Monday, June 16, 2025

Today's Scripture
Romans 8:31–39

What then are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not withhold his own Son, but gave him up for all of us, will he not with him also give us everything else? Who will bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (NRSV)

Reflection

Uncertainty.

Is that not the daily thematic message? It is so ubiquitous that the term is now cliché; instead, we speak of “transformation,” “evolving times,” “perilous moments.” But despite synonyms and metaphors, we return to the steady drumbeat of uncertainty. It makes my head hurt.

But our uncertainty didn’t just start in 2025. The older I get, the older the stuff I read — as in writings of the great Greek and Roman philosophers. (Soon I’ll be reading parchment). The origin of uncertainty or epistemic uncertainty began with Socrates — it is the assertion of what we don’t know. Our brains are limited; our knowledge is incomplete — thus the relentless pursuit of discovery, of truth, or as appears in our Northwestern University seal: quaecumque sunt vera — “whatsoever things are true.” Uncertainty is core to life; it’s how we create, why we ideate, what we evolve.

Not infrequently I speak to audiences of early career science professionals — their uncertainty is palpable; their fears are real. My secular message — amid uncertainty, there is both danger and opportunity. Choose wisely. And the best way to navigate today’s world is to “secure your anchors.” I speak of the institutions, people, doctrines, and especially the oath we take in medicine. Anchors.

But enough ancient philosophy, perseveration over today’s angst, quelling fears, and calming youth. We are people of Faith. We accept the wonderment of an awe-inspiring belief. We accept a dimension of existence we can’t imagine and revere a force of unbridled strength and unmeasurable love. We know a sublime truth. We have a constant guide; when we look to the hills (and I look often), we find our help (Psalm 121). We have grace. We have forgiveness. We have the antithesis of what everyone fears, and we have the source needed to navigate any challenge, face any stress, and calmly traverse any crucible crisis.

We have certainty. Return to today’s scripture —

Nothing can separate us, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow” … not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.” Even if we have “trouble, calamity, persecution, hunger, danger, even death … Overwhelming victory is ours through Christ who loved us.”

Let that settle.

Read it again.

Certainty.

Prayer

(My Mother’s homecoming song. Hilda had knowingness; she had certainty. “Sweet, Sweet Spirit” by Doris Akers.)

There’s a sweet, sweet Spirit in this place,
and I know that it’s the Spirit of the Lord;
there are sweet expressions on each face,
and I know that it’s the presence of the Lord.

Amen.

Reflection written by Clyde Yancy, Member of Fourth Presbyterian Church