“He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High
shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say of the Lord, ‘He is my refuge and my
fortress; My God, in Him I will trust.’
Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of
fowler and from the perilous pestilence.
He shall cover you with His feathers, and
under His wings you shall take refuge;
His truth shall be your shield and buckler.
You shall not be afraid of the terror by night,
nor of the pestilence that walks in darkness,
nor of the destruction that lays waste at noonday.”
Psalm 91:1-6
(KNJV)
Our intern pastor was talking
last week about the seeming paradox in the Bible concerning God's role and
ours. For example, in teaching His disciples how to pray, Jesus said they
should seek God's will to be done and to ask for God to give them their daily
bread (Matthew 6:10-11, NKJV). Yet we don't just pray and then sit back,
without doing anything, waiting for God's will to come to pass and for food to
show up at our doors. No, we're to pray and then go about our daily
business, seeking God's help to obey His will and following the means of
provision He gives us. In that way, we partner with God, doing our part and
trusting Him to do His part.
I was thinking how this applies
to the worldwide coronavirus pandemic and I turned to this psalm. It says that
we should not be afraid of “pestilence that walks in darkness” and that God
"shall deliver" us from the perilous pestilence. Does this mean we
should stick our heads in the sand, do nothing and just presume that God will
deliver us? Of course, God doesn't need us to do anything to accomplish His
will. But He has given us common sense to use in situations.
So we express our concerns to
God in prayer. We rest upon God’s sovereignty and remember that whether He
chooses to deliver us from harm or through it,
the Lord never leaves us nor forsakes us. We trust that God is our refuge and
fortress, and that He will guide us through all our days. But we also should
take reasonable precautions and measures recommended by health and other
authorities to keep ourselves and our families safe, and then rest in Him.
With God as our partner, we can
have His peace in our hearts, even while the world around us is in
crisis.