AND NOW IT IS HERE

AND NOW IT IS HERE

There is that moment when a crisis moves from ‘them’ to ‘us’. I sense it is happening this week in Zimbabwe. For weeks we have seen the reports about China (far way), Europe (a little nearer) and now South Africa and Zambia (next door).  Now it is here. We are waking up to what we have known for so long. What happens ‘there’ is bound sooner or later to happen ‘here’. Those far places have been taking ‘unprecedented’ – how much that word is being used – steps to contain and treat the virus. And they are able to do so because their economies can stretch to ‘unprecedented’ measures that will strain their resources for a while but, as they say, ‘we will bounce back’ and they will.

But now it is here. And we have none of those resources. In the emergency they have built hospitals in a week, provided face masks, ventilators and all the equipment – and they have been stretched to the limit to do so. They have been told to work from home, shop on line, avoid bars, clubs, concerts, football games, – even walks in the park unless they keep a good distance from others. They are organising their communities to deliver food to the housebound and the ‘locked downs’.

These instructions grate on us. The concept of ‘working from home’ or ‘shopping on line’ can only apply to a small fraction of our people. The vast majority have to congregate to survive. They have to go to work on crowded commuters, work and live in close proximity to others. Water, soap and paper disposable towels are a challenge to find. Face masks and all the other equipment are not widely available.

If we cannot contain this virus it will cut a swathe of death through our people and heaven knows where it will end. In China the government can make a decision and it is obeyed immediately throughout society.  In Europe the governments can make the same decision but people have to be persuaded to obey. Forcing them is always a last resort. What will happen here?

As so often in a crisis, people ask where God is in this. Well, God did not send this to teach us a lesson. He does not work that way. We brought it on ourselves by our own choice in a way we do not yet understand.  But God is with us in this as in every crisis. He always accompanies us, at times in compassion and at other times in delight. He is certainly with us now in compassion, suffering with us.  And he is working in this, in ways we do not understand, to bring new life out of this catastrophe. 

Today it happens that the readings open with the words; ‘Now I create… a new earth’ (Isaiah 65:17).  What are we to make of such words in the midst of the corona virus? Our response is twofold; first we are to believe that God really means what he says even if we see no signs at the moment; and second we have to do everything we can to push back against the virus in every imaginative way we can.  It is an invitation to reach out to others in ways that perhaps we have not done hitherto.