There's something supremely evil about a virus whose main method of transmission is connection, and whose only defeat will come through severe separation.
Welcome to Good Friday.
Today is a day in the Christian tradition that marks the unjust execution of a Jewish man more than 2,000 years ago. Jesus of Nazareth was born to a teenage mother in circumstances of total squalor. Dark skinned, unremarkable in appearance, and unschooled, Jesus became the central focus of Jewish life as he traveled throughout the region, performing inexplicable acts of kindness. He reconciled sight to eyes (John 9). He healed children and placed them back into the arms of their loving parents (John 4). He fed thousands of people on a hillside, hands touching bread touching stranger's hands (John 6). He gifted sanity to a man who was so mentally ill and ostracized, that his city had placed him in chains (Mark 5). He focused his eyes on a woman who had been bleeding for 12 years, and healed, not only her body, but the disconnection that she had suffered in her soul (Mark 5).
In short, Jesus' ministry was one of radical connection. He healed the doomed. He touched the ostracized. He brought together crowds, taught them, fed them and invited them to believe.
I don't often think about evil, or about the kind of ailments that require this kind of savior. Modernity has taught me that there is a cure for every disease, a reason for every moment of discord, a scapegoat for every global disaster. If I'm honest, Jesus' healing ministry as outlined in the Bible can at times seem quaint by my modern standards. Of course they needed healing. They didn't have modern medicine.
Enter a global pandemic in the year 2020. Suddenly, brutally, it becomes painfully obvious that "modernity" has failed us. The virus infiltrated dinner parties, funerals, and celebrations — and took what was meant for good and turned it evil. I don't need to recount the news, as I imagine you are reading it yourself. But it begs to repeat: we've stopped moving. We've stopped gathering. We've stopped hugging. Bodies are being buried in mass graves — unmourned, undignified. Part of the great sorrow of this pandemic is that it seems that the only way to defeat such evil is to play by its rules. To rid the world of the virus, we have to stop. We have to distance. We have to disconnect from one another. It appears that in order to stop evil — we must bow to it.
But a virus isn't a sentient being. It isn't playing a new game. It is simply following the prescribed rules of the universe into which it was born. The same way that a bird knows how to fly south, or a baby knows how to suckle at a breast, or an engine knows how to combust — a virus knows how to infect and separate us from one another. The rules were in place long before coronavirus arrived on the scene.
Could you imagine, for a moment, that a virus is a physical manifestation of a spiritual reality? Could you imagine, for a moment, a Greater Virus of the Soul? This Greater Virus has plagued humanity since the beginning of time—it is insidious, infectious, and ruthless toward its victims. Just as with the spread of COVID-19, there are rules this Great Virus must follow. (Evil can't help itself.) And so it distorts what is wholesome and good to spread death and destruction. Its ultimate design is to separate us — body and soul — not only from one another, but also from the God who created us.
If this were real — if there really were a spiritual virus of this kind — how would we possibly be able to fight it? How could we possibly save a single soul? To rid humanity of this spiritual disease, Evil would require the same payment as we're being forced to pay during this physical pandemic. The cost is simple and it must be paid in full: Total Death; or Total separation.
Jesus took on both.
Think for a moment about COVID-19. Wouldn't it be wonderful if just one community would voluntarily take it upon themselves to be infected with the virus, close their borders, suffer the consequences, and rid the world of the disease once and for all? In fact, Wuhan had those brutal, inhumane circumstances thrust upon it by its authoritarian government, but the virus still escaped the bounds and continued on its path of mayhem. Now, our battle against the coronavirus will continue until either enough people are infected, or enough people bow to the demands of total separation.
When Jesus entered the world, he did so with a specific mission. He came as a healer, not only of our physical diseases, but of our spiritual condition.
He bowed to the demands of Evil. He suffered death and total separation — not only on a physical level, but on an invisible, spiritual plane. His suffering paid a cosmic price. His separation ridded the spiritual realm of a soul-disease. He voluntarily took on the cost of death and separation, so that I might live. He volunteered. He closed off his borders. He suffered the consequences and eliminated the spiritual forces of Evil once and for all.
Thanks be to God, the father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.
I look forward to the day that we all will come out from our homes, smile, and tentatively shake hands and embrace, and sing, and break bread together again. How much more will we celebrate that day in New Canaan, when all souls who believe in this Jesus, this Great Physician — My Only Cure — will rise and join at the banquet table of the Lamb. And will break bread. And will sing songs of deliverance. And there will be no more tears. And no more death. And no more grief or sorrow or pestilence or disease.
Look around, ye sinners. This physical disease is a reminder of our spiritual condition. Let us remember today — even as we feel the pain of our own physical discomfort, and distance — the One who paid the ultimate price of death and separation in my place.
Amen.
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