A Letter About Certainty
Today’s Scripture Reading
Dear Friend,
I pray this letter finds you well. Thank you for being here. I sit quietly in my office, my feet cold, and my shoulders wrapped in a blanket. I write by a soft lamp in the corner. As I reflect on the texts for today, I am struck by the certainty in the voice of the Psalmist. The declarations feel firmly stated.
The Lord exists forever; your word is firmly fixed in heaven.
As the writer continues, it is clear they are not only certain but they are trying hard to be faithful in response to their certainty. These are the two themes that resonate with me as I read.
I don’t know about you, but as the pandemic began and political unrest continued in early 2020, I found the things I felt certain of grew fewer. I could watch them melt away from my life. What was once an anchor was now dandelion petals drifting up and away from me. There were of course times of great uncertainty in my own life through the years prior to the pandemic - that is normal. We don’t need a pandemic to be uncertain, but it did seem to elevate the number of uncertainties that haunted and unsettled me. How about you?
Even with all the uncertainty, there have been times throughout the last 24 months when I felt certain we were turning a corner and we would begin to find a new normal. Times I have felt certain people would behave or respond in a particular way to a crisis or situation. While some of these moments only served to disappoint me or hurt me deeply, others were glorious reminders of God's great community of faith caring for a neighbor or a ministry.
Today alone, I learned of 3 more friends and a niece who tested positive for this breath robbing virus.
So, certainty? I guess I could say I am certain Covid is here, alive and well, and going forth and multiplying.
While I am in awe and a bit jealous of the certainty with which the Psalmist expresses the sovereignty of God, I feel the need to remind myself, and you friend, that this is only a snippet of the longest Psalm in the Bible. If I tried to base my daily markers of faithfulness on this single scripture reading I would fail, and while I am not certain of most things most days, I am grateful that God’s love for me, and for you, is not dependent on our certainty. It isn’t dependent on our ability to believe or have faith or show up or proclaim.
It just is - It’s just God’s love, an anchor - and a dandelion seed taking root in our hearts and in the hearts of others, there to grow as we nurture it.
My prayer for you this night is that your feel the seed of God’s love in your heart as certainty, and in the moments when you aren’t certain about that, that you have a place, a space, a person, a verse, something you can turn to and be reminded. This is my prayer for you.
Grace and Peace,
Mitzie
PS. Leave a comment below and let me know about your current relationship to certainty. Here in the comments we can learn and grow with and through each other.