Within two months of the reporting of the outbreak of the COVID-19 disease in Wuhan by the Chinese authorities, the global rate of infection approached ninety thousand with nearly three thousand fatalities registered. Writing at the end of February, I am mindful that these figures may well have increased dramatically by the time you read this article. In Singapore, the health authorities have confirmed that there are more than one hundred cases of infection. The numbers worldwide are still rising, with Europe, the Middle East and the Americas waking up to the reality of the disease penetrating their borders and shores.

We are struck by the rapidity and range of this pathogen’s spread and remember again that we live in a world where plague and pestilence spread more easily than health and well-being. It is also a world in which people take to hate and violence more readily than to goodwill and peace-making. Christians should not be surprised at this since we know what the Bible says about a world that has become disordered. Since the sin and fall of Adam, and the disruption of the created order with him, the world has been given more to brokenness than to wholeness. Would it not be wonderful if cures and therapies could be as infectious as diseases? We know that is not the reality.

Despite the virulence of disease and evil in the world, the Bible reminds us that life is never bereft of hope because the world is never bereft of God’s grace. We see this in the glimmer of hope that God gave to Adam and Eve even as he pronounced terrible judgment on them. We see hope in the deliverance of Noah and his family when God brought his judgement on the entire human race. We are never left without hope because God’s grace is not exhausted by human sin, and we must believe this today. The church especially must continue believing in hope and in its ordained role of bringing life into the world even when other things are bringing despair and death.

As Christians, we can be hopeful in this season of anxiety, and sense God at work in bringing about good things. The current situation reminds me of the common humanity I share with those who are ethnically, culturally or religiously different from me. Whatever one’s persuasions are, we face a common threat. Viruses do not distinguish us by our socio-economic grouping, political inclinations or religious convictions. In the face of all we do not know about this new peril, we know this much to be true – to deal with what is developing into a global pandemic, we have to hold in abeyance our stubbornly held differences and work together. Can we take this unsolicited opportunity to build bridges with those who are different from us? And rising from that victory, find more creative ways to achieve peace and share the Good News of hope?

The current situation also has the potential to teach us humility. For Christians, it has been discomfiting to learn that our weekly congregating has contributed to virus spread. Several well-publicised local ‘outbreaks’ made that clear. It is doubly sobering to note that bigger congregations present bigger health hazards. God certainly has a way to show us we do not have as much control over our lives and achievements as we would like to think. Can God be prompting us to put aside our confident self-praise, change the posture of our worship, and fall before him in need more?

This is my Father’s world.
O let me ne’er forget
That though the wrong seems oft so strong
God is the ruler yet.¹

Prayer Requests

Friends, would you help us bring these prayer needs to our Father:

• For patience and graciousness as we cope with adjustments in teaching schedules, postponements and cancellations of group meetings, disruption of travel plans, increase in health and hygiene measures, and so on.
• For the health of students, faculty and staff. We give thanks that all but two of our students from mainland China are able to return to normal classes this semester. Please pray especially for our Chinese and Korean students who are anxious for their families back home.
• For God’s provision for the unbudgeted but necessary expenses as a result of all the adjustments.
• For the BTS Board of Management as the search for the next BTS President continues.

Fong Choon Sam
Interim Co-President

¹Lines from the poem “This Is My Father’s World” written by Maltbie D. Babcock and published posthumously in 1901. Set to music by Franklin L. Sheppard in 1915.