Finding Peace and Order From God in a Chaotic World of Sin

When I attended seminary in the 1970’s, I was taught that God creates order, and that sin brings chaos, or disorder. My wife might tell you that I am ‘a little’ anal-retentive. I have been known to quote the German proverb I heard in my youth, “A place for everything, and everything in its place.” I find comfort as a Christian knowing that God created all things in an orderly way. But, sin brought chaos and dis-order. I also find comfort in knowing that God’s law brings His plan and His love into disorderly lives. And, I am especially thankful to know that our Lord’s forgiveness, the gospel, overcomes the chaos created by our selfishness and rebellion. But, that is me and my feelings.

Perhaps you too are troubled as the world around us seems to plunge more and more into chaos. The political unrest of today seems more focused on destroying the current order, than building on the blessings we have received and continuing to face and to deal with our problems and fix injustice. I see a world that wants to reject God and his plan for families. I see a world where people are focused on gratifying themselves rather than giving glory to our Creator and Savior. For someone who finds peace in God-created order, I grieve at the current state of our country and of our world. Perhaps it is easy to forget that Jesus teaches this world will someday come to an end in judgement for sin.

All of that leads me to share some joy I personally find in my current activity. I have been spending time, a lot of it, working on my gardens. Yes, I tend to my vegetable and my flower gardens each year. However, like rust on a ship, like sin in our lives, keeping the weeds out and helping the flowers and vegetables to grow is a constant chore and battle. This year before I could roto-til my garden, I needed to remove raspberries plants which were creeping into the garden and stealing room for my vegetables. Therefore, I took down the restraining lines for my raspberries. I dug up the weeds in the raspberries. Then I dug up the raspberries out of the garden area and transplanted them into the midst of the original raspberry patch, where I had just removed the weeds. I pounded in new stakes and re-strung the lines holding the raspberries up. All that took some work! After that preparation, I was then able to till my vegetable plot and plant the seeds and starts. By the way, the starts I planted are doing well, and spinach and radish seeds are starting to push their leaves through the soil. I also worked pulling grass, dandelions, and roses from my strawberries. STILL, there is much work to do on my vegetable garden!

In the front and on the side of our home we have some flower gardens. We have placed rocks around these gardens to keep the grass out. Nevertheless, our lawn still invades the flowers. Dandelions seem to plant themselves everywhere. Moreover, even some of the flowers we planted seem to take over. I do not mind the columbine spreading. But, our daisies now seem to dominate. I am thinning those out. So, in order to work on these gardens, I removed the border stones, pulled roses which had spread too far, sprayed herbicide under the stones, and I have replaced some of them. Now, I am transplanting daisies into the west garden which was overrun with grass. And, STILL I have weeds to pull! I am trying to put some order into the chaos of the weeds in these flower gardens.

I hope I have enough wisdom to know that not everyone has the same ideas about order that I do. Not everybody abides by the motto, “A place for everything, and everything in its place.” God has created each of us with different personalities, different gifts, and different lives. Our Lord has created us as unique and diverse people. But, in that diversity, there are boundaries, like the stones I place in my flower gardens. God’s boundaries are called “the law.” God’s law shows us the danger of selfishness, rebellion, pride, and sin. Jesus is sometimes misunderstood about his teaching in Matthew 18. “8 If your hand or your foot causes you to sin cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life maimed or crippled than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire. 9 And if your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.” (Matthew 18:8-9) Jesus is not telling us to physically maim ourselves. He is telling us that when the weeds of sin invade our lives, then we should pull those weeds. Or, if there are places we go, shows we watch, or books we read, which lead to sinful thought and action, remove those temptations from our lives.

Even better than the gift of God’s law, is the gift of His forgiveness, or The Gospel. Ultimately, God is the real gardener of our lives. Jesus teaches, "I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.” (John 15:1-2) Jesus is the one who overcomes our sin with His death on the cross and His rising from the dead. Thankfully, in Jesus, God works through faith to create order out of the chaos in our lives.

I might be a little quirky. Others might exclaim, “What do you mean a LITTLE quirky?” However, when I get down on my hands and knees in the dirt, I am bringing some order out of the chaos created by the weeds in my garden and my yard. I am thankful that God’s law sets boundaries in my life, and that His love and forgiveness weeds out the guilt of my sin.