The Theology of GPS

The Theology of GPS.
(C) Rev. Joseph M Cherry
Written for and delivered to
the Unitarian Universliast Fellowship of Stanislaus County

Since I’m still relatively new to town, I’ve been relying an awful lot on my GPS. Need to find the Church? Use GPS. Need to find the Walgreen’s? GPS. Need to find just about anything? You go it: GPS.

I purchased my first GPS during my first year of seminary. I had been in Chicago for about 12 years at that point, and I knew pretty much knew every nook and cranny of that place, but when I had to take a class in Washington DC and then a class two weeks later in Saco Maine? I had never been to either place before, let alone driven there. What if I got hopelessly lost? GPS was the answer.

My trusty car at the time was a Honda Civic I named Thomas Paine. Yes, I’m a bit of a history buff. When my GPS arrived in the mail, I called her Patience, because she didn’t seem to have any when I made a mistake and she had to re-calculate her directions. Thomas, Patience and I drove the width and breadth of this country. From almost the 49th parallel to Mississippi, and literally from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

You can see why the loss of Patience was pretty upsetting to me. She had lead me to far away classes, to General Assembly twice, to my year as an intern minister in Vancouver Canada and to San Francisco.

And then she was gone. Stolen! I had to learn to navigate the streets of San Francisco without her. And I missed her voice.

In some ways, Patience was like a little god who traveled with me in my car. True, she was no beauty, being about 3x4 inches and a little gray box and all, but she was reliable. I could depend on her…most of the time.

The loss of my GPS reminded me a lot of losing the God of my Childhood.

That God was all powerful, and all knowing.

And like Patience, I went along with that God, but somewhere in the back of my mind, there was always a little bit of doubt.

See, Patience had once or twice, led me astray. In DC I had told her that I wanted to go to the Smithsonian. Dutifully, I’d searched for the Smithsonian under “Attractions,” which should’ve gotten me to where I wanted to go. After all, there was a button for it.

Instead, I ended up in an increasingly suburban looking area. I became suspicious, but because Patience had never yet failed me, I stuck to her plan.

See, I had supplicated myself, and done what I knew to do to appease my god, and still she failed me.

When I arrived at “The Smithsonian Institution” I was in a cul de sac, in suburban DC. A dead end.

I’ve heard that this has happened to other people, too. That their GPS took them to the wrong place.

Or even more fun, took them on a very circuitous route to their destination.


But when you’re new to an area, you don’t know it’s a circuitous route, do you? You happily plug along, listening to NPR on the radio, and following instructions from your own little God of Directions.

It’s only later, when you get to know an area, or there is a blatant error, like the Smithsonian being at the end of a cul de sac, do you begin to doubt and argue with your little God of Directions.


And to be led astray causes one to feel some of many things. Betrayed, disappointed, lost, confused, helpless.

And none of us really likes to feel any of those things, do we?

Maybe this has, in part, been part of your experience with the Divine.


But also, there is the joy of the journey, isn’t there?

For me, as long as I’m not in a rush to make an appointment, or visit someone in the hospital, I’m okay being taken the long way around. You never know what you might see along the way.


My second GPS is really just an app on my iPhone. It’s fun and all, and it has some features the old one didn’t have, and lacks others. I mean, it’s perfectly serviceable, but I haven’t named it.

What are we left with after the loss of our first “God,” and how can a second idea about what Divinity is possibly compare?

Earlier Marcia talked about the Universalism of her childhood, and how it was much easier to believe in all the tenets when she was young, before she experienced “more and more of life.” Yet still she believes some version of her childhood faith. She believes that loving one’s neighbor brings love into the world if the other party cooperates. She believes that she looses nothing by trying and that good results may yet appear.

Marcia’s life has been a journey, and the exact theology of her youth no longer fits her. Her adult mind and spirit cannot and will not see things the way she did in her childhood.

And yet she comes here to this church, to this community, to live out her adult, matured and maturing faith. She gathers with people who are also working on their faith.


Like many of us gathered here today, Marcia has taken a journey, perhaps only metaphorically guided by a GPS. ;-)

And she has found herself here, this morning. Rejoicing in the good of world, concerned about difficult things in our world. Perhaps you are doing something similar.

What weighs on your heart this morning? (long pause.)

I am thinking especially this morning of the people of Syria. I’m also thinking of the fans and family of Whitney Houston who died just yesterday. If you wish, please name something that’s on your heart right now.


Today we are welcoming 8 new members into our Fellowship. 8 people have decided to become fellow travelers with us. This is good.

This is good for our congregation, good for our spirits. Literature is full of stories of trusted companions on adventure.

One example is about two women in the Book of Ruth from the Hebrew Bible:

15“Look,” said Naomi, “your sister-in-law is going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her.”
16 But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. 17 Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the LORD deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” 18 When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her.

Like Ruth and Naomi, we gather from our origins as different peoples, beginning with differing faiths, but now we are one people. We are joined together not by marriage, not by becoming in-laws to each other, but by our membership in a beloved community.

Be glad today in our abundance. Expressed in pot luck and new members. In new children to run up for story time, in new laughter and with the strength of even more hands. Let us give thanks.

Blessed be, and Amen.