Like many of you I’ve been watching and processing the global expansion of the COVID-19 virus.  It certainly is the most prolific event of our 2020 calendar year thus far.  It came seemingly out of nowhere and has spread to pandemic proportions affecting people, businesses, communities, industries, and nations all over the world.

And as government officials, pundits, and medical professionals continue to comment on so many of the effects and changes this disease has created and will continue to create, I can’t help but see a deeper picture.  Are there economic ramifications of the virus?  Yes.  Are there political ramifications virus?  Absolutely.  We will have to watch and see how all of those issues pan out over the next several weeks but there is a much deeper issue on which to reflect.

What has been acutely on my mind is how this unprecedented event is truly rattling humanity.  What I see in all of the panic and worry in society is people who no longer have any kind of secure foundation at all. In an effort to emancipate ourselves from God’s design, we have been given over to our own wants and desires, searching for anything in which to have confidence but finding nothing lasting.  And it breaks my heart.  So if you are reading this as Christ follower, take heed and be encouraged.  And if you are reading this as a seeker or skeptic then contemplate your life before an ever uncertain world.

Peter quotes some truly contemplative words in the above passage.  And this is what I’ve been thinking about so much.  Human beings are the crown of creation but God’s word says we are like grass.  And all of the glory of humanity – the creativity, the discovery, the intellect, the compassion, the accomplishments of monumental proportions – is like a flower that just withers away.  We cannot have confidence in ourselves.  We cannot have confidence in the systems we create.  We cannot have confidence in our accomplishments as a human society as evidenced the upheaval this invisible virus has caused.

I think we are seeing that play out writ large in our own country as well as the globe.  There is so much worry and fear.  We have put our confidence in money and markets.  We have put our confidence in science and technology.  We have put our confidence in governments and political parties.  We have put our confidence in our professions.  We have even put our confidence in our own identities.  We have put our confidence in the things of this world.  But I think this infectious agent known as COVID-19 is meant to wake us up to the reality that all of these things will never satisfy, fulfill and ultimately save humanity.  These things don’t create peace they lend themselves to panic and anxiety when they all come crashing down.  We are putting our confidence in shifting sand.

Markets crash.  Economies sputter.  Money vanishes.  Medicine runs out.  Governments fail.  Science and technology are gifts of God’s grace to save lives but cannot provide an ultimate cure nor prevent every disease because new sicknesses will continue to appear in a fallen world.  This world is a sinful, broken, fallen, painful, hurtful, and infected place with no hope.  We are frail.  Civilization if fragile.  And the coronavirus pandemic is highlighting this very point in our own heart and life and in the hearts and lives of others.

Sounds like a bleak situation.  And it is.  Sadly, this is where millions of Americans find themselves and where billions of people around the world find themselves.

So listen to the good news of the Gospel!  Despite disease, pestilence, heartache, sickness, brokenness, sin and death there is a real hope that can be found by repenting of our confidence/faith in ourselves and in this world and trusting in the person of Jesus as Savior.  He provides a lasting hope.  His word lasts forever.  It is the only thing that will fulfill and the only thing that can sustain our peace in uncertain times.  Christ alone is where confidence is found.  Christ alone is the only foundation that cannot be shaken.

So to the seeker, the skeptic, the anxious, and the worried who might be reading:  God sees you and God cares for you.  God in his grace is shaking your foundation to show you your need to put your faith and hope in a foundation that will never crumble. Put your faith in a person who will never leave you nor forsake you.  Put your hope in the risen Christ Jesus.  You have already seen and felt seismic shifts of change creating fear, worry, and panic.  You don’t have to live with no hope or confidence in this life.  Repent of running from God and pursuing yourself – finding your confidence and identity in the things of this world.  Run to him.  He is a loving Father who will forgive you and welcome your return with open arms if you turn from your ways and trust in Christ for salvation.

And to my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ: Take heed, as I am doing, and search your heart to make sure your confidence has not been swept into the things of this world.  Take heed of your attitude and make sure that it is not the same as the world.  How will a fearful world know of any hope if we look and act as the world looks and acts?  As you take heed repent before the Lord, refresh your confidence in the living God, and begin to live in the hope of Christ.  Then, out of that renewal, trust God that he will provide everything you need. Pray. Be prepared to help others spiritually and physically, and carry out God’s mission of reconciliation to reap the eternal rewards found in Christ!

Let’s make sure that while this virus will be emblazoned in the annals of history, the bigger story will be a sweeping revival of repentance and hope throughout the whole world! May we pray and act to that end.