The Wild & the Waste | What Is God Doing in Our World (& in My Life)?

What is God doing in our world (& in my life)?

THE WILD & THE WASTE

Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

Genesis 1:2

• Formless and Void (Tohu Wabohu): wild and waste, chaos and emptiness, confusion, unreality, wasteland.  It’s the image of a world that is unordered and uninhabited. 

Non-existence in the ANE was having no PURPOSE and no ORDER.

The tohu wabohu is shorthand for each culture’s worst nightmare of social disintegration, and its specter stubbornly lurks in the dark corners of our ecological and social imaginaries.

- Christopher Watkin, Theologian

• Darkness and Deep Abyss (Tahom): ocean, the chaotic waters before creation. In the ANE mindset, the vast and untamed uncontrollable ocean represented disorder, destruction, and forces of evil.

…and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

The wild and waste is not where the story ENDS — it’s where God’s work BEGINS.

• God is PRESENT in the chaos—He’s not ABSENT.
• God is MOVING in the midst of the MESS—even when you can’t see it.
• God is creating BEAUTY and PURPOSE from chaos.
  • Day 1-3: God FORMS and brings ORDER.
  • Day 4-6: God FILLS and brings PURPOSE.
• God is not THREATEN by the deep—He RULES over it.
• God’s Spirit still HOVERS today.

"What the Spirit did in creation, He is still doing today — bringing life, beauty, and purpose to the places that feel empty and dark."

Where do you feel the most chaos right now?

What areas of your life feel wild and waste?

Where do you need God to move?