Life After Lockdown

In so many ways the last four weeks have dragged, yet the time has flown by. I have achieved a small number of ticks against my long list, because somehow the uncertainties of the future made many of the activities seem futile, unimportant.

Yet, there is a future, and there is a hope. The challenge is to find a way to embrace that, to visualise what this future might look like. Everyone says the world is going to be a very different place. How different? In what way? Are we suddenly going to be better behaved and treat our planet the way we were ordained to? Are we going to stop stealing and pillaging and slagging each other off? How will life be in this different world?

I read this week one of many lovely pieces about how the virus is a good thing, because the incarceration of man, the halting of the paraphernalia and industry that is part and parcel of what our lives have become,  has given the earth a chance to recover from the hammering it has taken. But it spoke of the virus as having a mind of its own, that it determined to spread its brand of havoc in order to save the planet from certain destruction.

My reaction was visceral: Not the Virus. No, it doesn’t have a mind or the ability to reason. In place of the virus, write ‘God’. Do you think God is pleased with the way man has mismanaged the earth over which he was given dominion? I don’t see how He can be.

The definition of ‘dominion’ in Collins Dictionary and Thesaurus is:

Control or authority

Young’s Bible Dictionary puts it this way:

       To be master of, to rule, to have power over, to have authority.

Surely together with authority, power, rule comes responsibility? How angry do we get when leaders renege on their promises, forget they are responsible for and to us, and impact our lives for the worse? But they, and we, have forgotten this side of the coin, the side that says with ruling and authority comes responsibility, an expectation to the best you can for all that has been entrusted to your rule.

We confused dominion with domination, ruling responsibly with tyranny, uncaringly raping the earth in search of riches and power. Industrialists and political leaders have rebelliously kowtowed to economic power blocks, ignoring the cries and pleas of naturalists and conservationists, to slow down, limit the damage, the earth is bleeding and there is not much time left before the planet bleeds out.

This time is spoken of in the bible. Romans 8 vv19-22:

19. For the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits for the revealing of the sons of God

20. for the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope,

21 because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God

22 for we know that the whole creation groans and labours with birth pangs together until now.

Jeremiah 12 v 4

How long will the land mourn, and the herbs of every field wither?

The beasts and birds are consumed, for the wickedness of those who dwell there, because they said, “He will not see our final end.”

V11 They have made it desolate, desolate it mourns to Me, the whole land is made desolate, because no one takes it to heart.

Couldn’t be clearer to my way of thinking. I hope the lockdown continues for a while yet, that the earth may heal completely, the animals enjoy some freedom, and for humanity to decide to behave a lot better in the new world all talk of so glibly.