Death and Certainty

I’ve probably heard John Lennon’s classic song Imagine a hundred times, and usually found myself humming the melodic line for hours after. Today I heard it again, and actually listened to the lyrics, and found it quite sad. I was sadder still to think that Lennon’s goal of a world without certainty was becoming a reality.

If you remember, Lennon dreamed of a world where there was no certainty about heaven or hell, about who was right and who was wrong. He invited us all to give up our certainties, our differences based on opposing truth claims or values, and just come and live as one. He envisioned that unity could only come about when there was a lack of certainty. Apparently, he had drunk the entire pitcher of post-modern elixir and the result was a beautiful melody that allowed a despicable lyric to glide past our intellect and straight into our psyche.

Back when modernist approaches to knowledge held sway “doubt” was considered in poor taste. If the doctor said you had this, and needed to do this, you did it. When education and government promised to end poverty, wars, and racism, we believed them. And when the church promised that if you followed these six easy steps you’d arrive at a pleasant, satisfying life, we bought the book, followed the steps, and hoped for the best. Along the way, if we had doubts, we kept them to ourselves simply because to express them was to admit we didn’t get it, didn’t see how it could work out, couldn’t connect the dots everyone else seemed to be championing. Unfortunately, the modern approach most often over reached, and over time, we’ve come to see its shallowness.

In the post-modern way of looking at life “doubt” has become the highest symptom of authenticity. Today, the man with the most questions is considered the most authentic guy in the room. To question is to demand that everyone understand how certainty is really a fiction, and anyone who claims to have it is just another clone playing a part in a cosmic power play designed to keep the powerful in charge.

To be fair, the postmodern critique of the modern world contains some truth. But while they are asking the right questions of modern epistemology, the answers they are giving are as ruinous as those they are chaffing to undo. While it is healthy to champion rigorous analysis and doubt as means to uncovering the truth in any situation, it is simply wrong to suggest that a perpetual state of doubt constitutes the only authentic state of being. It seems that it is all the rage to ask questions, but woe to those who suggest that they have answers.

Given my position as a theologian and pastor it will come as no surprise that I advocate giving pre-modern answers to the questions lobed at modernity by the postmodern ethos. I believe strongly that we all need to ask the great questions of life, and that no questioner should be made to feel that they are out of bounds. My belief in man as created in the image of God means I believe humanity was always meant to recognize and have to deal with the great question of life, death, and eternity. To stifle questions here is to block the very path our Creator expects us to travel in order to understand and respond to Him righteously. It isn’t enough to throw religion, philosophy, ethics, and other intellectual pursuits out the window and just imagine that their arguments and conclusions have no merit. Apparently that is what Lennon dreamed of. Unfortunately, I believe our society is grasping firmly on to his way of thinking. All around us the laziness of doubt is becoming vogue while the hard stuff of thinking, analyzing, and finding truth is being spun as fanatical and dangerous.

As I listened to Imagine it hit me that Lennon’s call to the world was to let go of any tightly held value if someone was opposed to it. For him, competing truth claims were the foundation of all our unrest. The solution was to imagine a world where everyone just gave up their values in order to secure the one value of unity. The trouble is, values don’t become so simply because we want them. Values are based on solid, authoritative foundations that can’t just be thrown away. And for me, that foundation is a personal, almighty God who has made both heaven and hell. Lennon would have done much better to acknowledge his doubt as to the meaning of life and death, and then poured his energy into finding the truth that would end his questioning with certainty. The same is true for all of us today as we struggle to find certainty in the postmodern quagmire of doubt.  Truth is here. We just need to find it, believe it, and build our lives on it.