Uncertain Times?

I keep reading and hearing this phrase over and over again on television, in the news, in person, and on the radio. It appears in commercials, on talk shows, on social media, and even in sermons. The phrase is: "In these uncertain times..."

We seem to have this need to define this period, to give a name to what we are feeling and seeing, what we are living through, but we are - forgive me - uncertain what to call it. I have heard many attempts. The global pandemic. The age of coronavirus. Covid times. Quarantine period. This time of social distancing. But the one that gets used most often, by a large margin, is uncertain times.

Uncertain times. It certainly seems to capture the essence of the moment. This week, even more so. We are literally uncertain about who has won the Presidential election. It is uncertain and unclear who will be the next leader of our country. We are uncertain when all the votes will be counted, how many legal challenges there will be, when the vote count will be finalized. Last night there were protests by both sides. We are uncertain if they are going to remain peaceful, if there is going to be unrest, rioting, or violence.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. There is so much more we are uncertain about - a vaccine, the economy, if masks actually work, if we get Covid whether it will be a case of the sniffles or put us in the hospital, when or if things will return to normal, and on and on and on. Which is kind of...reassuring. Hear me out.

Right now we are feeling the intensity of the uncertainty in our country because our sense of security, our sense of normalcy has been upended. However, the reality is that we have always lived in uncertain times. Nothing is ever certain, except maybe, as Benjamin Franklin opined, death and taxes. 

Our new Constitution is now established, and has an appearance that promises permanency; but in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.

            - Benjamin Franklin, in a letter to Jean-Baptiste Le Roy, 1789

In normal uncertain times, we delude ourselves into thinking everything is going along as it should be. We buy into the lie that things are secure, that things are certain, that tomorrow we will wake up happy and healthy, that all the people we love will be there with us, that our investments will go up, that interests rates will stay low, that the price of gasoline will remain under $2.00 per gallon, and that the Vols will compete for an SEC title. But none of those things are ever certain. (Especially that last one.)

So when a crisis comes - like a 9/11 or stock market crash or economic recession or contagious virus or an election that doesn't produce a clear winner immediately or a defeat by the Kentucky Wildcats in Neyland Stadium - everybody panics. The reason we panic isn't because unexpected things are happening, because unexpected things happen all the time, every day. The reason everybody panics is that the lie has been exposed; the myth of certainty has been debunked. All of a sudden we are face to face with our vulnerability, with the uncertainty.

Now the reality is that we are always vulnerable and things are always uncertain. However, we usually buy into the illusion that we are safe and secure, that things are predictable, because we live in a very affluent society where many of us are privileged and are able to surround ourselves with comforts that insulate us from the difficulties of day-to-day living, as well as those who live on the edge of uncertainty and insecurity every single day of their lives.

James reminds us of reality when he says:

Come, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a town and spend a year there doing business and making money. You do not even know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little while, and then vanishes."                                                                                               - James 4:13-14

Talk about a reality check! James says we can make all the plans we want, think we know how it's all going to go, and then die on the way out the door. James goes on to say that this is our lot in life - uncertainty, insecurity. So because of this, he says, we must build our lives on something stronger, more secure, more certain.

Jesus talked about the same thing when he told his stories. He told one about one man who built his house on the sand and another who built his house on the rock. When the storm came, the house built on the sand washed away. He told another about an affluent guy who kept building bigger and bigger barns so that he could store more and more stuff. Then the man died and all that stuff was just left there.

Jesus and James were reminding us that true security, true certainty is found in that which never changes. And what never changes is the character of God, the steadfast love of God, the grace and mercy of God. This is the only thing that is truly certain in the entire universe.

Every day the stock market changes. Every day there are new findings about the coronavirus. Every hour the vote count changes. Presidents come and go. Policies are written and rewritten. People delight and disappoint us. Viruses run rampant and then are contained. Housing values rise and fall. Businesses open and close. Financial conditions ebb and flow. We cannot build our life on that stuff.

I said this in a Wednesday night class a couple of years ago, but it bears repeating. If the Kingdom of God had a ticker the way the cable news networks do, here's what that ticker would say:

• God's character today - unchanged
• God's patience today - unchanged
• God's commitment to justice today - unchanged
• God's grace and mercy today - unchanged
• God's steadfast love today - unchanged

How long our lives will be disrupted due to the coronavirus may be uncertain. Whether or not we will be able to spend the holidays with our families may be uncertain. As of right now, the winner of the election is uncertain. These are uncertain times. They always are.

But nothing in heaven has changed. God's love for us is still certain. God is still sovereign. Jesus still sits on the throne at the right hand of the Father. He is our rock, our anchor, and our only hope. He is where security and certainty begins and ends.

And, by the way, that isn't up for a vote. We don't have to wait for ballots to be counted, for congress to act, for Nancy Pelosi or Mitch McConnell to put it on the docket, or for President Trump to sign an executive order. You can be certain of that!

So in the midst of these uncertain times, stop, take a breath, look around us at the beauty of fall in East Tennessee, and remember that our lives are built on sturdier stuff than what we see on the news. It doesn't mean that the election is unimportant or that we should not take precautions against the coronavirus or that we should not worry about justice for the victims of injustice. But it does mean we can put those things in perspective and remember that nothing, not life nor death nor rulers nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor anything else in all of creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.

Grace and peace...

PT