In it, Not of it – A Certain Future
The COVID-19 pandemic has generated a lot of debate, discussion, and speculation as to what the future holds. We often hear that our return to “normal”, whatever that looks like, will be anything but “normal”. Our new “normal” only lasts until the next prediction as to what “normal” really is or will be.
Uncertainty in the future or a loss of hope has always been one of the plagues that causes much anxiety, fear, depression, and a host of other physical and mental health issues. Fear creeps in, it realigns our focus on the fog of uncertainty and doubt. We begin to lose hope as we focus on the uncertainty of the future. Yet as believers in Jesus, we have a different perspective, a different hope, a certain future able to sustain us through pandemic, illness, and times of great uncertainty.
Too often our present circumstances determine our outlook on the future. We praise God when times are good, and we fall into doubt and despair in times of personal difficulty. Perhaps it is just part of being human, creatures of emotion. Perhaps it is our spiritual enemy’s way of inserting doubt. Apart from Jesus on the cross, the example of Job demonstrates one individual’s extreme suffering, pain, and personal anguish. His health, his children, and his wealth were taken. His friends and even his wife told him to “curse God and die” (Job 2:9). Yet it is the answer that Job gives his wife, the person closest to him, that demonstrates that Job had his focus on the certainty of his future. “Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive evil? In all this Job did not sin with his lips” (Job 2:10).
I am positive that Job wrestled with and anguished over his loss, wondering where God was in all of it. Yet, his faith was not broken. His faith was shaken, yes, but not shattered.
That brings us back to ourselves, living amid an ever-changing normal, a pandemic environment and an angry world of job loss, injustice, and interpersonal conflicts. What is our response? Where is our hope for today? Our hope is in the certainty of our future. We are in the world “but not of it”. This world is not our home, our destiny, or all that there is.
As believers in Jesus, our hope is focused on Jesus and our certain future with Him. I think the apostle Paul expresses this well in 2 Corinthians 4:17-18; “For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.”
Did you catch that? – a “momentary affliction” – our present circumstance is not all there is. This life is but a moment. “Preparing for us” – there is something else, something waiting for us, an inheritance, glory beyond our human capability to understand and beyond all comparison to anything we have now.
While our pandemic environment may be causing distress, robbing us of peace and inserting fear or even anxiety, we need not park there. We have a certain future that is beyond comparison with our current circumstances.
Helen Lemmel (1863-1961), was a gifted musician who wrote over 500 hymns. Her most famous was “Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus”. Reflect upon a part of this hymn as we live this life and contemplate our certain future.
O soul, are you weary and troubled?
No light in the darkness you see?
There’s light for a look at the Savior
And life more abundant and free.
Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim
In the light of His glory and grace.
In times of uncertainty, let us consider Jesus, the author and founder of our faith!
Rev. Bill Allan
AGC President