We have been shocked and stunned by the chaos breaking out in creation in recent days: mountainsides, boulders, houses, trees, floods, mud and human beings thrown together in an uncontrollable, destructive maelstrom.
When God’s Spirit first hovered over the chaos before creation, He brought order, separating earth from the waters so that plants, animals and people could live and flourish in blessed peace (Genesis 1). The Holy Spirit was God’s gift of love to creation from the beginning.
Sin—human beings choosing self-reliance over God’s grace and their own way over His—opened the door for chaos to re-enter creation. We live in a broken world and experience its brokenness ourselves.
Yet the Spirit has never left. He continues His work of bringing healing order from chaos for God’s world and His children. And He will accomplish this, because Christ has defeated the destructive powers of sin and evil through His death on the cross (Romans 8:17–25).
One day, this work will be complete. Heaven and earth will be made new, and we ourselves will be healed and transformed beyond anything we can imagine.
But that day has already begun to break through. By faith and the power of the Holy Spirit, we receive a foretaste of what is coming. So, we can live and work with hope for our broken world—and passionately invite our neighbours to share in that hope.
Jonathan.