Faith in the Age of Coronavirus

“I will ask God mercifully to protect us. Then I will fumigate, help purify the air, administer medicine, and take it. I will avoid places and persons where my presence is not needed in order not to become contaminated and thus perchance infest and pollute others, and so cause their death as a result of my negligence. If God should wish to take me, he will surely find me and I have done what he has expected of me and so I am not responsible for either my own death or the death of others. If my neighbor needs me, however, I will not avoid place or person but will go freely…” See, this is such a God-fearing faith because it is neither brash nor foolhardy…

I read these words of advice this week. They were timely in light of the rise of COVID-19 to pandemic proportions. (Bonus if you know where these words are from without reading ahead.) They didn’t come from Twitter or Facebook. They aren’t from a blog or magazine. I didn’t hear them in a sermon or podcast. They came from a much older, much lower-tech age. They are the words of the great Protestant reformer, Martin Luther, in an open letter with his thoughts about the proper response of Christians during an outbreak of the bubonic plague.

Admittedly, the stakes we are facing with the coronavirus are not as high as those of the black death, but I find that the major themes of Martin Luther’s advice still stand today.

1. Do not be consumed by fear. Luther prays—for God’s protection and intervention—and refuses to be controlled by fear. I’ve said often that as Christians our actions in such situations should be governed by faith plus facts, not by fear. We can face the world with realism (facts) but not be dominated by fear because we have faith in a good and powerful God. This does not mean we don’t take appropriate precautions (see more below), but it does mean we do not need to succumb to panic. This rejection of fear may be easier for some of us than others, but even for those of us who suffer from anxiety, it is the goal. We hold the steadfastness of God’s faithfulness and grace in front of our eyes, and we cling to the resurrection hope he offers us, even if we must remind ourselves of these things moment by moment.

2. Love your neighbor. Luther hinges his entire argument on the command to “love your neighbor as yourself.” In his day, that meant a willingness to risk contracting the plague yourself if your neighbor was in need of spiritual comfort or of physical care. Today, it may still mean those things or may take other forms. It may mean running errands or going to the store for a “neighbor” who is of higher risk. It may mean supporting families with children or college students who have had their schools shut down. It may mean speaking up against a hateful or racist comment or act toward an Asian or Asian-American (yes, it’s happening). It may mean checking in on someone who lives alone during a quarantine. It may be a note or a phone call to someone who is ill or anxious.

Think about your situation, your neighborhood, your church community, and use your imagination. As we walk through the next days, weeks, and months, let this be what shapes your thoughts and your actions: how can I love my neighbor today?

Luther mentions one other way to love your neighbor that remains particularly pertinent today:

3. Love your neighbor by taking care of yourself. I have heard people shrug off concern over the coronavirus outbreak because it’s only dangerous for the elderly or immunocompromised. I have heard them downplay its significance because it won’t do much harm to someone young and relatively healthy—like them, like me. This is not driven by a love of neighbor. We are given an opportunity to suffer inconvenience for the sake of caring for those who may be vulnerable. We are given a simple way to protect and affirm the dignity of their lives and health.

So, we follow the advice given to us by the medical community at the moment. For starters, we wash our hands (seriously, please do this). We don’t go out if there’s a possibility we’re sick. As they come, we honor the recommendations and restrictions put in place for “social distancing” to slow the spread of the virus enough for the medical community to not become overloaded, putting even more people unnecessarily at risk. (If you haven’t seen the “flattening the curve” chart yet, you can look at it here. It gives a good visual for why this is necessary.) We do these things not out of fear or hysteria. We do them because it is a simple way to love our neighbors who could suffer “as a result of [our] negligence,” in Luther’s words.

Each day, we face a new onslaught of news reports, statistics, diagrams, and hot takes about the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s easy to get swept up in it all. But this is my adopted approach, and I would encourage you to put it into practice as well. Faith and facts, not fear. This means I spend time praying. It means I make sure I am getting good information (facts) to guide my understanding and actions related to this virus (unless you are an infectious disease specialist, it’s a time worth listening to the professionals). But above all it means I seek to love my neighbor as myself, just as Jesus commanded.

Waiting Without (On the Mudroom)

“When I wait for God to act in answer to my prayers, when I wait for him to break into my season of pain and unmet longing, I am given no guarantee he will act in the way I desire. The guarantees I am given and the divine promises I must rest on are of a different sort entirely.”

Advent is a season of waiting. It’s a season to embrace the tension of the “already” and “not-yet” reality. It’s a season for lingering questions and for aching hearts.

As I wrote this post for the Mudroom blog, I thought of the generations of people who waited for the Messiah to come. Were they like me, I wonder? Did they too struggle with the wait? Did they struggle as they saw God delay to act in the way they desired?

They too faced a long wait. And they too had no other anchor than God’s promises.

I’m over at the Mudroom reflecting on these promises - and on how bad I am at waiting. Head on over there to read “Waiting Without.”

You Are Worth More Than Cilantro

I stop by the window, and I bend down to stare into the long green pot. It has become part of my morning routine, when my sleepy eyes are still only half-open. And my afternoon routine, when I wait for the microwave bell to announce my lunch is ready. And…well, I suppose the “routine” is that I stare into the pot every time I pass it, every time I notice it sitting in front of the tall window beside our bathroom.

At first, I was staring through cling wrap beaded with moisture. I clapped my hands the day I saw a thin green tendril erupting from the soil. I pulled the plastic film away, giving the single sprout room to grow, and hoped it was only the first.

Each day, I look for more. There are over a dozen now. A few sluggish ones pushed up to the sunlight only this morning.

I stare down at them, watching the soil like the tiny clay birds that perch on the pot’s edge. I look at the growing leaves, and the way they lean toward the morning light. I press a finger into the soil’s edge, wondering if they need watering. I look at the ones close together—do they need separated? I run my fingers gently over tiny leaves miraculously supported by thin stems, because I’ve heard this will help them to grow straight and strong. So much attention to watching things grow.

Oh you of little faith—does the Heavenly Gardener not tend to you with even more care? Does He not provide what you need to flourish and grow? Does He not rejoice as He sees you? Are you not even more so under His loving eye?

Are you not worth far more than a sprig of cilantro?

Protestant Amnesia: What's So Important About the Reformation?

My friend recently posted on Facebook about this year’s 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation. It was short, sweet, simple. 

Someone commented calling the post gibberish and my friend a history nerd. 

It was all in good humor—a friend teasing another friend—but I was shocked. I was shocked because the words were coming from a fellow Christian, and a fellow Protestant Christian, and she had no sense of the Reformation’s significance. 

I know she isn’t alone. 

It’s been said that Christians have very bad memories. (I would say this is generally true of humans.) We easily forget where we’ve come from. We forget our history. We forget that our present was birthed from the past. We are heirs of the ideas and decisions of the people and cultures that came before us. We did not emerge from nothing, ex nihilo. We are irreparably tied to our history.

History matters—not because of nerdiness and not for obsession with fact-collecting. History matters because it reminds us who we are. 

How does this relate to the Protestant Reformation? 

At the time of the Reformation, there was one Church in Western Europe—the Roman Catholic Church, and one Church in Eastern Europe—the Eastern Orthodox Church. It’s hard to imagine today, when we’re accustomed to a variety of church traditions. In my hometown and its surrounding township, for example, there are dozens of churches, and I can’t begin to list the various denominations these churches represent.

If you attend a church of any tradition aside from the Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox churches, you are a child of the Protestant Reformation. (In many ways, Western history as we know it, including my native United States culture, is also a child of the Reformation, but that goes beyond the scope of what we can talk about here.)

This year marks the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation. In honor of the occasion, I’ll be taking the next few weeks leading up to "Reformation Day" on October 31 to reflect on how the Reformation speaks to us today. But first, we need to cover some basic history.

Martin Luther and Reformation Beginnings

The Reformation started with a monk named Martin Luther. He was obsessive and anxious, hyper-aware of his sin and fearful of God’s judgment. As a professor at Wittenberg University, Luther threw himself into the study of Scripture.

As he studied and lectured, he gradually began to see the Bible's teaching differently. God's righteousness, like it's talked about in the book of Romans, isn't about God waiting to smite us. It's about God's gracious gift in making us righteous because of the death and resurrection of Jesus. He gives us His righteousness, bringing us to a place of right relationship, adopting us as His children. And He does this not because of our own merit or worthiness or action but merely by His grace, through our faith in Christ. 

For any of us who grew up in a Protestant church, this probably sounds like old news. But for Luther, it was revolutionary. He “rediscovered” this presentation of the Gospel, which now sounds so common to us. It was his reformation breakthrough.

The trouble started when Luther wrote and posted the Ninety-Five Theses in 1517. At the time, traveling preachers were selling indulgences. They told townspeople, often poor peasants without money to spare, that if they paid money for an "indulgence," one of their loved ones would be released from Purgatory. They even had an advertising jingle: “As soon as a coin in the coffer rings, the soul from Purgatory springs.” 

Luther was a concerned pastor. He saw a practice that was taking advantage of poor churchgoers, a practice that was theologically suspect in suggesting people could buy salvation, a practice that was conveniently funding a grandiose building project in Rome. So, he wrote ninety-five objections to the practice and publicly shared them for scholarly debate. 

The Ninety-Five Theses circulated widely and quickly, and controversy erupted. The next few years were a whirlwind for Luther. He wrote furiously, explaining the theological views that had slowly been forming during his studies. He publicly debated church leaders and stood before religious and secular councils. He was eventually declared a heretic, excommunicated from the Catholic Church, and made an outlaw. But the “damage” had already been done. The Protestant Reformation was taking Europe by storm. 

Reformation Basics: The Solas

I will not take the time to explain all that Luther did and taught for the rest of his life. And I will not detail his followers and the various early fragmentations of the Reformation. If you’re interested, this information is readily available elsewhere. Instead, I want to simply explain the Reformation distinctives, these significant shifts that revolutionized the expression and theology of the Christian Church. We call them the “solas.”

Sola Scriptura: Scripture alone is the highest authority.

This was the starting point of the revolutionary shift of the Reformation. No longer did the judgments of popes or church councils or the traditions of the church bear the authority of what was true. Scripture alone was the judge and standard of truth. It is the authority for our faith and doctrine, and everything must be interpreted in its light.

Solus Christus: Christ alone is our only mediator to God.

We could not come to God on our own, and we needed Him to reveal Himself and come to us. Christ alone is the way for us to be in right relationship with God and know what He is really like. Our salvation was accomplished once and for all by the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. He is the only way of salvation. 

Sola Fide & Sola Gratia: We are saved through faith alone, by the grace of God alone. 

It is impossible for us to save ourselves or work our way into God’s favor. Our salvation is entirely by His grace, not by any works or good things we have done. We do not add to the saving work of Christ—He has already fully won our salvation. We receive this salvation and are made right with God by responding in faith to what Christ has already done. In a “great exchange,” the penalty of our sin was paid by Christ on the Cross, and we are given His righteousness, declared to be right with God. The simple statement of the Gospel, which we have inherited from the Reformation is: Justification (we are made right with God), by grace alone, through faith alone, because of Christ alone.

Soli Deo Gloria: Glory to God Alone

God alone receives glory from our salvation and our lives. Because salvation is entirely His work, and not our own, He receives all the glory and praise from it. The whole of our lives should be lived for His glory.

Luther never wanted to break from the Catholic Church. His intention was always reform—to call the Church back to its roots, back to the basic teachings of the biblical Gospel. But the reformation turned into a break, and produced a new branch of Christianity. This year, we mark its 500th birthday.