Making Spiritual Sense Of the Coronavirus
How quickly conditions in your life have changed! Right? I know what you are feeling. Last week when I went to the store, my small city and this whole country was at peace. A few days ago, when I went to the store, I felt like I was headed for a war zone! What on earth has happened? A coronavirus catastrophe!
Would you have thought just over a week ago that a highly contagious virus with the potential to kill you was but another person’s cough or sneeze away? Would you have thought that you would have to be protecting yourself from the coronavirus by hunkering down inside your residence like an ancient ascetic hermit in his cave in the deserted wilderness? Would you have thought that your financial future would be as wobbly as a boxer who took a left punch to his gut followed by a right upper cut? Upsetting, isn’t it? Even for a Christian like yourself?
Can you make sense out of what is going on in your life and country?
One thing is for sure. This coronavirus crisis has not arisen without it being according to the immutable, unchanging foreknowledge and will of the Almighty God. He works all things, as his inspired, inerrant Scriptures tell us, “. . . God works all in all” (1 Corinthians 12:6).
This being true, you are likely to be struggling with the question we ought not to ask of God: “Why?” For after all, he is God Almighty. He does not have to answer to anyone. As Christians we simply are to trust in his graciousness and goodness without questioning his motives for what he does or brings into our life. We should just believe what he promises us: “All things work together for good for those who love God, for those who are called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28). Therefore, this is one more thing you can know about the coronavirus for sure – it is for your good! And not only for your individual good but for the good of God’s whole Christian Church on earth. For we are told, “God put all things under (Christ’s) feet, and gave him as head over all things for the church” (Ephesians 1:22). God has put our beloved Lord and Savior Jesus Christ over all things in heaven and on earth for the good of his Church, that is, all the believers in Jesus like us. This being the case, our Lord Jesus as true God with the Father and the Holy Spirit has brought about this coronavirus pandemic for the good of his Christians like us the world over.
Since it is true that this COVID-19 pandemic is for the good of Christians like you and me, what possible good purpose could God have in mind for us? That’s a good question, my wondering blog reader. So, let me go on to help you make spiritual sense out of the coronavirus crisis that you find yourself in.
To begin, let me assure you of one thing you should absolutely not think is going on – that you are being punished for some particular sin. I warn you not to think like that, because a Christian can slip into thinking that he (or she) must have done something to warrant the suffering he (or she) is undergoing. People tend to think that when a person suffers some kind of misfortune, he is being punished for something he did. Jesus’ disciples are a good example of such thinking. One of Jesus’ disciples, the apostle John who had been a part of such a mindset, wrote in John 9:1-3:
1 And while (Jesus) was passing by he saw a man blind from birth.
2 And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned? This man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
3 Jesus answered, “Neither this man sinned nor his parents; on the contrary, he was born blind that the works of God might be revealed in him.
The grievous misfortune of blindness was not a punishment for any sin of the man or his parents. Rather, it was serving a higher purpose in God’s gracious plan for the man. It provided the opportunity for the miraculous work of God to be done in his life, and even more importantly, through that miraculous work of Jesus giving the man eyesight for the first time in his life, the man came to know that Jesus of Nazareth was the Lord God himself in the flesh. The man then believed in Jesus and also was given eternal life and salvation.
So, likewise in your life. Don’t slip into thinking that whatever you may come to suffer through this coronavirus crisis is a punishment of God for something you have done. If you were a heathen unbeliever, yes; the coronavirus would be a punishment. But as a believer in Jesus, no. Jesus, our dear Savior, suffered all the punishment for your sins and mine. God punished all of our wrongdoings when he punished Jesus as our substitute, making him suffer the pains of hell while on the cross and death. Because Jesus suffered that punishment in our place and offered himself as the payment for our sins, God is now at peace with us. He loves us. He does only what is, and will be, a blessing for us. So, it is with this coronavirus crisis we are caught up in. God is dealing out of love with us and pouring out his blessing upon us.
In what way is this coronavirus a blessing for us? In the same way a catastrophic crisis was a blessing for the Old Testament Christian named Job. He lived in ancient Uz of the Edomites (ref. Job 1:1 & Lamentations 4:21). Based on how long he lived, he lived about the time of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He was extremely wealthy. I call him the “trucking magnate” and “agricultural baron” of the very ancient Middle East. For in the days when wealth was measured in heads of livestock and flocks, Job owned 3,000 camels, 500 yokes of oxen, 500 female donkeys, 7,000 sheep, and a great number of slaves. He was the greatest of all men of the East at the time. The Lord described Job as a blameless, upright, God-fearing man who refused to do evil. The Lord said there was no one like Job in all the earth.
Job was obviously an innocent man, guilty of no particular great sin or terrible transgression. Yet the Lord put Job through an unexpected, sudden catastrophic crisis that destroyed all of Job’s immense wealth in just one day, and on another day ruined his good health with an uncertain skin disease that caused an evil eruption, perhaps like dry skin cracking open and oozing. To add to Job’s misery all of his sons and daughters were killed in a tornado-like windstorm that collapsed the house on top of them. Job’s grief and misery were so horrendous that while he was sitting among the ashes, scrapping his oozing skin with a piece of potsherd, his wife asked him why he kept his God-fearing integrity. She told him to curse God and die! Job’s life-crisis could not have been worse.
For what possible good purpose could God have had in putting Job through such a horrific crisis? Satan was at his evil work behind the scenes. Satan was the evil spirit who challenged Job’s faith and God-fearing lifestyle. Satan became the destructive destroyer who brought about that horrific catastrophe into Job’s life. Satan was set upon destroying Job’s faith and turning Job against God, to the point of Job’s cursing God outright. God, on the other hand, allowed Satan to wreck such havoc in Job’s life for good, for the good, wholesome purpose of benefitting Job’s spiritual life. God permitted Job to be tried under such “fire”, so Job could prove that he was indeed a God-fearing, righteous man of great faith. Prove himself Job did! God’s Word says that through all that Job was put, he did not sin nor blame God (Job 1:22 & 2:10). In fact, Job declared,
Naked I came from my mother’s womb,
And naked I shall return there.
The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away,
May the name of the Lord be praised. (Job 1:21, Rev. JC’s translation)
Job proved Satan wrong. Far from cursing God, Job praised God! He passed his test of faith with flying colors.
And how did Job’s life turn out afterwards? The Lord restored Job’s fortunes and even doubled them, so that in the end Job was twice as wealthy as he had been! Plus, the Lord gave Job seven more sons and three more daughters to make up for those whom he had lost in the windstorm. (ref. Job 42:10-13)
Now look at your own situation in the midst of this coronavirus crisis. You are in a coronavirus catastrophe that has put you in a wealth and health crisis that God has allowed to engulf you. What is your financial scenario like? Are you facing possible unemployment with no income to support yourself and your family? Or, have you already been laid off indefinitely with no way to pay your bills? Or, may you be a small businessman or woman who has suddenly seen your business shrink and shrivel while your payroll and expenses mount with no profits to pay for them?
If those income crises have not been enough to stir up your fears about the future, what about your savings and investments? What about the collapsing stock market that has sapped your investments for the future and still has not bottomed out? Have you had to pull out of the stock market, as so many have done, to try to save yourself and what you can salvage of your investments for retirement? Are you afraid of ending up broke in your old age and having to live in a cardboard box on a street corner somewhere? Are you already retired and seeing your retirement income dwindling and going down the drain like dirty water? Have you already lost thousands of dollars and you cannot afford to lose any more? Are you an elderly retiree who has little in the stock market except what you had been able to invest over the years to pay for a new roof when you need it or to replace your refrigerator when it dies? Now do you find yourself in the situation that you cannot afford to sell off your shares of stock for a loss like everyone else is doing, because that would be a catastrophic financial loss you could never makeup? Are you having to ride the stock market down like it was the sinking Titanic in the hope it will pop back up again like a cork?
On top of the preceding financial nightmare(s) you may be having, are you also burdened with debt for such things as a home mortgage, car loans, student loans, and credit card debts? Now do you have worries gnawing away at you that without an income you cannot pay for them?
Then, like Job, you have the worries and fears about, not only your own health, but also about the hearth of your spouse, children, grandchildren, as well as beloved relatives and friends. You do not want to lose any of them. Being a Christian who knows by faith that you have eternal life in heaven, you perhaps are more concerned about losing your family members and friends than you are about contracting the coronavirus and dying yourself. Is that right?
What good purpose does God have for your going through the wealth and health crises in which you find yourself? Based on what the Scriptures say, there are several things I can say. For one thing, you can be sure that Satan is working behind the scenes to destroy your faith, as he did in Job’s case, so you turn against God and curse him. (1 Peter 5:8) But for another thing, an opposite thing, a good wholesome thing for you, God is at work to make Satan’s schemes blow up in his face! God is working for your good to prune you (ref. John 15:1, 2) to further cultivate your faith-motivated righteous, God-fearing lifestyle (Hebrews 12:4-11). The good purpose that God has in mind for you, then, is the same as it was for Job. God is permitting you to be tried under “fire”, so you can prove what a faithful, God-fearing, righteous Christian you really are. As evidence for my saying this, let’s look at the following verses, first from Peter, then from James:
The apostle Peter wrote for our encouragement and instruction:
6 . . . in which salvation you continue to rejoice, although now for a little while, if necessary, you have been made sorrowful by various kinds of trials,
7 in order that the genuineness of your faith, which is much more valuable than gold that perishes though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. . . (1 Peter 1:6, 7)
Please notice, my blog reader, that Peter tells us we are made sorrowful by various kinds of trials. That fits your present situation, does it not? Please notice also that Peter says such trials occur for a little while. Compared to the eternity God has prepared for us in Christ Jesus, these trials are only for “a little while,” a very little while indeed. They can last no longer than our earthly life; and often times they are for a much shorter duration. The coronavirus pandemic is an outstanding example. Its duration is being measured at the present time in terms of a few weeks to a couple of months. Our earthly trials are like a refining fire that purifies gold. They purge the dross, the imperfections, out of our Christian lives. They refine and purify our faith, which is far more precious than gold, for our faith results in everlasting life while gold will perish with the passing of this world in the coming judgment.
For what good purpose do we suffer these various kinds of trials, like the COVID-19, during our lifetime? To test and refine us, so that the genuineness of our faith may arise and shine and be shone to result in praise and glory and honor when our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ appears for the final judgment of the world. You see, while we are short-sighted, seeing only the present and our earthly life, God is far-sighted, having an eternal purpose for the trials we are suffering – our ultimate eternal salvation and life! This being the case, we can make spiritual sense of our trials, like the coronavirus. They are indeed intended to be a blessing to us in the long run, eternally!
James, who was a half-brother of our Lord Jesus and the head of the church in Jerusalem, wrote for our encouragement and learning:
2 Consider it all joy, my brothers, whenever you become engulfed in various kinds of trials,
3 realizing that the testing of your faith produces patient endurance;
4 and let the patient endurance continue to bring about its finished work, so that you may be fully developed and complete in all respects, lacking in nothing.
5 And if any one of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives to all without reservation and without reproach, and it will be given to him.
6 But let him ask in faith, doubting nothing, for the one who doubts is like the surging waves of the sea being driven and tossed here and there by the wind;
7 to be sure, let that man not begin to suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord,
8 since he is a double-minded man unstable in all his ways.
12 Blessed is the man who endures under trial, for after he has been approved by testing, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord promised to those who love him. (James 1:2-8 & 12)
James jumps right into his letter to Christians living in the first century. He tells them to consider the various kinds of trials they were enduring a reason to rejoice. How is that, my Christian blog reader, for surprising the daylights out you? Applying that encouragement to the coronavirus crisis you are having as a severe trial, you are to rejoice that you are engulfed in it! Wow! Is that different! Normally we do not think of trials and tribulations a reason for rejoicing. Just the opposite is true. We see them as a time of doom and gloom, right? That is because we fail to realize the innate value in those trials and tribulations.
You are surely wondering what is their innate value, just as those original first century Christian readers would have wondered what on earth James was saying. So, James informs us that they are a testing of our faith to produce patient endurance in us. When those trials and hard times come upon us, they test our faith and patience. We want to see them over with ASAP – as soon as possible! Is that not the way you and everyone else feels about this coronavirus crisis? Let it be over with! Now would not be too soon! In reality, however, that does not happen, does it? The doom and gloom days last for a little while. Since that is the case, in faith, trusting in our Lord to know what he is doing by allowing the hard times to come upon us, we wait out those trials. All the while we are waiting for them to end, our faith in the goodness of God and in his working all things for our good is being put to the test. Will we keep trusting in our Lord God to bring us through whatever the hard time is, like the coronavirus, or won’t we?
Exercising our faith to keep trusting in God in the face of our trials has a blessed end for us. That brings about what James calls a finished work. What finished work? That Christians like you and me may become fully developed, complete Christians in all respects, lacking nothing. In other words, like infants we grow up to become mature adults. We grow spiritually in our Christian lives to take everything that happens to us by faith, in stride, without getting overly excited and upset, knowing what is the God-pleasing thing for us to do and understanding how to conduct ourselves in whatever the situation may be before us.
If, and when, however, we should find ourselves up against a trial and tribulation of some kind, perhaps like this COVID-19, at which time we do not know exactly what is the God-pleasing, best course of action to take in that circumstance, and we are scratching our heads in perplexity, James tells us what to do:
5 And if any one of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God who gives to all without reservation and without reproach, and it will be given to him.
6 But let him ask in faith, doubting nothing, for the one who doubts is like the surging waves of the sea being driven and tossed here and there by the wind;
7 to be sure, let that man not begin to suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord.
When you do not know what to do or how to do it, ask God! He knows all things. He can tell you what is the best thing to do in your situation. Make sure, however, that you ask God with a firm faith that does not doubt that God will answer your request. It does not make any difference what your troublesome problem may be that you cannot solve on your own. God will answer you, without holding your prayer against you like it was some kind of a dumb request.
Let me share an example of this with you. Forty-two years ago, I had an old used imported car that had been out of production for some years. The front end was shot. I managed to come up with the parts needed to repair it – except for the specially made long bolts, four of them, that could no longer be purchased anywhere. I know that because I had tried. All I could do was salvage the old bolts in the front end. But they were very badly rusted. They would not loosen up no matter what I did – heating them repeatedly with a torch, spraying them with penetrating oil, and tapping on them with a hammer times without number. Nothing worked! The bolts were frozen. After about three or four hours of such frustration, I was at my wits end. I did not know what to do. All I knew was that I had to fix that front end, because I did not have the money to buy another car and no one else could repair it either. So, I laid under the car and said a prayer. I asked God if he would please loosen up those rusted bolts for me, so I could get them off without breaking them and repair the front end. You may find this hard to believe, but when I again applied my socket wrench to those bolts, zip! zip! zip! zip! they all popped loose! In no time then I had the job finished. Yes, my blog reader, God does answer our prayers no matter what they may be – even about loosening up old rusty bolts! I grew spiritually through that trial experience. It became very clear to me that God does indeed answer our prayers no matter what the problem is that we are up against.
We are in the midst of this coronavirus pandemic now. It will last a little while. What can we expect in the future? In the case of Job, God blessed the remainder of Job’s earthly life, making him twice as prosperous as he had been. We also know from Job 19:25-27 that Job had a saving faith in the coming of his Redeemer, who would judge the world in the end and raise Job’s body from the dead to eternal life. So, God not only blessed Job’s earthly life, he also blessed his eternal life.
What about your case and mine? Since I am not God, I do not know the future. What he may have in store for the remainder of our earthly life after the coronavirus pandemic is over remains to be seen. We do have his promises to watch over us, provide for us (ref. Psalm 34:8-10; Psalm 37:25, Psalm 145:14-16; Matthew 6:25-34) and to make all things work for our good (ref. Romans 8:28). More important than the extent to which God blesses our life on earth is how he blesses our life in eternity. As believers in Jesus who have eternal life already now (ref. John 3:36), we know we shall truly be blessed forever in heaven. Like I stated earlier, God has a blessing in store for us through our patience under trials and continued trust in him. As God’s spokesman James assures us of that: “Blessed is the man who endures under trial, for after he has been approved by testing, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord promised to those who love him.” (James 1:12) The crown of life awaits us!
Having explained what I have in this blog, you should now be able to make spiritual sense out of the coronavirus crisis in which you find yourself engulfed. Through it, God is testing your faith. He is giving you the opportunity to prove you are a God-fearing Christian of firm faith even in the face of a severe trial and Satan’s evil schemes.
So, dear blog reader, let me ask you: “How is your faith standing up in your present crisis?”
God’s blessings,
Rev. JC
Would you have thought just over a week ago that a highly contagious virus with the potential to kill you was but another person’s cough or sneeze away? Would you have thought that you would have to be protecting yourself from the coronavirus by hunkering down inside your residence like an ancient ascetic hermit in his cave in the deserted wilderness? Would you have thought that your financial future would be as wobbly as a boxer who took a left punch to his gut followed by a right upper cut? Upsetting, isn’t it? Even for a Christian like yourself?
Can you make sense out of what is going on in your life and country?
One thing is for sure. This coronavirus crisis has not arisen without it being according to the immutable, unchanging foreknowledge and will of the Almighty God. He works all things, as his inspired, inerrant Scriptures tell us, “. . . God works all in all” (1 Corinthians 12:6).
This being true, you are likely to be struggling with the question we ought not to ask of God: “Why?” For after all, he is God Almighty. He does not have to answer to anyone. As Christians we simply are to trust in his graciousness and goodness without questioning his motives for what he does or brings into our life. We should just believe what he promises us: “All things work together for good for those who love God, for those who are called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28). Therefore, this is one more thing you can know about the coronavirus for sure – it is for your good! And not only for your individual good but for the good of God’s whole Christian Church on earth. For we are told, “God put all things under (Christ’s) feet, and gave him as head over all things for the church” (Ephesians 1:22). God has put our beloved Lord and Savior Jesus Christ over all things in heaven and on earth for the good of his Church, that is, all the believers in Jesus like us. This being the case, our Lord Jesus as true God with the Father and the Holy Spirit has brought about this coronavirus pandemic for the good of his Christians like us the world over.
Since it is true that this COVID-19 pandemic is for the good of Christians like you and me, what possible good purpose could God have in mind for us? That’s a good question, my wondering blog reader. So, let me go on to help you make spiritual sense out of the coronavirus crisis that you find yourself in.
To begin, let me assure you of one thing you should absolutely not think is going on – that you are being punished for some particular sin. I warn you not to think like that, because a Christian can slip into thinking that he (or she) must have done something to warrant the suffering he (or she) is undergoing. People tend to think that when a person suffers some kind of misfortune, he is being punished for something he did. Jesus’ disciples are a good example of such thinking. One of Jesus’ disciples, the apostle John who had been a part of such a mindset, wrote in John 9:1-3:
1 And while (Jesus) was passing by he saw a man blind from birth.
2 And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned? This man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
3 Jesus answered, “Neither this man sinned nor his parents; on the contrary, he was born blind that the works of God might be revealed in him.
The grievous misfortune of blindness was not a punishment for any sin of the man or his parents. Rather, it was serving a higher purpose in God’s gracious plan for the man. It provided the opportunity for the miraculous work of God to be done in his life, and even more importantly, through that miraculous work of Jesus giving the man eyesight for the first time in his life, the man came to know that Jesus of Nazareth was the Lord God himself in the flesh. The man then believed in Jesus and also was given eternal life and salvation.
So, likewise in your life. Don’t slip into thinking that whatever you may come to suffer through this coronavirus crisis is a punishment of God for something you have done. If you were a heathen unbeliever, yes; the coronavirus would be a punishment. But as a believer in Jesus, no. Jesus, our dear Savior, suffered all the punishment for your sins and mine. God punished all of our wrongdoings when he punished Jesus as our substitute, making him suffer the pains of hell while on the cross and death. Because Jesus suffered that punishment in our place and offered himself as the payment for our sins, God is now at peace with us. He loves us. He does only what is, and will be, a blessing for us. So, it is with this coronavirus crisis we are caught up in. God is dealing out of love with us and pouring out his blessing upon us.
In what way is this coronavirus a blessing for us? In the same way a catastrophic crisis was a blessing for the Old Testament Christian named Job. He lived in ancient Uz of the Edomites (ref. Job 1:1 & Lamentations 4:21). Based on how long he lived, he lived about the time of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He was extremely wealthy. I call him the “trucking magnate” and “agricultural baron” of the very ancient Middle East. For in the days when wealth was measured in heads of livestock and flocks, Job owned 3,000 camels, 500 yokes of oxen, 500 female donkeys, 7,000 sheep, and a great number of slaves. He was the greatest of all men of the East at the time. The Lord described Job as a blameless, upright, God-fearing man who refused to do evil. The Lord said there was no one like Job in all the earth.
Job was obviously an innocent man, guilty of no particular great sin or terrible transgression. Yet the Lord put Job through an unexpected, sudden catastrophic crisis that destroyed all of Job’s immense wealth in just one day, and on another day ruined his good health with an uncertain skin disease that caused an evil eruption, perhaps like dry skin cracking open and oozing. To add to Job’s misery all of his sons and daughters were killed in a tornado-like windstorm that collapsed the house on top of them. Job’s grief and misery were so horrendous that while he was sitting among the ashes, scrapping his oozing skin with a piece of potsherd, his wife asked him why he kept his God-fearing integrity. She told him to curse God and die! Job’s life-crisis could not have been worse.
For what possible good purpose could God have had in putting Job through such a horrific crisis? Satan was at his evil work behind the scenes. Satan was the evil spirit who challenged Job’s faith and God-fearing lifestyle. Satan became the destructive destroyer who brought about that horrific catastrophe into Job’s life. Satan was set upon destroying Job’s faith and turning Job against God, to the point of Job’s cursing God outright. God, on the other hand, allowed Satan to wreck such havoc in Job’s life for good, for the good, wholesome purpose of benefitting Job’s spiritual life. God permitted Job to be tried under such “fire”, so Job could prove that he was indeed a God-fearing, righteous man of great faith. Prove himself Job did! God’s Word says that through all that Job was put, he did not sin nor blame God (Job 1:22 & 2:10). In fact, Job declared,
Naked I came from my mother’s womb,
And naked I shall return there.
The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away,
May the name of the Lord be praised. (Job 1:21, Rev. JC’s translation)
Job proved Satan wrong. Far from cursing God, Job praised God! He passed his test of faith with flying colors.
And how did Job’s life turn out afterwards? The Lord restored Job’s fortunes and even doubled them, so that in the end Job was twice as wealthy as he had been! Plus, the Lord gave Job seven more sons and three more daughters to make up for those whom he had lost in the windstorm. (ref. Job 42:10-13)
Now look at your own situation in the midst of this coronavirus crisis. You are in a coronavirus catastrophe that has put you in a wealth and health crisis that God has allowed to engulf you. What is your financial scenario like? Are you facing possible unemployment with no income to support yourself and your family? Or, have you already been laid off indefinitely with no way to pay your bills? Or, may you be a small businessman or woman who has suddenly seen your business shrink and shrivel while your payroll and expenses mount with no profits to pay for them?
If those income crises have not been enough to stir up your fears about the future, what about your savings and investments? What about the collapsing stock market that has sapped your investments for the future and still has not bottomed out? Have you had to pull out of the stock market, as so many have done, to try to save yourself and what you can salvage of your investments for retirement? Are you afraid of ending up broke in your old age and having to live in a cardboard box on a street corner somewhere? Are you already retired and seeing your retirement income dwindling and going down the drain like dirty water? Have you already lost thousands of dollars and you cannot afford to lose any more? Are you an elderly retiree who has little in the stock market except what you had been able to invest over the years to pay for a new roof when you need it or to replace your refrigerator when it dies? Now do you find yourself in the situation that you cannot afford to sell off your shares of stock for a loss like everyone else is doing, because that would be a catastrophic financial loss you could never makeup? Are you having to ride the stock market down like it was the sinking Titanic in the hope it will pop back up again like a cork?
On top of the preceding financial nightmare(s) you may be having, are you also burdened with debt for such things as a home mortgage, car loans, student loans, and credit card debts? Now do you have worries gnawing away at you that without an income you cannot pay for them?
Then, like Job, you have the worries and fears about, not only your own health, but also about the hearth of your spouse, children, grandchildren, as well as beloved relatives and friends. You do not want to lose any of them. Being a Christian who knows by faith that you have eternal life in heaven, you perhaps are more concerned about losing your family members and friends than you are about contracting the coronavirus and dying yourself. Is that right?
What good purpose does God have for your going through the wealth and health crises in which you find yourself? Based on what the Scriptures say, there are several things I can say. For one thing, you can be sure that Satan is working behind the scenes to destroy your faith, as he did in Job’s case, so you turn against God and curse him. (1 Peter 5:8) But for another thing, an opposite thing, a good wholesome thing for you, God is at work to make Satan’s schemes blow up in his face! God is working for your good to prune you (ref. John 15:1, 2) to further cultivate your faith-motivated righteous, God-fearing lifestyle (Hebrews 12:4-11). The good purpose that God has in mind for you, then, is the same as it was for Job. God is permitting you to be tried under “fire”, so you can prove what a faithful, God-fearing, righteous Christian you really are. As evidence for my saying this, let’s look at the following verses, first from Peter, then from James:
The apostle Peter wrote for our encouragement and instruction:
6 . . . in which salvation you continue to rejoice, although now for a little while, if necessary, you have been made sorrowful by various kinds of trials,
7 in order that the genuineness of your faith, which is much more valuable than gold that perishes though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. . . (1 Peter 1:6, 7)
Please notice, my blog reader, that Peter tells us we are made sorrowful by various kinds of trials. That fits your present situation, does it not? Please notice also that Peter says such trials occur for a little while. Compared to the eternity God has prepared for us in Christ Jesus, these trials are only for “a little while,” a very little while indeed. They can last no longer than our earthly life; and often times they are for a much shorter duration. The coronavirus pandemic is an outstanding example. Its duration is being measured at the present time in terms of a few weeks to a couple of months. Our earthly trials are like a refining fire that purifies gold. They purge the dross, the imperfections, out of our Christian lives. They refine and purify our faith, which is far more precious than gold, for our faith results in everlasting life while gold will perish with the passing of this world in the coming judgment.
For what good purpose do we suffer these various kinds of trials, like the COVID-19, during our lifetime? To test and refine us, so that the genuineness of our faith may arise and shine and be shone to result in praise and glory and honor when our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ appears for the final judgment of the world. You see, while we are short-sighted, seeing only the present and our earthly life, God is far-sighted, having an eternal purpose for the trials we are suffering – our ultimate eternal salvation and life! This being the case, we can make spiritual sense of our trials, like the coronavirus. They are indeed intended to be a blessing to us in the long run, eternally!
James, who was a half-brother of our Lord Jesus and the head of the church in Jerusalem, wrote for our encouragement and learning:
2 Consider it all joy, my brothers, whenever you become engulfed in various kinds of trials,
3 realizing that the testing of your faith produces patient endurance;
4 and let the patient endurance continue to bring about its finished work, so that you may be fully developed and complete in all respects, lacking in nothing.
5 And if any one of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives to all without reservation and without reproach, and it will be given to him.
6 But let him ask in faith, doubting nothing, for the one who doubts is like the surging waves of the sea being driven and tossed here and there by the wind;
7 to be sure, let that man not begin to suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord,
8 since he is a double-minded man unstable in all his ways.
12 Blessed is the man who endures under trial, for after he has been approved by testing, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord promised to those who love him. (James 1:2-8 & 12)
James jumps right into his letter to Christians living in the first century. He tells them to consider the various kinds of trials they were enduring a reason to rejoice. How is that, my Christian blog reader, for surprising the daylights out you? Applying that encouragement to the coronavirus crisis you are having as a severe trial, you are to rejoice that you are engulfed in it! Wow! Is that different! Normally we do not think of trials and tribulations a reason for rejoicing. Just the opposite is true. We see them as a time of doom and gloom, right? That is because we fail to realize the innate value in those trials and tribulations.
You are surely wondering what is their innate value, just as those original first century Christian readers would have wondered what on earth James was saying. So, James informs us that they are a testing of our faith to produce patient endurance in us. When those trials and hard times come upon us, they test our faith and patience. We want to see them over with ASAP – as soon as possible! Is that not the way you and everyone else feels about this coronavirus crisis? Let it be over with! Now would not be too soon! In reality, however, that does not happen, does it? The doom and gloom days last for a little while. Since that is the case, in faith, trusting in our Lord to know what he is doing by allowing the hard times to come upon us, we wait out those trials. All the while we are waiting for them to end, our faith in the goodness of God and in his working all things for our good is being put to the test. Will we keep trusting in our Lord God to bring us through whatever the hard time is, like the coronavirus, or won’t we?
Exercising our faith to keep trusting in God in the face of our trials has a blessed end for us. That brings about what James calls a finished work. What finished work? That Christians like you and me may become fully developed, complete Christians in all respects, lacking nothing. In other words, like infants we grow up to become mature adults. We grow spiritually in our Christian lives to take everything that happens to us by faith, in stride, without getting overly excited and upset, knowing what is the God-pleasing thing for us to do and understanding how to conduct ourselves in whatever the situation may be before us.
If, and when, however, we should find ourselves up against a trial and tribulation of some kind, perhaps like this COVID-19, at which time we do not know exactly what is the God-pleasing, best course of action to take in that circumstance, and we are scratching our heads in perplexity, James tells us what to do:
5 And if any one of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God who gives to all without reservation and without reproach, and it will be given to him.
6 But let him ask in faith, doubting nothing, for the one who doubts is like the surging waves of the sea being driven and tossed here and there by the wind;
7 to be sure, let that man not begin to suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord.
When you do not know what to do or how to do it, ask God! He knows all things. He can tell you what is the best thing to do in your situation. Make sure, however, that you ask God with a firm faith that does not doubt that God will answer your request. It does not make any difference what your troublesome problem may be that you cannot solve on your own. God will answer you, without holding your prayer against you like it was some kind of a dumb request.
Let me share an example of this with you. Forty-two years ago, I had an old used imported car that had been out of production for some years. The front end was shot. I managed to come up with the parts needed to repair it – except for the specially made long bolts, four of them, that could no longer be purchased anywhere. I know that because I had tried. All I could do was salvage the old bolts in the front end. But they were very badly rusted. They would not loosen up no matter what I did – heating them repeatedly with a torch, spraying them with penetrating oil, and tapping on them with a hammer times without number. Nothing worked! The bolts were frozen. After about three or four hours of such frustration, I was at my wits end. I did not know what to do. All I knew was that I had to fix that front end, because I did not have the money to buy another car and no one else could repair it either. So, I laid under the car and said a prayer. I asked God if he would please loosen up those rusted bolts for me, so I could get them off without breaking them and repair the front end. You may find this hard to believe, but when I again applied my socket wrench to those bolts, zip! zip! zip! zip! they all popped loose! In no time then I had the job finished. Yes, my blog reader, God does answer our prayers no matter what they may be – even about loosening up old rusty bolts! I grew spiritually through that trial experience. It became very clear to me that God does indeed answer our prayers no matter what the problem is that we are up against.
We are in the midst of this coronavirus pandemic now. It will last a little while. What can we expect in the future? In the case of Job, God blessed the remainder of Job’s earthly life, making him twice as prosperous as he had been. We also know from Job 19:25-27 that Job had a saving faith in the coming of his Redeemer, who would judge the world in the end and raise Job’s body from the dead to eternal life. So, God not only blessed Job’s earthly life, he also blessed his eternal life.
What about your case and mine? Since I am not God, I do not know the future. What he may have in store for the remainder of our earthly life after the coronavirus pandemic is over remains to be seen. We do have his promises to watch over us, provide for us (ref. Psalm 34:8-10; Psalm 37:25, Psalm 145:14-16; Matthew 6:25-34) and to make all things work for our good (ref. Romans 8:28). More important than the extent to which God blesses our life on earth is how he blesses our life in eternity. As believers in Jesus who have eternal life already now (ref. John 3:36), we know we shall truly be blessed forever in heaven. Like I stated earlier, God has a blessing in store for us through our patience under trials and continued trust in him. As God’s spokesman James assures us of that: “Blessed is the man who endures under trial, for after he has been approved by testing, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord promised to those who love him.” (James 1:12) The crown of life awaits us!
Having explained what I have in this blog, you should now be able to make spiritual sense out of the coronavirus crisis in which you find yourself engulfed. Through it, God is testing your faith. He is giving you the opportunity to prove you are a God-fearing Christian of firm faith even in the face of a severe trial and Satan’s evil schemes.
So, dear blog reader, let me ask you: “How is your faith standing up in your present crisis?”
God’s blessings,
Rev. JC
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