“The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent” (Exodus 14:14)

Exodus 14:14 is one of those verses that just will not leave me alone – it hounds me everywhere I go. During this whole Covid-19 thing, it is as if the world just got louder and the more we speak, strategize, plan, debate and speculate, the less forward motion there seems to be and the higher the death-rate climbs. It’s as if we are meant to realise how completely and utterly helpless we are and that no amount of human ingenuity will save us from this situation. The ‘curve’ will not flatten because we wish it so and while the common-sense measures pertaining to hygiene and social distancing will no doubt prove a hindrance in the virus’ path of destruction, it will not ‘save’ humanity. Among the cacophony of informed opinion, scientific commentary and opportunistic political rhetoric, all I can hear are God’s words to the Israelites: you have only to be silent.

I think that as a species supposedly occupying the ‘top of the food chain’ we want to believe that we are in control and that we create our own destinies. We do things, things are not done to us. We force our will on nature, it does not force its will on us. The prevalent humanistic world-view of this age is that we are the omnipotent masters of our realities and that victim-hood is ‘old hat’. “Own your life,” they say. But then a minuscule single-cell organism comes along and carries a hundred-thousand of us away. Just like that. A silent and violent murderer that robs you of the very air you breathe and which doesn’t even have the decency to look you in the eye as it sends you to your maker. An uncivilized death, for ‘civilized’ people.

It’s almost funny to see that despite our self-professed and dearly defended individuality we all go through the stereotypical stages of grief –denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance– as if we’re textbook subjects. We all start with the disbelief (This isn’t happening!); then go on to the kicking-and-screaming phase where we vow to fight and refuse to let this thing get us down (I won’t let this get me!); then we negotiate with God and ourselves (If I’m good, will I survive?); followed by the realization that we can’t make this go away and the depression that comes from hopelessness (This is so unfair!); and then it fades into the nothingness of acceptance (I don’t care anymore!). Some of us linger a little longer in the kicking-and-screaming phase and some progressed too quickly to a state of hopelessness, but collectively as a species we ride the same wave of grief.

God started talking to me during the early stages of the pandemic when I was still shrugging this off as another swine-flu, bird-flu, or Ebola. Something that wouldn’t come to my door. He really started poking me in the chest when I got angry at this thing and incessantly watched the news only to critique the efforts of the ‘idiots in charge’ — it made me feel like I still had some control over my life. And then, when the fear struck me and the picture-show in my head started replaying worst-case scenarios on a loop, I got a smack on the forehead.

Now is not the time for action. Now is not the time for planning and strategy. Now is not the time for logic and reasoning. Now is the time to be still and KNOW that I am YOUR GOD and I will do the fighting for you…