Our Hope During Coronavirus
Thursday (but almost Friday), March 12, 2020: My wrists cramped and eyes burned but I would not put the phone down, not just yet. My husband's breath evened into a deep sleep while my own quickened in anxiety. Just one more article. Precious minutes of sleep drained into this vortex of fear that I didn’t seem to have the least bit of power in resisting. The coronavirus was changing the world and I was completely out of control. Earlier that morning, on a walk with my daughters, a woman tugged at her Goldendoodle puppy who frolicked over to us, owing to my youngest’s squeals of desire to pet her. The woman stopped about 6 feet away from us and she and I looked at each other with strained smiles, each questioning whether we should interact any closer. Now here I was at midnight, reading about the virus that was shaking up our daily lives, faster than I felt prepared for. We live in downtown Minneapolis, which on a typical Friday night, means people are everywhere. This weekend, however, there were no couples in blazers and dresses streaming into the theater. No Ubers dropping off groups of women in their sequined skirts. The sidewalks were empty and there was only one person who sat in the restaurant I walked past. She was an employee.
The situation continues to change rapidly but as of now, the store shelves are emptied as quickly as they are stocked, major events have been postponed, the NBA has canceled the rest of its season, Minnesota schools are shut down and the Fed’s rates have dropped to zero. Italy is on a nationwide lockdown, Spain and France have followed similarly. Everything has gone off-kilter and we are encouraged to wait and hope in this new practice of social distancing, self-isolation, and lots and lots of handwashing. We hope that our most vulnerable will be safe and that our front line will be able to care for those who need it. There is no timeline for this and there are so many unknowns ahead of us.
We are all in different situations and there are many different ways we will react. We might try to reassure ourselves of our own personal safety, reading and re-reading the stats that work in our favor. Fear may threaten to latch onto our hearts with its cold grip; fear that we or the ones we love will become part of the worst outcomes. Maybe we are not as concerned about our own physical health as we are the dire economic state. Your livelihood could depend upon a steady stream of people, all of whom have vanished in a week. Your job could have been jolted by the volatile markets and you can already taste the impending financial loss. Covid-19 could be affecting you on emotional levels. Your wedding coming up, the one you have been planning for months, all of a sudden looks faded and far away. A few weeks ago, you were hoping the kids would enjoy the spring break you had planned, and now you are just trying to fill long days at home for weeks more than you feel will be possible. You look at your loved ones, you think of the friends you aren’t seeing and you wonder, how will we get through this? When I think about this pandemic I am tempted to fall into fear and anxiety, loneliness, and despair. There are other things that Scripture speaks to that are relevant to us right now, such as honoring what our government leaders are authorizing/encouraging us to do in response to Covid-19 (Romans 13:1–7) but I want to spend a little time focusing on these three particular areas and how the Word of God speaks to them.
Fear
The verse that has comforted me most when I face situations that threaten me is this one: “Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom” (Luke 12:32). We do not need to be afraid, he sees that we are weak and little, and he doesn’t scoff at our weakness. He feels affection for his little sheep, helpless and threatened. Jesus reminds us that we have a Father, who is better than the best earthly fathers (Matthew 7:11) and he is happy to give us the kingdom. And not in an afterthought, “Sure, I’m happy to do it.” kind of giving. His very will moves with pleasure to work for our good eternally, preparing for us what we cannot even imagine (1 Corinthians 2:9). We will all die eventually. And when our moment comes, it’ll be Jesus who victoriously holds the keys of death and ushers us through that door (Revelation 1:18).
Sometimes, I pretend to forget I will die. With the coronavirus, we have all been reminded of what every single human will face: death. As we take this pandemic seriously and fight to protect our most vulnerable we don’t need to be afraid of what it can ultimately do to us. And if he has conquered death for us, and tells us we do not need to be anxious about our food and clothing, then we don’t need to fear all of the other things this pandemic may create for us or take from us (Luke 12:22-31). Your Father will not hold out on you. He has promised to give you the kingdom.
Anxiety is similar to fear but a little different. Where fear responds to immediate threats, anxiety anticipates our future harm and leaves us unsettled. Here is a truth that helps me here, “Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases” (Psalm 115:3). We have seen above that our God is loving and tender and giving. Now we see that he does all that he pleases. When anxiety over the economic state of the world makes me feel sick, worrying how it will affect me, I remember “all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, and he does according to his will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand or say to him, ‘What have you done?’” (Daniel 4:35). He is not surprised and he is in control.
When anxiety threatens to shake me up as I think of my children and all the ways I may not be able to protect them, I remember that I am not the writer of their stories. I am a main character in their story, but I will never be the writer. When I give up the control I never had, I am free to love them even if the Lord brings them through hardships I would never, ever choose. He loves them and is by far the best author. “Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them” (Psalm 139:16). We do not have to fix our anxiety, but He loves when we put it on Him. He cares for us. He cares for you, sister (1 Peter 5:7).
Loneliness
“He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;
and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not” (Isaiah 53:3).
We have been asked to drastically change the ways we interact with one another in order to curb the spread of this disease. All of our social situations are unique but the distancing measures we’ve been asked to take makes me think we will all struggle with loneliness in one way or another. I think it is so helpful to remember that Jesus understands loneliness. He lived it in his life and experienced it in the ultimate sense, being forsaken completely by God on the cross (Matthew 27:46). So, he understands. Which means that we are not alone in our loneliness.
My prayer for us as believers is that we turn a profit on these days. This pandemic will end at some point and, until it does, what if we could use these days filled with more hours than we are used to to turn a profit? Do you have roommates? Could you pray for creative ways to press in to loving them well? Seeking their good without grumble or complaint? Do we have neighbors? How can we love them? A note of encouragement? A text? A gift card? Do you have children? Instead of pining for our lost adult interaction, what if we moved toward these little brothers and sisters in Christ with all our energy and all our smiles. What if we tried to turn this time at home into the sweetest stint of their childhood yet. Ultimately, what if we used this time with less human interaction to press into Jesus, the one person we ultimately need the most. What if we used these days that are filled with less people in our life to seek out communion with our Father. “As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God” (Psalm 42:1). His word is rich, his Spirit is alive and he will satisfy us more deeply than we can imagine (Isaiah 58:11, Psalm 37:4).
Despair
It can be tempting to lose hope when life hits us and hits us and hits us again. We all have different situations and the ways that coronavirus threatens us globally and individually may cause us to despair. He knows. It is okay to be very weak before your God. “For he knows our frame; he remembers that we are dust” (Psalm 103:14). The Lord is with you. He will never leave you (Hebrews 13:5). He will help you with whatever coronavirus will cause you to go through (Isaiah 41:10). Every molecule in this universe belongs to him (Deuteronomy 10:14). He knows exactly how to stop this and exactly how to take the worst in your life and make good of it — indeed, that is his promise to you (Romans 8:28).
The Lord is in control. He always was in control and always will be. If we feel we’ve lost control it is because we never had control to begin with. But we can trust him, the one who is in control. The one who set the universe into motion and will make good on his every promise. When your hope wavers, tell him. And look into his word where he has set a feast to satisfy your lean spirit and an anchor to buoy you in deep waters.
Let us pray for those affected by this in worse ways than ourselves. Let’s pray for our leaders and men and women working the front lines. Let’s pray that we would be ready and willing to sacrifice our own good for the good of those around us.
So, in our fears, let us put our faith in God; in our loneliness, let us press into knowing him and loving those around us; and in our despair, let us come before him, open in our weakness and ready to receive his help. Let’s hope in God, the one who will not leave us alone in our fears and promises to carry us through this. “Even to your old age I am he, and to gray hairs I will carry you. I have made, and I will bear; I will carry and will save” (Isaiah 46:4).