January 27, 2025
Long Beach, CA
“Go out and stand before me on the mountain,” the Lord told him. And as Elijah stood there, the Lord passed by, and a mighty windstorm hit the mountain. It was such a terrible blast that the rocks were torn loose, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind, there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake, there was a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire, there was the sound of a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And a voice said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” (I Kings 19:11-13, NLT)
Hollywood looks like Hiroshima. The aerial views from the heartland of the metaphoric Hollywood, aka, the Pacific Palisades, could be mistaken for the horrific devastation of that Japanese city 80 years ago. The Hollywood community is a state of mind, not a geographic location. Yet there are several communities where people related to the movie, music, and artistic community reside. The Pacific Palisades, Brentwood, Malibu, and Santa Monica are perched on beautiful cliffs overlooking the Pacific Ocean. They have been under siege and it will not be over soon.
A natural disaster begins with shock, disbelief, and horror. Adrenaline is the body’s EMT, the first to show up in a crisis, helping you react to a dangerous situation. Emotion dominates when a person stands in the hellscape that was once their home. Tears, shock, anger, befuddlement, thanksgiving, thoughts, memories, and a cascade of runaway feelings rush through the body.
“Adrenaline is the body’s EMT, the first to show up in a crisis, helping you react to a dangerous situation.”
And at some point, confusion sets in, and so do questions. Why? What good is there in this? Where is God? What kind of detached and malevolent monster causes this to happen? Or even allows this to happen? Everything is gone, gone, gone. Yes, except you, standing before God in the devastation. It’s time to listen for that still, small voice.
Apocalypse
Apocalyptic was the media buzzword. Apocalypse Now was borrowed from a Francis Ford Coppola Vietnam war film classic. The early focus was on fire, horror, power, confusion, and chaos that had befallen a place and people. These images are found in the Bible in the book of Revelation. Revelation is an English word taken from the Greek New Testament word, apocalypse. It means revealing God’s majesty, wrath, and power to bring an end to all things. It is the end that is both just and final. The story of humankind has a beginning and an end. Genesis is the beginning; Apocalypse is the end.
This is not the end; it’s hard to take in the devastation, but it is too limited and too small to qualify as the END. It is, however, revealing—a taste. Whatever one feels at such a moment as this is only a foretaste of the bitterness of being on the receiving end of hell’s fuller fury. But it does fall on the just and the unjust, and to the naked eye, it falls indiscriminately and without design. We stand in the ruins of what once was, knowing we were powerless to stop it when it came. And it comes with a strong dose of despair.
“We stand in the ruins of what once was, knowing we were powerless to stop it when it came.”
Where is God in the Ruins?
God did show up. Everyone is made in his image, male and female; he created us all. God’s image is not in a picture or statue but in every human personality. We all have a spirit, emotion, logic, intellect, a conscience, a sense of right and wrong, good and evil, and an empathy for others. We live in societies built on these basics. Therefore, our collective morality has seen fit to send someone to fight a fire. Everyone helps pay for it. God shows up driving a big red truck, wearing a yellow coat and a helmet, holding a hose, and putting water on your home to save it.
God shows up the first afternoon before rescue services arrive. He shows up in a neighbor who pulls an elderly man out of a burning house, saves a pet, or stands on a roof with a garden hose. In the actor who stands in the middle of the street for two days and directs traffic because cars are backed up and the lights are out. In the aid worker who gives a blanket and a bottle of water or sets up a table and hands out peanut butter sandwiches. In the nurse who takes your blood pressure, checks your vitals, and pronounces you ok. God uses the arms of a stranger to hug you, to help you walk, and even to cry with you.
“God shows up the first afternoon before rescue services arrive.”
Beauty
We heard apocalypse less and beautiful more from the L. A. media a few days after the disaster. I’m no expert on beauty, but I know it when I see it. Beauty naturally attracts us. It can even frighten us. It can cause a young man to pursue a beautiful woman or to be so intimidated that he avoids the woman. What was so beautiful about the hellscape?
The essence of Hell is being ignored; it’s not mattering, it’s being a nobody, it is all this and more when all you own is gone. Then someone calls you by name, treats you as a person, gives you food, a bed, and clothes, and your kids get toys and a place to play. Someone was paying attention to you, showing you count. You are reunited with your family. We’ve seen it all here in Babylon by the Sea. We see God wrapping his arms around the suffering—the only word that seems to work is beautiful—God breaking through the chaos.
Beauty is why people want to live in these dangerously located and vulnerable homes. Beauty is a cliff overlooking the sea or a mountain view. Beauty is the sea on one side and snowcapped mountains on the other or being surrounded by rolling hills, canyons, streams, and points of interest as far as the eye can see. We can’t help ourselves; it’s all so magnificent. It speaks to the glories of creation, the majesty of God; it is compelling.
“Beauty is why people want to live in these dangerously located and vulnerable homes.”
Dogs, cats, and even your pet parrot can live an instinctual life to the full, but they don’t glory in the view. Their spirit doesn’t rise and send chills through their bones as the human spirit does when it somehow connects with the divine in a special moment in nature. The earth is the Lord’s; he created it and said it was “very good”—even if he had to say so himself. There is no beauty unless there is God because only humans can pronounce it beautiful.
We are made in his image because he lives in us. We have souls and can connect with his soul. The scriptures tell the story of how we marvel at the heavens, the mountains, the seas, the deserts, and how all of creation shouts to us that God is good and his creation beautiful. Ancient cultures worshipped the creation and thereby sought to connect to its creator. The richer one gets, the more physical access to beauty you can buy. But living on these beautiful hills in L. A. involves risk—the risk of fire, mudslides, and earthquakes. The beauty of creation, however, is only an illustration of the greater beauty of God resident in human beings loving and caring for other human beings.
Sacrifice
Sacrifice is beautiful; it always seems to make us cry. Even when a child shares a toy in a sandbox at the local playground, the proud parent holds back the tears but smiles with satisfaction. It seems to me that people admire sacrifice because it strikes us at our core.
Our parents sacrificed for us. My mother wore the same winter coat for thirty years, got up at 4:30 a.m., walked to the bus stop, and rode to work, but left lunch money on the kitchen table for my sister and me. At the end of the day, there were only Morton’s TV dinners or their wretched chicken pot pies, but I still grew to 6′ 7″. As an adult, I insisted that my mother cease buying me clothes and stop sending me $10 a week. Children usually don’t see the sacrifice and the beauty it reveals until later in life.
I recently had a conversation with a young man about the Clint Eastwood film Gran Torino. It is the story of a grumpy old war veteran, a widower dying of cancer, who lives in a deteriorating neighborhood that has transitioned from white to Hmong. Hmong gangs are a problem, and he hates his Hmong neighbors. He calls them every socially unacceptable name one can imagine. It gets so absurd you begin to laugh—the young Hmong kids think he’s funny. He slowly warms up to them and is nice to them in his way.
“Children usually don’t see the sacrifice and the beauty it reveals until later in life.”
Had this young man seen Eastwood as a Christ figure in the film? He had not. If you have seen the movie, you may recall Eastwood’s death scene. He knew that to save the young Hmong boy from a life of crime in the gangs, he would need to sacrifice himself. Eastwood puts his estate in order, says his goodbyes, and confronts the gang leaders at their homes. He pretends to have a weapon; he threatens them, and they shoot him dead. At that moment in the scene, when the old man lay dead, his arms spread in the form of a cross. The image is unmistakable. He sacrificed his life to give the young Hmong boy a new and different life. His enemies would be imprisoned; he would be free from them. And the young boy inherits the beautiful Gran Torino.
It is remarkable how savior-like Eastwood’s films have been. From the “Dirty Harry” series to the Outlaw Josey Wales, The Unforgiven, Pale Rider, The Mule, and Two Mules for Sister Sara, he remains a deliverer, a savior, an unsavory savior to some, but to those who are saved, he is loved. I don’t know Mr. Eastwood’s theology, but I do know that his heart is to see good win over evil.
All of creation loves a good redemption story. God is beautiful because Christ is God and he made the ultimate sacrifice for the sins of the world. The cross is the most recognized symbol on earth. God became one of us and lived and died on planet Earth. But he rose again; he conquered death and the grave. When we raise a cross, see it on top of a building, a hill, a mountain, or written in the sky, we should get on our knees; we are in the presence of God.
“All of creation loves a good redemption story.”
The most hideous, unfair horror in history was when a perfectly innocent Jesus, the Christ, the Messiah, the lamb of God, was killed for us. He was killed, but he gave himself up. And he said it for us and to us, “Father, forgive them, they don’t know what they are doing.” He who knew no sin became sin, that we might become the righteousness of God in him. And then he said, “It is finished.” The work is done, his mission complete—but not ours. Now it’s our turn. Like Elijah, listen for that still, small voice and then obey it.
From Bill Hull’s ‘No Longer a Bystander.’ Used with permission.
