'The Great Disruptor: What God Wants to Interrupt in Your Life'

You hear the word everywhere. Disruption. It's the golden calf of our age.

In boardrooms, it's thrilling—the way Uber disrupted taxis, the way Google disrupted research, the way startups keep disrupting last year's billion-dollar companies. Disruption equals progress, innovation, and winning. We celebrate it. We chase it. We build business plans around it.

But in our actual lives? We hate it. We spend enormous energy trying to disruption-proof our existence. We buy insurance. We establish routines. We save money. We avoid unnecessary risk. We lock our hearts behind walls. Studies show that roughly 50-60% of people feel unfulfilled in their jobs but stay anyway—because at least it's familiar. At least tomorrow looks like today.

We want a God who matches that instinct: the God who is "the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow." Our protector. Our shelter. Our comfort in an uncertain world. But here's what the Bible actually shows us: God is also a disruptor. God actively, deliberately works to interrupt our lives, upend our assumptions, and redirect us toward something we didn't see coming.

And if you've ever encountered the actual risen Christ, you know exactly what I mean.

Two People. One Disruption.

Acts 9 gives us one of the clearest examples of divine disruption in all of Scripture. Saul is certain. Completely, absolutely, 100% certain. He's breathing out threats, carrying letters of authority from the religious establishment, traveling town-to-town imprisoning and killing Christians. And here's the terrifying part: he thinks he's serving God. When they stoned Stephen, Saul believed he was purging true faith of a virus.

Then, without warning, blinding light knocks him off his horse. Jesus speaks: "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?" This isn't just a behavioral correction. This is an identity crisis. Jesus is saying: You think you're serving me, but you're attacking me. Your entire life's work, your certainty, your mission—it's all been an act of war against the very God you claim to defend.

When Saul gets up and opens his eyes, he sees nothing. The aggressive alpha male commander has to be led by the hand like a child. For three days—no sight, no food, no control, no certainty. Just darkness and the horrifying realization that everything he believed about himself was a lie.

Here is the first disruption of God: He shatters false certainties.

Religious confidence can be a mask for spiritual blindness. Saul had to be completely deconstructed before he could be reconstructed into who he was supposed to be.

This is the pattern throughout Scripture. Moses was certain he was disqualified — God disrupted him at a burning bush. The disciples on the road to Emmaus were certain the story was over—God disrupted them at the breaking of bread. You simply can't skip the disruption phase. We want resurrection without death, transformation without deconstruction. Doesn't work that way.

Then God Turns to Someone Safe. But the disruption doesn't stop with Saul. Enter Ananias: the perfect opposite. While Saul embodied certainty, Ananias embodies safety. He's a quiet, faithful disciple in Damascus. He's keeping his head down. He's got a routine. He's secure.

Then comes the Divine assignment: "Go find Saul of Tarsus and pray for him." Ananias's response is honest: Lord, I've heard about this man. He's dangerous. He's unreasonable. He came here to kill us.

God doesn't explain. He doesn't calm Ananias's fears. He just gives a command and a mysterious promise: "This man is my chosen instrument. I will show him how much he must suffer for my name."

Here is the second disruption of God: He disrupts our sense of safety.

Following Jesus doesn't eventually lead you somewhere comfortable. It leads you somewhere unsafe—not reckless or foolish, but definitely beyond comfort. Ananias's natural instinct is self-preservation. God asks him to walk toward his worst nightmare and he does. This ordinary, frightened disciple chooses obedience over safety, walks down the street, and knocks on the door of the man who came to arrest him. That decision—one frightened person choosing to obey despite the risk—becomes the pivot point of church history.

Disruption Leads to Mission

When Ananias lays hands on Saul and says two astonishing words—"Brother Saul"—the scales literally fall from Saul's eyes. Sight returns. The Spirit fills. Enemy becomes family. Violence meets forgiveness.

But notice what happens next: God doesn't give Saul a comfortable retirement. He gives him a mission. “Go! This man is my chosen instrument to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings and to the people of Israel. I will show him how much he must suffer for my name.” (Acts 9:15-16)

Here is the third disruption of God: He saves us not to comfort us, but to send us.

Saul wanted power. God gave him purpose. Saul wanted certainty. God gave him the Holy Spirit. Saul wanted control. God gave him a calling that would lead to shipwrecks, beatings, imprisonment, riots, and eventually martyrdom.

Think about the stakes: If God hadn't aggressively disrupted Saul on that road, he would have destroyed the early church. If Ananias hadn't been disrupted from his safe routine, Saul never gets healed. Both men had to be made profoundly uncomfortable so the gospel could eventually reach the entire world.

What About Your Disruption? Here's where it gets personal. Most of us are living Saul or Ananias before their disruption. We're either absolutely certain about our plans, or we're deeply invested in our safety and routine. We view disruption as the enemy—something to endure until we can get back to normal. 

But what if normal is actually the problem? Normal was Saul being entirely blind to his own violence. Normal was Ananias paralyzed by fear in his house. Sometimes normal is broken, and God has to interrupt it.

There's a feeling we all know—the familiar hope that if we just keep our heads down and don't make sudden movements, this storm will eventually pass and life will return to comfortable status quo. But if God truly is the Great Disruptor, then that's actually backwards. The most dangerous thing you can do is resist God's call. It's far more dangerous to stubbornly hold the steering wheel than to surrender it to God's scary but exciting work.

Here's what Ananias couldn't have known: His obedience in praying for one dangerous man would unlock the evangelization of the entire Roman Empire. Disruption is never just about you. It's about who's waiting on the other side of your obedience.

Look at what feels most chaotic in your life right now. The interruption you're desperately trying to fix. The change you're fighting against. What if that's your Damascus experience? What is the vision God has given you at home—in your family, your work, your relationships—that requires obedience despite fear?

What is the disruption God has put in your life to do something unforeseen?

Here's what Ananias couldn't have known: His obedience in praying for one dangerous man would unlock the evangelization of the entire Roman Empire. Your obedience will unlock the Kingdom of God in someone else's life.

You don't know who's waiting on the other side of your yes. But this much is true: disruption is never just about you. It's about the person God is sending you toward.

The question isn't whether God will disrupt you. The question is whether you'll resist or respond.

Blessings,

Jonathan