Covid-19 A time to reduce giving?

Covid-19 - A time to reduce giving?

Pierre and Jacqueline had retired a while ago. They had settled into what they expected to be many years of enjoying a slower pace combined with active service in ways fitting to their experience and abilities. There had been a trip of two and more local engagement than when they were employed. Life was good.

Then along came Covid-19.

They took care. Hands were washed and contacts with others, including some nearby family, were carefully managed. They remained physically close to one another and agreed that they went together through this in life or death. Their Christian faith left them unafraid to die, although not welcoming its untimely advent.

Their retirement income had been adequate to their needs, but a significant share was market-linked and suffered under the Covid-19 downturn. And so, after seeking advice they took a decision to reduce that income with a view to preserving wealth for the longer term.

That meant some belt tightening. But first a reckoning. They faced the possibility that some of their extended family could have reduced or no employment and might need support. A significant sum was pledged to various Christian agencies and their local church. Through their church they were also committed to share support for a local needy family.

What expenditure could be reduced? They reduced some unnecessary items from the household budget but still needed more savings. How about the external giving? Reductions there were an easy way to reduce outgoings

Some of the missionaries they supported wrote to suggest that the new time was tough for donors and they understood if people cut back. Other missionaries pleaded for increased giving because of the sudden and dramatic drop in their support.

However, Pierre and Jacqueline decided not to cut their giving. They knew that others would not have any choice in this, but they did. Meanwhile the needs of the causes they supported continued. The result of not cutting their giving was a threat to their own future welfare, but also a threat to the present welfare of others and to the increasingly urgent gospel task. They also knew where their rust-proof wealth was deposited, and they knew and trusted the One who promised to care for those who seek first his kingdom.

This was a time to give and to give again.

Covid-19 - Dying to live

Dying to live

As Covid-19 continues its grim dance of death around the globe, most of us follow government urgings to isolate ourselves and to avoid danger areas where possible. And so, there are stories of people away dashing to cross borders before they close, and they are trapped on the wrong side while others retreat behind latherings of handwash and bolted doors.

This is not universal.

Central Nigeria is an area where Covid-19 is not yet virulent but is also an area with very limited health facilities. For example, ventilators are few and are hand operated. Expatriate workers in a Christian mission were given a choice to stay or to evacuate during a recent one-week window of available flights. There was no pressure on anyone and no criticism of anyone’s decision. A group of missionaries in the vulnerable post-70 age bracket chose to stay and continue serving, well-aware that this may be a choice resulting in their death.

This is not new. See the articles below for a few stories from the past of Christian choosing to stay or to walk into seasons of plague or pestilence.

Why do people do things like these missionaries in central Nigeria?

·       Loved by God in Christ and wanting to reflect and repay that by serving others.

·       Loving neighbour and wanting to serve as they are able.

·       A sense of eternity in which it is better to be with the Lord and in which death is not the worst that can happen to a person.

And of course, a decision by a particular missionary to evacuate is not necessarily selfishness or cowardice. There are times that it is better for some to withdraw from a danger zone (eg, Matt 10:23; 24:16; Acts 8:1&4). And equally so, there are times when a decision to stay may arise from false motives or may cause unnecessary burdens on others including nationals.

All that being said, the decision of these older missionaries to stay in central Nigeria is worth recording. These are people who know that they started to die when they were born, and that Christ has conquered death. They value life, are not careless with it and doubtless take responsible measures such as handwashing and social distance. The decision to stay is taken with knowledge and as an expression of faith that, whether they live or die, their calling is to deny themselves and follow Christ. They choose to wear his crown of thorns that they may have his crown of life.

To read

There’s plenty of good material starting to appear abut Christian responses to CV19. Here is a selection of material that brings a historical perspective.

·       https://au.thegospelcoalition.org/article/when-the-plague-came-to-eyam-four-lessons-for-the-church-an-a-time-of-covid-19/

·      https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/03/13/christianity-epidemics-2000-years-should-i-still-go-to-church-coronavirus/?fbclid=IwAR0QTCLf5lMQBlh-x77ClkKeR_qmG2wsFTvkZET8iPeqeaIq-J6YwGsq_go

·       https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/spurgeon-ministry-cholera-outbreak/

Covid-19 and the myth of ‘my world’.

Covid-19 and the myth of ‘my world’.

A world of our own?

A trend of our times is the self-constructed world. We want to decide what is real, true and right for ourselves. Some want to decide their own gender, independent of biology. We resist others telling us what to do, map out our future vision and make plans for its execution. In short, we like to build a world for ourselves and then build a wall around it to keep others at bay.

And then things come along to rattle our DIY world. Climate and weather events send droughts, fires, storms and floods in unusual patterns and disrupt lives and livelihoods in varying ways. The rapid global spread of Covid-19 impacts through deaths, economic turmoil and growing fear. Even if these miss us personally, there is always the potential of an apparently random event in which being in the wrong place at the wrong time sends life topsy turvey.

Such events shatter the myth that we are in control and that life is certain.

What do we do when life goes topsy turvey

Common responses are to rage against events and lash out at anyone who we can find to blame. (Who would want to be a political or organisational leader at such a time?) Or we surrender to despair and passivity, concluding that the world is in the hands of the bad or the mad – if it is in anyone’s hands at all. Or perhaps we opt for a Stoic response of not trying to make sense of it all, shrug our shoulders and soldier on anyway.

Lessons from and for the times

1. We are not in charge of our destiny and the sooner we accept this the better.

2. Learn to live with contingency.

It is wise to know and engage with what is in our power and leave what is not in our power alone.

And so, we ask, what can I do to prevent contact and contract with the virus or any other threat? What prudent precautions can I take in anticipation of contact or contract such as laying in medications, basic foods etc and having a family plan in place.

It is also wise to have proportionality in perspective. All things are possible, but what is the probability of contact or contract with the virus and what are the likely outcomes of either? If we engage with the worst possible outcome, then we are equipped to deal with anything else.

The hardest lesson – humility before God

Our liking for a self-constructed world is shattered when events beyond our control break in. Our ego is undermined. We do not welcome the news that we are not god.

For unbelievers, the challenge and opportunity is to align themselves to God through faith in Jesus. That connects people to the heart of the universe and is our best path to flourishing amidst uncertainty. Knowing that he is God and bowing before him is the hardest of all human lessons. It is also the wisest.

For believers, the news that God is God and is in control is most welcome. The universe and our personal world are not in the hands of the mad nor the bad and is not a driverless train. What we see is not the sum total of reality.  Rather, our all-knowing, all-wise, all-powerful and always present God is watching and working for the good of his people. The way he worked redemptively through the dreadful death of Jesus is proof positive of his unseen and good hand behind the appearance of chaos.

For believers, our alignment to God in Christ enables calmness. We know that chaos and contingency have real and painful impacts which we too may suffer. However, we also know his unseen hand that works all things for the good of his people and works towards his plan of reconciling all things in Christ. That enables us to live with serenity, take active responsibility where we can and to give of ourselves to the needs of others with generosity.

Historically, Christian believers have responded to the world’s chaos by stepping forward and leaning in. Followers of Jesus have stepped into situations of threat such as war, natural disasters, pestilence and plague, embracing risks in order to serve. Love of God and of neighbour take us there.s

A timely word

Let James have a timely word to us all:

Come now you who say “Today or tomorrow let’s go into the city, and spend a year there, trade and make a profit. Whereas you don’t know what your life will be like tomorrow. For what is your life? For you are a vapor, that appears for a little while, and then vanishes away. For you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will both live, and do this and that”. (James 4:13-15)

Covid-19 - all power to medical science?

Covid-19 - all power to medical science?

As Covid-19 continues its global advance questions arise as to responses of prevention, containment and management.

The common response seems to be based largely around medical science. Chief medical officers and their ilk advise governments on what can be done and how to do it. This is a proper role of medical science and it is advice that should be sought and respected. All strength be to these medical advisors, as also to the medical scientists working on vaccines and cures. We need this science and should value it. 

And of course, there is a civic obligation to cooperate with public health measures implemented by governments based on the advice that they receive. This post is not a call to civil disobedience on Covid-19 control measures!

However, it is good to ask a wider question: is it wise to cede all power to medical science in the determination of public policy and should public policy be based on it alone?

Responses to and impacts of Covid-19 raise issues beyond medical science. Consider the economic costs and impacts of efforts to contain the virus. And consider the social costs of rising authoritarianism, along with rising fear and suspicion between people and societies. How can these non-economic costs be measured? How do these costs stack up against: (a) the probability of success in containment strategies and, (b) the medical severity of Covid-19 on its victims?

Asking these questions does not downplay the effects of Covid-19 on vulnerable people. These vulnerable ones include the frail aged and young , individuals with compromised health and whole societies that are medically marginal such as the people of Timor Leste. These effects and their costs there are severe and are clearly relevant to response strategies.

However, the question remains of the rightful limits of the scientific contribution to Covid-19. What part do ethical, political and economic values have, alongside medical science, in informing mature responses?

These questions nest within a wider discussion of the proper limits of science. Science is essential and helpful for understanding how the physical world works and how we can intervene in it to advantage, but it has limitations outside of those roles, including in developing and applying ethical values. However, that is a discussion for another day.

Is it really ‘all power to medical science’ when it comes to Covid-19?

Is this the end?

Is this the end?

Is this how the world ends?

In my country of Australia unprecedented summer bush fires tore through vast tracts of land leaving communities, habitats and livelihoods in tatters. In some place, dramatic storm events followed in the same places, resulting even more damage. An enduring drought means that much of the land is parched.

Other nations and regions have their own stories of natural disturbances. Alongside them, the evidence is that the globe is warming at human hands with yet unknown outcomes.

Meanwhile, global leaders such as Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, Boris Johnson and Xi Jing Ping strut the stage in their respective spheres, alarming many with their ambitions.

In the moral sphere, the once largely Christian nations of the western world sink under their denial and defiance of the God they once worshiped. Self-worship in the new religion and the only absolute truth is that there is no absolute reality, truth or values.

A low-level virus event originating in Wuhan has elevated to a global event of pandemic scale, causing fear, restricting lives and commerce and prompting global stock markets to tumble.

Is this the end?

This could be the end. Many of the conditions in the following verses have been met: ⁵ For many will come in my name, claiming, “I am the Messiah,” and will deceive many. ⁶ You will hear of wars and rumours of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. ⁷ Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. ⁸ All these are the beginning of birth-pains. ⁹ ‘Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. ¹⁰ At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, ¹¹ and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. ¹² Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, ¹³ but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved. ¹⁴ And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. (Matt 24, NIV).

It would be foolish to deny that this could be the end. However, it would be equally foolish to assert that it is the end. For Jesus equally said: ³⁶ ‘But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son^, but only the Father. ³⁷ As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. ³⁸ For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; ³⁹ and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. ⁴⁰ Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. ⁴¹ Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left. (Matt 24, NIV). The key points here are that his return will happen at a time unknown even to him and amidst the normal ebb and flow of life events.

The present natural disturbances may be at the more severe end of the scale but are not unprecedented. The present virus is not the first global health emergency (consider the 1919 flu pandemic) and Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, Boris Johnson and Xi Jing Ping are not the first national leaders with ambitious ambitions. Life rolls on.

Again, a little reading of the history of Biblical interpretation shows past times when people have incorrectly read the skies and predicted the imminent return of Jesus. Even apart from the predictions of cults, mainstream Christians have wondered at the end around the millennial turns of 1,000 and 2,000 AD, let alone during the English civil war, the rise of Napoleon and Hitler and the 1917 Russian revolution.

Is this the end?

It may be – and how good is that if Jesus does soon return and bring the fullness of the new creation. Or it may not be – the present events may be just another in those regular cyclical disturbances in the affairs of the heavens and of earth.

It’s time to listen to Jesus again: ⁴² ‘Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. ⁴³ But understand this: if the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. ⁴⁴ So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him. (Matt 24, NIV).

This is a time for Christian people to remain constant in faith, hope and love. It’s a time to love our neighbour by serving them with the gospel and with deeds of mercy to those to suffer. And it’s a time to love God by being about the Master’s business while we wait for his coming.

Let this be our prayer: Come Lord Jesus come! And let me be found faithful in you and for you as I wait for that glorious day when my Lord will be all in all to all.

Covid-19 and virtual church

Virtual church in a day of virus

There’s an old joke about the benefits of hospitals without sick people and schools without children.

How about a church without people?

That’s come to life recently because of the Covid 19 scare. As a public health measure, and in the light of official advisories to avoid large public gatherings, some churches have gone virtual. Bible talks, and even prayers and musical items are being posted online for members to access in asynchronous mode in the comfort and privacy of their own home or wherever they choose.

Such measures prompt the question, is it necessary to physically gather to be a church?

Let’s argue the case for virtual church.

The inbuilt cameras on smartphones can be used to record talking heads doing Bible talks, prayers etc and these can be posted on social media at little cost.  DIY music can happen through YouTube (and each can choose music to their taste – avoiding these pesky worship wars). Prayer requests and other responses can be collected through chat groups, where small group meetings can also be facilitated. Communion can be celebrated through individual wafer and juice packs delivered to the door and likewise for baptisms with vials of water drawn from the church taps. Funds can be collected through the electronic banking schemes that many churches are already using. All this enables a virtual gathering of God’s people, perhaps on a wider and more regular scale than may happen presently.

One advantage is cost. Churches can downsize their property holdings. Away with those large auditoriums, classrooms etc that are only used for limited hours per week. Away with the paid staff and volunteers who invest their time and energy to do physical setup, clean buildings, provide security and parking control, along with greeting people as they arrive and caring for them until they leave. Another advantage is security, in places where to attend church is risky or where governments practice building surveillance or simply forbid church attendance on pain of arrest. Yet another advantage is convenience. Church members travelling for employment or leisure can participate on a ‘whenever and wherever’ basis. Likewise for those in remote or institutional locations or those who are housebound with their own infirmity or that of those they care for.

In a setting with even modest technical affordances, there is a good utilitarian argument for virtual church. And in situations such as corona-virus or some of the just-mentioned special needs, there is much to be said for it. Maybe the day is not far off, or already is, when many churches will add an asynchronous virtual church package to their standard offerings.

And so we return to the earlier question? Is a physical gathering of God’s people necessary or preferable?

The quickest of concordance searches shows many references to church as God’s people physically gathered. (Try searching under the groups of words clustered around ‘assemble’ or ‘gather’). For example, Israel gathered before God on Mount Sinai to make covenant and receive the law (Exod 19:7f). They gathered to hear Ezra read and explain the same law after returning from exile (Neh 8:8ff). They gathered again to choose new leaders after the apostasy of Judas (Acts 1:15) and to pray when Peter was arrested (Acts 12:12). Such physical gatherings were not just in times of crises. Passages such as Acts 2:42-47and 1 Cor 14:26 suggest that physical gatherings were regular, involved the whole church and were the norm. Even given the technology of letter writing, John recognises that there are things best done face to face (2 Jn 13; 3 Jn 13). Paul longed to see  his readers (Eg, Rom 1:11; 2 Tim 1:4; 1 Thess 2:17).

Why is a physical gathering of church so desirable? The reasons are many. The 70% of communication that happens with body language happens best with physical proximity. That quick twinkle or moistening of an eye, furrowed brow, pause in response and sagging of the shoulders can be concealed even when a camera is used. The warm handshake, brotherly hug or simple touch on an arm that can signal “I’m here for you” can only happen in person. The encouragement that comes from gathered voices raised in prayer and praise is hard to replicate when we each sit in our own lounge room with headphones and splendid isolation. Indeed, there is much to be said for God’s people physically gathered.

So, by all means let’s use virtual church when public health, security and other circumstances prevent physical gatherings. However, just as we seek and await a face to face experience with the Lord (eg, Exod 33:11,18-23; Rev 22:14), let’s do all we can to gather with his people week by week (Heb 10:25).

Covid 19 - The virus

The virus

It started small. A handful of people were infected in a distant city known only to a few.

And soon it spread. Airports, roads and rail lines closed in response. Shelves emptied of anything edible as hoarders dug in for a siege. Evacuations were arranged and strangers found themselves sequestered in quarantine.

Worst of all was the tsunami of suspicion.

Suspicious eyes glared over face masks at anyone who looked as though they might come from the country where it started. A cough or sneeze was enough to make a crowd scatter, as though a dog ran into a flock of pigeons. Even inside churches, the place where faith should banish fear, people looked at familiar faces, and those of strangers, with wary eyes. Who knew where the enemy would next appear under a deceptive disguise?

We’d been through it before, with SARS. This time, governments and people were better prepared and swifter to react. However, and in a horrid twist, this only made the virus spread more swiftly and with greater effect.

Someone has said, we have nothing to fear but fear itself. However, fear was the virus that stalked the land.