When you are fighting an enemy, you are usually fighting on multiple fronts. The aim of the Generals is to take into account all battlefronts and establish how best to achieve victory with the minimum loss of life. They never consider that the defeat of the enemy will come with no loss of life.
We are currently fighting a hidden enemy in the coronavirus.
There have been calls for people to return to work in spite of the coronavirus still present. Some are accusing these people of being heartless because “every life counts”.
The problem with this approach is that these people ignore that COVID-19 is being fought on more than one front.
How compassionate is it to sacrifice 1500 additional suicides per year over the next five years as a result of the lock-down of the economy?
This could drive deaths up to 10 times more than what the virus itself will do in Australia.
As much as this lockdown is driven by a response to try and save lives, it would be naïve to think that fear is not present as a motivating factor.
Fear from the people and fear of the people. While I’m not wanting to smear our leaders as they are doing largely what the people are expecting them to do, I can’t help believe that they have great fear in regard to how they will be held accountable if some people deem there are too many deaths.
This, in part, explains the overreach we see in many states of Australia.
You only have to look at the vitriol aimed at our Prime Minister Scott Morrison over his handling of the recent bushfires.
In the utter hate and disgusting critical rhetoric, he was all but accused of lighting the bushfires himself! No wonder the leaders are bowing to the fears of the people.
It is amazing what fear can do to people. It does often cause us to make unwise choices.
The Bible has a lot to say about fear. The one most significant, I think, is its criticism of misplaced fear.
Fear, in itself, can be a healthy emotion. When handled rightly, it will motivate us to move back from the edge of a cliff; it will caution us from jumping into a mountain pool from a 10m high ledge.
But what do you make of those old cartoon photos of a woman jumping up onto a chair to escape the mouse running through the kitchen? Excepting the satire, that is surely a misplaced fear.
The Bible speaks of a terrible time to come. A time of apocalyptic judgement. It’s called the “day of God’s wrath” when He will pour out His anger on a Christ-rejecting world.
Those who have faith will have a healthy fear of what is to come and will ensure that they are following Christ now.
Follow Him now and He will be your Saviour and you will never need fear the judgement to come.
(cf. Acts 10: 39-43; 2 Thessalonians 2: 7-12; Hebrews 2: 14-15)
David McAllan, Echuca Community Church
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