COVID-19 in 2020. God Makes Things Crooked.

I don’t want to mess your day up too much, but since I must deal with certain truths, I thought I may as well include you on this unique journey with God that you and I are on in this wild and crazy year of 2020. So, consider this:

God bends things.

“Consider the work of God: who can make straight what he has made crooked? In the day of prosperity be joyful, and in the day of adversity consider: God has made the one as well as the other, so that man may not find out anything that will be after him” (Ecclesiastes 7:13–14).¹

The Lord makes things crooked, and we cannot make them straight. But we will keep trying while trusting in Him. What else can we do?

He also brings disease, which, as we have seen, has made things a bit—warped.

Many Christians think that God does only good things according to what we consider good, in our natural understanding. Therefore, He would never cause nor allow a disease, a disaster to bend things, or to make things negative and difficult for us. He is, after all, a God of love. And love would not behave in this way. So, let me say this straight up: Such a view of God is not biblical. Strum through these passages and let’s see if we can hear what may be a sour tune:

“I form light and create darkness; I make well-being and create calamity; I am the LORD, who does all these things” (Isaiah 45:7).

“The LORD will strike you with wasting disease and with fever, inflammation and fiery heat, and with drought and with blight and with mildew. They shall pursue you until you perish” (Deuteronomy 28:22).

In spite of these plain truths, however, I will tell you with sadness that many Christians reject such passages, saying “That’s the Old Testament. Things are different in the New Testament.” Well, then what should we do with Ananias and Sapphira? We can read about it in Acts 5:1-10, which is, by the way, in the New Testament. The Lord took the lives of these two people because of their deceit. Here is what happened soon after that incident:

“And great fear came upon the whole church and upon all who heard of these things. Now many signs and wonders were regularly done among the people by the hands of the apostles. And they were all together in Solomon’s Portico. None of the rest dared join them, but the people held them in high esteem. And more than ever believers were added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women, so that they even carried out the sick into the streets and laid them on cots and mats, that as Peter came by at least his shadow might fall on some of them” (Acts 5:11–15).

Good, wondrous, miraculous things happened after God took these two lives?

Here are some more biblical incidents to consider. This one is about King Herod.

“And the people were shouting, ‘The voice of a god, and not of a man!’ Immediately an angel of the Lord struck him down, because he did not give God the glory, and he was eaten by worms and breathed his last. But the word of God increased and multiplied” (Acts 12:22–24).

The Lord did wondrous things after He killed an evil king in front of a crowd.

But one day, the Lord is going to take the lives of many more.

“So the four angels, who had been prepared for the hour, the day, the month, and the year, were released to kill a third of mankind” (Revelation 9:15).

“After this I looked, and the sanctuary of the tent of witness in heaven was opened, and out of the sanctuary came the seven angels with the seven plagues, clothed in pure, bright linen, with golden sashes around their chests” (Revelation 15:5–6).

So much for the cute, baby angel image.

Let me hasten to add that He heals and forgives, too. “Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy” (Psalm 103:2–4).

The Lord brings disease, but also forgives and heals. Got Him figured out yet?

Let me know when you do.

¹All Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. (2016). Wheaton: Standard Bible Society.

Gif courtesy Bing images.