Pandemic Ponderings Ep. 4, Do Not Despair!

Hey everyone, Pastor Tim here with another episode of Pandemic Ponderings.

We've been cooped up now for several weeks, and some of us who are considered high -risk folks haven't been to a store in about a month and haven't had any real significant social contact in all that time.

Some of you are not only cooped up, but laid off. You've applied for unemployment benefits because your company has essentially shut down.

Others of you own businesses, and you're beginning to wonder if you'll even survive the economic downturn caused by the restrictions in place because of this pandemic.

Many wonder if they'll catch the dreaded virus and die. For many people, despair is starting to nibble around the edges of their thinking.

You feel this sense of hopelessness overtaking you, like a tire with a slow leak.

Every day you get a little lower. Maybe you're just discouraged, but it's a discouragement that seems deeper than most.

Whatever you might call it, you sense that you're losing hope. The world is gray. You have a hard time enjoying life.

You just can't seem to get motivated. What can you do when you start despairing, when hope seems so elusive?

Well, the first thing you must do is recognize that the events of this pandemic are not causing you to despair.

You cannot draw a straight line from events to your emotions. You see, something comes between those events and the feelings of hopelessness.

It's your interpretation of those events. The circumstances of this pandemic must first pass through the grid of your interpretation before you feel despair or discouragement.

Have you noticed your friends who seem unaffected by these recent events? They experience the same things that you are, yet are seemingly happy.

How can that be? Because they see the same things, they interpret those same events differently.

What are you saying to yourself? In some sense, your heart says to you, these events mean something.

Think carefully. What exactly are you saying to yourself that produces this despair?

These events mean, my job is ending, the company will not recover, and who knows what kind of hardship will result.

These events mean, life will never be the same again, I know it. These events mean, with the fluctuations in the stock market, my retirement funds have been destroyed, and I'm not going to be able to do what

I'd planned on doing. Maybe these events mean, I might die, and then what?

Quite possibly, these events mean, the life that I once enjoyed will no longer be possible.

Think about it. What are the interpretations you've put on these events that move you to despair?

What is your despair telling you? How can you defeat despair in these difficult circumstances?

Well, you've already figured out the answer. Change the interpretation of your circumstances.

Now, I'm not talking about some Pollyanna kind of interpretation like, we're all in this together, we'll make it through, because that may be a false interpretation.

Your job just may disappear, and life may not be the same.

No, you must incorporate interpretations based on the character and revelation of God, that is, interpretations that are true and certain.

If you would have a true interpretation of present events, then remind yourself of the promises of God.

Here's a promise to recall from Hebrews 13. Keep your life free from the love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said,

I will never leave you nor forsake you. So we can confidently say, the

Lord is my helper, I will not fear. What can man do to me?

No matter what happens in life, God will never, ever leave or forsake you.

Notice this promise comes in response to worries about money. Maybe you need to learn to be content with what you have, and forget about all those rich dreams you would fulfill with the money you are going to earn.

You have something better, and that is God. Learn to enjoy him rather than all this stuff you can accumulate.

By the way, wealth is rather unstable, and it can sprout wings and fly away in no time, but God promises that he will always be there right for you to enjoy.

Unlike wealth, you can possess him, for he will never leave. He makes this promise to people who fear what others can do to them.

Isn't that what fuels your despair? You fear what others in management may decide to do, and thus end the life you comfortably lived.

The Lord is your helper, and he will never leave you. So as you look at your situation in this pandemic, you must refuse to think, this means the end of the good life

I have enjoyed, and instead remember that the times that mean loss of material things, and the harm that others may inflict, are the times when

God will show himself to be your faithful companion and your helper.

That's a better interpretation. That's a right interpretation. That's a true interpretation of these events.

There's another interpretation that should help you navigate away from despair. One interpretation that will drive you to despair is, your best life now, popularized by Joel Osteen.

That way of interpreting life will certainly take away hope in this pandemic. God clearly says, your best life later.

God has promised us eternal joy, free from sin and its curse, when we inhabit a glorious new earth.

You must see this present life, with its anguish, hardship, heartache, unpredictability, and pandemics, as temporary, and look to the eternal reality that awaits.

Those folks whom the writer to the Hebrews addressed knew about losing what seemed precious.

They were finding out the hard way that, your best life now, was a lie.

Here's how they are described in Hebrews chapter 10. Remember those earlier days after you had received the light, when you endured in a great conflict full of suffering.

Sometimes you were publicly exposed to insult and persecution. At other times, you stood side by side with those who were so treated.

You suffered along with those in prison, and joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property, because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions.

So do not throw away your confidence. It will be richly rewarded. Did these folks have reason for despair?

They didn't face a pandemic, but their lives certainly changed in drastic ways.

Listen, this pandemic may cause the loss of your comfortable life, and it may never be the same.

But that is no reason for despair. You must look to the future, to the time when you will have better and lasting possessions.

The Apostle Paul, addressing the very issue of hopelessness, wrote this in 2

Corinthians. Therefore, we do not lose heart.

Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.

For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen, but to the things that are unseen.

For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

So, as you look at your situation in this pandemic, you must refuse to think, my best life is gone for good, and instead think, life in this pandemic with all its losses is but light and momentary.

Something better, something glorious, something eternal is yet mine to possess.

That's the proper interpretation of what you're facing. Let's try one more interpretation.

This pandemic means that God loves you. Some of you right now are turning to your spouse and saying, he can't be serious.

Well, actually, I am, because this interpretation comes from Hebrews 12.

To the same people who suffered ridicule, jail, and the confiscation of their property, the writer says, in your struggle against sin, you have not resisted to the point of shedding your blood.

And have you completely forgotten this word of encouragement that addresses you as a father addresses his son?

It says, my son, do not make light of the Lord's discipline and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the

Lord disciplines the one he loves and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son.

Endure hardship as discipline. God is treating you as his children, for what children are not disciplined by their father?

To these folks suffering hardship, God says, look, the hardship is discipline and discipline means

I love you. It's evidence that you are my children. Yes, it's true.

Any hardship you suffer comes from the hand of a father who loves you. Now, he's not saying that whenever you do something wrong,

God will spank you. Rather, God clearly says that any hardship in life has been made tailor made for you in order for you to grow, because he says later, for the moment, all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant.

But later, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

So as you look at your situation in this pandemic, you must refuse to think we're doomed to a gray existence now that we've lost so much and instead give it the proper interpretation.

God loves us and he's brought this horrendous virus to us in order for us to know the greater peace of righteousness.

You see, God intends his people who suffer to find hope, and he accomplishes that through that suffering as you look at it the proper way.

So, go to work. What is your despair telling you and how will you answer it?

Start the all important task of interpreting your circumstances through the lens of scripture.