From the series: Perspectives for Disruptive Times

Job is the poster-child for trials and disruption in the Scriptures. He lost his kids, home, livestock, livelihood and health.

Covered head to toe with painful boils, Job sat in ashes while his friends offered spiritually bankrupt advice. It did little to ease his ordeal. Satan watched in delight, convinced that Job would forsake God in such misfortune.

Finally Job responded by recounting God’s act of creating everything in the universe. He capped it off with “these (the majesty of creation we can see) are the fringes of His ways!”

Job compared the obvious glories of the universe, stars, oceans, thunder, light and darkness to the fringes of a rug. The marvels of the universe are just the edge of what God does!

Job’s comment offers great perspective for us in the midst of our current disruption. God is up to so much more than we will ever see or understand. No doubt that God will use this, as with any disruption, to accomplish His plans in our lives and in the world.

A disruption for one person may be the thing that causes another person to turn to Christ for a relationship. Disruption causes us to see God more clearly.

God has not fallen asleep. He is never wringing His hands. He is never stumped, fooled or dismayed. He is never scrambling to solve the world problems. He never utters the phrases, “Uh, oh!” or “Now what?” He is at work in unseen ways.

Christians are not exempt from the consequences of disaster or disruption. These are the times when one’s faith in God deepens and strengthens. Hebrews 11:1 says faith is the assurance of things not seen.

We can trust the God who is at work in the universe in ways that we cannot see.

Tom Petersburg, www.catapultministries.org