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Crushing Chaos: Calm Your Storms. Order Your Life. Find Your Peace.
ECPA BESTSELLER • Respected pastor and Bible nerd Manny Arango reveals how the gospel empowers us to establish peace in our disordered lives by embracing God’s design for us to be agents of order in a chaotic world.
“Manny Arango doesn’t pull punches in Crushing Chaos, and that’s exactly why you need it. You’ll laugh, you’ll grow, and you’ll be glad you picked this book up.”—Travis and Jackie Greene, lead pastors of Forward City Church, South Carolina
There is chaos in your life, probably more than you bargained for. But rest assured that the God of the Bible is neither intimidated nor stumped by your chaos. He knows exactly how to conquer it and create order in your life. The story of the Bible centers on God’s work of bringing form and function to the messes we humans make. In fact, His solution for the Chaos found in Genesis wasn’t to automatically provide peace—it was to establish order. And for good reason.
In Crushing Chaos, pastor and self-proclaimed Bible nerd Manny Arango unfolds the ways that God faithfully, lovingly does just that, showing you how to conquer the chaos you’ve carried with you for far too long and restoring passion and purpose to your life. You’ll discover how a path of surrender and self-sacrifice can lead you from a place of turmoil and confusion to a place of hope and peace. The answer is in saying “yes” to a radically reordered life.
Amid the life and ministry, suffering and death, and triumphant resurrection of Jesus, we encounter the methods behind his mission ( they took pretty much everyone by surprise) to bring His people back to life in the Garden of New Creation, which we were originally intended—and are still destined—to call home.
The One who triumphed over chaos once and for all wants to bring you out of the confusion of this broken world and into a divinely ordered life. Embark on this journey you were always meant to take and have joy fill your heart and hope flourish in your soul.
“Manny Arango doesn’t pull punches in Crushing Chaos, and that’s exactly why you need it. You’ll laugh, you’ll grow, and you’ll be glad you picked this book up.”—Travis and Jackie Greene, lead pastors of Forward City Church, South Carolina
There is chaos in your life, probably more than you bargained for. But rest assured that the God of the Bible is neither intimidated nor stumped by your chaos. He knows exactly how to conquer it and create order in your life. The story of the Bible centers on God’s work of bringing form and function to the messes we humans make. In fact, His solution for the Chaos found in Genesis wasn’t to automatically provide peace—it was to establish order. And for good reason.
In Crushing Chaos, pastor and self-proclaimed Bible nerd Manny Arango unfolds the ways that God faithfully, lovingly does just that, showing you how to conquer the chaos you’ve carried with you for far too long and restoring passion and purpose to your life. You’ll discover how a path of surrender and self-sacrifice can lead you from a place of turmoil and confusion to a place of hope and peace. The answer is in saying “yes” to a radically reordered life.
Amid the life and ministry, suffering and death, and triumphant resurrection of Jesus, we encounter the methods behind his mission ( they took pretty much everyone by surprise) to bring His people back to life in the Garden of New Creation, which we were originally intended—and are still destined—to call home.
The One who triumphed over chaos once and for all wants to bring you out of the confusion of this broken world and into a divinely ordered life. Embark on this journey you were always meant to take and have joy fill your heart and hope flourish in your soul.
305 pages, Kindle Edition
Published May 6, 2025
73 people are currently reading
2503 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
April 16, 2025
I have mixed feelings regarding this book. On one hand, it is intriguing, thought-provoking, and well-written. Certainly centered in a sound theological framework. Unfortunately, the unintended consequence of rooting so much of your focus on speculative possibilities hidden in the biblical narrative is that you create distance between people and the Word.
I don't think this is what the author intended, but if you center the Gospel on ancient cultural narratives of chaos and dragons, you make it difficult for the everyday believer to have confidence that they can grow in their understanding of the Bible and genuinely hear from God. In other words, they need expert scholars to know what the Word says. It appears from the acknowledgements, this book is an adaptation from his doctoral project, which makes a lot of sense. It would help the audience to explain this earlier and nuance how to integrate these ideas in their ongoing spiritual formation. He makes a few attempts to do this, but most of them are quick and vague.
While it may be interesting and helpful to consider these concepts, we can know and understand God through the revelation of the Holy Spirit when we simply meet with Him in the Word. I DO NOT have any reason to believe the author would argue with this assertion, but the entirety of this book makes the opposite case.
These are fascinating conjectures with enough merit to consider, but it doesn't make sense pastorally to center our relationship with God on them.
I don't think this is what the author intended, but if you center the Gospel on ancient cultural narratives of chaos and dragons, you make it difficult for the everyday believer to have confidence that they can grow in their understanding of the Bible and genuinely hear from God. In other words, they need expert scholars to know what the Word says. It appears from the acknowledgements, this book is an adaptation from his doctoral project, which makes a lot of sense. It would help the audience to explain this earlier and nuance how to integrate these ideas in their ongoing spiritual formation. He makes a few attempts to do this, but most of them are quick and vague.
While it may be interesting and helpful to consider these concepts, we can know and understand God through the revelation of the Holy Spirit when we simply meet with Him in the Word. I DO NOT have any reason to believe the author would argue with this assertion, but the entirety of this book makes the opposite case.
These are fascinating conjectures with enough merit to consider, but it doesn't make sense pastorally to center our relationship with God on them.
August 23, 2025
I thought this book was phenomenal. He made certain connections that were fascinating and created perspectives on chaos vs orders that are game changing. Especially for those of us struggling to maintain godly order in our lives when our family history didn’t teach us this. I think this is who can get the most out of this book. We may not be as fixated on certain nuances like others. And Manny Arango seems to get what it’s like for people that are trying to dig their way out of the chaos. He gives insight and breaks certain paradigms about what a faith walk should look like. It breaks the stigma that as Christ followers there will be no chaos in our life. But rather we aren’t impervious to chaos but Jesus has crushed chaos and we are overcomers IN and THROUGH Him. Personally, I had a lot of reflections and takeaways from this book. It encouraged me to dig deeper into scripture and that there’s so much more to the text that God is trying to show us rather than tell us. I’m inspired to read Gods word from a different lens. Job well done! 10/10
June 13, 2025
3.8
A good book about God's good order. Arango is reading the right scholars and doing a good job bringing biblical scholarship down to an accessible level. I didn't think he always did the best job demonstrating some of his more surprising intertextual connections. I think he's often correct, but doesn't make the strongest arguments. But this isn't an academic book. I think dealing with every counteraurgument is beyond its scope--and it didn't really deal with any. It leans more into appealing to scholarship and peppers in pop culture references and relatable anecdotes. It was enjoyable and struck me as profound on a few occasions. The good outweighed the bad but I found myself disagreeing with an idea or the presentation enough to leave me feeling somewhat mixed by the end. He also casually mentions he and his wife's experience with IVF and is completely unbothered by the practice. This was a supporting, but not insignificant, detail in one chapter that bothered me and felt out of step with the rest of the book's consistent emphasis on God's order over chaos. Chaos was promoted over order in this singular place and everywhere else a thoroughgoing Christian ethic was on display even when it might offend acendent cultural currents. This book was still really good for what it promotes, and I hope it accomplishes what I think it's aiming to do.
A good book about God's good order. Arango is reading the right scholars and doing a good job bringing biblical scholarship down to an accessible level. I didn't think he always did the best job demonstrating some of his more surprising intertextual connections. I think he's often correct, but doesn't make the strongest arguments. But this isn't an academic book. I think dealing with every counteraurgument is beyond its scope--and it didn't really deal with any. It leans more into appealing to scholarship and peppers in pop culture references and relatable anecdotes. It was enjoyable and struck me as profound on a few occasions. The good outweighed the bad but I found myself disagreeing with an idea or the presentation enough to leave me feeling somewhat mixed by the end. He also casually mentions he and his wife's experience with IVF and is completely unbothered by the practice. This was a supporting, but not insignificant, detail in one chapter that bothered me and felt out of step with the rest of the book's consistent emphasis on God's order over chaos. Chaos was promoted over order in this singular place and everywhere else a thoroughgoing Christian ethic was on display even when it might offend acendent cultural currents. This book was still really good for what it promotes, and I hope it accomplishes what I think it's aiming to do.
August 12, 2025
Enjoyed every minute reading this book! I’ve been really diving into scripture lately and have found myself so delighted in it and in the presence of God so reading something like this based on the theology of scripture and the comparisons of the Old and New Testament was so refreshing and gave me a new perspective. This book made me literally laugh out loud at times, tear up and take so many notes. Overall great read, I learned a lot. 10/10
December 14, 2025
A great read for those who want to break free of old habits! This book is full of comparisons and figurative language to keep young and older readers engaged. When I was reading this book I felt like I was there talking with him! There is also some humor in there to light up the atmosphere. Great read and I recommended!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 16, 2025
"Sometimes things die, but death is not the end."
A fantastic read that brings an entirely new meaning to the Creation story. Arango humbly and passionately guides readers through prominent Scripture passages to show how practicing order brings the peace offered to us through Christ.
A fantastic read that brings an entirely new meaning to the Creation story. Arango humbly and passionately guides readers through prominent Scripture passages to show how practicing order brings the peace offered to us through Christ.
September 25, 2025
This book was PACKED with wisdom and knowledge. I had to take my time through it.
October 6, 2025
Absolutely recommend! The Bible is so much more interesting than we see at first glance and this book unlocks the incredible beauty & intricacy of scripture in an easy to follow way.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews