Strive to Live Out a More Genuine and Fulfilled Spiritual Life.
COVID-19 illustration was drawn by Alonzo E. Thornton.
Grace and Peace
Introduction
Whether it is God’s divine or His permissive will, the entire world as we know it has been forever altered in every aspect that we knew by the Covid-19 virus!
At least in modern history, this virus has successfully impacted every living soul on earth, either through the multi-leveled negative life-changing devastation of Nations and their citizens or positively by the small minority who have profited from this pandemic.
The central rationale for this blog post is to provide a Godly worldview and spiritual perspective that will assist and direct living souls throughout this somewhat “nightmarish” deep sleep that has befallen all of us.
Be Reminded of One’s Spiritual Heritage
As difficult as it is for each of us during the year, those of us who are faithful is to never lose sight of the fact that you are not an outsider and living apart from Christ. Immanuel is with us!
Never forget that despite the death, pain, human and systemic suffering that is growing worst, you and I are not outside of the spiritual citizenship of the Nation of Israel and each nation that is redeemed by her. Both Jew and non-Jew are one in Messiah and His Kingdom.
Whatever challenging distress your family and you are facing in the world at present, you are spiritually, providentially established, and forever blessed in the Kingdom of God, which is the essence of our hope and fulfillment.
Our ultimate loyalty and allegiance should be eternally established at the foot of the Cross and the Empty Tomb of Christ Jesus; as unbeknown to many, there is an ever increased reality of the powerful presence and impact of the Kingdom of God upon the earth.
Those of us who are believers within America may have a very challenging time differentiating between the laws, principles, and governing guidelines between America as an empire and our spiritual conventual agreement to God and His Kingdom. To this writer, this fact is the hidden secret between success and destruction of one’s spirituality during this pandemic.
As a result, God as a conventual-keeping God is restained to only move or respond to His own divine decrees and Word. As we have witnessed thus far in 2020 no other nations, gods, kings, or earthly rulers have the power to change the course of destruction that is an ever-present evil in our world!
Life and death are within the hands of an oftentimes quiet God.
What a noble time in this Covid-19 season to call upon God to release His promises and blessings to those who wait on His Face to be seen and His voice to be heard.
Strive to Live Out a More Genuine and Fulfilled Spiritual Life.
Before Covid-19, our lives were literally filled with more activities and interests that we could bear, thus leaving very little time for increased spirituality and life transformational changes.
COVID-19 is causing many of us to rethink just how we are spending our time. Previously, much of our lives had been consumed by many other multiple activities.
Now is an acceptable time to concentrate on tasks and items that bring fulfillment, while increasing joy and peace and increase faithfulness ― particularly those important disciplines that grow our spiritual life!
Divine Presence
There are no more loving words in Scripture than these: “I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac…, remember, I am with you; I will protect you wherever you go…, I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” Genesis 28:13-15.
These words are the very words that each living soul needs at present. Jacob is the recipient of these divine blessings from the Highest at Bethel. While the blessings that God is promising Jacob are wonderful, none of them are made available until we as it was with Jacob, have our own living and very real personal encounter with God.
God has revealed Himself to the human race in four major ways: nature, the human conscience, the Person of Jesus Christ, and finally in the Bible. Each of these methods testifies to His existence. Humanity has no excuse whatsoever for rejecting Him.
He now is hiding within the Covid-19 pandemic seeking out those who will do whatever is necessary to find Him while living in the world’s misery. The very best outcome in our seeking God’s face is to powerfully encounter His divine presence, to become a benefactor of His continuous preservation as well as His moment by moment restoration of one’s entire soul-life.
Only God can deliver His people to the very plans that He has promised. Amen.
Ritual of Mourning
“Though He slay me,” he declared, “yet will I trust in Him,” Job 13:15
What better example than Job that will perhaps help those who are at the end of your coping throughout this very painful 2020 year. Job’s real-life experience is just like millions in all of the earth at present.
Of all of the areas that are under attack, none is greater than how this major crisis has the capacity to unsettle one’s spiritual faith. The charge today is that in the various levels and waves of this pandemic to its long-awaited end, each of our spiritual faith will greatly increase throughout the storm.
Those of us who have read or studied the Book of Job discovered that throughout his crisis, he evokes dependence on God. Job, very much just like us, have learned to pray that God matures us to be upright and fearing God the Father in all ways.
Nevertheless, with no fault of the individual (s), we like Job were thrust into a very deep crisis. Researchers contend that there are three elements of crisis: a triggering occurrence, one’s viewpoint of the happening that instigates subjective anguish; and thirdly a disabling of the coping mechanism causing the affected individual to function at a lower performance rate than before the event.
It is safe to say that Job and millions today have experienced all the three components of this Covid-19 crisis. Job’s transformational moment was when he wept “naked come I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return.” Job 1:21.
It was only during this time that he came to realize that he no longer had the ability to cope with his fate or his life. He in essence saw if not experienced himself dead and ready for his burial. Job, like many of us at present, are experiencing and living through a life of mourning grief, and death!
Theology of Suffering
Suffering: the fertile soil into which God transplants every growing Believer. -Anonymous-
Some of the most important key takeaways in this brief reflective study of Job is more of a question. That question is just how do we who are still alive during this pandemic obtain the practical skills and ability to remain human, and faithful in and during this worldwide undeserved suffering?
The review of Job’s life of suffering leads to the golden discovery that the lament formulated by a faithful heart directed toward God, compelled God His Creator to appear and speak to him in his very real deathlike distress.
Somehow through his willful submission to his fate, he was able to obtain a deeper level of spiritual consecration while yielding totally to God. Job’s wounded body, mind, and spirit reflect what type of needed spiritual journey that he traveled, thus this conclusion is my heart-felt personal offering to those who are reading this blog post.
Undeserved suffering can lead a faithful disciple of the Master to a transformational spiritual revival encounter with the Lord our God. The only preeminent requirement is a contrite and willing heart to endure with God to the very end.
Other powerful considerations:
- Suffering estranges and isolates.
- To learn about self and God, each living soul must learn to not flee from suffering while embracing and learning in silence.
- When in our living we lose our peace is the very best timing to struggle with God so that He may guide us to the eye of the storms in our lives.
- Only when God releases us during these times of wrestling with God will we see and perceive everything new in our lives. These are the times when it is God and not ourselves, nor the world who blesses us, commissions us or ordains us to with a new calling or duty.
In closing, let me leave you with this profound true story.
Viktor Frankl, a psychiatrist, and Nazi concentration camp survivor wondered why some prisoners endured while others did not. He found a profound truth in Nietzsche’s words: “If you have a “why” to live for, you can bear with anyhow.
Frankl concluded that the most important driving life force for humankind was the search for meaning. Every human being has to have a task; it doesn’t matter what it is, but it must be uniquely his or her own, and it comes with the responsibility to live up to the person’s full potential as a human being.
Frankl insisted that an individual can find meaning in life even when challenged with immense suffering, as suffering in itself does not annihilate the dignity of human beings or the meaning of life. Forces beyond our control can take away everything we possess except one thing: our freedom to choose how we will respond to the situation.
Grace and Peace
Listen, Learn, Love, Liberate
Research materials used for this blog post:
Va-Yetzei Genesis 28:10-22, Etz Hayim, Torah, and Commentary; A review and study of Job’s Crisis, Asia-Africa Journal of Mission and Ministry, pp.43-62, Feb. 28, 2019. Additional reading from “Lament of a Wounded Priest”: The Spiritual Journey of Job, by Jean-Pierre Fortin. Spirituality as a Powerful Means of Coping and Growing. [Chronic Illness], page 309, Professional Spiritual & Pastoral Care: A Practical Clergy and Chaplain’s Handbook