(Note: This blog entry is based on the text for The Third Pandemic, originally shared on June 4, 2020. It was the twentieth video for our YouTube Channel, Streams of Living Water (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB7KnYS1bpHKaL2OseQWCnw), co-produced with my wife, Rev. Sally Welch.)
So much has changed in response to the
COVID-19 worldwide pandemic that it was hardly imaginable that anything could
take our focus away from it in 2020. Until something did. And then, yesterday,
we had an earthquake. But, this is Southern California. We shrug those off.
What has newly captured our attention are
the demonstrations that began in response to the murder of George Floyd at the
hands of 4 Minneapolis police officers. They have attracted thousands people, energized
to make their voices heard and to do something positive for change.
Sally and I are still mindful of the care
old people with underlying health conditions like us have to take during what
is still the first pandemic.
The second pandemic of 2020, I would say,
has been the demonstrations and the variety of responses they have drawn. Everything
else now seems to insignificant. What do people feel at the demonstrations and what
do people watching them see? Our actions and their responses have both matured
and gone viral.
What do you think, or feel when you see
people of every color, law enforcement officers and marchers for justice
sharing a bended knee?
What do you think, or feel, when you see
looting, the destructions of public and civil properties, like libraries and
police stations, the deaths of demonstrators and of law enforcement officers?
What do you think or feel, when you see
rubber bullets and pepper balls fired at peaceful demonstrators? Looters? What
about when cars being driven through people, when guns are brandished, or
people are killed, on both sides?
Do you feel energized and more open to
change, or more resistant. Are you more open to learning about people whose
life experience is very different than your own, or do you think about how to protect what “I” am and what is mine. How to restore law and
order, which means to go back to the way things were?
We have seen demonstrators self-policing to
discourage the violence and destruction that has threatened to move the
conversation from the death of George Lloyd to the behavior of the few mixed in
with the many.
We
have seen some react to what they see in disgust, seeing only the anarchists,
criminals and the desperate.
It’s been said that seeing is believing, but
that what we believe is also how we see.
Who are we when we only watch in suspense, like
watching a car chase; how will it end?
Who are we when we watch in cynicism,
wondering when it will collapse and spiral into anarchy?
Who are we when we watch and see the breaking
down of historic barriers, and we hope that this time things will be different,
that there will be change.
We watch and bear witness to ourselves.
And, if we are open to it, we can welcome a
third pandemic and allow another kind of movement to go viral among us, a
movement of the Holy Spirit to make all things new, a movement that has the
ability not just to change people’s behavior, but to change the human heart,
the third pandemic.
I would like to propose a changed world by a pandemic of changed lives.
*John 3:3-8
I Wanted To Change The World
Attributed to an anonymous monk in the year
1,100
“When
I was a young man, I wanted to change the world.
I found it was difficult to change the world, so I tried to change my nation.
When I found I couldn't change the nation, I began to focus on my town. I
couldn't change the town and as an older man, I tried to change my family.
Now, as an old man, I realize the only thing I can change is myself, and
suddenly I realize that if long ago I had changed myself, I could have made an
impact on my family. My family and I could have made an impact on our town.
Their impact could have changed the nation and I could indeed have changed the
world.“
The thing is, we cannot even change ourselves, but God does. We are
God’s people. We are God’s children.
*Romans 8:12-14
Only God can draw us out of ourselves and make us into something new,
and that’s exactly what God does.
Dietrich
Bonhoeffer, a Lutheran pastor imprisoned and killed by the Nazis near the end
of World War II, at the beginning of his book on Christian community, Life
Together, says, “When Christ calls a (person), he bids (them) come and
die.”
We
die with Christ in Baptism and rise with him to newness of life. We become a
new creation. We are born again.
To see the good and to do it comes from God in the power of the person
of the Holy Spirit. Death is a past tense experience for us in our baptisms and
eternity has already begun.
When
we get to heaven all races will be gathered together on the basis of our faith,
our common relationship, given by God, with the one true living God. We can
make that happen more now, in an imperfect world, until that day when it will
be brought to perfection in the world to come.
We
cannot change ourselves, but God can, and will if we only open our heart to
receive God’s gift. We can act to make this world more like the kingdom of God,
more like the new heaven and the new Earth.
What can Christians do right now? I’d like make a few suggestions:
1.
Pray.
2.
Before you speak or
act, listen, listen, listen, and listen some more. Listen. Seek trusted Christian
leaders of all kinds, and learn. Then act. Don’t let fear, or confusion, or
inertia, or resistance stop you from doing the will of God. This is a time that
is ripe for change.
3.
Die to our old
selves and rise with Christ every day. Ask every day, What is God’s will, God’s
justice and what does God call me to do to advance it”? As Pastor Rick Warren
put it, our task is not to ask God to bless what we are doing, but to ask to do
what God is blessing. Be humble with regard to our expectations for what will
come of our efforts, from ourselves, and from the efforts of others. Be
encouraged. In the end, God wins.
4.
Go to a Christian of
another race, another background, another income or educational level and ask
to have an honest conversation. Talk about faith first, and then about life
experiences. Look for what unites as greater than what divides, and talk about
how God’s justice can bridge the divides.
5.
You have probably heard
or seen negative or hostile
comments online from somebody who either assumes you agree or that you will
bullied into silence by them. Stand up. Remember that, as 1 John 4:4 says, you are
from God, and have conquered them; for the one who is in you is greater
than the one who is in the world.”
6.
Seek a relationship between churches, share respective gifts and, when the first pandemic if over, share
experiences. Again, connect on the basis of faith, and then get to know one
another. Examine any questionable reactions or judgements in yourself and ask
yourself where these reactions are coming from. Reject any that do not lead to
Christian community.
7.
When you go to the online
or local community meetings that are sure to come, share a Christian worldview.
Look for those of other races who agree and bond with them over our common,
defining relationship, a living relationship with the living God.
8.
When conditions
allow join or start a racially diverse prayer group and/or Bible study at your
church or in your home. Anthropologist Margaret Meade once said, “Never doubt that a small
group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is
the only thing that ever has.”
What other concrete
steps can Christians take to improve relations among the races and doing
justice, that is, doing God’s will? Write them in the comment section below and
we will discuss them.
The Christian Church is a movement of the Holy Spirit. Movements are
made of individuals, and individual form small groups, and small groups form
larger groups.
Movements are made of transformed individuals, and transformed
individuals transform the world.
Open your heart to receive the transforming presence of the living God, and live that transformation today.
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