Craziness

There is a wonder that I have only found in India.  In the middle of overwhelming poverty, difficulties, and chaos, life works.  In the midst of crushing traffic, crazy drivers, and crumbling roads, life works.  While electricity often goes missing, land line telephones never quite connect, and uncertainty about anything related to infrastructure is a norm, life works.  In spite of everything, or in the midst of everything possible good and bad, life works.
Because of India, especially in the contrast of orderly, clean, and predictable Singapore, I find myself looking at life differently.  When bad things happen, I remind myself that the important question is not why but what now.  When chaos reigns, on my best days I find myself looking beyond the cause to what I can do to improve the situation with my next step.  Even when I am tired, discouraged, and struggling to hold onto hope, I find myself thinking of friends who succeed in the middle of overwhelming odds.  Life's craziness provides texture not boundaries.  Life's difficulties give birth to opportunities not permanent disasters.  Life's nightmares are darkest just before Hope is found.
There are far too many days when I find myself overwhelmed like those around us.  If I was the on the scene reporter my headlines would be as follows; “Their heads were spinning; they couldn't make head or tail of any of it.  They talked back and forth, confused: 'What's going on here?'”  (Acts 2.12)
Today does not have to be this way.  In the presence of chaos, I can reintroduce myself to hope.  With the pressures of deadlines and commitment, I can take time out to connect with God.  While fear seeks to conquer, I can act in faith that Truth is strong.
 There should be no doubt in our minds that life if full of craziness.  This state is far more normal than exceptional.  Yet we can bring a bit of heaven to the present and those we find in it.  We can be God's answer to the world; be warned, it will not be easy.