Chaos and Grace
By Kyrie Price
There’s a spot in my backyard where the trees open up just right, and the four o’clock light shines through the tops into the brush and brambles. The shadows don’t dance, they stay perfectly still, and for a second it reminds me of the calm of the Costa Rican jungle we traversed on our honeymoon, and the light hit through the treetops just right, making a magical little spot open on the jungle floor for the sun rays to poke through like a beam from heaven.
I bet you can think of a similar sun ray, where the brambles light up the underbrush and create a magical forest-esque moment that makes your mind calm and imagination soar out of your mid-afternoon slump for a few seconds.
That is how I like to think of grace.
It’s magic to me. It’s an opportunity to receive perfect peace that needs no payment in return. It’s such a beauty, such a renewal. It keeps me awake at twilight in gratitude for not having to work SO hard to out myself in the right light for God to love me.
He loves me in my steady worship of His marvelous light, the light I think of peeking through the treetops, casting its perfect light on the dark floor of heart that’s murky with exhaustion from motherhood duties, laundry waiting for me in the hallway, and feeling left out of “opportunities” I feel I’m missing because of said exhausting motherhood duties.
Chaos
That brings to mind chaos.
kā′ŏs″
The word that makes that perfect spot of brightly lit underbrush I love to gaze at fold and be swallowed-up into the underworld. The word doesn’t roll off the tongue like ‘grace’ does. It’s harsh.
And chaos is harsh. It’s against the natural order.
Think about it. When your life feels chaotic, how does it make you feel? I’ll bet grumpy, overwhelmed, downcast, foggy-brained. Too much to do, too little time. No time to Sabbath, exercise, heck, what even is date night?
It’s not the way we’re meant to live- in chaos. We’re meant to meander through life on the pathway of grace. Where, while life still happens to us, we aren’t picking ourselves up by the bootstraps, but instead, let’s say, by the giant Hand in the Sky who plucks us up and sets us back on our feet.
I promise I’m not writing this for no reason. It resonates so deeply right now. I’ve been on a journey this month to deconstruct the chaos within my control and chase God’s thirst-quenching grace He offers to me.
“He has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time,”
- 2 Timothy 1: 9
I’ve been walking in the grace of untangling the cultural norm of hurry, accomplishment, studiousness, knowing everything about everything, showing up online, showing up in real life, working from home, working out of home, working in home. Work, work, work…
Until one night, I jerked awake in utter defeat. I was over it. I was so over the chaos in my life. The devil can have that. I want that unshakable, unshackle-able, freedom to meander through life apart from the chaos. I want the peace that surpasses understanding ( Philippians 4: 6-7). Surely, such an abrasive sounding word is just as abrasive to the soul if you let it reign in the four walls of your abode.
There is grace for the chaos, hear me out.
God doesn’t just leave you there and drop you for good. There is however, a tugging that is likely pressing your spirit as you contemplate the level of chaos in your life at this very moment. Consider it your ray of light in the jungle treetops, highlighting the brambles tangled in the underbrush- (the brambles being the chaos, and the underbrush being you).
It doesn’t have to be this way. You can choose grace.
