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| Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash |
For so many years now, I've been telling myself that I need to get my act together when it comes to time management, organization and cleaning my home because God is a God of order and it pleases Him when we bring order out of chaos. While I know that God doesn't love me more or less based on my performance, I have convinced myself that I can't be all He made me to be unless I can keep my house and self and child presentable and present at all times.
Excuse me a moment while I remind myself that I am not God. I am not God.
Okay, now that we've established that, let me remind each of us a little bit more about who God is.
God created the world out of nothing. He made a good, good world of beauty, order and structure. This displays His characteristic of orderliness.
I think it's also safe to say He's pretty darn organized, too, given He knows the number of hairs on my head, and yours, and your cousins' and your neighbors'.
God is omnipresent. He is everywhere all the time. He also knows all things. That makes Him the ultimate listener, winning the award for "Most In the Moment". Yeah, I'm never going to even be nominated for that one. God also never forgets to respond to voicemails, texts or messages, or call His grandma (well, mainly because He doesn't have one, given He is eternally self-existent, but you get my point).
So there's my case for God being orderly, and taking pleasure in order.
But humans are not orderly. There was this time when a couple of humans decided to take matters into their own hands instead of trusting their loving Creator and walked away from order and peace and quite frankly, all things good. And in that moment, chaos entered that perfect world God had created. It has never been the same.
Our world, and our very souls, are characterized by chaos and disorder. Our bodies decay, our minds grow sick from the pressures and twists and turns of this life. Our homes get messy and our clothes get stained.
And yet, into this very chaos, our Savior was born. The King of the world was not born into a pristine palace, but into a dirty stable and a family with a messy past. God chose to become human, to enter into our mess, instead of expecting humans to become God before we could reach out to Him. Because we never could bring order out of chaos. But He can.
In fact, His very nature is imprinted on our hearts. That's why we ache for stillness, for quiet, the solitude of a mountain stream, the peace of low-maintenance relationships. That's why I long to purge and organize and deep clean my house and my schedule, to have some semblance of order in a life that sometimes feels like a hamster wheel inside a cage that's slowly filling with water.
Good news time.
Our Redeemer is the God of order, yes, but He remains God in the chaos. He calls to us just as we are - mess and all, whether it's our own doing or just due to the fact that we live in a broken world. Just as we are, messy houses, messy relationships, messy hearts. We don't have to wait for the quiet moments to feel the Spirit's presence because He's with us when the poopy diaper leaks and the doctor calls with test results and Monday comes before you had a chance to breathe.
God delights in order, but He delights in us. *cue tears of awe and joy* Isn't that amazing?
And He is making all things new. As we live in His presence, we can live with peaceful hearts in the midst of a peace-less world, relishing His love for us in these everyday moments. All the while, we look forward to the day when no more tears will be shed over death or pain or the seeming meaningless redundancy we fight against as we daily strive to follow His footsteps in bringing order out of chaos.
