Tuesday, September 15, 2020

Thinking Biblically about Fear and Health During COVID

This is part of a series. To see part one, click here.

People with phobias might see reality more clearly than those who are not afraid of much - if you don’t factor God in the equation. There are many dangers in a fallen world. The theme song from the TV series Monk summarizes it well (he was a detective who saw dangers a bit too clearly):

 It's a jungle out there
Disorder and confusion everywhere
No one seems to care
Well I do
Hey, who's in charge here?
It's a jungle out there
Poison in the very air we breathe
Do you know what's in the water that you drink?
Well I do, and it's amazing
People think I'm crazy, 'cause I worry all the time
If you paid attention, you'd be worried too
You better pay attention
Or this world we love so much might just kill you
I could be wrong now, but I don't think so
'Cause there's a jungle out there
It's a jungle out there

When it comes to the Coronavirus, we have heard a lot of statistics and stories that can make us afraid. Having some level of fear doesn’t make us crazy or worthy of some sort of psychological label.

However, Christians serve the living God and look forward to resurrection life as our ultimate hope. That means something for how we should deal with fear and respond to it. In this post, I want to address how the Bible tells us to think about fear in general. Then I want to tackle one fear we might have – the fear of getting extremely sick or dying from this virus.

The Biblical Picture of Fear

Fear is not inherently wrong. It is the opposite side of the coin as desire. If I fear something, it is because I desire something else (and fear losing it). So, we should fear God (fear his displeasure and desire his smiling face). In a fallen world, I should fear jumping from a 5-story building or being bitten by the rattle snake I am staring at on a trail. God gave us fear to protect us physically and spiritually.

Fear, however, like other God-given emotions, can reveal where our desires have gotten off track. For example, Saul was king of Israel, and he disobeyed God’s direct command “because [he] feared the people” (1 Sam. 15:24). He feared losing the approval of people more than losing God’s approval. This fear revealed a heart that elevated a good thing (wanting the approval of people) to an ultimate thing (“I must have it, even if I have to disobey God”).

So, fear can be useful, but it can also reveal where our hearts have gotten priorities out of order. We need wisdom from God and the help of loving Christian friends to help us sort this out.

Fear and Disease

It is not bad to fear a serious disease as long as it is kept in its proper place. Life is a gift from God, and we should care for our bodies. We should take reasonable precautions (knowing what is reasonable has been challenging with COVID because much was unknown early on).

But, we must also check to see that good health does not become ultimate or idolatrous. Our bodies are a gift, but they are not worthy of our total allegiance and worship. God is. Good health is a good gift from God, but it makes a terrible god. We must steward our health in service to him. However, we must not worship it because all things are from him and through him and to him so that he might be glorified (Rom. 11:36). In other words, our problem comes when our desire for good health gets ordered above our desire to obey God. We should not be controlled by the fear of anything except the Lord.

Should Fear of COVID Keep us from Gathering?

If fear causes us to disobey God, then that is a problem. If fear of persecution made me deny Christ, that would be a sin. If a fear of getting sick (or even dying) caused me to forsake assembling, that would be a sin. Remember, forsaking is not the same as temporarily not gathering[1] or being providentially hindered (like a Christian being in the hospital for a month).

If we might get sick from gathering, we know that our physical life is not ultimate. The world lives as if this life is all they have because it is all they have (kind of like the Monk theme song). We should display our faith in God by being willing to gather. This is not a faith that we won’t get sick. It is a trust in God’s sovereign ordering of our lives, including sickness, health, life, and death.

Conclusion

I realize there are other reasons, besides ungodly fear, which might keep some from being able to resume gathering for worship at this stage. I am not assuming everyone has ungodly fear. But I know that in my heart, there have been seasons of fear, and I assume others might have that experience too.

Our goal isn’t to avoid feeling fear as much as it is to honor God, even when we feel afraid. I often tell my boys when they feel scared that courage isn’t the absence of fear. It is doing what honors God, even when they feel afraid. I need to be reminded of that too.

In the next few posts, I plan to address how to renew our thinking with God’s Word. Specifically, how to fight fearful thoughts.



[1] I believe temporarily suspending meeting together when the government asks us to can be right. When there is evidence that the lives of many citizens will likely be put at grave risk if any group gathers, we can rightly decide to suspend meeting out of a love for our neighbors and proper submission to the government.  

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