In God we have boasted continually, and we will give thanks to your name forever. Yet you have rejected us and abased us, and have not gone out with our armies. You made us turn back from the foe, and our enemies have gotten spoil. You have made us like sheep for slaughter, and have scattered us among the nations. (Psalm 44: 8-11)

I do not perceive that God rejects us, abases us, or causes us to be slaughtered. I do perceive a universe of freedom where we can choose horrible paths. I also perceive a universe where random creativity can seem to us like catastrophic chaos. We are in danger from both intentional and unintentional threats but God does not threaten us.

It is my experience that, like Job, we can find God in the whirlwind. God does not propel the whirlwind - or the enemy - or the disease to a specific target. But God is certainly there.

I do not wish to meet death today. I hope that today I will make progress, not fall into a pit. But I do not wish to live in a universe without the possibility of death or failure. In challenge and chaos there is a call to a creativity, a faith, a hope, and a love that really matters.

The promise of God is to be with us whatever our circumstance. God will not stop the whirlwind. But in relationship with God we have the strength to make whole what the whirlwind has broken.