September 2026 Rock Newsletter - Uncertainty
September 2026 Rock Newsletter |
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UncertaintyA Devotional from President Mike SwalmI try not to pay attention to the news too closely these days, but when I happen to catch a headline or two, I see swirling chaos and uncertainty. I see situations that are impossible to reconcile, ends that I can’t predict, and irrational actions in seemingly rational people. And it feels like things are spiralling out of control. I wonder if you’ve felt the same. We can’t keep up with the news because we’re not made to handle so much information. And our brains wheel and whirl in the confusion. It reminds me of the beginning. The Bible tells us that “in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was tohu wa’bohu…” I’ll bet that’s not what it says in most English translations. But that’s because it’s Hebrew. It just so happens to be my favourite phrase in Hebrew, too. In English, we interpret this phrase as “formless and void” but it doesn’t quite capture what the original language intends. There’s a sense in the Hebrew of swirling chaos, orderless matter and void. There are connotations of upheaval and violence, of rawness and un-made material. The creation story doesn’t stop with chaos, though. The creation story is ultimately the story of God taking raw chaos and creating order. It’s the story of God who does not leave things in chaos, but who speaks peace and order into the chaos, and who brings wholeness from splintered reality. God’s creative energy doesn’t stop after the six days of initial creation, however. God is still at work even today, bringing order from chaos and beauty from swirling darkness. As I read the news, it’s easy to be overwhelmed by what I see. But that’s only when I can’t remember that God is the God of redemption and order, the God who can take the mess we make and create something breathtakingly beautiful. And it doesn’t stop at the news. Where is the chaos in your life? Is it in your work, your family, your finances, your emotions, your thinking, your spirituality? Maybe it’s in all of those areas! God’s ability to create order out of chaos does not guarantee that each of these areas of your life will automatically get better when you give your life to Jesus, or when you pray, or when you read the Bible. What may happen instead is that God starts to order your perspective of those things, starts to help you understand your part in the chaos and your opportunity to reframe that chaos as God works within you. The uncertainty we all face in the midst of the chaos around, and inside, of us can be crippling, but it does not have to be the end. God is in the business of ordering chaos. When we are willing to submit the chaos to God, He may reorder our thinking around the chaos, or quiet the storm within us, or use the chaos to create a different kind of order. But in all ways, God is able to work with the tohu wa’bohu in and around us to bring about something far more beautiful. Our job is simply to surrender that chaos to God’s design and trust His ways. They’re certainly higher than ours!  President Mike Swalm |
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