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Newsweek magazine published an interesting article recently about Covid-19. The subject of the article was a survey of religious Americans and whether or not they believed the pandemic was a sign from God. According the poll, sixty-three percent of religious Americans say that the pandemic is a sign from God, telling humanity to change its ways of living. Additionally, the poll also found that a majority of religious Americans, 55 percent, believe that God will protect them from being infected with the coronavirus. The poll, which was conducted by the Associated Press/NORC, surveyed 1,002 U.S. adults who say they believe in God. The poll was conducted from April 30 to May 4 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.2 percentage point.
As to believing God will provide protection from the virus, I believe God might say, yes, I will protect you. My protection comes in the form of common sense and masks!
Here is my question about that survey – how do we know if Covid is a sign from God? How do we know? Well, we don’t. We can speculate all we want, but is there any way to have a definitive answer as to whether or not Covid is a sign from God? I don’t believe so. We can interpret Covid and God’s role in the disease and the pandemic all we wish, but really, all we can do is speculate. It’s a question that is without a definitive answer, and as it is without a definitive answer, I would say that it is the wrong question to ask.
We ask a lot of questions in life, and rightly so, because asking questions is one of the most important ways we learn. In the learning process, however, what becomes important is learning to ask the right questions, because if we want to get the right answers, we have to ask the right questions.
I am speaking this morning about questions and about answers; specifically I am speaking about the importance of asking the right questions. This morning’s Scripture text, which teaches us about the importance of asking the right questions, comes from John’s gospel. Follow along with me now, as I read this morning’s Scripture text, John 9:1-12 –
1As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth.
2 His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
3 “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.
4 As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work.
5 While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”
6 After saying this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man’s eyes.
7 “Go,” he told him, “wash in the Pool of Siloam” (this word means “Sent”). So the man went and washed, and came home seeing.
8 His neighbors and those who had formerly seen him begging asked, “Isn’t this the same man who used to sit and beg?”
9 Some claimed that he was. Others said, “No, he only looks like him.” But he himself insisted, “I am the man.”
10 “How then were your eyes opened?” they asked.
11 He replied, “The man they call Jesus made some mud and put it on my eyes. He told me to go to Siloam and wash. So I went and washed, and then I could see.”
12 “Where is this man?” they asked him. “I don’t know,” he said.
This morning, I will contrast a wrong question with the right question, the first of which is –
Wrong question – why does suffering exist?
Right question – what will we do to alleviate suffering?
If I had a dollar for every time that I have been asked the question why does suffering exist, I could have retired to the beach long ago. It’s a great question. Who doesn’t want an answer to the most perplexing of questions? It’s a tough question and is one we have all asked or struggled to understand. It is also, I think, the wrong question.
To explain that statement, allow me to turn to the beginning of the story in our Scripture text. The story begins with the disciples of Jesus asking a rather odd question. Upon seeing the blind man, the disciples asked Jesus, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? Do you find that to be an odd question? I do. Personally, when I encounter someone who is blind, my first thought is not to wonder who is to blame for their condition. I might wonder how long they have been blind and I might wonder about the cause of their blindness, but assigning blame for their blindness would not enter into my mind, because I understand blindness to be a medical problem.
The disciples, however, did not see the man’s blindness as a medical condition, or as the result of an accident; they saw his condition as being the result of someone’s sin; therefore, there was someone to blame, they just did not know who was to blame. In the minds of the disciples, suffering and sin were always connected. The answer Jesus gave, in response to their question, was that no one was to blame for the man’s blindness, which was in keeping with what Jesus taught. In the Sermon On the Mount, Matthew 5:45, Jesus said that God causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. God is not doling out punishments and rewards based upon our behavior. That is not to say there are not consequences to our behaviors; there are. But when the disciples asked who was to blame for the man’s blindness, they were asking the wrong question, and they asked the wrong question because their assumption was faulty. Their assumption is that someone is to blame for suffering. Sometimes that is true, but not always. When we talk about suffering, we can divide suffering into different categories. There is suffering that is caused by other people. A government can adopt policies that benefit some, while causing suffering and difficulty for others. Someone can harm me in a manner than causes me great suffering. Other sufferings fit into the category of we don’t know the cause. I might contract a disease that has no apparent cause. I didn’t do anything to cause the disease; I just happened to be unfortunate enough to contract the disease.
The right question – the question the disciples should have asked, is this – what can we do for this man? When people are looking for blame, when they are searching for causes, they often miss the more important question of what are we going to do about suffering? The question of why do good people suffer, why does evil exist, and so on – is one that is, for the most part, unanswerable. Why, then, do we continue to ask it? Do we expect to suddenly find an answer to a question that has been unanswerable from the beginning of time?
I do not know why people suffer. I have some theories and I have a few words to offer about suffering, but I can’t say that I am able to offer a definitive answer. I can’t answer, for instance, the larger question of why we are experiencing this pandemic. I understand that diseases are contagious and that living in a connected world is why diseases spread more quickly, and that it was only a matter of time before a disease took us into a pandemic. I cannot, however, answer the question of why diseases exist. What I can say in response, however, is that we ought to do what we can to help alleviate the sufferings of others that have been brought about because of the pandemic.
The disciples were, unfortunately, busy with placing blame for the circumstances in which this man found himself. Perhaps they did not believe there was much they could do to alleviate his suffering, but there must have been something they could have done. Alleviating his suffering would certainly have been better than trying to determine who was to blame for his circumstances.
In contrast, Jesus demonstrated no interest in a theological discussion about the cause of the man’s blindness. Instead, he sprang into action and healed the man. And while the disciples did not have the healing power of Jesus, they could have done something, for sure.
I think that asking, as many people have, if Covid is a sign from God is the wrong question. I think it’s the wrong question because we cannot know the answer, first of all, and second, there is a question that matters much more, and it is this – what are we going to do about it?
Wrong question – why is it my concern?
Right question – how can I show compassion?
It is important to note that the disciples noticed the presence of this man; Jesus did not point him out to the disciples. That the disciples noted his presence is important, I believe. It is important, first of all, because the disciples probably expected Jesus to point the man out to them, and so their question was a way of shifting the conversation away from a difficult topic, which would be, how are you going to help this man? Jesus, you see, had a way of not only noticing need, but of bringing the disciples into that need. The disciples, then, asked a theological question to move the question away from a conversation that perhaps they did not want to have. It was also, secondly, a way to shift responsibility. If the disciples could place the blame on the man, or even upon his parents, it takes away from them any sense of responsibility to help the man. Perhaps this is why society often seeks to blame people for their difficult circumstances. If we can find a way to blame people for their difficult circumstances, we can convince ourselves we have no responsibility to help them.
Jesus often placed responsibility upon his disciples to help those who were in need, even when the disciples could not understand how they could help. In Mark 6, for example, when Jesus fed the 5,000, the disciples noted the large crowd of people and said to Jesus, 35… “This is a remote place,” they said, “and it’s alreadyvery late. 36 Send the people away so that they can go to the surrounding countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat.” 37 But he answered, “You give them something to eat.” They said to him, “That would take more than half a year’s wages! Are we to go and spend that much on bread and give it to them to eat?”
My intent is not to be critical of the disciples or imply they were hard hearted. I will, however, note that they sometimes had the common reaction of why is it our concern? That was their attitude towards the crowd they wanted to send away. How could it be their concern to feed thousands of people? It was a natural reaction, of course, to wonder how in the world it would be possible to feed such a crowd. What kind of resources did they have on hand? All they came up with were five loaves of bread and two fish. They could certainly be forgiven for their level of skepticism about what they could do in the face of such need.
But they were still called to help. They weren’t, however, expected to do it alone; they had the help of Jesus, and that’s some really big, serious help, isn’t it? When God asks us to demonstrate compassion, there is no expectation we must provide all the resources. What God asks of us is to provide the compassion. Compassion was one of the central elements of the ministry of Jesus. Mark tells us that when Jesus looked upon the crowd, before feeding them, he felt compassion for them.
We could sure use more compassion in our world, can’t we? There is a lot of talk about compassion, certainly, and we do see examples, but there are too few examples of compassion that will reach across the many divides that separate people. The lack of compassion has been with us from the beginning of time. When Cane killed his brother Abel, God asked Cane, where is your brother Abel? Cane’s response was, as we all know, am I my brother’s keeper? (Genesis 4:9).
Verse 4 says, as long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Do the work, Jesus was telling his disciples. Do the work of helping those who suffer and are in need. Don’t spend all your time in the ivory tower of theological discussions, talking about questions you cannot answer, when the more effective use of your time and energy is doing something about the problems of the world. Jesus was not interested in engaging in a theological discussion; he was moved by his compassion for the man. Compassion is at the heart of faith, not theological treatises and discussions.
Wrong question – how can we stay safe?
Right question – who controls our destiny?
Now, let me say that we should most certainly be safe. I believe we have taken all the necessary precautions here at church to keep people safe. We have followed all the suggested recommendations and even gone beyond. We want people to be safe. And I am most certainly not recommending that you get rid of your masks or engage in any other risky behavior. What we learn from this pandemic, however, is we are not as secure as we have believed – pandemics were on other continents, but could never reach us, or so we believed. And now it is here, and is going to remain here for a while yet.
But let us remember – no one can guarantee your safety, or mine. I’m not making that statement because I want to scare you or keep you up at night with worry. I’m not engaging in scare tactics. I’m simply telling you the truth. Modern medicine can do a lot to care for us, and we all thank God for what it can do, but it has its limits. Thankfully, not everyone who contracts Covid will become seriously ill, but many will, and not all will survive. The pandemic, like other dangers in our world, is a great equalizer. Covid does not care if we are rich or poor. It doesn’t care where we are on the social ladder. Disease, and other sufferings, are equal opportunity predators. We can take every precaution of which we know, but are we guaranteed to be safe?
No.
And again, my intent is not to try and scare you as much as it is to point out that every safety precaution that we can institute in our lives will not always be enough. What happens when medicine has done all it can do? What happens when the doctor says, I’m sorry. It is out of our hands at this point. That is the point when we need to know where our destiny truly lies.
Stay safe. Do what you can to remain healthy. But never forget that the question is much deeper than how to stay safe; it is who holds our destiny? This has not been an easy time, and life was already difficult enough for many, many people. Adding in a pandemic has added so much to people who were already wondering how to hold up under the weight of all their sorrows and difficulties. But know this – when a situation is out of the hands of the doctor, it does not mean it is not in someone’s hands.
This passage begins and ends with questions, none of which is given a fully adequate answer. The end of the passage has a series of questions that are asked after the man is healed. Isn’t this the same man who used to sit and beg, asked his neighbors and others who had seen him begging (verse 8). How then were your eyes opened, they asked next (verse 10). And finally, where is this man, they asked him (verse 12). In answer to the final question, the man, replied, I don’t know. That is an incomplete answer. I know the man did not know the physical whereabouts of where Jesus was at that moment, but I say the answer is incomplete because there is a complete answer to the question. You know what the answer is, don’t you? Where was Jesus? Right there with the man, as he always would be. Where is Jesus now? Right here with us. I know there are some who will question if God is anywhere to be found in this pandemic, or in all the other struggles of the world, for that matter. To answer their question – where is God? – I would affirm that God is where he has always been. God is right here with us. No matter what happens in the world, no matter what happens in our lives, no matter how scary things become, and no matter how vulnerable we feel, God is here with us. And to that we say, amen, and amen.
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