Living with uncertainty
Isaiah 55: 1-3a, 6-9
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
March 20, 2022
In a world where everything is commodified and monetized, God’s grace, mercy, and love are free and abundant. In a world where we mechanize time down to the millisecond and change the hour of sunrise and sunset to control productivity, the earth measures by seasons when to plant and when to harvest, which stars are visible, when the moon turns her face to us, when the sun is high. In a changeable world of uncertainty, we establish systems and processes to make it as predictable as possible, and in so doing, we end up creating more uncertainty and more suffering.
The book of Isaiah, like much of the Hebrew as well as the Christian scriptures, is an epic poem of the uncertain path forward and God’s faithfulness and love in the midst of uncertainty. Isaiah spans several centuries and the Isaiah who began the journey as God’s prophet is not the same one at the end of the book; in fact, there are several voices who declare judgment, speak tenderly, and give hope to God’s people. God’s people in exile, in their lamentations, in their insecurity and suffering, cry out to God, “Our inheritance has been turned over to strangers, our homes to intruders. We have become orphans, fatherless; our mothers are like widows. We must pay for the water we drink; the wood we get must be bought.” And now God’s prophet, summoned while in exile, calls God’s people home, generations who were born in captivity can now return to their ancestral land.
But in their insecurity, even while God makes promises of faithfulness, God’s people spend their silver on what is not bread and exhaust their substance on what does not satisfy. Do we not do the same? In our desire, our quest for certainty, we buy and buy more, we spend our substance on work to make enough money so that we can give up that work, we create products with planned obsolescence to ensure future demand, we invent plastics and forever chemicals, and all this creates more uncertainty, more suffering.
We confuse faith with certainty, when a life with God on a living world is anything but certain. As Frederick Buechner reminds us, the only things we can be certain of is that beautiful and terrible things will happen. Certainty is not a bad thing, but too much of it erodes the ability to have faith; it doesn’t build the courage needed to trust. The core, the heart of a spiritual life, what it means to be human, is trust. When we first come into this world, our survival depends on whether we can trust those who care for us. Living with uncertainty requires us to develop the ability to trust. As we become adults, our best relationships are ones with people who are unpredictable, that is, they continue to grow, and they are people we can trust.
We have fashioned all sorts of ways for human beings to trust each other. Money is one of the most universal methods we have. We now have a global economy with systems in place to trust that goods and services are worth the money we exchange them for. A legal system and a shared language allow us to trust one another. Religion allows us to trust others who share the same beliefs.
And yet all of these have become more about certainty than about trust. We put “In God we trust” on our money, and yet we scrutinize how the poor spends every dollar while we are enthralled by how the rich spend theirs. Our legal system was designed to benefit those with property ownership. Language is used as an assimilation tool to discriminate against immigrants and refugees. Religion has become more about belief than about how to live, which you’d think would go a long way in engendering a sense of trust.
Our systems designed to foster trust wind up causing conflict because in truth we don’t trust each other, and we prefer certainty and control over uncertainty. Violence and war provide certainty in death, destruction, demoralization, dehumanization, and yet they also create unnecessary uncertainty and suffering. We use uncertainty as a weapon, as a tool of oppression. Fear of war, fear of scarcity, fear of the uncertain future keeps us off-balance, in despair, easily manipulated, and more susceptible to disinformation and gaslighting. The desire for control over one’s circumstances can make a tyrant out of any one of us.
This past week I attended a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion workshop sponsored by the Newark Partnership. One of our first activities was to split up into breakout rooms with one other person and fill in this statement: My name is…I am from…One thing you cannot tell just by looking at me is…This is important for me to tell you because… Since this was a workshop on diversity, equity and inclusion, I decided to take a chance with my answer. One thing you cannot tell just by looking at me is that one of my children is transgender and the other is bisexual, and this is important for me to tell you because their place is not assured in this world. The person I was paired with decided to take a chance with his answer as well: his oldest is non-binary. And with just that one interaction, a piece of trust was created, a connection was made, and a tiny corner of the universe shifted toward wholeness.
The uncertainty that comes with this world is here to stay; not only that, but it is also how we grow and evolve. Author Octavia Butler wrote, “There is no end to what a living world will demand of you.” Uncertainty is actually the good news. Resurrection, unexpected new life where once there was certain death, comes from uncertainty. Uncertainty, unpredictability is what will save humanity. What it means to be queer and trans, what it means to be Black and brown and indigenous, what it means to accept and embrace differences, love your neighbor, love your enemy, what it means to be generous, forgiving, and compassionate, what it means to bear life and truth within our bodies, is to be unpredictable. To be faithful, to be hopeful, to be loving in the midst of uncertainty is to be unpredictable, to thwart those who seek to control and inflict fear.
Surprise people with your expansive heart rather than one that is certain of doom. Throw a curve ball of grace. Take your anger and fear and wrap them in a blanket of gentleness, hold them while you weep. Where the universe is bending toward justice, give into it, bend with it, and spend your money there. In the words of the poet Wendell Berry, “…every day do something that won't compute. Love the Lord. Love the world. Work for nothing. Take all that you have and be poor. Love someone who does not deserve it. …Be joyful though you have considered all the facts.”
Benediction – enfleshed.com
Go forth in reverence of pleasure in your life —
shared meals, shared affection,
working towards shared hopes for the world.
As God delights in us,
may we too delight in the wonder of being alive.
And when delight and pleasure feel far away,
may the compassion of the Holy Spirit
and the encouragement of your spiritual ancestors
bring you fortitude and peace
until wonder knocks on your door once again.
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
March 20, 2022
 |
| Photo of a path through dark thick green growth that opens to sunlight and leads back into shadow. |
In a world where everything is commodified and monetized, God’s grace, mercy, and love are free and abundant. In a world where we mechanize time down to the millisecond and change the hour of sunrise and sunset to control productivity, the earth measures by seasons when to plant and when to harvest, which stars are visible, when the moon turns her face to us, when the sun is high. In a changeable world of uncertainty, we establish systems and processes to make it as predictable as possible, and in so doing, we end up creating more uncertainty and more suffering.
The book of Isaiah, like much of the Hebrew as well as the Christian scriptures, is an epic poem of the uncertain path forward and God’s faithfulness and love in the midst of uncertainty. Isaiah spans several centuries and the Isaiah who began the journey as God’s prophet is not the same one at the end of the book; in fact, there are several voices who declare judgment, speak tenderly, and give hope to God’s people. God’s people in exile, in their lamentations, in their insecurity and suffering, cry out to God, “Our inheritance has been turned over to strangers, our homes to intruders. We have become orphans, fatherless; our mothers are like widows. We must pay for the water we drink; the wood we get must be bought.” And now God’s prophet, summoned while in exile, calls God’s people home, generations who were born in captivity can now return to their ancestral land.
 |
| Graphic poster of swirling colors of black, gray, and blue with black box superimposed over it with this quote: "God of both the calm and the chaos, rather than looking to ourselves, help us look to you." www.lifeinthelabyrinth.com |
But in their insecurity, even while God makes promises of faithfulness, God’s people spend their silver on what is not bread and exhaust their substance on what does not satisfy. Do we not do the same? In our desire, our quest for certainty, we buy and buy more, we spend our substance on work to make enough money so that we can give up that work, we create products with planned obsolescence to ensure future demand, we invent plastics and forever chemicals, and all this creates more uncertainty, more suffering.
We confuse faith with certainty, when a life with God on a living world is anything but certain. As Frederick Buechner reminds us, the only things we can be certain of is that beautiful and terrible things will happen. Certainty is not a bad thing, but too much of it erodes the ability to have faith; it doesn’t build the courage needed to trust. The core, the heart of a spiritual life, what it means to be human, is trust. When we first come into this world, our survival depends on whether we can trust those who care for us. Living with uncertainty requires us to develop the ability to trust. As we become adults, our best relationships are ones with people who are unpredictable, that is, they continue to grow, and they are people we can trust.
 |
| Photo of the Milky Way above a hilly rocky beach with this quote by Frederick Buechner: "Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." |
We have fashioned all sorts of ways for human beings to trust each other. Money is one of the most universal methods we have. We now have a global economy with systems in place to trust that goods and services are worth the money we exchange them for. A legal system and a shared language allow us to trust one another. Religion allows us to trust others who share the same beliefs.
And yet all of these have become more about certainty than about trust. We put “In God we trust” on our money, and yet we scrutinize how the poor spends every dollar while we are enthralled by how the rich spend theirs. Our legal system was designed to benefit those with property ownership. Language is used as an assimilation tool to discriminate against immigrants and refugees. Religion has become more about belief than about how to live, which you’d think would go a long way in engendering a sense of trust.
 |
| Screenshot of a tweet by Rev. Benjamin Cremer that reads "If our Christianity causes us to look at how a poor person spends their welfare check with inherent suspicion all while we look at how the exorbitantly rich accumulate mass amounts of wealth with inherent admiration, we need a grand reversal." |
Our systems designed to foster trust wind up causing conflict because in truth we don’t trust each other, and we prefer certainty and control over uncertainty. Violence and war provide certainty in death, destruction, demoralization, dehumanization, and yet they also create unnecessary uncertainty and suffering. We use uncertainty as a weapon, as a tool of oppression. Fear of war, fear of scarcity, fear of the uncertain future keeps us off-balance, in despair, easily manipulated, and more susceptible to disinformation and gaslighting. The desire for control over one’s circumstances can make a tyrant out of any one of us.
This past week I attended a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion workshop sponsored by the Newark Partnership. One of our first activities was to split up into breakout rooms with one other person and fill in this statement: My name is…I am from…One thing you cannot tell just by looking at me is…This is important for me to tell you because… Since this was a workshop on diversity, equity and inclusion, I decided to take a chance with my answer. One thing you cannot tell just by looking at me is that one of my children is transgender and the other is bisexual, and this is important for me to tell you because their place is not assured in this world. The person I was paired with decided to take a chance with his answer as well: his oldest is non-binary. And with just that one interaction, a piece of trust was created, a connection was made, and a tiny corner of the universe shifted toward wholeness.
 |
| Image description: black background with white letters, with this quote, "Consider this remarkable fact: in the Sermon on the Mount, there is not a single word about what to believe, only words about what to do and how to be. By the time the Nicene Creed is written, only three centuries later, there is not a single word in it about what to do and how to be--only words about what to believe." - Robin R. Meyers, Saving God from Religion: A Minister's Search for Faith in a Skeptical Age |
The uncertainty that comes with this world is here to stay; not only that, but it is also how we grow and evolve. Author Octavia Butler wrote, “There is no end to what a living world will demand of you.” Uncertainty is actually the good news. Resurrection, unexpected new life where once there was certain death, comes from uncertainty. Uncertainty, unpredictability is what will save humanity. What it means to be queer and trans, what it means to be Black and brown and indigenous, what it means to accept and embrace differences, love your neighbor, love your enemy, what it means to be generous, forgiving, and compassionate, what it means to bear life and truth within our bodies, is to be unpredictable. To be faithful, to be hopeful, to be loving in the midst of uncertainty is to be unpredictable, to thwart those who seek to control and inflict fear.
 |
| Deep salmon poster with these words in white letters: "Controlling people try to control people, and they do the same with God--but loving anything always means a certain giving up of control. You tend to create a God who is just like you--whereas it was supposed to be the other way around." - Richard Rohr. |
Surprise people with your expansive heart rather than one that is certain of doom. Throw a curve ball of grace. Take your anger and fear and wrap them in a blanket of gentleness, hold them while you weep. Where the universe is bending toward justice, give into it, bend with it, and spend your money there. In the words of the poet Wendell Berry, “…every day do something that won't compute. Love the Lord. Love the world. Work for nothing. Take all that you have and be poor. Love someone who does not deserve it. …Be joyful though you have considered all the facts.”
Benediction – enfleshed.com
Go forth in reverence of pleasure in your life —
shared meals, shared affection,
working towards shared hopes for the world.
As God delights in us,
may we too delight in the wonder of being alive.
And when delight and pleasure feel far away,
may the compassion of the Holy Spirit
and the encouragement of your spiritual ancestors
bring you fortitude and peace
until wonder knocks on your door once again.
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