The Tank Is Going to Fail

Nobody expects their weekend trip to Disneyland to come with a press conference.

I was traveling to Southern California to speak at a church. Michelle and I flew in on a Friday in order to have time to spend Saturday at Disneyland. We had booked a hotel within walking distance, and I was looking forward to spending some time enjoying SoCal. As I sat in the airport before boarding my flight, I got the following text from the pastor who was flying me out to speak.

"Did you see the news about a chemical spill causing problems and evacuations near Disneyland? I wonder if your hotel is safe still?"

Depending on your personality, you might react in a number of different ways to a text like this. I read it to my wife, and we both wondered what this would mean for our trip. Michelle called our hotel to inquire about the situation and the lady at the desk seemed like this was a trivial thing to ask about because it was happening in Garden Grove. The funny part about this response is that our hotel was in Anaheim, which is an adjacent city to Garden Grove (in fact, less than a mile away).

We went forward with our flight and kept researching the situation. Apparently, it was even worse than we initially thought. Craig Covey, the Orange County Fire Authority Division Chief, held a press conference the next day to explain the situation more clearly. Here is an actual quote from him:

"There are literally two options left remaining. One, the tank fails and spills a total of about 6,000 to 7,000 gallons of very bad chemicals into the parking lot in that area. Or two, the tank goes into a thermal runaway and blows up."

I wondered how those could be the only two options. Basically, it would either spill toxic chemicals into the surrounding area or release toxic vapor over a wide area. But the only question seemed to be the timing of it all.

"This thing is going to fail, and we don't know when."

I appreciate honesty, but this guy just kept laying it on.

"This is as bad as I've ever seen... I've been in the fire service for 32 years and it's the most significantly dangerous event I've ever been a part of."

This is one of many moments in life that are significantly beyond our control. This type of moment often brings out weird reactions in us. We can deny it and try not to think about it. We can downplay it and look for alternate explanations to make ourselves feel better. Or we can accept that it is beyond our control.

Even though some people ended up avoiding church on Sunday as a result, I didn't feel this was the right move for us. So we spent the weekend cautiously optimistic that some other third option might be found and continued with the reason we were there.

While life doesn't normally give us anxiety-producing moments to quite this degree, it is a common enough occurrence that it's worth thinking it through. Jesus addresses this in Matthew 6.

That is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life—whether you have enough food and drink, or enough clothes to wear. Isn’t life more than food, and your body more than clothing? Look at the birds. They don’t plant or harvest or store food in barns, for your heavenly Father feeds them. And aren’t you far more valuable to him than they are? (Matthew 6:25-26)

When is the last time you stared at a bird? For me, it's only been about an hour since my wife is obsessed with birds. She came into my office as I typed this and pointed out a bird from outside my window. Birds are super jittery. I don't think Jesus was discouraging hard work to deal with the real challenges in our lives. But despite their constant efforts, birds remain far more dependent on the whims of nature than are people. Jesus continues,

Can all your worries add a single moment to your life? And why worry about your clothing? Look at the lilies of the field and how they grow. They don’t work or make their clothing, yet Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautifully as they are. And if God cares so wonderfully for wildflowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, he will certainly care for you. Why do you have so little faith? So don’t worry about these things, saying, ‘What will we eat? What will we drink? What will we wear?’ These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs. (Matthew 6:27-32).

I'm not sure if you've ever tried growing flowers at your house. It doesn't take much to totally kill them. Which means that Jesus is using fragile images here to make His point. Birds and flowers are not icons of security.

Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need. So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today. (Matthew 6:33-34).

Today's trouble is enough.

Jesus is talking about birds and lilies, which is almost comically domestic compared to a fire chief telling you the tank is going to fail. But I'd argue the logic runs in both directions. If you can trust God with the small daily stuff, the framework doesn't suddenly collapse when the stakes go up. If anything, the chemical spill just made the question more honest.

Because what the fire chief's press conference actually did was make visible something that was always true. I don't control outcomes. I just usually have enough comfortable distance from that fact that I don't have to feel it. The tank didn't create the problem. It removed the illusion that there wasn't one.

Most of what we call everyday anxiety is the same dynamic at a lower temperature. We worry about money, about health, about what people think of us, and underneath all of it is the same reality the tank made undeniable: we are more fragile and less in control than we prefer to believe. Jesus isn't offering a technique for managing the feeling. He's pointing at the source of the feeling. The birds aren't calm because nothing can hurt them. They're dependent and they don't pretend otherwise. And that dependence, it turns out, is exactly what Jesus is inviting us into.

This is why Jesus teaches us to pray in a way that highlights the present moment. “Give us today our daily bread" (Matthew 6:11). It's much easier to have an accurate perception of what's in front of you when you give yourself fully to it. As the author Ryan Holiday writes, "The less energy we waste regretting the past or worrying about the future, the more energy we will have for what’s in front of us."

Yet this position often creates anxiety in us as God doesn't tend to give us as much comfort or reassurance as we want. It's why so many Christians crave certainty and make an idol out of it. But the theologian Dallas Willard offers a different frame entirely.

Today I have God, and he has the provisions. Tomorrow it will be the same. So I simply ask today for what I need for today or ask now for what I need now. This is how children do it, of course. A mother who discovers that her child is saving up oatmeal, pieces of toast, or strips of bacon for fear of not having food tomorrow has cause to be alarmed. The world being what it is, we can all too easily imagine situations in which the child’s action would be reasonable. But in any normal situation parents will be astonished and pained that the child does not trust them to provide for it day by day.

I remember learning in our training to become foster parents about foster kids saving up food. It was absolutely a sign that the situation warranted it. But it is not the ideal condition in which we should choose to live.

Which means we may need to be content with less reassurance than we crave. We don't know how any given scenario will play out. All we have is the present moment.

If you're wondering about the chemical spill, they did indeed find a third option and the tank held. I wish I could promise that's always how it goes. But Jesus didn't actually promise that either. He promised something smaller and harder: that today is enough to live in.

One thing I hear more than anything else from people in this community: "I thought I was the only one." You're not. The online community is a private space for people rebuilding their faith outside the walls of institutional Christianity — guided book studies, live monthly calls, weekly behind-the-scenes content, and actual conversation with people who get it. Starts at $10/month. No pressure — but the door's open: Find out more.

Photo by steven lozano on Unsplash

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