I first heard the term “a new normal” twelve years ago when my husband changed his address to heaven. It was and is the expression used to describe life that has lost its usual markers and descriptors, life that has to create and adapt new ones. At the time I didn’t realize that a new normal is not a one-off. When my 34 year old son suffered a life-altering hemorrhagic stroke four years ago, I said hello to my second “new normal,” never thinking I’d experience another so soon. But once again that curve ball life seems to delight in throwing strikes again. Only this time it wasn’t aimed at just me. All of our lives are being turned upside down by the onset of the coronavirus, another “new normal.” And what a new normal it is proving to be.
What event in modern times in the US has been the impetus for shutting down professional and non-professional sporting events? Closing schools at all levels? Banning visitations to hospitals and care facilities? Restricting crowd sizes at public events? Closing stores and bars and any number of places and institutions that are hallmarks of our civilizations? What in modern history has shut the doors of places of worship on a Sunday morning in the nation that identifies itself by its faith profession as a Christian nation?
Yes, the new normal of life in a world under attack by a deadly virus causes us to reflect, not just on testing kits, toilet paper shortages, and video images of people in fights inside grocery stores. This new normal forces us to look beyond our own needs, to consider how closely connected we are; how dependent on one another in ways outside the box of family and close friends. It reminds me of the scripture in 1 Corinthians 12:1-27 that compares the body of the church-its members of whom we all are if we call ourselves Christians- to the physical body’s many parts: feet, hands, ears, eyes, weaker parts, and unpresentable parts. The Apostle Paul writes all parts of the physical body have purpose and value; that if one part suffers, every part suffers with it. We who claim Jesus and profess Christianity are part of the body of Christ. We all have a part in responding to what happens to that body. None of us is immune to what may happen to another affected directly or indirectly by this “new normal.” Somehow we must adjust for as long as it takes to life as we have known it being in disarray; to let our actions demonstrate our faith convictions; to turn from hoarding, from judging, from turning a blind eye to another’s suffering, to understanding the trickle down effects upon the least among us. They are the ones who must cope with lost wages, closed schools, having to balance child care with needing to work. What does the new normal of COVID-19 require of the body of believers who call themselves Christians? To me it’s a question that demands we self examine; that we find ways to respond for the benefit of all. And I suggest we begin that purposeful examination with prayer for ourselves, for other members of our collective body and for the world.
“If my people who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.” 2 Chronicles 7:14