I thought I had to find the silver lining.
I thought if I could find it, we could all be encouraged.
The silver lining could make COVID-19 somehow okay for all the people who are suffering and hurting and losing. If there could just be some golden nugget in the midst of it all, then perhaps we could all move beyond this virulent disease, in one way or another, improved.
Perhaps it’s too easy for me, sitting in my comfortable home with most of my dear family around me, to contemplate the blessing of time…
to experience life on pause,…
to hope.
But what about those who have died alone in an ICU with no family? What about the people who are dying now?
What about the enormous loss to the sons and daughters, mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers, aunts, uncles, cousins who have lost their loved ones and couldn’t say goodbye?
What about the people who live alone? How long can they be okay without the fellowship of family and friends?
For those who are sick or elderly at home and longing for a visit, for the physical touch of a friend, a hug, a warm body?
What about the men and women who have lost their only means of putting bread and butter on the table for their families?
And what about the children? Are they all okay? What about the children who aren’t safe in their homes?
Where is the silver lining for all of these?
Then I saw a friend’s feed on Facebook.
Underneath the post, just a short phrase in a long list of comments, just five words amidst a plethora of encouragement, was a short sentence that caught my eye.
Sometimes there is no silver lining.
Those five simple words hover in my mind now. They nag at me. I hear them amongst the chatter of our twelve person shelter in place. They hover over my thoughts as my day carries on in typical fashion and cast a sadness over my soul – a grief that grips me and beseeches me to expatiate.
The words speak volumes to my soul.
Sometimes there is no silver lining.
Sometimes things are horrific and painful…and evil.
Sometimes there is nothing good amidst the catastrophies of this world. They are just atrocious, dreadful, horrifying, ghastly, realities in our lives.
There was no good in the Holocaust, no silver lining in Stalin’s evil regime, no love in slavery, no good in the oppression of the Native Americans who once ran freely across America.
No.
These were evil. Only evil.
COVID-19 too, is a wretched virus, a sickness that kills, that brings fear and separates loved ones. It isolates. It breaks the hearts of men and women across the world.
My heart breaks open and bleeds with the thought of every horror and pain the world is experiencing.
I am brought to my knees in prayer for the men and women who are serving the world throughout this pandemic that is ravaging our world.
I can find no comfort here in this temporal place where evil rules and answers hide.
I can only find comfort in God, in His word, in His fathomless love for us, and in the eternal life He offers all, freely, yet cost him so much pain and suffering to provide.
God knows our pain and is familiar with suffering.
He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.
Isaiah 53:3
The God of this universe cares about us so much that he holds every tear that we’ve cried.
He knows our pain.
And He promises to be with us through all the pain and horror of this world.
Throughout the Psalms we are reminded how deeply God cares for us.
Psalm 34:18 reminds us God is close to us when we are hurting.
Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go.
Joshua 1:9
In this temporal world where evil still reigns, God promises to be close to us, to offer the comfort of His Spirit. We need only to ask.
Yet peace and comfort amidst the catastrophes of this world aren’t all God offers. He offers eternal life. He invites us into eternity with Himself and our loved ones.
Future Glory
18 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. 20 For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. 23 And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? 25 But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
Romas 8:18-25
26 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. 27 And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because[g] the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. 28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, who have been called according to his purpose.
Romans 8:26-28
God is grieving.
Today, over two thousand years ago, He died on the cross to take away the sin and pain and suffering of this world forever – to conquer death, to offer immortality to all those who would believe in Him.
Today, in the midst of COVID-19, amidst all the circumstances of this groaning world, God invites us to come to Him and experience peace and joy and life like none this world has to offer.
This is Easter, this Resurrection Sunday, when all the world is united in the pain of this global crisis, may we bow before God and seek the comfort and peace and eternal life that only He can give.
May God bless you and keep you in HIs tender care.
Blessings!
