Pastor's Blog: The Sky Is Not Falling
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Like many of you, I was a bit taken aback last week by the news that debris from a Chinese rocket that had been launched into space was careening back toward earth, with no clear indication as to where that debris might land. In a day when mathematicians and astrophysicists can calculate virtually everything, I found that fact hard to believe and more than a tad unsettling. Who was to say that the debris couldn’t have landed in Birmingham?
The reports reminded me of the children’s tale of Chicken Little. You remember that story of the chicken who had an acorn fall on her head and concluded that the sky must be falling. Of course, it wasn’t. But from Chicken Little’s perspective there were enough indications of such catastrophe to convince her.
Like Chicken Little, sometimes we let our hearts and minds jump to conclusions that aren’t necessarily true. That’s not to say that in the course of everyday life we won’t have some things hit us upside the head, both literally and figuratively. But when those times come, it’s always best that we face them with as much courage as we can muster. This response is especially true for people of faith, who believe that our lives are not governed by blind fate or mere physics but are directed by a compassionate and benevolent God who has promised to watch over His own.
If you listen to the news cycle, regardless of your preferred network, you might be led to think that the sky is falling. It’s almost as if the networks have concluded that only bad news generates viewers. Truth be told, that’s been the way news organizations have worked from the very beginning. Good news bores us. Bad news makes us stand up and take notice. Convince enough people that it’s all caving in and before you know it, you’ve created a sense of buzz that keeps people glued to the tube or the radio or the computer screen. The decision to avoid that narrative of despair for one of hope is a choice that can only be made by those who dare to believe that God is always at work, even and especially in those moments when it seems like the sky is falling.
As far as the space debris, fortunately it fell to earth somewhere in the Indian Ocean, just west of the Maldives, far from any populated area. Let’s hope that all countries involved in space exploration pay close attention to the potential for calamity when things go awry so that this situation is never repeated. Let’s also hope that for those calamities that are beyond our control, we choose to trust them to God. If we do, even if our trust is “little,” God will respond to it and find favor with it so that when we look up in times of distress, we won’t so much see the sky falling as we will our redemption drawing nigh.
“I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there and it will move.’ Nothing will be impossible for you” (Matthew 17:20).