For the past year, as my heart began to transform from one of stone to one of flesh, I resisted my innate interpretation of the world as being hostile. I believed that if I only thought positively enough, catered to a universalist philosophy, read all the feel-good literature and stay as far away from the concept of sin as much as possible, I would have peace.
But the past two weeks only confirmed that life is a fight and the Bible has truths in it that I have not yet found in any other teaching or belief system. And while I still understand sin with compassion, as I understand we act inappropriately based on hurt and fear, I need to reassess how I have been choosing to relate to the world.
The past few days I have been recalling verses from the prophet Isaiah, who was gentle, but ominous. The book of Isaiah teaches us that sin cannot be tolerated, that it must be addressed, and that God forgives sin. I understand this exactly as what has been happening as this virus takes over our lives.
Our old ways of living were not sustainable, and I think we all knew that. We have been taught about the hole in the ozone layer for almost 40 years, we see images of polar bears dying because the ice caps and glaciers are melting, we turn a blind eye to the fashion industry's crimes, being the number one polluter ranking even above the airline industry, we produce so much waste globally that we now rocket it to litter outer space, and of course, what truly started this all, the inhumane way we treat animals as our food source.
This is sin, and it is now being corrected through the avenue of a devastating pandemic. But God is forgiving, and he is rectifying the problem, as we weren't able to correct it ourselves. This virus can be seen as an act of mercy, as vindication, as the harbinger for a new way of living. Living in mindfulness, in awareness, and in compassion.
We get so lost in this world because it is not ours. We do not really know it and we are constantly being misdirected. We find ourselves in battles we never waged, and they take us very offtrack. Jesus said, "My Kingdom is not of this World; else would my Servants fight for it." (John 18:36) We have to fight for our peace through denial of our appetite, the desires that cause us to act selfishly, ignorantly, and at times even cruelly. Our peace does not come from resting within our primal and lazy nature. It comes from bringing our senses into alignment with God, through taming them and resisting them more times than we would like.
There is something that I have found confidence in, during this distressing time of the most unnatural act of social distancing, and also in this raw fear of pain and death. And that is I have not in fact been offtrack in my interpretation of the world. We are either in battle, or preparing for it, and those who don't prepare end up in far more pain than that which they intended to evade. When we are defiant we are not making the necessary accommodations through diligence and vigilance, and all it takes is a single moment for our lives to turn upside down.
But this is not the end, it is a passage into better things. The reconstruction will be challenging, but it will be so worth it. We talk about leaving a better world for the next generation, and now we might actually do so. We can consume less and check in with our communities more. We now understand how connected we are, which can be our great downfall, but also our great strength. What will we do differently, what reliable infrastructures can we establish? These are exciting times. We are being given a get out of jail free card to leave the old corrupted ways behind, and to rebuild our world for the better.
We get so lost in this world because it is not ours. We do not really know it and we are constantly being misdirected. We find ourselves in battles we never waged, and they take us very offtrack. Jesus said, "My Kingdom is not of this World; else would my Servants fight for it." (John 18:36) We have to fight for our peace through denial of our appetite, the desires that cause us to act selfishly, ignorantly, and at times even cruelly. Our peace does not come from resting within our primal and lazy nature. It comes from bringing our senses into alignment with God, through taming them and resisting them more times than we would like.
There is something that I have found confidence in, during this distressing time of the most unnatural act of social distancing, and also in this raw fear of pain and death. And that is I have not in fact been offtrack in my interpretation of the world. We are either in battle, or preparing for it, and those who don't prepare end up in far more pain than that which they intended to evade. When we are defiant we are not making the necessary accommodations through diligence and vigilance, and all it takes is a single moment for our lives to turn upside down.
But this is not the end, it is a passage into better things. The reconstruction will be challenging, but it will be so worth it. We talk about leaving a better world for the next generation, and now we might actually do so. We can consume less and check in with our communities more. We now understand how connected we are, which can be our great downfall, but also our great strength. What will we do differently, what reliable infrastructures can we establish? These are exciting times. We are being given a get out of jail free card to leave the old corrupted ways behind, and to rebuild our world for the better.
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