When God Crosses the Line

The singing beaches of Lake Michigan have a clear line demarcated by the beach grass. The stretch of sand meets the border of beach grass, sequestered higher up where waves do not lap. Yet, gale, untold white caps, lightning charging ferociously forward, and storm clouds pushing waves higher and higher. Line is breached. Unforeseen. Unexpected. Unheard of.

We expect storms. We know the waves will crash. We hold out for the calm afterward. It can’t get worse—surely there is a glimpse of blue sky past that storm cloud, a lightening on the horizon…. But then, sometimes, it seems God crosses the line. The “surely never,” the “God wouldn’t do that,” the “God, you won’t give more than I can bear” are all breached in storm gale.

God crosses the line. What we thought was safe, what we sheltered in, the bulwark of beach grass is swamped in rollers. What should never have been is.

Question. Doubt. Anger. Rage. Despair. Turn the back. Raise the fists.   

And what…. What do we say? What can we say? Tears thicker than the whipped deluge of rain... until they run out. What can we say?

The lightning bolts shed light on unseen things--a searing gift. The squall lines only mirror hidden lines in our own hearts. We have compartmentalized and religiousized. We have held things back, protecting “my rights,”—my health, my child, a certain degree of security. God is not Lord over that area.

Yet, this line shows something deeper. Why do we create these lines? We have religiousized. We treat God in a legal contract, not a relationship. Subtly, it becomes, I do X (be faithful, trust you in this storm, not question your ways, pray so much, still praise you, etc.) and then God will do Y or won’t bring Z. We reduce God. Quantify him. Put limits.

It is a searing gift. Destruction that brings nitrogen for new life. Recognizing this brings freedom and eases some nagging darts sent by the evil one. The storm has not blasted your bastion because you didn’t do X (wasn’t loving enough, didn’t pray enough) or need to do Y (just have more faith, say thank you, etc.). We do not live in a give-take contract. We live in the dance, the freedom, the union, the marriage, the realm of grace. Grace, not just a force, but grace, God’s personal countenance towards us. Grace, embodied in a man, Christ.

Recognizing this, a relationship rather than contract, also brings lordship. As Tim Keller has pointed out (1), if all is by grace, it also means he can demand anything. This could be frightening—we fear the storm, the white caps that rail, the beating that leaves the beach grass shredded and uprooted. What if…? What if….? What will be the next wave that crashes?! Oh, God! Lord, have mercy! Fear rises up with the waves, as they rise higher and higher, edging closer and closer to that line of “safe” beach grass.Yet.... 

These squalls also reveal the Storm Lord in a new way. Instead of fearing his storm, we see him more clearly in these staggering lightning bolts. I remember driving home on the lonely Michigan Tipton Highway. Stretches of cornfield. Raging storm--lightning so fierce it inversed everything. Black was white. The darkness white. I had never seen anything like it. It was as if the lightning itself was a black bolt and the sky on white fire. The corn fields blazed in light. It was so eerie in its power. But a storm does this to our sight of God and the world as well--we had seen things one way, and a storm shows how inside-out we had seen things. Instead of fear, when we realize we live in (all-demanding) grace rather than contract relationship, it also shows us his heart. Grace--all giving. He is not a demanding God by nature, living in give-and-take, equal, eye for eye. By nature, he is Giving. By nature, he is Grace. By nature, he is Love pouring forth. Grace, relationship, shows his heart. He may demand anything, but it is because he will give everything. The searing bolts shows us the way true Reality is, He is Love. He gives.

Give? But the waves seem to rip, tear, wrench. The wind wrests. It seems all is loss. Natural storms can leave us speechless in their grandeur and power. And what words dare we speak in light of such loss as I speak? When souls are ripped, broken? Beach grass, twisted, torn, uprooted, shredded! What words?

No words.

Person.

Acts.

Events.

The God who rides the storm clouds comes in a pillar of fire, in prophets, in miracles, in a babe. Not a legal contract. Person. Emmanuel. And he stood in the storm, gave his all, so we would never be deserted in the storm. He himself stepped over the line, offering himself. So, when God seems to cross the line, it is the cross that has broken all lines. He steps toward us in the cross, destroying all lines and barriers between us and him, so he can be with us when the storm sweeps.

NOTES

(1) Can’t remember which book or sermon; I believe he uses it a few times.