Gracious Uncertainty
Somewhere in the mountains…
As my time at The Cove came to an end, it was time to leave a beautiful place of peace and tranquility, and head back out into the busy world. As soon as I left the gate, I was welcomed by the noise of a busy interstate and I decided to head to downtown Asheville to walk through the city and find a place to eat lunch; however, I immediately got turned around and found myself heading down a road I didn’t know. I pulled off to the side and pulled up my map to see I was heading down a road that would ultimately re-connect with the interstate that would take me home, and I took a moment and considered whether or not to go back to my original plan and backtrack to Asheville, or continue down this unknown road I found myself on. It just so happened there was a cool looking local sandwich shop right where I pulled off, so I decided to make that my lunch destination and continue down the road I was on. This unexpected journey turned out to be exceptionally enjoyable and beautiful as a I drove the winding mountain roads and passed horse farms, hay fields, trout streams, log cabins, and hundreds of acres of fields covered in yellow flowers. The scenery all down this winding road was just amazing… more beautiful than the place I left that I thought topped them all.
This reminds me of a quote by Oswald Chambers in the April 29th entry called ‘The Graciousness of Uncertainty’ in his timeless devotional book, ‘My Utmost For His Highest’. In talking about being certain in God in the midst of uncertain circumstances, he says, ‘Certainty is the mark of the common-sense life; gracious uncertainty is the mark of the spiritual life. To be certain of God means that we are uncertain in all our ways, we do not know what a day may bring forth. This is said with a sigh of sadness, it should be rather an expression of breathless expectation. We are uncertain of the next step, but we are certain of God. Immediately we abandon to God, and do the duty that lies nearest, He packs our life with surprises all the time. …when we are rightly related to God, life is full of spontaneous, joyful uncertainty and expectancy’.
Thank God for the unexpected and unplanned detour that led me away from the city and along the beautiful mountain road. Through the hills and the turns with beauty abounding all around, it was there that I regained a God honoring rhythm from the noise that flooded me as soon as I left The Cove, and it was there that I experienced His beauty in a vibrant new way. In considering the spiritual implication of that road I found myself journeying down, it wasn’t a road of willful disobedience that I needed to turn back from and go back to the place God last told me to go; rather, it was simply an unexpected detour from the plans and determinations I had previously made. Had I journeyed back to what my logical mind previously determined to do, I would have missed the awe-inspiring beauty of this long and winding country road. The place I originally pulled off wasn’t beautiful at all; it was rather plain and unassuming with nothing that would lure me down it any further, and maybe that’s a proverbial truth to where you find yourself too. The place where you are doesn’t seem special in the least, but yet there you are. Do you trust God for the beauty yet to be seen, or do you turn back to the beauty you already know? In the words of Oswald Chambers, be certain of God, be rightly related to Him, and live with joyful uncertainty and breathless expectation.
