In the first semester of my senior year in college, a massive terrorist attack took place on United States soil, taking thousands of lives, and suddenly everything changed.
All that had seemed certain to many of us on campus now felt terribly uncertain. The stock market tanked. Friends who’d been looking for jobs, especially in New York City, the site of one part of the attack, had to look elsewhere. But it wasn’t just that. Life as we knew it seemed to have been turned upside down. Everyone was operating with more suspicion, more fear. Around campus, people talked anxiously about what might happen next – none of it good.
Where can we turn in moments like these when upheaval and instability seem like the new normal? Is there any certainty to be found in uncertain times?
History as recorded by the Bible shows that no matter what appears to be going on politically, economically, or culturally, there is something rock solid underneath it all that is there for each of us to find. The lives of the men and women in both the Old and New Testaments show us over and over that God and our understanding of Him do more than just get us through uncertain times. As we are grounded in what is true, we are actually lifted above them.
One of the most comforting metaphors that appears frequently in the Scriptures is God as Shepherd and us as God’s sheep. There is something stabilizing and restful about knowing we have a divine caretaker whose love never wavers, no matter the circumstances. Deeper than that, though, is the understanding it can provide of the actual structure of the universe – of God’s role in it in contrast to ours.
One way to understand this divine order is that the Shepherd leads and guides, while our job is to follow. To trust. But how often do we really live as though we’re in the “sheep” position? We’ve been miseducated to believe that we’re the ones having to figure it all out, to find our way. There’s a misconception that God is somewhere “over there,” and only when things seem scary or don’t work out do we invite God into our lives and hope He can sort it all out.
But God, Love, is always here, ever present – the “centre and circumference of being” (“Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” pp. 203-204), wrote Mary Baker Eddy, who discovered the actual Science of Being, which she named Christian Science. She also defines God as Principle: the sole source, creator, ruler, and power.
We don’t move and hope Principle moves with us. Principle moves, expresses, and that movement or expression is us. Our life! We, being, in reality, wholly spiritual, flow out from this source of perfect harmony, purpose, supply, direction, and anything else we could ever need. Since Principle includes all good, we, by reflection, include it too. No upheaval or uncertainty can change that.
Does that mean our dreams, goals, or plans don’t matter? No. They express something of what’s in our heart. But a thought shift – a letting go – comes when we remember the true structure and order of things. As a hymn in the “Christian Science Hymnal” expresses it, “[God] knows the way He taketh / and I will walk with Him” (Anna L. Waring, No. 148).
It’s Principle’s way, Love’s way, and, you could say, we’re along for the ride. Again, our concept of God grounds us. Love’s way means it must be profoundly good. To use another synonym for God, Mind’s way means it must be intelligent, wise, and compelling. To understand the control that Love, Mind, has over its universe and our lives reassures us that we can’t miss out, can’t be left out.
And if we still feel fearful or uncertain? Then we can count on Christ, “the true idea of God” (Science and Health, p. 54), to dispel that fear with the deep peace that comes from knowing that God really is all that Christ Jesus knew and proved Him to be. Christ, Truth, wakes us up from believing we are the center of things, with all the burden that includes, and reveals God to be both all good and the source from which all good radiates in an infinite variety of ways.
Facing a changed world in college, I’d found it comforting to realize that my deepening trust in God meant I could find certainty in the midst of uncertainty. But as I’ve grown in my understanding of Christian Science, I’ve discovered that that wasn’t really accurate. What’s there for all of us, what’s real, is the certainty that overrides – actually eliminates – uncertainty: the certainty that we are never walking alone.
Originally published as an editorial in the July 14, 2025, issue of the Christian Science Sentinel.
