God in the Chaos
Stay-Put. Corona Virus. Hunker Down. Unemployment. Lockdown. Covid-19. Stay at Home. Recession.
Is God in this chaos?
For me, this question actually started during another time of chaos in my life. A little over a year ago, Alaska experienced a massive earthquake. It was a 7.2 and what it felt like is indescribable. It was early - around 8:30 am - but since it was winter in Alaska it was still dark out. My husband was downtown playing hockey before work, and I was home with the kids - we were about to leave for school. We were all in the kitchen and we heard a loud sound - for a split second, it sounded like a bomb maybe, or a plane crash.
It took a while for us to realize it was an earthquake - the shaking was so violent and in the past it had always felt more like swaying. The power cut off and it was pitch black but we could hear and sort of see everything falling off of our shelves and flying around the room.
I clung to all three of my kids underneath the kitchen island and just watched as our house was destroyed.
I VIVIDLY remember looking around, searching for God, and telling myself “He’s not here.”
I worked through that for a long time after that moment. Why didn’t God show up when I needed him the most?
I was talking with a close friend and mentor about it one day and she said,
“You know, Jenna, God hovers.”
“go on…” I said.
She said, “imagine you’re checking in on your newborn baby who is sleeping in his crib. You don’t want to wake him, but you can’t stop staring - so you hover over him and you’re just there. God does that with us sometimes.”
She’s not wrong.
In fact it’s in the chaos that God hovers.
Genesis 1:2 says “the earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.”
That word “formless” can be translated as chaos.
And “was moving” can be translated as hovering.
The earth was chaos, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God hovered - breathing life into the chaos.
Chaos is necessary. A definition of chaos [brought to you from Wikipedia] says ::
Chaos theory is an interdisciplinary theory stating that, within the apparent randomness of chaotic complex systems, there are underlying patterns, interconnectedness, constant feedback loops, repetition, self-similarity, fractals, and self-organization.
Chaos is an opportunity for beauty to be created. It’s an opportunity for collaboration to birth new systems.
A couple of years ago, God showed me that part of my true identity, part of who He created me to be, is a protector. In the middle of that earthquake, I held my three kids as close as I possibly could and we huddled together. I protected them. I protected them by being with them. I protected them by experiencing that moment WITH THEM.
But outside of that specific incident, my identity of protector has manifested in hugely unhealthy ways.
I tend to live in fear and anxiety, thinking through all of the “what-if” situations of everything that could go wrong, obsessing over health decisions and school decisions and every little detail of my kids’ lives. I project worst-case scenarios in my mind so I can “protect” my family “just incase” it happens. (I’m obviously a classic six on the enneagram). But those ways of living aren’t how God created me. He created me to be in the moment, fully present.
So that time of chaos birthed in me a new sense of my identity. It gave me a new lens through which to see my family. It freed me from fear and anxiety that I had been living in all in the name of “protecting.”
And now we’re all finding ourselves in a new season of chaos.
And it feels like everything is out of control.
But we know that in this chaos there is opportunity for transformation. There is opportunity to see transformation in ourselves: what is God revealing to you about your true identity right now? There’s also opportunity to see transformation in our families, our communities and our cites, our states, our nation, our world.
We’re living in an unprecedented time. For literally the first time in history, the entire world has come to a complete stop. Soon, we’ll find ourselves re-entering life, walking into what will be our new normal. But we have an incredible opportunity in front of us right now. We get to choose what that life will look like - from the individual to the world at large, we get to take part in designing the new. Like gardeners, we get to uproot, prune back and plant seeds that will grow into our future. Don’t let this opportunity pass. Take the time now to lean in and decide:
What needs to die? What needs to be totally uprooted and removed?
What needs to come to life? What seed will you plant right now for it to grow to its full potential?
What is already here, but needs to be nourished so that it can continue to grow?
And if all of that feels like too much right now, that’s ok. Start small:
Where is God hovering in your chaos?
Be encouraged and know that He’s here - even if you can’t see Him or feel Him - He’s here in this chaos. A few days after the earthquake I was talking with my kids and I told them my story. I told them how scared I was and how I had looked out searching for Jesus and I couldn’t find him. My three year old said, “Mom if you had just looked harder you would have seen him! He was under the table with us.”
