Calm in Chaos
The secret to being calm in chaos has nothing to do with the outside and everything to do with the inside.
Maybe you’ve been here. You’ve cleaned your car, organized your kitchen, paid bills, got a haircut, groomed the dog, cleaned the rugs, had those big trucks come and blow out the old air and freshen up the vents in your home. You’ve created the ULTIMATE checklist, downloaded some new apps for your phone and created a whiteboard on your kitchen wall that is not only an efficient list of chores and schedules but also a work of art. Everything is in place and you’re standing back looking around, and it feels good, it feels really good.
Chaos, as you know, can come from anywhere. No matter how well we brush our teeth, one of them can crack. No matter how well we organize our schedule, we can forget a meeting or leave our kid waiting at the bus stop longer than we meant to. No matter how much we try to minimize stress, those phone calls happen and someone (like me) writes a blog and as we read, we begin to feel more anxious than before.
So, what then, Heather? What are you getting at?
When I was first diagnosed with Endometriosis back in 1994 and recovering from a surgery, a kind, godly and wise woman from our church came to visit me. She brought a book called “31 Days of Praise” by Ruth Myers. Inside each page, for each day of the month there was a prayer written. Each line of the prayer had a footnote that related it back to verses from the Bible.
Although I was grateful for the gift, and the sweet message written inside the front cover, I was skeptical. It seemed formulaic, and too idealistic to impact the raw, chaotic reality of my physical pain and the losses I was experiencing in this huge upending of my life as I knew it. However, I was desperate, so I read it.
Our brains seem to default toward unhealthy, protective, fearful habits unless we tell them otherwise. It seems left to our own tendencies, health doesn’t come naturally.
This little book I was given, was exactly about reforming habits! It was basically cognitive behavioural therapy in a prayer book! By forcing myself to read a prayer every day that focused on the truth of who God is, how He works and how He feels about me, my mind and heart began to change. As we focus on God, He changes us!
Perhaps it’s best just to show you.
I’ll finish by writing out my favourite day of the book, day 18. And consider, as you read this, the long-range change in our hearts that is possible as we focus our minds in this kind of way:
Father God, I'm so delighted that You are both loving and sovereign, and that You cause all things to work together for good to those who love You, to those who are called according to Your purpose. So I thank You for each disturbing or humbling situation in my life, for each breaking or cleansing process You are allowing, for each problem or hindrance, for each thing that triggers in me anxiety or anger or pain. And I thank You in advance for each disappointment, each demanding duty, each pressure, each interruption that may arise in the coming hours and days. In spite of what I think or feel when I get my eyes off You, I choose not to resist my trials as intruders, but to welcome them as friends. Thank You that each difficulty is an opportunity to see You work that in your time You will bring me out to a place of abundance. I rejoice that You plan to enrich and beautify me through each problem, each conflict, each struggle. That through them You expose my weaknesses and needs, my hidden sins, my self-centeredness (and especially my self-reliance and pride). Thank You that You use trials to humble me and perfect my faith and produce in me the quality of endurance, that they prepare the soil of my heart for the fresh new growth of godliness that You and I both long to see in me and that my momentary troubles are producing for me an eternal glory that far outweighs them all, as I keep my eyes focused on You. I'm grateful that You look beyond my superficial desire for a trouble-free life; instead, You fulfill my deep-down desire to glorify You, enjoy your warm fellowship, and become more like Your Son.”
31 Days of Praise, Ruth Myers (P. 82-83)