Hurricanes and the Hope of God

With a heavy heart, I’m taking a break from my usual topics for this post, in order to reflect on the events from this week.

I live in the Houston area, a place which has recently captivated the whole world as it suffered under the power of Hurricane Harvey.  The storm was indeed one for the history books: Harvey broke the continental records for rainfall in the U.S., dropping an unprecedented 51.88 inches of rain in some places.  Estimates are in the area of 27 trillion gallons of water.  The damage is unprecedented.

During the week I’ve received concerned messages from all over the world, which I greatly appreciate.  My family and I are, thankfully, safe and sound, and though we did see some damage to our property, it is nothing compared to the unbelievable catastrophe around us.  Families just streets away from us had to be rescued by boats, helicopters, and by the strong swimming of good people risking their lives.

I really can’t do justice to how shocking and how humbling it all is: imagine the places you go every day (your favorite grocery store, your job, your friend’s house) all underwater.  It’s been surreal seeing the speed boats, jet-skis, and canoes sailing down your street, over the tops of submerged cars, across your high school’s football field, and through large parking lots turned into lakes.  Sounds like a strange dream, doesn’t it?  If only it were a dream.

On one of the worst nights of the storm, around 2:00 in the morning, I got up to change out the bucket which was catching water in the fireplace.  The power was out; I sat in pitch black listening to the rain go on and on.  When my cleanup was done, I found my way back to bed and crawled in.  I just kept listening to the rain for what seemed like hours.  Have you ever heard heavy rain beat against your house for five days straight, with no end in sight?  I thought I might go mad.  And then I thought about Noah, sitting in his boat listening to the rain for 40 nights.  That made my cabin-fever worse.  What was happening out there in all that cold and all that darkness?  What would happen to us?

And then I thought: This world has no hope without God.  None.

For a very long time this planet has been a stormy place.  When we pause our busy lives long enough to really dwell on the waves of suffering, tragedy, and injustice rolling across the earth every day, it’s almost too much to bear.  But we shouldn’t forget that God dwells on this suffering constantly; he hears the rain beating against his world, and he’s heard it for a long time.  But is he just sitting there, listening to the rain in the dark?  Is he ever going to do anything about it?

It’s easy to ask where God is at a time like this.  But if we look carefully, I think we can find him.

God is the man lifting a family onto a helicopter.  God is the woman handing out water at the shelter.  God is the man crying with his neighbor who has lost his home.  God is the husband and wife brainstorming at the kitchen table about how they are going to pay their bills without a car to drive to work.  God is the man rebuilding sheetrock in a damaged home.  God is the little boy, patting his dad on the back, telling him it’s going to be okay.

It’s precisely at times like these that the value of the Christian meta-narrative shines through: the world is full of suffering, yes, but God has not left it alone.  He is creatively, passionately moving forward to restore it, both now and later.

Jesus promised that his God was working to restore the earth, and today Jesus is still challenging us to believe him.  Will we trust that God, despite appearances, will one day make all things new?  Will we trust that God, despite appearances, is making us new even now?  How can we?  Where are the signs that we are even worth saving?

When we see people helping each other, loving each other, saving each other amidst the storm, it reminds us that there is still good in this world, and also that it wasn’t always this way.  The flicker of good in people is a remnant of God’s original dream for creation, still showing itself from time to time, and surprisingly showing up just when the planet is plunging itself into more division and more war.  This little light in a world gone dark challenges us to think a bit more highly of man, of this world, and of God, than we might usually do.  And ultimately, seeing this light keeps the dream alive that one day the good will overcome the bad.  It shows us that the promise of Jesus about a better world is still on the table.  It reminds us that God isn’t finished with us.

It’s supremely important in these troubled times, when the powers are raging, when the waters are rising, when we are sitting in the dark hearing only the endless rain, that we remember what good looks like.  If we forget about the good, if we listen only to the news, and the pundits, and the politicians, if we dwell constantly on fear and hate, then we lose sight of God and the work he is doing even now to save the planet.  Despite appearances, I believe that God is indeed, on a grand scale, saving the world—we have no hope apart from his great plan of restoration—but on the small scale too, even now, I believe we can find God.  We can find him in the little reminders that there is still good in this world that is worth saving.  We can find him in the people who still embody his love and salvation no matter the cost to themselves.  We can find God if we look carefully.  I think it’s imperative for faith that we do so.