Where is God in a Pandemic? (Part 1)
Message Description
Senior Pastor Dr. Kurt Bjorklund begins a new 3 week series looking at the Old Testament book of Joel, which addresses a country and a people going thru a crisis, and looks at the questions that people ask about God when going through difficulty.
Message Transcript
Certainly, we have been through a season together in this country. A season unlike any other that probably any of us have been through. And this time has brought about a lot of different reactions from different people. There are the optimists among us that say it will all be over soon, and the economy will skyrocket, and it won’t be as bad as you think.
There have been those who are more pessimistic who say that this is going to be worse than you think, and it is only the beginning. And we are headed to something that is incredibly difficult, the food supplies are going to dry up, the economy is going to tank, and everyone is going to be left fending for themselves.
And there are those who see this, and they see conspiracy theories almost everywhere. They look around and say well, this is the democrats who want to kind of make it hard for the republicans, or this is some grab for power by some group or something like that.
And here is what we do not know. What we really do not know, is this coronavirus event a blizzard, or is it the beginning of winter, or the dawn of an ice age? And we don't really know the answer to that. And this has spawned a lot of people to ask some significant questions. Some people are asking the question, where is God in this? Has God abandoned his creation? Some people are asking, is this the judgement of God? Other people ask me, are these the signs of the end times of the last days before God comes?
They are all great questions. They are not questions that are being discussed in the national media, but they are questions that thinking people of faith have, and often people who don't even ascribe to a particular faith, that people are starting to ask where is God in this moment of history? In fact, I think you have to ask the question.
I saw a story the other day about how some of the curve is starting to flatten in our country but how in some place it’s probably going to be much harder in the days ahead. They were talking specifically about refugee camps, and how people can't socially distance, and how once the virus gets into a place like that, there is no good outcome. You have to ask the question, where is God, where is God in this pandemic?
Today we are going begin a new 3-week series that were calling, Where's God in This Pandemic? We are going to look at the old testament book of Joel. Joel is a minor prophet. There are two groups of prophets in the old testament. The major prophets and the minor prophets. The major prophets are longer books and the minor prophets are shorter books. Joel is one of those shorter books. Incidentally, I had planned this year to take us through the book of Amos a little later, which was a prophecy that often spoke to people who were comfortable. And Joel, which I now switched to, is a book that addresses a country going through a crisis. A people going through a crisis.
And I often read the scripture before we jump into the teaching, but today I'm going to read enough of this teaching that I didn't want to read this ahead of time. And here's what we read. It says this, “The word of the lord came to Joel, son of Pethuel.” And this is a way of just simply, standardly starting a book. And then it said this, “Hear this, you elders;” Now, elders here means civic leaders, it probably doesn't mean elders of a church since churches didn't exist like this. This is just saying, elders of the community, civic leaders. “Listen all you who live in the land, has anything like this ever happened in your days or in the days of your ancestors? Tell it to your children, and let your children tell it to their children, and their children to the next generation.” And what he simply does here, he says listen, all of you, I want you to ask this question, have you ever seen anything like this?
Now, Joel is talking about a locust plague. We’ll read about that in verse 4. But the question is pertinent for you and me today. Have you seen anything like this in your lifetime? And the answer probably for most of us, is no. Unless you are old enough to remember the Spanish flu in 1918. For most of us, we have not seen anything like this. This is new. And what Joel does is, he says if you are experiencing something like you've never experienced before, then this is the time to say pay attention, see what’s happening. And then he says, I want you to tell this to your children, and to their children. And I think the point of this is because it’s easy to get so comfortable that we forget what is ultimate reality, saying, when you have a moment of seeing and understanding beyond things what you typically think. He says I want you to tell it to your children and to their children.
Then we read about this plague, verse 4. “What the locust swarm has left the great locusts have eaten; what the great locusts have left the young locusts have eaten; what the young locusts have left other locusts have eaten.”
Then there's actually four different words used for locust here. That probably just connotes the totality of this kind of blight to the people. And as we see this, a locust is a plural for grasshopper. So, this is a grasshopper invasion that was so pervasive, that it ate the crops, it completely devastated the land.
Then we read this, verse 5, “Wake up, you drunkards, and weep! Wail, all you drinkers of wine; wail because of the new wine, for it has been snatched from your lips.” So here he's saying, listen, those of you who enjoy your drinking and enjoy your wine, know that your wine is gone. Now I've had some people ask the question in PA, why is a beer store an essential business and a wine store not? It’s almost the same thing that where the drinkers of wine are saying why??? is this not the way it is? And what's happening here in Joel, is Joel is saying to the people who like to party, who like their wine, who like their drinks, and yes he calls them drunkards, but what he’s doing in essence, he’s saying, this is your lifestyle. Know that it’s been disrupted.
Then we see this, a nation, verse 6 through 8, “A nation has invaded my land, a mighty army without number; it has the teeth of a lion, the fangs of a lioness. It has laid waste my vines and ruined my fig trees. It has stripped off their bark and thrown it away, leaving their branches white. Mourn like a virgin in sackcloth grieving for the betrothed of her youth.” What’s happened here, is her wedding is probably called off. Maybe her betroth has lost his life, maybe this just had to be delayed because of the locust swarm.
Some of us have had weddings or celebrations that have been postponed. Maybe we’ve welcomed a baby at this time, and we haven't been able to share the baby with friends and family. Or, maybe we’ve had an event, a birthday, or graduation, or season that’s been cancelled. And he’s saying, mourn these things because your life, the things that you had enjoyed and thought were significant and are significant, are being taken away.
And then it says this, Joel 1:9, “Grain offerings and drink offerings are cut off from the house of the Lord. The priests are in mourning, those who minister before the Lord.” And what he’s saying is here’s the church, the temple, in that day can’t go on like it’s been doing for so long.
And then it says this, verse 10-11. “The fields are ruined, the ground is dried up; the grain is destroyed, the new wine is dried up, the olive oil fails. Despair, you farmers, wail, you vine growers; grieve for the wheat and the barley, because the harvest of the field is destroyed.”
So here he has got the farmers included. So, what you get here is the civic leaders, the partiers, brides, priests, farmers, and workers. And here is what I believe is happening in this text. Joel is saying this locust swarm has come, these grasshoppers have invaded, you've never seen anything like it, and this is a disruption to every area of life. Every one of you has a life right now that is not like the life you had a few weeks ago or expected to have today. Does that sound familiar in any way? You see, when disruption happens, it creates a perspective in a certain way. Or maybe better stated, it reveals our perspective.
There is an article that a man named Michael J. Kruger wrote, and he was talking about the idea of when this first came out and the people were still going to Florida and partying on the beaches for their spring breaks. And not to make too much of an analogy between the drinkers of wine and partiers on spring break, but he was saying that their attitude of saying, "We don’t care if this virus spreads any further because we had a spring break planned and we’re going to have a spring break no matter what."
He said, that reveals an attitude of our age, what he said, and he has tabbed as an attitude of, "you do you." And he said "you do you" has been the predominant attitude of our age. And he says this, “Nothing tests the validity of a world view like tragedy and suffering. The coronavirus is awful and terrible as it is, has done at least one good thing, namely, it has exposed our cultures commitment to an utterly unworkable and unsustainable world view.” What he's talking about here is a commitment to relativism. In other words, the coronavirus has exposed our culture’s commitment to relativism for what it is an utterly unworkable and unsustainable world view.
You see, what’s happened, all of sudden, is this mindset of saying “you do you,” kind of the predominant view of much of culture, has been exposed because when those people continued to party, people started to say, that’s not cool, because you’re going to impact others.
There is another world view or thought that has come for some and that is this whole idea of saying why don’t we let the virus run its course and if it people die, well they die. And yet the Christian view has always been that every life matters because every life is created in the image of God and dignity exists in human beings no matter how old or how frail.
There was a piece by Russell Moore in the New York Times that argued for this, and he basically said that this is part of the perspective that we need to have. And I like how he concluded his article, he said, “The pandemic will change us, change our economy, our culture, our priorities, our personal lives that we cannot avoid. But let’s remember one day we will tell our grandchildren how we lived, how we loved during the great pandemic. Let’s respect human life in such a way that we won’t be ashamed to tell the truth.”
See, “you do you” says, you know what, it doesn’t matter how it impacts anybody. Now I’m not suggesting that there aren’t thorny issues of the economy and how we reopen the economy. Those are complex, moral decisions, ethical decisions, and we need to pray for our leaders to make good ethical decisions in this this point. And we should have some debate around that.
But my point is, right now, is to say this is what the coronavirus has done, it has exposed and disrupted our pattern of life and our mindset that says “you do you” is enough. And you see this even with the hoarding that some people are doing, where they are buying goods and trying to profit. I saw one thing where a guy had bought all kinds of hand sanitizer, was going to try to sell it at a higher price, and Amazon shut him down from selling it. But there’s an outrage from people, rightly, because they say, what is this person doing?
So, what do we learn from this disruption? Let me suggest at least four things. First, I think we learn that our sense of control is not as solid as we think it is. That we don’t have as much control as we think we do. The control is really an illusion.
This is what was happening in Joel's day when the people, and we don’t know the definitive, historic setting of this, but the people, when they had this locust invasion, all of sudden, their wine, partying, work, farming, marriages, lives, didn't go on the way they thought they would and all of their plans came to nothing. And all of sudden they had to say, I don’t have as much control as I think I do.
And many of us love the notion of controlling our future, of managing our lives in such a way that we think we have everything the way we want it to be. But what this pandemic is doing, is it is showing us that we don’t have as much control as we think we do.
And here’s the second thing that I think we learn, and that is that we really don't have, or that our resources are not as valuable as we think they are. And I say this because all of sudden in the midst of this locust plague, the resources of the farmers, resources of the coming marriages, church, the community of faith, resources of the partiers, and drinkers, weren't what they thought they were. One of things we learn when we come up against something like this, is all of the resources we have, may amount to very little against something that shows us the ultimate reality.
In Matthew chapter 6:19-21, we read these words, this is Jesus teaching, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
You see one of the things that happens when we are confronted with a pandemic, all of sudden, some of what we’ve amass, doesn't have the same value as we thought it did. Whether it be homes or money or whatever. And some of us will say, it’s better to have money than not. That’s true, but what we’re realizing in the midst of this is that money can’t be a hedge against anything in this world. That it isn’t ultimate security or valuable because you can be rich or poor and be in the same predicament.
I was spending some extra time with my family, and one of the things we do from time to time is we’ll play some games. And last year, when we were with my wife’s extended family, her brother-in-law, I like to say he’s nothing to me because he’s her sister's husband. Actually, that was his joke to me long before it was mine to him. So, if you think I’m being rude, I'm just saying that’s for you Uncle John, that’s how I see you today.
But Uncle John said, you should get this game Yunta. I thought, why should I get this game Yunta? So, I bought this game Yunta because he remembers it fondly, because when we get together with extended family, we play some games. So, Yunta is this game that we didn’t actually get to play yet, but I figured out how it’s supposed to be played. And the premise is, all these people are on this island, and the island is about to run out of money, and so all of these families are competing to get as much money as they can and send it to a swiss bank account. And whoever sends the most money to the swiss bank account through political corruption and intrigue is the winner. So, it's kind of an awful game in a sense.
But here’s what it made me think of, in a sense, we’re all living a game of Yunta. Except, here’s the thing, it’s not about how much you can stab somebody in the back and get money in a swiss bank account, but it’s about saying I can send money out of the game to a secure place where it can never be touched and it’s waiting for me. That’s what Matthew 6:19-21 is saying. That you can send treasure ahead and one of the things that happens when we are in the midst of something like this, is that we realize that all of the acquisition that we can get in this world may provide a more comfortable existence, but we can't take it with us.
I’m so thankful so many of you who call Orchard Hill your church home, have given so generously in this time, and many of you have given to the Eleos fund as just a way to say I want to share with people. You know what you are doing every time you do either of those things? You’re saying I’m sending treasure ahead. It isn’t about just my resources. So, we learn in the midst of this that in one way or another, we don’t have as much control as we think we do. We learn that our resources aren’t as valuable as we think they are, and I would say we learn that our pleasures aren’t as lasting as we think they are.
If I were to ask you, what is your pleasure in life? It would be easy to talk about the drunkards and the partiers that are mentioned here. But notice again, it’s the young lady who is getting married, so it’s family, social relationships, the farmer who works, the priests who serve in the temples. In other words, this covers the gamut. There’s also the civic leaders. So, it’s saying wherever you find your value, whatever you find as your pleasure, partying, serving, family, resources, work, he says whatever that is, something can come and take that away.
In other words, our pleasures are not as lasting as we think they are. Richard Foster wrote this once years ago, he said “Superficiality is the crisis of our age. The doctrine of instant satisfaction is a primary spiritual problem. The desperate need today is for a greater number of intelligent people or gifted people, but for deep people.” And one of the things that happens when we come face to face with this crisis, is we realize that our pleasures are not as lasting as we like to think they are.
In American Christianity, often what it seems like, Christianity is about is getting your best life now. Getting God to help you to have a happy family, to have success, to have money, to have quality time, or whatever it is you think you value.
I came across something the other day that just struck me. This is from the Book of Common Prayer for the Church of England, and it’s an order of visitation of the sick. And this is from a few generations ago, so it’s not their current one. But I want you to just imagine that you are sick, and that a pastor, friend, or leader of a small group comes to the hospital to visit you. And they go over this prayer service with you. Just see if this makes you go, yeah, that’s what I would expect, or if it’s something different.
This church of England, a couple generations ago, not long ago, “Wherefore, whatsoever your sickness is, know you certainly, that it is God’s visitation. And for what cause soever this sickness is sent unto you; whether it be to try your patience for the example of others, and that your faith may be found in the day of the Lord laudable, glorious, and honorable, to the increase of glory and endless felicity; or else it be sent unto you to correct and amend in you whatsoever doth offend the eyes of your heavenly Father; know you certainly, that if you truly repent you of your sins, and bear your sickness patiently, trusting in God’s mercy, for his dear Son Jesus Christ’s sake, and render unto him humble thanks for his fatherly visitation, submitting yourself wholly unto his will, it shall turn to your profit, and help you forward in the right way that leadeth unto everlasting life.” And then your encouraged to end with an Amen.
Now, the reason I read that is, can you imagine if you are sick and one of our life stage pastors/care ministry team comes and visits you and says let me pray that over you. You’d say I want somebody from a different church. Because what you want, is you want someone to pray for healing, comfort, let’s make this feel better. But notice that a generation ago says here’s what you should pray when you are sick. And it understands, Gods visitation is here to bring about some kind of a change in your life.
You see when you ask the question where is God in a pandemic? Part of the answer is that he is visiting you and me to help us realize we don’t have as much control as we think. That our resources aren’t as valuable as we think and that our treasures aren’t as lasting as we think. So, you may then say, does God then send this? In the Bible, that answer, does God send a crisis, is actually two-fold. That is yes and no.
Now, I realize some of my friends who are more deterministic, Calvinistic, would say God ultimately sends everything and I would agree with that. But biblically, you can make a case for either answer. In the book of Joel, God seems to send the locusts. In fact, that the implication in Joel chapter 2, repent and see if I may not yet turn, and change, and relent from sending this. But in the book of Job, when Job goes through a crisis, it’s clearly not God who sent it. It was Satan, and God allowed it. But either way, God allows something to come. And what we see in Joel, is that God wants to use it to reset our attention. And that leads me to the fourth thing we see, and that is that our situation is not as bleak as we think it is.
The reason I say this is because Joel chapter 1 verse 13 says, “Put on sackcloth, you priests, and mourn; wail, you who minister before the altar. Come, spend the night in sackcloth, you who minister before my God; for the grain offerings and drink offerings are withheld from the house of your God. Declare a holy fast; call a sacred assembly. Summon the elders and all who live in the land to the house of the Lord your God and cry out to the Lord.” So he says, here’s what I want you to do, I want you to call people together and call out to God, mourn and call out to God, so that you would have a sense that God can be active in this.
Now, if you’ve followed any kind of teaching on this in the broader Christian community, there are different people that will say a lot of different things. Here are the basic messages that I’ve seen from Pastors nationally. Some are focusing on calming your anxiety and try to help you navigate fear, and that’s helpful. I’m not sure it answers the entire question, but it’s helpful.
But there are those, and this would be more in the charismatic and Pentecostal group that all you need to do is declare that the coronavirus has no power of your house and then you will be delivered from this. But what that misses, is the possibility that God is calling people to himself.
In fact, I saw one of the well-known charismatic churches, one that spawns a bunch of music people like, and it has a healing room that’s infamous. But they closed it due to the coronavirus. I thought that tells you everything you need to know about a healing room if it has to be closed because of the coronavirus. I’m not trying to pick on that, other to say, this is what we need to do. Not just manage our anxiety, we need to say where is God in this? He’s saying to people, I want you in the midst of your disruption to come back to me, to cry out to me. That’s what he’s saying here. And here’s what we see in Joel Chapter 1 verse 14-15, “Declare a holy fast; call a sacred assembly. Summon the elders and all who live in the land to the house of the Lord your God and cry out to the Lord. Alas for that day! For the day of the Lord is near; it will come like destruction from the Almighty.”
It says the day of the Lord is near. Now what’s the day of the Lord? Notice here it is the day for destruction. In one old testament dictionary, an article written by J.D. Barker, the day of the Lord is a significant recurring theme in the prophetic literature of the old testament. At its essence, it refers to the time of Yahweh’s unmistakable and powerful intervention.
The prophets employ both the specter of the day of the Lord to offer both a warning and a hope, announcing disaster and salvation. In other words, without taking you through all the text that say the day of the Lord, it is used both to say this is a day of judgment for those that don’t believe and a day of salvation. In other words, this is a way in which God says I’m going to work in the days ahead. And the reason I say that it is not as hopeless as we think, is because even if this day, alas the day that we’re in, the day we’re crying out, for the day of the Lord is near, and we can call out to the Lord and be on the side of salvation.
To cry out to God is a little Hebrew verb, zakar, and it means something very similar to the new testament idea of call on the name of the Lord. In other words, when it says call on the name of the Lord and you may be saved. To cry out to the Lord was very similar and it meant to wail, mourn, summon for help in desperation, so that’s what this is.
And what Joel does, chapter 1 says, here’s a locust plague. Chapter 2 says this is pointing to something more. Chapter 3 takes us to the ultimate day of the Lord. Chapter 1, wherever you find your life disrupted, whenever you find yourself in a place that this happened before, this is unique, let it be an occasion to turn to the Lord, cry out to the Lord, God I need your help. My resources won’t help me as much as I thought it would, my pleasures aren’t as strong as I thought they would be.
I saw a thing a while back about a tsunami, and I guess when a tsunami comes, there’s a couple of different indicators. But one thing that can happen is that the water can recede from its normal shoreline substantially several minutes before the actual wave appears. And there’s one video I saw where people were experiencing this phenomenon and were so taken in by it, that they were going wow, this amazing. Then all of sudden, the wave comes. And what should happen when the tsunami is about to hit is you should actually run. So, when the water goes out, you should say this is a bad sign and run because soon a wave is coming.
The locust plaque, Joel says, is like that. Alas for that day, the day of the Lord is near, the day of instruction, it’s coming, be ready. You know it’s coming. So now do something about it. And what he says to do is to cry out. Now, you may say, shouldn’t the priest call a solemn assembly? Call all the elders together. That’s absolutely what he says. And that’s good.
Do you know that the old testament priests do not have an analogy in the new testament? And here’s what I mean. In the old testament of priests was one who represented God to people and people to God. In the new testament, we’re told in 1 Peter 2 that there’s a kingdom of priests. In other words, anyone who believes in Jesus is a priest.
And here’s why this is important. The implication of Joel chapter 1 is not pastors should call a solemn assembly, it’s a good thing. I’m not saying you can’t do that and call people together. But, right now, in our moment of social distancing, it doesn’t seem like a thing to do, to say call everyone to the church and let’s have a solemn assembly, but that could be a response to a disruption, disaster. The reason I point this out is because the idea of a solemn assembly and priests saying everyone who is priest, which if you are a follower of Jesus Christ you are a priest, it’s saying use this event to call people to Jesus.
In fact, just listen to these verbs that are here. Here this, listen, verse 2, pay attention, verse 5, wake up, and then I say this, lament or mourn, verse 8 and verse 13, and then it’s cry out or call on the name of the Lord. And so, here’s just simply the message today about where is God in a pandemic. And that is, he’s maybe allowing this to say I want you to see that there is a day of the Lord coming and that day will be destruction for those that don’t believe. So, call on the name of the Lord.
And maybe, just maybe today, wherever you are you can say, I want to cry out to the Lord, I want to mourn, I want to see, be a person that sees and just doesn’t see this as a momentary disruption to my partying, my work, my marriage, my family plans, but it’s something bigger. But also, to say in essence, I want to cry out in a way that reflects this sackcloth and mourning as priests, a representative of God and call others to the same thing.
Now how do you do that? Well, it’s going to be different for everybody. But I think at a minimum it means that you would say if I have never come to Jesus this is a moment to come to Jesus. And you know it’s possible that some of you grew up in a church, maybe this church, and you’re sitting around with your parents and you’ve never really bought the whole religion thing because it felt like it crimped your style. And maybe, God is using this to say, your job you thought you had lined up, your income, marriage, parties, stuff, I’m taking it all away so you’re forced right now to deal with something more. Maybe this is your time to say I believe that Jesus came and died for me. That the day of the Lord is coming, and I want to be sheltered by Jesus himself. And that is the clear teaching of the new testament.
And if you think about the moment we’re in, if someone said I have a universal antidote to this virus and it can be available to everyone and it’s free, that would be such good news. That is the message of the gospel. Our virus is sin and Jesus has the anecdote. He has paid the price. It is available. Cry out to the Lord. And maybe for some of you, you say I’m going to cry out to the Lord on behalf of the nation, the people around me.
You know there’s two great prayers that I want to share or recommend in the old testament. Nehemiah 9 and Daniel 9 are prayers of confession from the people. Maybe if you’re watching some family and friends you just want to say hey, let’s be our own priests today. And let me take a moment and pray one of those prayers of confession for us together as just a way to say we’re are going to cry out to the Lord in the midst of this moment.
And what we’ll see next when we talk about Joel chapter 2, is that there’s this beautiful language where Joel says if you return to the Lord, who knows, he might still relent. And then there’s this beautiful promise about God restoring the years that the locusts have eaten away. We will examine that next week, but I want to just very simply say today that what Joel 1 urges is for us not to just put blinders on in the midst of this, but to cry out to the Lord in the midst or our mourning and sadness. And I hope you’ll do that wherever you are and however God is working in and through this time in your life.
Let’s pray together, Father we thank you for the chance to be together via this medium, though it’s not the same as being together in person. We thank you that at least this is available to us today. And God, we pray that in the midst of this pandemic we wouldn’t amuse ourselves in our time away but instead we would let the gravity of this, point us to the day of the Lord, your day. And that we would cry out to you as this text so beautifully invites us to do. And we pray this in Jesus name, amen.
