Learn and Believe- UCC Daily Devotional
Chris Mereschuk
But as for you, continue in what you have learned and firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it, and how from childhood you have known sacred writings that ware able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. -2 Timothy 3:14-15 (NRSV)
What do you do when you don’t know what you believe anymore because you don’t know what to believe anymore? Seemingly each day a new threat, new reality, new horror that shakes us to the core. Some waking up to what has long been a reality for others; some facing increase in the risk and persecution we’ve long known.
Perhaps to some extent for all, we witness our collective protections, traditions, institutions, norms, mores, morals daily degraded, dismantled, and destroyed- the rubble gold-plated and hawked by charlatans as bigger, better, more beautiful. And the more of it we buy, the more the dissonance of hyper-normalization overwrites the harmonious sacred lullabies of our salvation.
“But as for you, continue in what you’ve learned and firmly believed…” We’ve learned and believed this: In these days, there will be distressing times- selfishness, extreme arrogance, greed, cruelty, manipulation, outright lies, death-dealing propaganda, exploitation, oppression (2 Timothy 3:1-4).
And yet, at the same time and for all time, we continue to learn and believe this: In these days there will be- has been, is now, still to come- fierce selfless love, abundant generosity, steadfast solidarity, boundless compassion, unfailing empathy, unceasing hope, divine flourishing, transformative salvation, radical liberation (Genesis 1 to Revelation 22). While we contend with the multiple troubling truths that surround us, the holy truths of what we’ve learned and believed ground us.
Prayer: Remind us, ground us, teach us again so that we might learn and firmly believe. Amen.
About the author: Chris Mereschuk (he/him) is the Director for Legacy and Church Redevelopment for the Southern New England Conference, UCC
