Grief or personal suffering make Covid very real. But most of us, personally untouched as yet, are just fed up with Covid.
We resent the restrictions. We want freedom from fear. We could wish away all the alarmist headlines. But what can we do?
Blame others of it?
Now local lockdowns are being imposed, the blame game is on. BAME communities feel unfairly targeted at present and point to crowds of white revellers or families on packed beaches.
Blame comes so naturally. Whenever we’re confronted with what we’ve done wrong, our first instinct can be blame shifting. “If they hadn’t . . .” “Well, they’re worse than me . . .”
Downplay it?
A growing number of people are doing this. Covid is seen as something that is more someone else’s problem than mine. “Well, I don’t know anyone who’s died from it,” you hear people say. “Life’s full of risks,” others add.
Christians are used to hearing people downplay risks. Often when someone is asked about the risk of final judgement they think it can’t really be that bad, and that they’ll be all right.
Ignore it?
Fed up of Covid, you may well have heard people say “I can’t go on like this, life is for living!” Increasing numbers are resuming normal life, acting as if Covid wasn’t there.
Few will admit to ignoring the evidence in front of them. But many do so with their own failure to live up to God’s standards. We would rather live as we want than consider the consequences of doing so.
Escape it?
Some take Covid very seriously indeed. They shield beyond the government’s requirements. They wear masks outside as well as inside. They avidly check the infection rate around them. They are armchair experts in R numbers. But ultimately – short of relocating to a desert island – they cannot escape.
This is how some people have reacted to the disease of sin, our breaking of God’s 10 Commandments. They seek to escape. Men escaped to monasteries, only to discover that the selfish desires of their hearts came with them.
Cure it?
People hope for herd immunity through a vaccine but there’s hardly a whisper of a cure. It seems to good to be true. But this is exactly what God offers us from the inescapable disease of sin.
Jesus said that sin comes out of our heart. Selfishness, lust, envy, hatred and so on just come so naturally. And they inevitably lead to wrong thoughts, words and actions.
The wonderful message of the Bible is that God who knows how polluted our hearts are, loved us so much he provided a solution. He sent his Son into this world as the only one without a polluted heart. Jesus died in the place of sinners to bear God’s judgement for them, so that he might clean us from the inside out.
The blood of Jesus, [God’s] Son cleanses us from all sin. (1 John 1:7)
A cure for Covid would mean escape from death from Covid – but we all will die one day. God’s cure for sin means that anyone who turns from going their own way, and asks him for forgiveness, will escape his judgement and enjoy eternal life in heaven.
If you’re desperate for some good news at the moment, there’s none better than this.
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