A Dance with Death

We live in strange times.

Right now the world is gripped in the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak. Besides all the social and economic changes, there is a roller coaster of emotions that accompany it. You can feel the tension in the air.

Anxiety

Distrust

Confusion

The current is churning, rolling. The power and magnitude of it all is gathering into a tidal wave, slowly dragging to sea the unsuspecting.

Can you feel it?

I know I do. I feel the draw to get angry, to feel anxious or to just function out of fear than faith. And then calm – seeing the swirling storm and knowing that one “Peace! Be still!” can set it all right again.

If we’re really honest with ourselves this time is no different than any other time. And this storm is no different than any other storm since the dawn of time. Every day is a dance with death.

It seems we have forgotten that. Risk and death is a part of the human existence. Before COVID-19 there were other viruses. There are accidents and diseases and natural disasters and murder. And if we survive all that there is still the ageing process that takes us one step closer to the grave every single day we wake up.

Have we forgotten?

Mankind has handled electricity, broken the speed barrier and taken a man to the moon and all that has been fraught with risk and untimely death. And now we’re afraid to go to a restaurant?

We’ve tight-roped across the Grand Canyon, gone to battle with nothing more than a musket to fight an army bigger and stronger than us, and fought and won against cancer. And now we won’t even go a the store where everyone won’t wear a mask?

Look, I’m not here to argue about whether COVID-19 is deadly or if we should ignore it. What I want to know is since when did we all get concerned about dying? Did we just now wake up to the fact that we dance with death on a daily basis – coronavirus or not?

When COVID-19 is long gone, death will still linger as a constant companion. You can leave for work tomorrow and never reach. You can be at the wrong place at the wrong time and be killed. You can go to sleep tonight and not wake up. Death is not a respecter of persons. You don’t have to be elderly or have a comorbidity.

Life is not promised to us. Out of all the crazy, deadly things in this world, apparently it took a rather virulent form of the flu to drive that point home. Take advantage of this reality check to make reservations at your eternal destination. When you know where you’re reservations are at, you don’t have to live in fear of COVID-19 or anything else.

Let the coronavirus be that come-to-Jesus moment that will secure your eternity. Then you can do that daily dance with death with peace in your heart.

“Where, O death, is your victory?
    Where, O death, is your sting?”
1 Corinthians 15:55