Is God Still Good in the Middle of a Pandemic?

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Do we trust that He is good, even in the midst of a world turned upside down and fear turned loose to whisper in our ears? Because before we can proclaim His goodness across the room, or across a driveway, or across the space of social media, we need to first wrestle with it in our own hearts. Is God good even through a pandemic like covid-19?

Trust. It’s hard to trust when we forget to exhale.

I turn to well-beloved words by Ann Voskamp: “I’ve got to get this thing, what it means to trust, to gut-believe in the good touch of God toward me, because it’s true: I can’t fill with joy until I learn how to trust” (146).

Yet it’s hard to learn trust in the middle of a tsunami. When what we know is ripped from our unwilling hands and what we have left is badgered and pummeled—trust then?

When I lose sight of Your face, it’s hard to remember that You are good.

When I lose sight of Your already fulfilled promises, it’s hard to trust that You have never changed.

Fear—it closes like a noose around our vision, tightening until we can’t see beyond ourselves, until we can’t see You.

We fear, yet God is near.

He perfects our praise, our feeble alleluia, our broken whispers of thanks.

Even now, even when I can’t see You, Lord You are near. May my hand reach out beyond the limits of my vision until I touch You.

You have been here. You are here. Emmanuel, God with us.

May I know it now—taste it, see it now, Your holy Presence all around me.

You hand holding me up when I don’t have strength to stand.

Your faithfulness is constant, Your love unchanged.

Lord, may we have eyes to see Your heart that hurts with us and yet always, always continues to wildly pursue us?

As I read in Psalms 139:17-18, TPT:

Every single moment you are thinking of me!
How precious and wonderful to consider
that you cherish me constantly in your every thought!
O God, your desires toward me are more
than the grains of sand on every shore!
When I awake each morning, you’re still with me.

I pause. Perhaps I’ve been inhaling the wrong things. Slanted news and hearted-wrenching statistics here for the taking. Yet they sit heavy in my lungs, and I need oxygen. I need Him.

Perhaps if I inhale Him, I can exhale gratitude. Exhale gratitude until it tilts the balance in the room, cancels out some of the fear and anxiety and worry.

“Thanks is what builds trust,” writes Ann Voskamp. “Count blessings and discover Who can be counted on” (150-151).

My own journal lays open before me. 760 numbered praises. I’ve been keeping my own ongoing gratitude journal since first reading Ann Voskamp’s One Thousand Gifts.

Recording my thanks helps me remember. Pain and promise. Sickness and health. Ordinary and holy. And God good through all of it. Giving gratitude might not change the circumstances, but it does change whether they take us out or lift us higher.

I’m reading Michele Cushatt’s book Relentless: The Unshakeable Presence of a God Who Never Leaves. This book is timely and Michelle’s writing heartfelt and engaging. I encourage you to get a copy if you haven’t read it yet.

Relentless is an invitation to collect twelve stones to remind us of the ways God hasn’t left us, just as God prompted the Israelites to do long ago. These stones are a tangible remembrance of our thanks. In the first chapter, Michele shares:

This is the necessary and perhaps ambitious quest of this book. To descend into the basement of my faith journey and, hopefully, discover evidence of God’s presence. To scour the sixty-six books of the Bible for glimmers of God’s unending desire to be with us. To learn, once and for all, that God doesn’t condemn our questions, doubts, and despair but actually pushes further in, drawing closer still. And to discover, to our deep relief and lasting delight, that God’s greatest desire isn’t to browbeat us into obedience but to woo us with His relentless nearness. 16-17

She later asks, “What if God isn’t absent in our struggle but fully present in it? And what if we could collect enough evidence of His presence to bring relief to our pain and anchor our faith outside the reach of it?” (18). When we keep a record of our gratitude, we can return to these indications of God’s faithfulness when we find it hard to trust that He is still good.

Today perhaps you need to know that God sees your sadness and hears your questions, even the unvoiced ones. Though it may feel He is distant and uncaring, and your belief in His goodness is shaken, even yet He is the same “yesterday, today, and forever” (Hebrews 13:8, TPT).  His plan is bigger than what we can see right in front of us, and the end of the story has already been written.

God hurts when we hurt because He loves us. And He is right here. Here as He has been the whole time. Here as He will always be. The things that are not as He originally created don’t discount the Maker. Rather, the broken things are evidence that “all creation longs for freedom from its slavery to decay and to experience with us the wonderful freedom coming to God’s children” (Romans 8:21, TPT).

We whisper that He is good, even as we are still learning to trust, to fully understand. We whisper that He is here with us and that He is good, even in the middle of a pandemic. Because when we whisper it, we begin again to believe it, and we help others begin to believe it as well.

Our words, actions, and beliefs have a ripple effect. Fear, and we spread fear. Love, and we spread love. Trust, and we help others learn to trust that God is good as well.

What does a missional life look like in the midst of pandemic? Perhaps building our trust through our feeble alleluia as we remember the ways, both past and present, we know He has never left us. Perhaps being intentional about what we are allowing to ripple out from us into our homes, neighborhoods, and social media spaces.

Before we close, I’d love to share a few ways that are currently helping me cultivate what I want to ripple out from me.

1 – Filling my mind with praise.

When I don’t know how to praise, I let others praise for me. I let the lyrics others have written carry me, nudge my heart towards God. And this I well know: when I come into God’s presence, everything else begins to pale in importance. The worry that ripped my heart fades. The sharp edges of stress soften. I can breathe deeply again. And I remember how, time and time again, I have found hope and solace when I am with Him.

Songs that speak straight to my heart these past few weeks I’ve been saving to a YouTube playlist. If you would like to listen, you may access it here. Podcast listeners, the link will be in the show notes.

Quarantine Playlist – YouTube

Songs that especially resonate with me during the coronavirus quarantine.

2 – Keeping an ongoing gratitude list.

This practice has been transformative for me in more ways that I can recount here, so I will simply encourage you to start one, or pick one back up if you have gotten off the rhythm of writing down a few things you are grateful every day. I invite you to see for yourself how giving thanks aligns your heart to trust the One receiving your thanks. Give thanks for the small as well as the big—the sunshine dancing through new leaves, the promise in a passage of Scripture from that day’s reading, answered prayers, past stories of His faithfulness, and the fruit He is growing in you in the midst of the covid-quarantine.

3 – Cultivating rhythms that sustain and propel me forward.

Our lives have been disrupted and we may be struggling to keep any semblance of routine. I’m finding it easier to avoid non-life-giving habits when I am intentional about the rhythms I want to strengthen. I long to live all the more on mission today, but I know that apathy is a real struggle when we have to keep extra distance from our neighbors. So I put together a list of six missional living rhythms to cultivate during the quarantine—as much for myself as for you. I’d love for you to join me in intentionally growing rhythms that will help us live on mission in the here-and-now and provide a foundation for missional living post-quarantine.

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As we close for today, I invite you to pray Psalm 18:30, TPT, with me.

What a God you are! Your path for me has been perfect!
All your promises have proven true.
What a secure shelter for all those
who turn to hide themselves in you!
You are the wrap-around God giving grace to me.

And finally, here is a prayer to help us remember that though we may be quarantined, we are not alone.

Jesus, You speak soft in the slow. Your voice fills the void with hope. And now I invite You near.

I am undone on the inside, but You bind up my hurt deep within.

When the weight of world-wide crisis feels paralyzing, let me feel instead Your holy presence and weighty glory.

May my praise rise and ring loud.

Both prayer and praise from all across the earth mingle and move Your heart.

You are with me. Here. Now.

And I trust that even now, You are good.

Cushatt, Michele. Relentless: The Unshakeable Presence of a God Who Never Leaves. Zondervan, 2019.

Voskamp, Ann. One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are. Zondervan, 2010.

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