The Distance
Things have been better.
It’s scary. A highly contagious virus that spreads like wildfire is running rampant, all over the world, and we’re being told to stay home and quarantine ourselves. I, for one, have never experienced this before, and I’m guessing many of you are in the same boat. Almost everything on my calendar has been canceled, and it’s unfamiliar territory. I’ve never had to wonder if the grocery store will have what I need. At noon on a Tuesday, I had to check and see if the store was open so I could get more dog food. I can no longer call up a friend and go to lunch. Things that have been constant for my entire life are now uncertain. We’re all feeling the distance, and it’s unsettling, to say the least.
Before we get too far into this, I do have a confession. When this whole COVID-19 scare first came out, I downplayed it BIG TIME. I didn’t get the hype, and I treated it like it was an overstated flu. Like, come on, people, it’s a cold!!
I was wrong. Go ahead and quote me, if you must. I was looking at it from a completely wrong angle. And that angle was focused on myself.
I wasn’t worried about it because I wasn’t in the “most affected” category. I wouldn’t suffer from it, and it wouldn’t make a huge impact on ME.
Well, guess what? It’s not about me.
It’s about my grandmother. The people at my church. My coworkers who are pregnant. My friend who has a weak immune system. My next door neighbors. And their friends and families.
The social distancing isn’t about me, and yet, for the first time, I’m being asked to limit my everyday life to keep others safe. I’m being asked to do all my grocery shopping for a week and a half in one trip, to help keep someone else healthy. I’m intentionally distancing myself from those I love, in hopes that I can help “flatten the curve”. I may not even know who I’m helping, but that’s okay. I don’t need to know someone’s name in order to decide if they’re worth it.
Because you know what else? I am not the judge of who is worth it and who isn’t. God is. And He says EVERYONE is worth it. If He says it, I believe it. He calls me to love each and every one of His children, and if loving them requires me to stay home and miss out on some fun activities, then I’m okay with that.
Is it annoying that I can’t/won’t get my hair cut for another month or so? Absolutely. It has been WAY too long and I desperately need some layers. I would LOVE to have a fresh cut for spring and not look like Tarzan. But, I can wait, and my waiting could save someone’s life.
I can’t say that coming home from vacation to a “self-quarantining” community was my favorite thing. But, weirdly enough, I am grateful. I’m grateful that our community is making an effort to distance themselves, for the sake of the greater good. Because it’s about more than just me and mine. It’s about us and ours. Whether we like it or not, we are a community. We still need each other, and even though things have been a little crazy, we are resilient and strong and we care about one another. There are tons of healthy, young adults who are staying home to protect someone else who might not be as healthy. So often, we are faced with the selfishness of our culture, and it’s almost the norm to put yourself first. And yet, here we are, with almost an entire nation making sacrifices for someone other than themselves.
Not only am I grateful for a community coming together, I am proud of how so many people are using this opportunity to “go the distance”. I see so many friends on social media making lists of fun or productive things to do at home and sharing them with others. Some friends are getting together to play music or sing and posting videos to spread some cheer. Others are offering their expertise as teachers to parents who are homeschooling their kids for the first time. Still others are offering to pick up groceries for the elderly. We are coming together to fight this thing, even though its hard, and we are going come out healthier, stronger and kinder. As a community, we are going the distance.
This season is forcing us to focus on the things that really matter. Our friends, our family, our loved ones. As a wise friend told me yesterday “I am believing that out of this ‘social distancing’ thing, people may come to appreciate the face to face that we need as humans, not through a screen, but person to person, as we were created.”
I think she hit the nail right on the head.
“So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.” Romans 12:1-2