Living in What’s True (George Stulac)
My “high risk” family
The spread of Covid-19 has caused us to group people by levels of risk, and I find myself, unfortunately, both in and surrounded by the most dangerous category. At 75 years old, I am high risk. My wife is even higher risk, with a history of heart disease and high blood pressure. Our sixteen-year-old grandson, diagnosed with leukemia in January, is undergoing chemotherapy, leaving him at high risk too. Our daughter and son-in-law, who are frontline primary care pediatricians in Boston hospitals, are also at high risk.
Every day I am hit hard with the reality of our vulnerability. And every day, I have Jesus’ promise, “I am with you always.” Jesus promises peace in the midst of high risk times: “In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”
Yet the dangers of sickness and death remain real. I wonder in what sense Jesus could have meant it. How has he overcome the world? And how can I know it’s true? I long for answers to those questions, answers that stand up in the realities of our virus-plagued world.
One reminder that comforts me is that Jesus did not enter and overcome a world free of risk. The church has never known such a time. In the first century A.D., for example, Christians faced violent persecution and death. Jesus sent them the book of Revelation as a reminder that he has overcome the world. His answer to my questions is spread all through the book but stated succinctly in Revelation 1:5. There Jesus reminded those Christians of four truths about himself: his faithful life, his death, his resurrection, and his ascension to rule. Now I, too, remember. His faithful life was full of grace and truth for us, as John testified. His death was sinless, atoning for our sin and sealing us into his love. His death-defeating resurrection was undeniable to his incredulous disciples and was confirmed by hundreds of witnesses. And his ascension was to heaven where he now rules until he returns to make this world new.
Now it strikes me that his answer to my question is strong because it is not theoretical but actual. In those four acts, Jesus has proven himself trustworthy in ways no one else ever has. No one else in all of history has done those four acts. This gives me compelling reason to trust him now.
I am at high risk, but I know Jesus, who entered into a vulnerable world, and is alive with goodness and love. So I am comforted. I am isolated by being separated from others, but nothing can separate me from the love of God in Christ Jesus. So I endure. The world is a frightening place, but I have Jesus’ promise that he does rule and will return to make the world new and to wipe away every tear. So I rest in this hope.
Still, it is not easy, in the midst of such dangers and unknowns, with anxiety rising in myself and others, to live into what I know to be true. I need God now as much as ever, so I turn to Scripture and prayer to hear and speak with him there. And I need thankfulness in a time when it seems hard to be grateful, so each morning I begin my day by giving thanks for the day itself and God’s presence in it. I need worship in my separation, so my wife and I draw upon the hymns that we have known. I need friendship and meaningful work to do in isolation, so I check in with friends and faculty members and others in my ministry through any means I safely can. And lastly, given the difficulty of trust in the midst of vulnerability, I need to affirm my faith—intentionally and often—so I say one of the historic Christian creeds or catechisms, such as the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed.
In one of those historic confessions, which was itself written at a time of immense turmoil, the writers asked, “What is your only comfort in life and in death?” And I find myself answering with these believers of old: “That I am not my own, but belong—body and soul, in life and in death—to my faithful Savior, Jesus Christ.” This is the deeper reality. This is the truth in which—with prayer, scripture, hymns, friendships, and creeds—I try to live.
George Stulac is a ministry partner of The Carver Project and works with faculty ministry for InterVarsity Christian Fellowship.
Further Reading:
Dorothy Sayers, Creed or Chaos, especially the essays “Creed or Chaos?”; “The Dogma Is the Drama”; and “Strong Meat.”
Dorothy Sayers, “What Do We Believe?” published in Unpopular Opinions.
Dorothy Sayers, The Man Born to Be King (a play).
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