Why Disruption Is Necessary for Change
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down,
that the mountains would tremble before you!
As when fire sets twigs ablaze
and causes water to boil,
come down to make your name known to your enemies
and cause the nations to quake before you!
(Isaiah 64:1–2)
I once had someone ask me why protesters would block major highways in the Bay area after each death of an unarmed Black person. The question was genuinely prompted by their inability to see how such an act in any way contributes to constructive change.
I asked them what they knew about the death of unarmed black and brown people before the protest. And I saw the moment they made the connection.
Disruption for the purpose of change and innovation is always accompanied by the kind of revelation that unsettles and is often painful to acknowledge.
In truth, pain is the greatest motivator of change. A wise mystic once wrote:
The truth will set you free, but it will make you miserable first.
The prophet Isaiah, praying from an unsettling place of pain and need, calls upon God to tear open the heavens and come down. Isaiah calls for a holy disruption that is like fire that burns wood and boils water. Isaiah needs those causing pain to feel the pain — because what else could possibly be enough to bring change?
James Baldwin in his book The Fire Next Time asserts that the plight of the marginalized will not cease until all experience marginalization — all must live the struggle. It’s what we cannot see, what we refuse to understand that will cause us the most harm. Ignorance may be bliss but it won’t protect us from the realities that exist whether we know those realities to be true or not.
The prophet calls for a holy disruption that unsettles and then brings revelation. “Come down to make your name known…”
Holy disruption reveals, unsettles, and may even be painful to acknowledge but it leads us back to proper relationship with the Divine. It reveals in a way that produces awe and trembling at the sight of the God of all creation.
Advent brings a holy disruption through a Savior who enters in an unexpected way. Locating the need for change in systems that cause us pain can sometimes be a clearer view than noticing how the pain has also caused a need for change in us.
Where might we need to welcome such a holy disruption in our own life — are we open to the revelation that leads to life? What if peace and hope this season are being served on a platter of interruption? As we press with God to disrupt the oppression of the world we must also allow the press in us that God might disrupt the oppressive beliefs, thoughts, and practices that hold hostage peace and hope in our own lives.
Come O God and tear open the barricades of our hearts. Disrupt the places of our lives that keep us from the gifts you so freely give. Continuously make room in us for the change we fight for in our families and in the world.
Prophetic Practice:
This week take 10 minutes each day, be still, breathe deep and invite God to disrupt your thoughts and actions with a moment of peace.
