We are living in a time marked by fear, and understandably so, our lives have been turned upside-down as COVID-19 sweeps through the world leaving destruction in its wake. Many of us have lost jobs and are racked with uncertainty about the future. Besides this, our relationships have been tainted with distrust as everyone becomes a possible carrier of this rogue virus. Our own family have become estranged. We are under siege in our homes, too scared to venture out. We are prohibited to travel outside our region; the borders under guard by teams of imposing personnel in dark uniforms. It sounds like something from a Hunger Games film—how did we get to this place?
Alarming still, some people are behaving like those in the Hunger Games, having given in to fear and panic they have become obsessed with saving their own skin above all other considerations. Hoarding supplies, clawing and screaming at people for a roll of toilet paper. Insane. They are driven by fear, and who can blame them? Fear and anxiety are powerful enemies. We have given them a foothold in our lives by putting our hope in material things—in this we have all been exposed. Our fear unveils that in which we had placed too much trust: our jobs, money, health, & education. As COVID-19 spreads its tentacles into our lives, we are realising how little security these things really gave us. As it sucks our routines, our social connections, and our agendas from our grasp, our anxiety gently asks us a different question: why were we holding them so tightly in the first place? This suggests we were looking for security in the wrong places. We were trying to extract something from the world, that the world could never offer us.
We had forgotten that "man does not live by bread alone." No matter how we tried to pick every crumb off the floor, bread alone was never going to satisfy us anyway. We were fooling ourselves, our false confidence robbing us of a larger blessing. We were like chickens scratching through a field of diamonds looking for food, unable to apprehend the glorious wealth all around us while in futile search of a mere grain. We had forgotten that our joy and our hope and our peace are all found in Jesus Christ our Saviour—and these transcend our physical reality. We had forgotten that when we seek first our joy in him, all else is made more joyful. We had forgotten to put the kingdom of God first, and all else will be added to us; we have been too busy trying to establish everything else for ourselves first, and then squeeze the kingdom of God in at the end.
But could this virus be like a Trojan horse in reverse? Rolling resolutely through our gates, the very image of death and destruction; but then pouring out of its belly (as the scripture puts it) rivers of living water? In other words, a blessing in disguise? Something has changed in the spiritual atmosphere: something is brewing, something is coming. Rest assured, it is coming. God is doing something new, do you not see it? He is making a way in the wilderness that had become our lives. A way to seek him. A way to reset our priorities. A way to put him first again. He has given us time back, he has taken away our crutches, so that we may find REAL hope in him. He is making a way for us to trust in him again, to hope in him and not ourselves. To be sustained by him and not our own meagre provisions. Oh if only we'd see it! If only we would put our pride aside and get down and worship him! Really trust him with our lives!
Voltaire once said that, 'In the beginning God made man in his own image, and man has been trying to repay the favour ever since.' If only we would let go of our ideas of God, the tame god, the powerless god, the angry god, the vengeful god, the god in a box, the god we pay lip service to at the end of long day, and let him actually BE who he is. He gave us a verb for a name, have you ever thought about that? His name is an action. "I AM WHO I AM." I will be who I will be. Regardless of your infantile attempts to understand me. I am self-determining. I am a God of action. I love. I create. I hold all things together. I lavish grace and mercy upon you. I pursue you. I reach out to you. If only we would make him the centre of our lives and watch him get to work in our hearts, then our homes, then our communities! What transformation could be unleashed!
God has turned the way we do church on its head—let this be a wake-up call. We were GOING to church, but now it's time to BE the church. Let's make Jesus Christ the first thing again. Let's not make life about anything else. Are the churches empty or deployed? It's a glass half full question. You can do church where you are. God has not left us unprepared or unequipped for this situation. Do you know a single person in your life who doesn't own a phone or computer? My wife and I worshipped tonight with our church community, simultaneously spread across dozens of households using digital technologies. Our friends were able to comment, writing scripture, prophetic words, encouraging words, speaking truth to one another. We came away feeling uplifted. The Holy Spirit was as present in our kitchen as he is in a church with a fancy stage and a few hundred people.
Church: it is time to rise up. It is time to DEMONSTRATE our hope, to ACT our faith, to LIVE our confession in Christ. The time for talk is over. For all its pearls of wisdom, the enlightenment has left us in the dark, ushering religion into the realm of the esoteric and the arcane and pointing society to place its trust in science and reason. It gave us Postmodernism, which has failed the world, and the world knows it. For all our advances in science and medicine our global society has been disabled by a strand of the common flu; our economies shaken and our social institutions brought to their knees as the futility of putting our hope into humanity alone becomes painfully apparent—something the Bible has been saying for a couple of millennia.
As Christians, we have the truth. Not a version of it (relativism was postmodernism's evil progeny) but the ACTUAL truth. We are in possession of the greatest message of hope that humankind has ever known, and now they need it more than ever. That is why we are able to live and breathe hope regardless of what is happening around us. We are to stand, and shine this light for all to see. The world needs this message, they need to be set free. They need to know the truth. They need to know what we know:
We know that God is real, and powerful, and holds our world together by his will.
We know that he deeply loves his creation,
We know that we are made to be in relationship with him,
We know that we are made for a purpose,
We know that despite our failures, we have been made right with God, and;
We know that he has made a way to bring us into his presence.
We know that we are promised freedom (in the here and now), unparalleled by anything else the world can offer.
We know that he is coming to make all things new again, to set things right, and to establish a new creation.
So Christians, let us lift our eyes, as our forerunners did. As the Psalmist wrote, "I lift my eyes to the mountains—where does my help come from? My help comes for the LORD, the maker of heaven and earth" (Psalm 121). Let us say, as our forerunners said: "Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will not be shaken" (Psalm 62:5-6).
There is a wonderful opportunity in this. We have been, in a way, set free from various illusions and entrapments. We are locked in, commanded to stay at home, to stay with our families, to be still. I want to remind you Church, that God works all things together for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. I want to challenge you to spend some time in the stillness, to shut out the craziness, and really listen to what God is saying. Embrace the opportunity.
I have been doing this a lot lately, and this is what I'm hearing:
"Look forward. The best is yet to come. Look forward."
So we press on, we look forward, we look up, we live in hope, faith, expectation and love.
Amen.
***
'Rather`, as it is written:
"No eye has seen,
no ear has heard,
and no heart has imagined..."
...what God has prepared for those who love him.
— but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit.'
1 Corinthians 2:9 (BSB)
Leave a comment...
What does 'BEING' the church look like to you?
How are you worshipping at the moment? Are you using virtual spaces? How is it different to 'usual' church? Do you sense the Holy Spirit is present?
How can we demonstrate our hope and our faith during these challenging times?
How do you set aside the time and space for God to speak to you?
Did anything you read here challenge you? Convict you? Do you disagree with anything? Let's get some discussion going!
