When Life Swerves

This morning I woke up and did what most people do in the mornings; check Facebook. As I scrolled down my timeline of news about North Korea’s successful attempt to kidnap the American movie industry, I came across an interesting article someone posted with the title: 10 Signs That Predict That You Have Cancer.

I’m a sucker for these. As all suckers would do, I ate the bait and clicked on the article, pulling up 10 symptoms I’ve definitely had in my lifetime, nonetheless the last week! There was a moment that I sincerely thought that I may have cancer.

All of a sudden a seemingly brave 21-year-old dude who claims to love the Lord was reduced to the likeness of a child afraid of the boogeyman. I wasn’t afraid of cancer, but the knowledge that I had no knowledge whether I had it or not. I was afraid that it would sneak up on me.

To be honest, I was afraid of uncertainty.

Not only is this true about major circumstances, but the small ones as well. Being a college student doesn’t help. We could leave our universities with undergraduates and masters degrees yet still work a job that has little to no interest to us.

It makes romantic relationships seem more frightening than they already are! We can give it our best shot and be alone in the end; the worst possible scenario and biggest fear when we enter one. The plan was to make it to the end, not add another name to the list of ones that didn’t work out.

The uncertainty of life can not only make one afraid to make moves, but it makes us afraid to truly live. It makes us scared to take risks. It makes us avoid honesty and face the truth. Uncertainty makes us afraid to follow Jesus.

In Matthew 4, Jesus called Peter and his brother, Andrew to follow Him. Two grown men who have jobs and families and contentment were asked to leave it all to follow Jesus. And they did it. The Lord’s one promise to them in this passage: that they will become fishers of men!

Nothing else is promised in this passage.

Jesus did not tell them that He would make sure they will happy, He declared joy in himself. Jesus did not pinky promise a squeaky clean life, He preached that we must suffer. The Lord did not assure an unchanging world, but as the world changes, He assures us that He will not. We cannot predict or put it in our planners. To follow Jesus is to trust Him. Bob Goff says,

“The way we deal with uncertainty says a lot about whether Jesus is ahead of us leading, or behind us just carrying our stuff.”

Here’s our response to the Lord. “Jesus, you can have my burdens, my hardships, my brokenness, and my sin, but how dare you to ask for my life!”

One who claims to pick up their cross may not confess this, but it is certainly how we live our lives at times. Before a test it’s, “Jesus take the wheel!” After a long day it’s, “Lord, fill me up.” But after a life event happens that totally blindsides us, we wonder why we feel so alone and hopeless, asking ourselves questions as if God has left us and forsaken His people. Some may say that the cause of this may be that we just didn’t see life coming. However, I believe that for most of us, it’s exactly what Bob Goff said. Jesus isn’t leading us. He’s just carrying our stuff. This is not what following Jesus looks like.

Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. (Matthew 16:24-25)

God expects perfection from us and we do not deliver on our end of the bargain. Jesus however, does. Jesus lives the perfect life and died with the sin that should have casted us far away from God. In this grace we stand and live our lives, knowing that the God of the universe provided us with what we ultimately need, Himself. Because of Jesus and His Lordship, we can know God! And when we get to know God, we get to know His goodness.

Our problem is not the fact that we don’t deal with spontaneity very well, but it is that we do not believe that God and His plan are Good enough for us. When life swerves out of control, we do not hold “unswervingly to the hope we profess.” God, who sacrificed His Son to redeem us is the same God that we don’t allow to touch our lives. Tim Keller says it much better than I can,

“If you say: I believe in God, I trusted God, and He didn’t come through; then you only trusted God to meet your agenda.”

I am finishing reading the book of Acts right now. All over this book of the Bible are not only miraculous acts of Jesus’ disciples, but there are also unforeseen acts against the apostles. Many of them die. Some are lucky to be imprisoned. A few live to tell about it all. Through Acts, I have learned that there is an unmatched beauty about this unpredictable life that we live for the Lord. In Acts 21, Paul’s friends and disciples attempt to persuade him to not go to Jerusalem. There was a 99% chance that if Paul had went there he would be imprisoned or killed. Jews were planning his demise. Nobody knew what the final outcome would be. After all of the weeping and sadness over Paul leaving on this uncertain voyage to preach the gospel, Paul replies to his friends, “For I am ready not only to be imprisoned but even to die in Jerusalem in the name of the Lord Jesus (Acts 21:13).” The next verse says that they all replied, “Let the will of the Lord be done.” This is very similar to what Jesus said before He would be taken away to be murdered on our behalf. Paul left his life up to the One who has secured His salvation, his Father.

Letting God’s will be done means several things when you follow him in this broken world we live in:
1. There will be uncertainty
2. But God is in control
3. We must trust Him

Yes, we can die at any given moment.

Yes, we put our best foot forward and circumstances may not work out in our favor.

Yes, we can try our hardest to make life go north, but we steady face south.

Whatever our situation that has caused uncertainty is, I urge us to remember what does not change in this ever-changing world. The light that we can see as we head out on the narrow path. The love that is consistent even in our wavering.

Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful. (Hebrews 10:24)

My name is Mitchell Johnson, and like you who may be reading this post, sometimes I think that I have life figured out. The truth is that I have been trusting in my own plan and not the one that God has for me (which I have no idea about!). However, God does not change like we do. He does not switch headlines as the media does hourly. Most importantly, He does not swerve on us as this life does everyday. Let’s hold onto God and trust in what is sure: His goodness.

“Don’t let your happiness depend on something you may lose.” – C.S. Lewis