When you don’t know, but you know.

The parish priest at mass today just got back from Italy yesterday (and no, we didn’t all run out of church when he told us 😁), but he mentioned how much uncertainty he had experienced in the past week because while in Italy he wasn’t sure if he’d be able to make it back to the UK as scheduled. The corona virus situation was changing so rapidly in Italy, he didn’t know if something would happen that would cause him to be quarantined. He was already thinking of how much he had to do and how much he’ll need to reschedule if for some reason his plans had to change as a result of the situation with the virus.

He finally got on a plane heading to London and while in transit, the plane experienced such severe turbulence that he started thinking again to himself all that would happen, or not happen, if he didn’t arrive home as planned. But he did get home on schedule and as planned and he shared in retrospect if he had known for certain what the outcome of these two scenarios were going to be, he would have spent less or no time thinking or worrying about them and definitely no effort trying to reorganize his schedule just in case he got delayed.

This certainty in knowing the outcome, despite the uncertainty and even turbulence in going through the process is akin to ‘When you don’t know, but you know’.

Hearing Fr’s experience reminded me of so many whom I know who are waiting for, working towards or looking forward to something in anticipation. How sometimes the uncertainty and turbulence in the process can cause you to doubt that you will arrive at the expected outcome, you will get that which you have waited on, worked for or sought after.

So to myself and to all those who this might resonate with I say these words of encouragement: We may know nothing about the process, it may be fraught with uncertainty, difficulty, lack of clarity, pain, sweat and tears; that’s okay. Because we know what we know, we know the outcome. And the only reason we can be so confident about the outcome is because “We know in whom we have believed, in whom we have put our trust “ 2 Timothy 1:12; and we know the plans he has for us are “plans to bring us prosperity and not disaster, plans to bring about the future we hope for” Jeremiah‬ ‭29:11‬ ‭GNBDK‬‬.

So with confidence and certainty in the outcome we can go through the process, turbulent and uncertain though it may be. For though we may not know; but we know.

God bless us all.