The Quest for Certainty
To be certain is to be sure, positive, and not doubting. It is a lofty state to be in, a most desirable state, if you may. I mean, who of us doesn’t want to be certain about how our life turns out – certain that we will safely arrive when we travel, that our marriage will work out, that our investments will give good returns, etc.? Therefore, the pursuit of certainty is an endeavor we are all on. We are investing to secure our financial future, we vote to ensure the security of our political and social-economic future, we choose neighborhoods that we consider safe and use the latest technology in locks to secure our property, and the list could go on. We are helplessly in pursuit of certainty.
Gambling With and Ensuring Certainty
But there is really no assurance that all our plans will work out. You see, a gambler places a bet on something with the “hope” that his bet will give him a jackpot. Gamblers do not do this with certainty; instead, they imagine they will be lucky. And on this promise of luck, gambling companies continue to thrive at the expense of millions of addicted users who keep on being impoverished by every bet. You cannot bet on them! And when you live life like a gamble, you set yourself up for failure since you are anchored on luck, and luck is no guarantee!
When we have accumulated our imagined pillars of certainty – investments, connections, networks, jobs, money, etc., we begin to imagine the risk. What if the investment does not work? What if the car is stolen? What if I lose my job? And these what-ifs (uncertainties) then make us think about insurance. So, you buy a car that is supposed to make your movement comfortable and convenient. Still, since it cannot assure you of uninterrupted service, you take out insurance to enhance the certainty that it will serve you. And that is how we are; we cover our risks with insurance we can afford. But even then, we still hope that somehow it will not be us who get into trouble, but someone else out there.
Hindrances to Certainty
This series on the nature of biblical hope aims to ground us in the truth that Christian hope is radically different from the hope that the world offers. As believers, we are anchored securely and steered safely by God in Christ. Those who are outside of Christ have to deal with their overconfidence, fear of the unknown, and the dynamics of life.
Overconfidence is thinking of yourself more highly than you ought to. You hold your abilities, experiences, and power in higher regard than God. But we know how we are, frail, sinful, and needing redemption. We are nothing outside of God’s gracious kindness to us. Secondly, those outside of Christ must deal with the fear of the unknown, where outcomes cannot be accurately discerned. In gambling, you are only taking chances, while in insurance, you hope that your risk assessment is accurate, but you do not know for sure what the outcome will be. Finally, life is dynamic, and change is inevitable. Our circumstances and environments change and require us to be adaptable. How do you adapt when all you hoped for and in is gone?
The Biblical Guarantee for Hope in Uncertainty
Ps. 139 shows us how the greatness of the all-knowing, ever-present, and eternal God guarantees our outcomes. If you had every knowledge of your life and circumstances, were present all around yourself, and did not have to deal with mortality, then you could say you have certainty. But you do not possess those qualities; only God does. What a blessed assurance we have when Jesus is ours! As the hymn says, it is a foretaste of glory divine!
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God knows: God is all-knowing. There is nothing in creation that is hidden from Him. He made all of it. He knows us (me), as in verse 1. He knows my sitting and rising, my thoughts from afar, my going out and lying down my ways, and all my words even before I speak them. The inconsiderable and casual are under his continuous notice. Not only is this the case, but God has also hemmed us in (verse 5). Our life has not been left to chance. We are not victims of sheer luck or avoiders of risk; no, we are known and hemmed. What a perfect assurance!
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God has a grasp on us: God is ever-present (omnipresent). He is not localized. Unlike the devil, who moves around (1 Peter 5:8) and roams the earth (Job 1:7), God is everywhere all at once. No darkness can hide anything from him. Nothing gets him from behind. Where can I go from your Spirit? (Ps. 139: 7). There is nowhere to go, to flee, or to hide. We are, like in the mall, under 24-hour CCTV surveillance. His power, love, righteous judgment, goodness, and grace are always with us. And He is a good God. What a glorious assurance!
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God made us: God is the only one who exists outside himself. He has aseity and is the creator; He creates ex-nihilo (out of nothing). God made and knitted us together and determined our frame; he ordained days for us and wrote them down (Ps. 139: 13-16). We don’t merely exist for nothing; we exist from him who made us, and since he set out all our days before any of them came to be, we can hope in Him who made us. What a precious assurance!
How do we respond to this good news? Proverbs 3:5- 6 sums it up very well: Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your path straight. We are invited to trust, to lean not, and to acknowledge. This results in the assurance (the certainty) that God will make our paths straight.
Our Response
In the wake of all the uncertainty in life, we can have hope in God, who knows us, who has taken hold of us, and who made us. If we trust him fully and lean not on our own, if we acknowledge him, then he will make our paths straight, and that will be our certainty. Amen.
