Jehovah's Witnesses do not teach the truth of what is in the Bible. I have been to many services in different churches/different religions and always came out feeling like I was missing something.  For a long time I let it go, but since 1996, I finally got the truth, and to be sure, I read the Bible-all of it,word for word and I realized that it was the truth-this is the true God, not the traditional with the holidays and birthdays and all. I read the King James Bible, then I read the one the Witnesses gave me and it is a simplified version of the King James Bible. They both say the same thing -God's Words that his apostles wrote down for him. When I was told the truth before reading the Bible, I felt as if the holy spirit had entered by body, it was amazing, because then, when I read the Bible, I was able to understand it as Jehovah God allowed me to, a little at a time when he felt I was ready. I have been his servant since then.

Next time: What Does the Bible Say About Pandemics? - Will Pandemics Ever End?

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