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When this pandemic began, I was, as I think we all were, concerned. Life as we knew it was going to be disrupted, and people were going to die. It was a sober realization.
But then I thought about how this could be an opportunity. So we didn’t interact with people as much; take the time for introspection, for really examining yourself. So activities and events were cancelled; take the time to rest and really be with God. These are things we should surely want. At the very least, they are things we desperately need.
This time could have been a great opportunity. Instead, it has been a time of great pain. I’ve heard stories of beach and vacation resorts where instead of thanking the staff for trying to keep everyone safe and healthy, people have done the worst imaginable assault in a pandemic crisis: they spit in their faces. Instead of taking this time to sympathize with one another and love our neighbor as ourselves, we have yet another black man, George Floyd, tragically and brutally crushed to death as he pleaded for his life saying, “I can’t breath.” This time could have been a chance for us to come closer together, and yet we often seem divided even more as a nation and a world than we were before. And in the midst of it all, we have another act of violence close to home with yet another shooting at the Galleria Mall in the Greater Hoover-Birmingham Area.
None of us wanted these things to happen. I hope that on some level at least that the perpetrators, the spitters, the racists, the murderers, didn’t want to do these things. But they did. They did them anyways.
This has been a hard and stressful time for all of us, whether we want to admit it or not. I’m not sure that any of us have behaved at this time as we would want. I know that I haven’t.
There’s this divide with-in ourselves. There are things, terrible and horrible things, that we don’t want to do, yet we find ourselves doing them anyways. Whether our actions are big or small, that terrible voice inside of us somehow seems to end up winning more times than we would like it to. That is the case today. It was also the case in Paul’s time as well.
In fact, this is the very subject of Paul’s words to the Romans we read this morning. Paul tells us that even in his time, he himself struggled with doing those things he does not want to do. It’s a cycle he can’t seem to shake. It is a cycle that can’t seem to be broken.
Where is the hope in times like these? Paul says it well at the end of our reading today: “Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!”
Only Jesus and His Saving Grace can tear us away from that sinful part of ourselves. Only Jesus can rescue us from doing those things that we don’t actually want to do at all.
That is the truth I have found in my own life and in my ministry. When I neglect God and my relationship with Him, I find I slip into my worst ways. When I don’t nurture my love and connection with God, I start to become angry at others, God, and even myself. I lose my way and my drive. I lose my sense of purpose and meaning.
But when I work on my relationship with God and start to build it up, I find peace in my life, even if it is only fleeting moments in the midst of struggle. When I take time for the Lord, I find that I do those things that I want to do again, not because it is I who do those things, but because I am open and listening to what it is that God would have me do.
This is why it is so important to take time to be with God. It is why retreat time to be with God regularly is an important and necessary part of our job for those of us in ministry. Without renewing that connection, it is impossible to do ministry. This is a lesson I have learned the hard way time and time again. It is also why I encourage each and every one of you to take time, when you can, to be present with God and God alone, even if it just means 10 minutes of silence behind a closed door, or reading a short passage of Scripture, taking a secluded walk by yourself, or whatever it is you do to become closer to the Lord.
To do what we want to do and to be the people we want to be, we have to make Jesus a part of our lives. I believe more people realize this than you might at first think. While there are so many horror stories from this pandemic time, I have also found ones of hope. My first service during this pandemic had, last I checked, over 600 people who watched it online. That is more than double the number of baptized members of that parish, and well over the normal Sunday attendance. In this time of uncertainty and death, people are looking for love and hope. Jesus is where we can find this hope.
If you have found yourself behaving in ways you are not proud of at this time, do not fear. Renew and restore your relationship with Jesus. Though that voice that wants us to do wrong still remains, with Jesus there is hope that we can be more like the people we want to be. There is hope in Jesus that we will finally act as we really and actually want to.