Yesterday afternoon at after school we got caught in the middle of a big thunderstorm. As if having a big storm with loud thunder wasn’t creating enough chaos for kindergarteners on their first week of after school, the roof in the cafeteria started leaking. And by leaking I actually mean pouring. I have never seen a ceiling leak so bad, it was leaking as fast and heavy as the rain was falling outside. So there we were caught in the middle trying to calm down 50 kids and keep everything organized in the small cafeteria. In the midst of this the door decided it was tired of holding out the water and began to leak and created a huge puddle at the entrance all the parents would come through to pick their kids up. Some kids were scared, others were fascinated, some just didn’t care. We got all the kids calm and started a movie.
It is always interesting to see what happens when a little bit of chaos gets introduced to a situation. I love the line in The Dark Knight where the Joker says, “Introduce a little anarchy. Upset the established order, and everything becomes chaos.” Yesterday at after school it was fun watching all the counselors go into “damage control mode”. We had a counselor keep all the kids doing homework on task, another went to calm down the kindergarteners, another started cleaning up, and I got the movie rolling. None of us had really talked about or rehearsed this situation, but it was as if we had. We were caught in the middle of a storm that had wrecked everything we had planned for the day, but we took it in stride and didn’t miss a beat.
Just like all the kids and counselors had reactions to the thunderstorm yesterday, we all have reactions to the storms of life. How do you react when a little bit of chaos gets introduced to your life? As most of you are aware, I recently lost my full time job. I found out on a Friday afternoon after a long week of camp. Jim and I had the discussion right before I was leaving for the weekend. Understandably I was pretty upset about the news. In a pretty crucial point in my life, the skies got dark, the storm came, and chaos was created. I had two choices in that moment, I could panic or I could trust God. I chose the latter. It was not easy to do. Trusting God is something that took (and still takes) a lot of prayer. I had to keep telling myself that even though I was confused, His thoughts and ways are higher than mine (Isaiah 55:9).
Less than a week after I received that news, I got a phone call from Pastor Sean. He had gone to the National Religious Broadcaster’s Convention a few months earlier and had met some people from Israel’s Ministry of Tourism. They really liked our church’s TV show and had invited us to come to Israel to shoot an episode. Sean asked if I would be able to be a part of the team that went, I told him absolutely. If I had still been employed at Trinity it would have been tough to be able to go. Between the mission trip to Brazil and my honeymoon I would have already used up all my vacation for the year. I literally laughed out loud when I thought of how me losing my job was making way for me to be able to go on this trip.
Next month, myself and the rest of the TV One Life team will be heading to Israel to shoot an episode. Israel’s Ministry of Tourism will be showing us around and taking us to all kinds of cool places. It is a huge opportunity and a huge blessing for our TV show. Just thinking about it makes me think, what have I done to deserve such a blessing. The truth is that I really had not done anything but trust God and continue to go after Him. Hebrews 11:6 says, “And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.”
We need to remember that just because there is chaos in our life doesn’t mean God has left. When there is chaos, it is just a chance for us to show our faith. In his song “The Upside of Down”, Chris August sings, “Funny how we figure out where happiness is found, in the midst of this sadness I’m closer to You now. And that’s the upside of down.” The upside of down is knowing that God is still there protecting us. God is still looking out for us and still has a plan for us. Breakthrough and blessing are waiting if we continue to have faith and seek God. When chaos enters your life, don’t lose your focus and you will be able to weather the storm.
until next time…
Comment Question: What do you do to keep the faith when the storms of life come?