Chaos

We can all agree that chaos is bad. Right? The mere mention of the word conjures up feelings of anxiety and thoughts of confusion. Chaos means that we are out of control. We envision messy closets and desk drawers full of trash, old magazines and articles we thought we would file. There is nothing about chaos that is attractive. In fact if we are to have a good life we should read a book that will show us how to get control. Or listen to a podcast. Preferably from an organized podcast app on our organized iPhone. Control is good and chaos is bad. Right?

Wait a minute. I recently went online and quickly found that chaos is regularly considered synonymously with a lack of productivity. If one is to be productive, one must be in control. Or so I am told. Don’t get me wrong, I love a clean closet. One day I even plan on having a clean garage. I love when all my pens in my drawer are lined up in the same direction and if a cap is missing, then the pen will soon follow. Who in their right mind would say that chaos is a good thing?

I am sitting in my office tonight and I love the fact that all my books are lined up on my bookshelves perfectly. There is no dust on my desk and even my computer screen is smudge free. My laundry is done, the whole house is clean and even my little dog Sancho has been outside to do his business. No chaos here. I have slain the beast.

Not quite. What might look clean and orderly on the outside may just hide what may be going on in the inside. Control over one’s life is an illusion that can cripple. Indeed it leads to fear and paralysis. I suspect that is why people love to think that chaos is the enemy. If it can be controlled then tomorrow will not be a surprise. No chaos means no disasters, no tragedies, no problems.

I can see why this is so attractive. Who wants to live a life that feels out of control. Slay the chaos brother and sister so that you won’t have to face the unknown. Keep life under control so that the phone call late at night won’t come. You won’t get the unexpected email or that text from your boss will never arrive. What a life! Everything as it should be.

I am wondering if you, the reader, have that kind of life? Do you have everything under control? Are you on top of things so much that you never face the unexpected? Of course not.

Over the past several years I have been taken with something called “chaos theory,” particularly as it might help us see how what seems like random confusion, may be part of something more complex. If you are not familiar with chaos theory it can be explained as a mathematical theory that can be used to explain complex systems such as weather, astronomy, politics, economics and even life itself. It suggests that many complex systems may appear to behave in a random manner, but in reality, there is an underlying order that may be difficult to see.

Sounds like of a life of faith to me. What if all the energy we spend on trying to control the chaos around us was redirected? Instead of control we sought to simply embrace. There are unexpected tragedies in life. Sometimes the phone call comes late at night. People lose their jobs, businesses go bankrupt and even churches close. What if those seemingly random events that cause such anxiety were simply embraced as part of life? What if we stopped trying to slay the chaos and simply moved our chairs up close to the chaos and embraced it? I suppose the only way to do that is to understand, like the writer of the book Hebrews told us, that faith is being certain about what we cannot see. What if we were certain that God was at work, even in the midst of our fear of the unknown?

I am learning this. God is good. God’s love is deeper than we can conceive. God is not surprised by that phone call or that unexpected event that we thought we might be able to control. Beyond that, God is intricately at work, building on all we thought we could control. By trying to slay the chaos, we might be working at cross purposes to the underlying beauty God is building in our lives and in the world around us. Even out of tragedy.

I am still going to keep my books organized in my office but I will no longer try to control the chaos. Instead I will embrace it. Because in the midst of chaos, God is. And where God is, beauty resides.

Until next time,

DP