Photo by Andrijana Bozic on Upsplash
One thing COVID-19 has done definitively is to remind us that we’re not in charge. In fact, it’s a pretty outsized object lesson in that truth. Surely there’s enough that happens in life without a pandemic to convince us that life doesn’t go according to our own scripts.
Still, we do have a love affair with being in charge. This desire to be our own God is as old as the Garden of Eden story where the serpent’s argument to Eve lies squarely on the question of God’s trustworthiness: “God knows that the moment you eat from that tree (the forbidden one), you’ll see what’s really going on. You’ll be just like God, knowing everything …” (Genesis 3:5 The Message). Somehow, we think life will be safer if we get to be the boss.
I do hear Christians getting excited about unbelievers finally getting the picture that God is the one in charge. While I agree that this is true, we need to acknowledge that it’s more complicated than merely asserting our lives are in God’s hands. Divine oversight of the globe doesn’t take us off the hook of responsibility as we combat this menace.
Because even though God is the CEO, the Lord has given charge to us in many things.
The stewardship of the Earth, as outlined in Genesis 1:28-30, is just for starters. Neither our understanding of our free will, nor our teaching about God’s forgiveness exempt us from the responsibility of dealing with life’s curveballs.
What is boils down to is that while God is in charge, we always have a job to do at the same time. It feels good for us humans to have this work and see that our positive efforts generally line up with good outcomes. If you read Proverbs, you’ll see a lot of logic surrounding prudent practices in human interactions. The problem seems to lie in our getting hooked on the idea that we can make things go our way. The better you are at it, the harder it is to give up the management of your own life, and the easier it becomes to suppose you can do a better job of handling the lives of others. That is until everything you have planned for gets a monkey wrench thrown in that you didn’t anticipate.
My fear is that we end up telling ourselves that – yes, COVID-19 took us by surprise, but in the future, we can figure out how to control the spread of viruses and take this wild card out of the equation. Don’t think I’m not championing those fighting to discover both a cure and a vaccine for this disease. I pray answers will come even more quickly than predicted. But the desire to be in charge runs strong in the human genome. We can waste a lot of time trying to cover all our bases, making sure we’ve thought of every contingency to make us feel safe.
In the end, that’s not our job – that belongs to God. That’s the kind of universal scope only the divine can cover. We need to stop thinking that if we just get smart enough, and careful enough we can avoid adversity.
We need to remember that humans are actually built for adversity. Suffering has the capacity to make us both stronger and more compassionate. While it’s wise to attempt to avert problems, when they do come, it’s best to embrace them and discover what they have to teach us. Every sports trainer knows you don’t build muscle until you break it down first.
God runs the world unlike any human “boss” we’ve ever had. The better analogy is that the Lord wants our interaction with the divine to be a dance. In the course of our lifetime, God will give us the lead many times. “See what you can do” seems to be the encouraging directive. Likewise, the Lord is always there to pick up the lead when our coordination or creativity start to wane.
The point is, don’t make the dance into a solo performance. Richard Rohr puts it well when he suggests we ask: “What is mine to do?”
And let’s keep dancing—with our amazing partner.
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