Chaos

<<disorder, mess>>

The supreme battle in the universe is between Satan – who because of his nature is characterised as the ruler of darkness, destruction and disorder – and Jesus, “the light of the world” (Jn 8:12,44, 9:5, 10:10; Eph 2:2, 6:12). Chaos conveys the idea of disturbance, confusion and turmoil. In contrast, the Bible declares, “God is not a God of disorder but of peace” (1 Cor 14:33). Under God’s rule, disorder and chaos are replaced with order and peace. The testimony about Jesus was, “He does all things well”, correcting physical ailments in people (Mk 7:37; Lk 13:16).

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void…” with light created to drive back the darkness of chaos (Gen 1:1-4). This original chaos was not evil; God created everything and called it “good” (Gen 1:10,21).

Everytime order wins over chaos

Chaos became evil when Adam and Eve rebelled against God and this destructive force invaded all of God’s good creation for it is when boundaries are breached, chaos takes over. God’s judgment resulted in expulsion of the first humans from the Garden with more chaos affecting every interaction and activity of life as we know it, ultimately ending in physical death (Gen 3:16-19,23,24). In His sovereignty and love, God sought to restore back to wholeness what He had created with a special emphasis on the pinnacle of His handiwork – humanity with whom He desires intimate relationship.

Human wickedness continued to spoil God’s creation. The sovereign God removed His restraining hand allowing the corrupted world to return to chaos with a huge flood destroying all but a remnant in the ark with the righteous Noah (Gen 6:13). Again, soon after, humanity rebelled against God’s mandate to “fill the earth” and walk in relationship with Him (Gen 1:28, 11:4). His solution was to bring confusion through a multitude of languages so people would disperse over all the earth. He then focused on one obedient person – Abraham and this continued down through his family and to those who would eventually become the nation of Israel.

Jesus entered our sin-filled world and died, bearing the penalty for the sin of all who would put their trust in Him. When He was resurrected and ascended to God’s right hand, this showed that He is sovereign even over the chaos of death and rules from His heavenly throne to restore order to God’s creation. At the present not everything is under

God always has been, and always will be in total control

His feet or in total submission to divine authority, so there is a fluctuation of cycles between ‘order – chaos – order’ (1 Cor 15:27; Eph 1:22). However, the final outworking is when Satan and all those who live in rebellion to God’s authority will be doomed forever to the lake of fire while those who have genuinely trusted in Jesus will experience eternal life in His presence where there will be no night (Heb 12:17; Rev 20:10,15, 22:5). Death will be no more and He will make all things new, with the universe restored to God’s original intention (Rev 21:4,5).

When we turn to Jesus for salvation the old sinful life of spiritual emptiness and disarray is replaced and it is then our responsibility to walk in the new lifestyle of being children of light (Rom 6:4; 2 Cor 5:17; Eph 5:8; 1 Pet 3:11). Furthermore, as believers we are commissioned and empowered to continue the work Jesus instigated by His death on

What God does ends in order, not chaos

the cross of releasing sinners from the bondage of sin and introducing others to our Saviour (Mt 28:19,20; Mk 16:15-18).

Like the rest of humanity, as believers because we are living in a world seriously affected by sin are not exempt from experiencing chaos, but our attitude and response should be a witness to those observing. Through every ordeal we should be developing Godly qualities (Gal 5:22,23). Are there areas of chaos in my life that I should be addressing? Do not be so busy and involved in too much so that your life gets out of balance and reverts to chaos.