At last! I’ve tested positive for covid!
It’s taken nearly three years, and just about everyone I know has succumbed to the virus at some time. Why has it taken me so long?
At last, I can look everyone in the eye and say, ‘I know how you feel. I share in your suffering.’
Or can I? Maybe you will respond, ‘Well you’ve just spent 8 days on a cruise ship with 3,000 other people. What did you expect? Cruise ships are well-known as super-spreaders.’
Whatever. I’ve had my four jabs. Covid for me has just been a minor inconvenience: a heavy cold; a few sleepless nights; an inability to concentrate. I can hardly say that I have suffered in a way that so many people have.
And that leads to the inevitable question: why do some people suffer more than others? It is a fair question; it is a good question; it has been asked since the beginning of time. The Book of Job, most probably the oldest written text in the Bible addresses this very question. Still today, we ponder upon it.
There are no easy answers. But reflection brings me back to God. I do believe in a God of love. I do believe in a God of justice. I do believe in a God who understands me and my pain, as well as the pain of the world. I do believe in a God who weeps at the horrors that go on in the world. I don’t see covid, or any other natural disaster as being either God’s creation or judgement upon the world. God is just not like that. As the ancient collect says: ‘God, the author of peace and lover of concord’.
When God created the world, it was good. And it continues to be a good world. The natural thrust of God’s creation is for good. After winter, comes spring – new life. Cut your finger and your body will work to heal itself. Blessed are the peace makers. Dis-ease has come into the world as direct consequence of the rejection of God’s purposes. That’s what the story that we call The Fall (Genesis 3) is all about. In simple picture language, it expresses a significant truth – humanity has sought to reject God and go its own way. We, of course, see the reversal of The Fall in the coming of God into the world. In His work of redemption – through Christ on the cross – we are offered a new beginning: re-creation, restoration, renewal: in short, new life in Christ. This hope offers a reason for living – a hope that one day our lives will be made complete in Christ – no covid, no pain, no suffering. The prophet Isaiah even looks forward to a time when swords will be beaten into ploughshares.
Does it all sound too optimistic? We must continue as people of hope. The medieval mystic, Julian of Norwich describes it like this:
All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well.
Through Christ’s work on the cross, God offers us redemption. We have the reality of eternal life. All will be made new and there will come a time when God will make a new heaven and a new earth, a time when there will be no more suffering or tears.
I can’t explain why, in the meantime, we live with pain, doubt, uncertainty and suffering. I can’t explain why some people appear to have much easier lives than others, but I do know that it breaks God’s heart when even one of His precious creations suffers, and that is why He has not given up on the world. And that is also why He calls us to be people who work for renewal: of love, kindness and compassion; to play our part in working for good.
I write this on the Sunday before Advent – a Sunday when I am unable to worship in church because I am isolating – sharing in the consequences of The Fall, but I remember the words of the collect for today:
Stir up, O Lord, the wills of your faithful people;
that they, plenteously bringing forth the fruit of good works,
may by you be plenteously rewarded; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen
May I be stirred up to work for peace, harmony, wholeness, healing in the world: all in the name of Him who gave His life to restore me to my full humanity – made complete through the love of God.
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