The Death of Normal
“So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”- 1 Corinthians 13:13 (ESV)
I’ve heard the following statement from church members more times than I can count over the past year, “I am so ready for everything to go back to normal”. And yet “normal” has yet to happen, and may not for a while. In looking back over the past twelve months, it is interesting to see the progression of people’s emotions and thinking in the midst of a global pandemic. In many ways, they seem to mirror the stages of the grieving process which include denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.
When the pandemic hit in early 2020, many saw it as a problem for “others”, those who lived in other countries or states. Though there was a sense of sympathy, and even empathy, for those who had contracted the virus, it still seemed distant and not something that would have a direct impact on our lives. As such, many entered into a sense of practical denial. Denial is a common defense mechanism to help a person or group of people absorb significant news and begin to process it. In denial, we keep the implications of such news at bay in our heads and hearts, seemingly keeping us immune to its personal effects.
As the virus spread to global proportions, anger began to rise, as did questions and accusations. Why is this affecting us? Why didn’t someone see this coming? It’s their fault! Why isn’t the government acting faster on this? What do we do now? Anger began to mask the deeper emotions of fear and panic that dwelt right under the surface of our lives, afraid that this calamity might touch us and those close to us. Intensity began to rise in response to the imminent threat.
That is when the bargaining began. Do we wear masks or not? Do we go into lock down? How can we protect both lives and the economy? How will small businesses and churches survive if we close up shop? Do we take the Payroll Protection Plan or not? Leaders began to make plans to compensate to protect the health of people and the sustainability of organizations. Christian leaders, specifically, had to learn to adapt from tried and true methods and employ new ways of communicating, fostering community, and caring for their congregations. It was, and still continues to be, an effort in trial and error. Leaders also had to navigate the responses of their followers to the plans being made. As more conflicting information was released concerning the virus and its effects, conspiracy theories abounded. Leaders had to balance personal beliefs with follower’s beliefs, demands, and accusations. Christian leaders had to either choose sides or ride the “middle lane” to keep the divergent views of their people focused on the Kingdom and not on the latest news feed. For many pastors and leaders it has been a lose/lose scenario.
As 2020 wore on and the promise of a vaccine loomed, anger and bargaining burned out into a more settled sense of depression. Physical isolation and “Zoom fatigue” set in and began to dominate the thinking and emotions of people. This created a sense of feeling “foggy”, “dazed”, “lazy”, and “confused”. Church members who were on the fringe during pre-pandemic times, began to fall farther away from Christian community. Many semi-faithful believers began to admit a sense of spiritual apathy, pulling back from live or online engagement. Faithful members and lay leaders began to wonder if we would ever recover those in our groups, services, and congregations to pre-pandemic levels.
Now that we are in the first quarter of 2021, there seems to be a more settled sense of acceptance, not of COVID-19 as the new forever standard, but of the death of normal. As Christian leaders and laity have adapted to new ways of thinking about and doing church, many are beginning to see that some of the things that were done in the past were simply things that were done in the past. As such, much of the way of thinking about and doing church has been put under the microscope of evaluation. And that is a good thing. As the church comes to accept that they may actually have to rethink what they do to reach and disciple those around them (and around the world), they will have to move from adaptation to innovation quickly. They will have to consider ways and means that they have never considered before if they are going to continue to have influence for the gospel in the culture. They will need to think about how to create processes instead of programs, learn to develop disciples who are trained to multiply disciples that can reach a more disparate world, have a bigger Kingdom vision than the numerical growth or survival of the local church, and be willing to suffer loss and still find joy.
So, where do we go from here? Obviously, not all churches or individual believers progress through such a grieving process at the same rate. But, if we take this process as applicable to the current pandemic, how do we find a way forward? The Apostle Paul, following his grand description of agape, or self-sacrificing, love, concludes 1 Corinthians 13 with a summary of the highest of godly virtues; faith, hope, and love (13:13). Each has their place in this present life. Theologian Scott Hafemann argues that “[i]n the midst of the suffocating self-love of our modern and postmodern culture, the Bible is clear that our real hunger is to know the one true God revealed in its pages. Only in doing so will we satisfy our cravings for security (faith), find the purpose for which we exist (hope), and be able to live free from slavery to self (love)”[1]. As we interpret our present condition in light of God’s Word, we are enabled, by God’s Spirit, to view the world not out of self-centered panic or fear, but out of the virtues mentioned above. As such, we not only gain a new view of our present but of the future. Oliver O’Donovan encourages us by saying,
“Faith and hope each express our dependence upon the future: the present, in which we have to act, needs the future of God's kingdom to give it intelligibility, and so to give our acts a frame of meaning. . . But the direction in which thought moves between the present and the future is different in either case. When we hope, we begin from the problematic character of the present, from its ambiguity and unsatisfying incompleteness, and turn gratefully to the future judgment of God which perfects the imperfections of the present and promises completion. In faith we move in the opposite direction. Beginning from the final judgment with its affirmation of man's created life and love, we turn gratefully back to the present, our appointed scene of action, to claim and enjoy that affirmation not simply as an object of hope but as an immediate reality.”[2]
Faith and hope, then, are crucial in discerning our current situation in light of the future, but both are subservient to love, which is the supreme virtue. “Love is the greatest because it is the purpose and goal of faith and hope”[3]. Faith relies on God’s provision in the present. Hope looks forward to the consummation of all things in Christ in the future. Love finds satisfaction and joy in God regardless of the current circumstances.
As individuals and churches grieve the death of normal, may we as leaders cast a new (but old) vision moving forward. May we cast a vision that places Jesus and not the latest news at the center of our thinking and practice. As such, we will have an appropriate template in which to interpret and navigate the problems of our day. We should recognize this as a Kingdom vision, a vision built and sustained by Jesus’ rule and reign over our lives. As we realign our thinking around Jesus, we can then realign our practices around Him as well. No longer should “nickels and noses”, “programmatic efficiency”, or “the gospel of sin management” (Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy, 41) be the standards of success in ministry, but building disciples who place the Kingdom vision of faith, hope, and love at the center of their lives. As a result, we will find the end of the grieving process: a new way of life and possibility for the future.
[1] Scott Haefmann, The God of Promise and the Life of Faith. Understanding the Heart of the Bible (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Books, 2001), as quoted in Ciampa and Rosner, The First Letter to the Corinthians, Pillar New Testament Commentary, 661.
[2] Oliver M.T. O’Donovan, Resurrection and Moral Order: An Outline for Evangelical Ethics (Leicester: IVP; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1986), 247, 253, as quoted in Ciampa and Rosner, The First Letter to the Corinthians, Pillar New Testament Commentary, 661.
[3] Thomas Schreiner, 1 Corinthians: An Introduction and Commentary, The Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (Downer’s Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2018).
