A server with a tray of sizzling fajitas hoisted onto his shoulder passed my table as I sat and waited for my friend, who had been delayed by heavy traffic. As I sipped my iced tea and absently stared out the window at the passing cars, the conversation at the table behind me funneled through the space between the booth and the wall as though amplified by a hidden microphone.
“How are your grandchildren?” I heard a young female voice asking. “Have you seen them lately?”
After what seemed like a lengthy pause, another voice from an older woman with a sorrowful tone responded. “They’re so afraid,” she said. “I don’t understand it. They’re young and healthy, and they say children are not generally susceptible. They’re afraid for me, I suppose. Afraid of making me sick, but I’m healthy too. I don’t have any major health issues.”
A brief pause.
“The last time I saw them it was through the windows of their van from the driveway. They wouldn’t get out and come into the house. They wouldn’t even roll the windows down. My daughter told me, ‘We have to be careful, Mom.’ I couldn’t touch them. I couldn’t hug them. I couldn’t give them grandma kisses…” Her voice trailed off, and I could hear her fighting the tears through her faltering voice.
Maybe you’re thinking I shouldn’t have been eavesdropping. Maybe I shouldn’t have been, but it was impossible to tune out the emotion, the sadness in the woman’s voice. And it struck me again as it has hundreds of times since the pandemic began: the fear. People were so very afraid.
I remember the day back in March, eight months ago, when I was leaving the store at the end of my shift. A pair of police officers were gathered near the general merchandise entrance and there was a kind of muffled panic permeating the air. Customers hurried through the entrance into the store with an urgency we generally see when a hurricane is approaching. As I made my way across the front end to the grocery entrance, I saw customers with buggies piled high with toilet paper, paper towels, Lysol and other cleaners. My thoughts at the time were mild curiosity. What in the world was going on?
When I got home and turned on the television, the news was filled with announcements of businesses shutting down and schools closing. People were cautioned not to leave their homes unless absolutely necessary, and even then, they were told they were taking an awful chance of contracting the “novel Corona virus.” What was this all about? I thought to myself. Is it really so deadly?
In the months since the initial outbreak, we are told that millions of people have died worldwide and that tens of millions have contracted the virus and survived. The virtues of quarantines and lock downs have been debated endlessly with no clear scientific answer, although the damage to our economy and to peoples’ lives is more than anecdotal. One could arguably find evidence to support whatever position one chose, and as with so many polarizing issues in our society today, pretty much everyone has.
Clearly people have died, and in every case when someone has lost his or her life, it has been tragic and devastating and heartbreaking for the loved ones. I am no stranger to grief, having lost my mother twenty years ago to breast cancer and my husband to a recurrence of stomach cancer in March 2019. What I wouldn’t give to have had both of them even for a few more years. Grief can be a cruel despot. But I have learned that in whatever state I am, I have choices. Even when I feel powerless and the burning hope inside me dwindles to a glowing ember, I can stoke it back to a flame, if I choose to do so. Why would I not?
The message I want to share here is specifically meant for my Christian friends, but I am hopeful anyone reading it who does not have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ might be inspired nonetheless.
For my Christian friends, I have a question. Are you living every day in fear, and if you are, why?
I remember a conversation I had with one of my stepdaughters during the last days of her father’s life. I had heard stories from her mother and sisters of how she had fainted, passed out cold some eighteen years before when her father was diagnosed with signet ring cell carcinoma of the stomach, and I was concerned for her now and how she would be able to deal with what his doctor had told us was the inevitable outcome. She had grown and matured a great deal over the years, having experienced some very difficult struggles of her own, and she assured me that her outlook had changed as well. She told me how she believed we were ill-equipped to handle death, even though it is as much a part of life as birth is. We are taught to fear it and fight it tooth and nail instead of accepting it as the inevitable part of life that it is. Ultimately, we have no control over when or how it will happen, but we live every day as though we do, and it’s like a cruel joke we play on ourselves.
It gave me a sense of peace to hear her explain it to me the way she did. I can only hope I captured the essence of what she said because it was quite profound. When the day came on March 4th, 2019, she faced it with courage and grace.
When it comes to this matter of control, I find it to be an illusion, for the most part. When we were children, our parents protected us and taught us how to live carefully and cautiously. We looked both ways before crossing the street, bundled up in the winter time to stay warm, slathered sun screen on our skin to protect us from sunburn. We were taught not to talk to strangers and to be wary of charlatans and crooks who would swindle us if we were foolish. Good advice, all of it, and we did well to heed it. Even so, every time we leave our home, go to work, cross a street, board an airplane, or get behind the wheel of a car, we take a chance. No doubt someone reading this message has lost a family member completely unexpectedly to an automobile accident or some other kind of misfortune. Every time we go out in public, we potentially expose ourselves to bacteria, germs, and viruses. They are part of life. Always have been. When I was a child, I didn’t worry a great deal about any of them. In fact, I played hard in the dirt, barefooted most of the time. We didn’t use hand sanitizer, and alcohol and hydrogen peroxide were reserved for cleaning the occasional skinned knee or mildly infected sore from a splinter. As a result, our immune systems were strong, so that when we did catch a cold or the flu, it ran its course and we were good to go again in no time.
Then this insidious fear crept into our society. Those who stoked it told us we needed to keep our distance from each other, not breathe each other’s breath or touch each other with a friendly handshake or a warm hug. We couldn’t gather to worship or to share meals or to watch our children play baseball or sing with the choir. We couldn’t visit grandma at the nursing home or conduct a funeral service for our beloved uncle. Weddings were canceled and reunions postponed indefinitely. If we did any of these things, we were selfish and foolhardy, placing ourselves and others at risk. We might get sick. And if we got sick, we could die.
There is no question about it. We are all going to die. It is an inevitability, and no quarantine or mask or arbitrary law can prevent it. Some might argue these measures might delay it, and that’s reason enough to comply. And I say, at what cost? I can tell you assuredly that if I were immunocompromised, as I undoubtedly am becoming due to the chemotherapy I am taking, and my sons were forbidden to see me, hold my hand, place a cool cloth on my fevered forehead, and give me comfort in my final hours, I would pray for death to come quickly. I am not afraid of death, for as my stepdaughter so aptly put it, it is as much a part of life as birth. For Christians, it may be the end of life as an earthly being, but it is the beginning of another, eternal life. That knowledge gives me peace and extinguishes the fear.
For all Christians, such peace should cradle our hearts and minds, and even more than that, there should be exultation and joy through the pain of death, because for Christians, it is nothing more than a separation, and a temporary one at that. We believe that our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ conquered death, and in so doing, gave us eternal life, if we believe. I know assuredly that I will live forever. Not in this realm. Not on this earth, and for that I am especially thankful because it’s not a very nice place.
John gets angry sometimes when I talk about this because I think he thinks I sound as though I am looking forward to death or that I somehow wish to die. Nothing could be farther from the truth. I certainly don’t want to die. There are so many things I want to do yet and so many things I cherish: memories of times spent with family and friends, laughter, a baby sleeping in my arms, a song with a melody that carries me away to the mountains, a conversation with my sons about something special to them, walking in the woods with my sweetheart and his dog, diving in the ocean with friends, a long road trip with casual stops along the way to see historic sites or scenic vistas, opening my home to young people on spring break, rescuing a neglected or endangered animal, sharing a holiday meal with my late husband’s daughters, devotionals with others who love God as much as I do. These are moments that give this life meaning and make it so worthwhile. Of course, I want as many of them as possible. I want to see my sons accomplish their dreams. I want to walk on the beach and feel the waves wash over my feet. I want to hike through the woods and hear the quiet moan of the wind high in the trees. I want to step off of a dive boat and feel the cool ocean water swallow me up so I can explore that other world under the waves.
I don’t deny the good in the world. I see it. I have experienced it. I have loved my life. I try very hard to focus on good, positive things.
But there is so much evil and darkness here too, and sometimes it can feel overwhelming. I don’t want any part of it, and yet, I am part of it by virtue of my human nature. Jesus even said as much to the Jews who did not understand His nature.
“Once more Jesus said to them, ‘I am going away, and you will look for me, and you will die in your sin. Where I go, you cannot come.’”
“This made the Jews ask, ‘Will he kill himself? Is that why he says, ‘Where I go, you cannot come’?’”
“But he continued, ‘You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. I told you that you would die in your sins; if you do not believe that I am he, you will indeed die in your sins.” John 8:20-24
Yes, I love my life, but I love the promise of the next one more. I long to see my mom again; I have missed her so. Especially now facing this challenge of multiple myeloma, uncertain about the outcome and how it may ultimately impact my longevity. I long to see Roy, my late husband. I can only imagine what it will look like, but I know what it will feel like. The joy will surpass by an infinite measure the ultimate happiness I have ever experienced as a human being on this earth. Whatever I have felt in exuberance in this life will not come close to the exhilaration of heaven. And it will be that way forever.
Because of my faith and that assurance, I refuse to be afraid. I refuse to live in fear. “For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.” II Timothy 1:7
Multiple myeloma may cause me to be more susceptible to a cold, the flu, pneumonia, and yes, COVID-19, but if anyone thinks I intend to hunker down in my little house and avoid contact with my family and friends who I love dearly and whose love for me is better medicine than any standard of care for any disease, they are quite mistaken. Death is nothing to fear when you know it not a permanent state but rather a passageway to the next life:
“And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.
And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.
And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, Write: for these words are true and faithful.” Revelation 21:3-5
Great post my friend! Every thought so well stated. My prayers for you daily in my list of those I know battling numerous different situations of this fallen world but all still “living” in the face of it as you seem to be.