September 2020

Worldly Pandemic, Yes! Spiritual Panic, No!

Be gracious to me, O God, be gracious and merciful to me,
For my soul finds shelter and safety in You,
And in the shadow of Your wings I will take refuge and be confidently secure
until destruction [disaster] passes by.          Psalm 57:1 (AMP)

I am in the process of re-reading Thomas Keating’s Intimacy with God—and yes, it’s just that impactful that it’s worthy of multiple reads. Written in 1999, Intimacy focuses on contemplative prayer as a means of healing and transcending the self to have intimate union with God. I mention it now because in these uncertain, quickly fluctuating and, for the masses of us, perilous times we now face with COVID-19 and its many ramifications, shifts, changes and challenges as a world-wide pandemic, intimacy with God is our only way to make it through—period.

Let’s be clear: intimacy with God is always the answer to everything and the only way we can make it through any and all situations! And while this Truth never changes, it is also true that there are things that happen that are outside what we deem “the norm” that demand our attention;  things that bring us face-to-face with our finiteness and frailty as humans in ways that we have never had to confront, conceptualize or contend with before. COVID-19 is such a thing.

The word unprecedented has probably been used more frequently in the past few months to describe this pandemic than it has in the past few years to describe anything. It is a term that most aptly captures this historical moment as this novela coronavirus poses a health threat that has, in, multiple ways, arrested our movement as a society and forced us in to what should be a time of holy hibernation where we are literally being still before God. And while this pandemic has arrested our movement, it should not in any way arrest our spiritual growth and development, especially not because of panic. In fact, for the latter, the opposite should be happening: we should be witnessing an increase of humanity drawing closer and more intimately to the certainty of God in these uncertain, unpredictable and yes, these unprecedented times.

As the infections increase, the number of transitions escalate and the public becomes more restless about and resistant to the stay-at-home orders, we, as Christians, have a higher calling and expectation upon us that we must respond to. Granted, in the face of disease, devastation and death, it is a peculiar call and yet, it is a call that remains: the call to even closer intimacy with the Lord our God. Just as David knew to draw more intimately to God and hide himself in the shadow of God’s wings when Saul was seeking his life, we too must draw more intimately to God until the destruction of COVID passes by. We must let the intimate knowing of God be what positions us in times like these to be used by God, both as voices of hope and actions of faith as we, with confident security, witness to an otherwise panicked world, an unequivocal message: “a worldly pandemic, yes!; but spiritual panic, no!”    

Submitted by: Rev. Dr. Janaé Moore