The Beauty of Uncertainty
Uncertainty. Just that word can make our stomachs churn our hearts pound faster, our minds race. Everyone is dealing with uncertainty right now from the upheaval of the coronavirus—whether it be your travel, work, schedule, group meetings, church, school, child care, etc... it all boils down to our PLANS becoming uncertain. Less fixed. Less known. We who are used to booking our schedules weeks or months in advance. Always having what we need (or want) in the stores. Rarely inconvenienced in a way that technology or a little will power won't "fix."
But it's all an illusion. Your well laid plans, your schedule, your "tap of the i phone and ___ happens" gives you and me a sense of control— but not actual control. Times like this really drive that home.
I don't know about you, but I really like to be in control or to have systems in place that make me feel like I am in control. My planner, schedule, time lines, phone, etc... ,while all God-given tools that can and should be used to serve Him and others, are often more about my own little kingdom than about His. This really points to the pride of my heart that the Lord graciously can especially peel back in these seasons.
Scripture speaks to this concept over and over:
"Come now, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit'- yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, 'If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.' As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil'" (James 4:13-17).
"The heart of a man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps" (Proverbs 16:9).
Uncertainty has a way of slowing our lives down. All of a sudden all of our plans come to a screeching halt. If we let it, that "white space" can reveal to us what we might have been placing our trust in. When there is uncertainty, I often get anxious. My tendency is often times more be to "pedal faster" than simply to "be still." Uncertainty can put us in one of two postures—one that spins out of control and the other one that recognizes that there never was a whole lot of control to begin with and therefore simply just receives. Sometimes the Lord holds us in that uncomfortable space of uncertainty to show us that the only source of certainty (and joy) was only ever Him to begin with.
The Lord is gracious to us in our anxieties, for He "remembers our frame, that [we] are of the dust" (Psalm 103:14). He enters into and speaks kindly to us in our fears. I'm so grateful that Scripture is full of promises as He patiently reminds us that He alone is what is certain.
God is too big, too grand, too EVERYTHING to be contained by my little agenda, my "boxes." But if I spend too much time looking at my prideful way of clinging to control, that can actually sometimes keep me further stuck. When I just simply look UP to the One Who IS in control, later on when I look down at my hands, at what I was clinging so tightly to, I see that they have opened, that control has been released.
Psalm 131 states this heart posture simply,
"Oh Lord, my heart is not lifted up; my eyes are not raised too high; I do not occupy myself with things too great and too marvelous for me. But I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child is my soul within me. O Israel, hope in the LORD from this time forth and forevermore."
So often I am occupying myself with things "too great and too marvelous for me"— like certainty through my own knowledge, agenda, schedule, plans, etc..., rather than calming my soul through the beauty of "[hoping] in the Lord."
What does it look like to hope in the Lord and the certainty of His character?
Psalm 139:1-6, 16 (emphasis added) says,
"O Lord, you have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether. You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high; I cannot attain it...Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them."
God knows. He knows! He has literally written down all of your days and the details of them. You may have written down (in a planner if you're old school like me!) or jotted down on your phone what your plans are, but only God really has the ones written down that are going to stay, and He alone knows what they are.
What a comfort to bring all of this to the certainty of the cross. "He Who did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all, how will He not freely give us all things?" (Romans 8:31). The "all things" may not be exactly what we think we want or need—but as we look to His hands pierced for me, my own hands slowly start to release control.
What does it practically look like to rest in the certainty of God's character in the midst of uncertainty? Sometimes in the face of uncertainty the bravest, most God-glorifying thing that we can do is to just "do the next thing" (a quote often used by Elisabeth Eliot). It doesn't have to look radical. It can be doing that load of laundry. Calling a neighbor. Speaking kindly to your roommate or spouse or parent. Taking longer to play with your kids. Getting off social media and the news and into the Word. Going on a long walk outside. Staying in the moment with God, with the people of God, with His Word, with whatever large or small task He sets before us.
Maybe this season of uncertainty can be a time that we all rise up to remember what's really important and rest all the more in the steadfast certainty of God's character. That is beautiful.
