Being a Christian creative, I tend to process current circumstances as if they were story devices, as if they were physical metaphors for spiritual realities. And so, in this bizarre time, I started to write a short play to explore COVID-19 and its metaphors.
At first, I mused about how oddly isolating the pandemic is. To do your part well, you must live as if you are a potential disease carrier. If you love others, you must stay away from them.
But as I continued to write, I began to realize that I was already familiar with this practice on an emotional and spiritual level. Even before the pandemic, I’ve had a tendency of withdrawing from others because of a painful awareness of my own “diseases”. I was always afraid of my own personal deficiencies and injuries that might hurt someone else. “Hurt people, hurt people,” as they say, and I never wanted to be that person.
That was when the metaphor formed: COVID-19 reminded me of sin. Just as there is a global pandemic that physically separates us, so there is a sin sickness that emotionally isolates us.
And when I mean sin, I mean it as a term of distortion. Sin is the idea that humanity (either an individual or a system) is not as it should be. We experience it as not-enough-ness, or in blatant wrongdoing. And because we fear our broken identities, because we know ourselves at our worst, we often push or pull away from others because of it.
With this comparison of two isolating “diseases” in mind, I began to wonder the weird question that became central to the play: what if we always lived like this? What if we always lived like “potential disease carriers” of sin, and always kept careful distance in order to keep loved ones safe?
For like half a second, that sounded nice. It sounded like maybe some damage control. But as soon as I explored that question one step further, I realized how utterly wrong of a notion that was. Because even during a pandemic, people know that love doesn’t (normally) exist at a distance. We’re all operating under the assumption that this isn’t how things are meant to be, and we’re all hoping for things to “go back to the way they were” so we can finally be safely reunited with everyone we love. We’re experiencing an urgent need to be together.
Even if the only pandemic were sin, this would still be a true phenomenon. Despite every disease and injury, despite abuses and mistakes, despite miscommunications and ignorance, we lick our wounds and press on. We do our best to rebuild old relationships and form new ones. But why? Why do we persevere, even with the constant potential for hurting each other? Because we’re all operating under the assumption that this isn’t how things are meant to be.
But how do we know this?
This is where the Biblical narrative meets our narrative: creation was an act of love. A loving God created us for the purpose of loving relationships with others and with Him. And after the Fall, after we rejected Him and elevated ourselves, God persisted in love. He condescended to humble earth and sacrificed Himself to bridge the gap between deficient humanity and God. This was unachievable in ourselves, so He accomplished it for us.
Romans 6:5-7 “For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin—because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.”
Christ’s death and resurrection defeats the power of this sin sickness, and trusting in this act is how we receive new life. We’re no longer helpless to hurting each other, but liberated by a supernatural love that heals us to love better. And we no longer have to hide in shame, because through Jesus, God has accepted us (deficiencies and all).
And so, instead of emotionally isolating, I hope we press on: empowered by a divine, shameless, fearless love. I hope we persist in confessing and forgiving, and that we persist in unity, knowing it was what we were meant for. This is what I concluded in my writing, and this is what I hope to live by.
“We will never again fear separation from those we love. Disrupted love, the greatest sadness that earthly life contains, will be gone forever. In heaven they shall know that they shall forever be continued in the perfect enjoyment of each other’s love.’” – Tim Keller (with quotes from Jonathan Edwards).
Originated in, bought by, and destined for love, we understand on a very intrinsic level: we weren’t meant for isolation. We were meant for love.
