Is anyone else struck these days by how very fragile life is? It hit me a couple of nights ago like a ton of bricks. I had been reading stories of people personally hit hard by COVID-19. The stories had compounded into this mound of mental doom and gloom and I could feel the fear rising up in me. This could happen to me. This could happen to someone I love. 

So I started to pray, shaping my worries into prayers. And my fear began to morph into something else. I would call it awe and wonder. In that moment I was overcome with the revelation that EVERY breath is a gift from God. Every moment I’m allowed to live on this earth, every day I have the capacity to think and speak and move and feel … these are priceless, undeserved gifts. 

We live in an age and area of affluence. We pride ourselves on our independence, our financial prowess and security, on being “self-made”. But strip all that away and when it comes down to life and death, not one of us had a bit of control over when our hearts first began to beat and not one of us gets to decide when that final beat and breath will occur.

Turns out none of us is self-sustaining or self-sufficient. We are utterly and desperately dependent on our Maker. 

And another realization begins to soak in. He doesn’t owe me a long, problem-free life. He doesn’t owe me another day on this earth. I’m not entitled to any of it. Life itself is a precious miracle. When I come back to this most basic truth, I find I’m strangely free from fear. All I want to do is thank our Almighty God for blessing me with another day and to see every moment as the sacred gift it is.

I’m seeing a whole range of emotional reactions to the COVID-19 shutdown. Fear, anxiety, frustration, indifference, even elation over the forced slowing of our daily pace. All of these reactions are natural and understandable. But I believe God is whispering to us in the midst of the chaos … Come back to me, child. Be still and know that I am God. 

He will take what the enemy means for evil and use it for unimaginable good

Our lives have been distracted by a hundred different pursuits; our hearts have become lukewarm. What if there’s a gift somewhere in the rubble? An invitation to get off the hamster wheel, to be reawakened to the joy of our first love, to find our identity and peace in Christ? Perhaps it’s a time to purge some of the meaningless distractions and align our hearts fully with His.

I believe He wants to use this time to purify His bride. He will take what the enemy means for evil and use it for unimaginable good … if we pray and if we are surrendered to His purposes. 

Friend, you are so loved. I pray you find hope and truth and greater certainty in Christ than ever during this season fraught with so much uncertainty. Our hope is in Him.