The Importance Of Uncertainty

Uncertainty By Nicu Buculei

As an artist, all is uncertain. Whether a dancer, musician, sculptor, photographer, writer like myself, or creative of another ilk, uncertainty has a way of painting itself across your work. Uncertainty at the quality of your work, ‘Will any audience like this song?’, uncertainty at financial viability, ‘Is this really going to be commissioned?’, and, most crucially, uncertainty of your calling, ‘Am I just dreaming, is this really what God has got for me?’ Thankfully, uncertainty is crucial, it is God’s proving ground, a place of unparalleled character growth.

Uncertainty breeds faith
 
We find, in Hebrews, the famous verse, ‘Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.’  Faith is reliant on the unseen, the hoped for yet unrealised.  Without uncertainty, faith has no place.
 
When Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were presented with the fiery furnace, they had a choice, a choice to doubt for a moment, one moment of weakness, and kneel to Nebuchadnezzar’s golden image, or to trust.  What would come out of their trust was uncertain, unseen, yet hoped for, they had surely never witnessed God pluck others from a fiery furnace but their response is never in question, ‘We have no need to answer you in this matter,’ they say, ‘Our God, whom we serve, is able to deliver us . . . if not, be it known . . . we will not serve your gods.’ Never had their future been more in doubt, and never had they a greater opportunity to rely on God.  Great uncertainty breeds great faith.
 
For the artist, every new endeavour, every blank page in the diary, every bank statement is an opportunity to rely on God.  Seek, at all times, His ‘assurance of the things hoped for,’ His ‘conviction of things not seen’.
 
Uncertainty breeds works
 
Imagine a sport.  Two teams take the field, both knowing the outcome, knowing the eventual score line, knowing who’ll score, who’ll miss, who’ll leave the field injured.  Do you imagine the blood is pumping, adrenaline flowing, or do you see the inevitable lack-lustre affair?  In life as in sport, uncertainty drives us.  James contains another famed passage on faith, ‘Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.’  Like the sportsman who believes, unknowing, in a favourable outcome, who sweats and strives for every moment of the game, every yard won, uncertainty demands we work, demands we give our all to grasp the hoped for, the unseen.  Without works, faith is dead.
 
Joshua never stopped striving for the unseen, promised inheritance.  When ‘all the people of Israel’ rebelled against God, and, in fear, refused to enter the promised land, Joshua, along with Caleb, still proclaimed, ‘The Lord is with us; do not fear them.’  When presented with the vast unassailable walls of Jericho, Joshua trusted in a plan that no human military strategist would advise, leading God’s people, step by step, undoubtedly hounded by taunts and cackles from the besieged city, on their circular march.  When ‘All the kings of the Amorites,’ were gathered against them, ‘Joshua [still] went up . . . he and all the people of war.’

Uncertainty, from a worldly perspective, leaves us slaves to indecision.  As Christian artists, great uncertainty leads to great works of faith.
 
Uncertainty Speaks of God’s Commission
 
When told by a certain scribe that he would follow him wherever he went, Jesus declared to the earnest man, ‘Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head’.  A life following Jesus is a life marked by uncertainty.  ‘Behold,’ Jesus said, ‘I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves.’  He never called us to a life of certainty.  ‘You will be dragged before governers and kings,’ ‘you will be hated by all.’  The expectation of the Christian should be uncertainty, an uncertain life on earth, knowing that we are a people sent.  Jesus sends us, not to a cosy, rosy existence, but to one of challenge, risk and uncertain outcomes, for every moment of challenge is a moment to trust and better glorify Him.
 
‘Do all things,’ persevere in every penniless project, perform at every tiny venue, pursue every commission, no matter how small, ‘without grumbling or complaining,’ in spite of the uncertainty, in spite of the challenge, in spite of the obstacles, ‘that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world.’  This is what he calls us too, for we are his servant, in whom He will be glorified.
 
A Note on Certainty
 
Faith, in the face of an uncertain future, sets the Christian apart, but it is not, like our analogous sportsman, faith in one’s own ability, it is a faith set in The Rock of certainty.  The most common promise in the Bible is one of certainty, ‘I will be with you.’  ‘I chose you before the creation of the World,’ I knitted you together in your mother’s womb, ‘the hairs of your head are all numbered,’ when you sit and when you rise, I know, I shall renew your strength, I hem you in before and behind and lay my hand upon you, ‘I know the plans I have for you,’ even though you walk through the valley of the shadow of death, you will fear no evil, for I am with you, ‘behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.’ This is his certain promise to us, through all uncertainty, he will be with us, Immanuel.

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What do you think about this article?

Sam Butt – Saturday 24 Mar 2012

I found this article really helpful. I’m a young photographer, recently married, working mainly in the fashion and music industries, on a freelance basis. God has clearly called me to work in these industries and i’ve experienced some incredible blessings in terms of influential people that God has allowed me to meet and clients he’s lead me to work for but uncertainty follows me daily and it often feels sinful that I don’t know exactly what I’m supposed to do next or who to go and see etc. I find it really exciting to be reminded as I embark on new projects of the fact that my ability and purpose for creating comes directly from God and that though who my clients will be and who will and won’t like my work is uncertain his promises are not, incredible! I haven’t been able to attend the Everything conference for the past 2 years due to working but it was at the first conference that I gained huge amounts of confidence to step out in faith in a new way and being able to catch-up and feed on the web content is such a blessing. Thanks for writing this article Tom and to all involved with the Everything conference, keep pressing on in faith.

Sam