How Have Crises Taught You?

I'm wondering these days if our response to crisis is a key factor that shapes the kind of faith we talk about here, and I wonder about your thoughts.

This week has brought two presenting incidents for those of us in the Northeast. 

Here in Boston, a water pipe (brand spanking new, interestingly enough) burst, which led to a "boil water" order for two million people for three days.  You can imagine that that was a conversation starter during that time.  "Oh my God, I drank from the tap ALL DAY before I heard about the boil water order!  I want to be buried back home in Arkansas!"  (Intriguingly, the only inner-Boston town not affected was Cambridge, ever the contrarian, because they--way back in the late 1800s--decided they didn't want to be dependent on the same water supply as everybody else, so developed an independent source.)  The government response was an amazing show of activity--automated calls to most homes, flashing signs on the freeways, free bottled water deliveries to many towns, outreach to the elderly and homeless, round the clock work on fixing the problem.  All the while telling us that the secondary water source was probably, in fact, safe.  It was from a different reservoir and was treated water, but they couldn't be sure, so boiling was commanded.  (Today, in the aftermath, we're told that tests of the secondary water confirmed it was exactly as safe as the normal tap water.)

The second incident was the failed car bombing of Times Square.  I don't know if you followed the hunt for the perpetrator, but these forensic people are impressive.  After diffusing the bomb, they traced the car, found that it had been sold--for cash, with no exchange of names or title--that previous weekend to a Pakistani-American.  Armed with a description, they managed within hours to get an ID, upon which they found the man at an airport boarding a plane to Dubai.  Wow. 

So there you have two big stories in the Northeast over these past few days.  And I find myself reflecting on a number of things.  First, I find myself thinking that, for all our utter political polarization these days, for all the dysfunction in governing that brings, there still are some pretty impressive qualities to our public sector.  It gives me a warm, tingly feeling inside.

And I find myself reflecting on some standard but difficult to practice spiritual advice about responding to crisis--that our first response is advised to be praising God and keeping our eyes open for how God will be at work in the crisis.  And then our next response can be doing whatever it is we need personally to do to address how the crisis intrudes upon us--boiling some water, say.  This is to forestall our default response of fear.  As if, if crisis always pushes us to fear, our life will increasingly be defined by reactivity--in the end, not just to actual crisis, but to everything.  And so we get the counsel to praise God in crisis, as if this will teach us something profound about all of our lives, not just about the crisis of the moment, as if this will shape an experience of living like nothing else can.

It appears that not one of the two million affected people will get sick because of the water.  And, praise God, no one died in Times Square.  And the man who was quite possibly the perpetrator was caught in the nick of time.  It all worked out.

Praise God.

How have crises taught you about life?

Comments

[christy]

I think what you said regarding praising God in crisis really resonates with me because i'm having one of those moments living in new orleans and watching the oil crisis in the gulf unfold. but each morning i wake up and praise God anyway..and that has given me such a sense of joy and calm and hope actually. The oil slick is huge and i'm in no way discounting it. But God is so much bigger and i know he has a plan to get us out of this somehow. It's going to look scary but perhaps what i've learned is that it doesn't have to feel scary. I can still experience his consolation in the midst of what looks like a desolate situation.

[Cj.L]

An interesting TED Talk on Happiness:
http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_gilbert_asks_why_are_we_happy.html

--crisis impact on happiness, and psychological "immune system" or a justification/rationalization of the crisis.

It seems that faith in God and looking to God in a crisis is an ultimate way to synthesize happiness. How many times have we hear people say that "things worked out for the best. praise God for making a blessing out of a curse." and so on. Whether or not this refutes or supports the existence of reality of a spiritual real God, it does support that faith in God is mentally healthy. Skeptics may use this sort of argument to say that God is for the weak minded, or a crutch.
..But I guess having a crutch doesn't mean that it isn't real..

[Brent]

to sort of build on what Cj said, crises are the times, I think, when our faith is most tested - when we find out if the theology we ascribe to really works or not.

Sure, we can praise God when things work out for the best, but what constantly amazes me is when they don't and people praise God anyway. That is much harder and, I am inclined to think, not always the right response. For example, I have often heard people going through some horrendous personal tragedy say things (or be told things) like 'God knows what he's doing. This is all for the best. It will all work out in the end.' Those might be comforting words, but only in a way that perverts our experience and maligns God's character. Because things do not always work out well. Sure, the car bomber got caught this time, but most of the time he doesn't and hundreds have lost their lives as a result. How do we praise God then? It's my conviction that we can't praise him because 'this is all for the best.' To do so is to lay the blame for tragedy in God's hands or to deny that evil is really evil. But I do think we can praise God for who he is - for his faithful character, for the fact that he loves us, for the fact that he doesn't give up on us, for his commitment to bring beauty from the ashes in the end. And then we can accept his invitation to be a convenantal partner in dealing with the crisis that is the entire human and worldly condition in effective and meaningful ways.

[Crispin]

I have certainly learned more about God in the times of crisis than I have in the times when everything was going awesome. Crisis has a way of bringing both the good and bad up in our lives. We find our hearts stirred with a renewed sense of passion while at the same time realizing that maybe we're not quite as spiritual or caring or bold as we had led ourselves to believe in the good times. I found this to be true in the aftermath of Katrina. It brought out the best in people, but also the worst. Here, five years later I really am immensely grateful for going through that trial because what God did in me through that would have never happened had everything had just stayed comfortable. So I can now identify a little bit with the writers in the New Testament who say insane things like "rejoice in trials" because if you can submit to God in the process he will do some amazing things in your life.

This recent oil spill is a crisis that, for the moment seems really overwhelming and depressing, partly because I feel like there is so little that I can do personally because it involves oil companies, fishermen, boats, and stuff. So like many others in Louisiana, I am eating shrimp as if it may be the last time for a while and praying that God keeps the coast and the wetlands safe. Honestly prayer seems like the only real option at the moment. Not a bad option though.

[Crispin]

One more thought too which has been brought up in recent talks about suffering. I don't think one has to embrace a trial as from God because as Brent noted above God is not the author of evil. But we can and should embrace God in the trial. I was actually thinking this morning of how Jesus told Peter that Satan was coming to sift him like wheat. And Jesus didn't say anything about keeping him safe from that sifting. He says, "Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers." Jesus' prayer was answered and Peter did end up strengthening his brothers.