“I am a party of one, and I live in an age of fear.” (Elwyn Brooks White)
“Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith.” (Matthew 8:26)
I will show you fear in a handful of dust. (T.S. Eliot)
It isn’t the Coronavirus (COVID – 19) that we should be afraid. I get that 2% to 3% of people that contract the virus will die. I get that this virus is extremely contagious and I get that there is no known cure or vaccine available. It is dangerous and life threatening, but, really, come on, we have had worse epidemics in America and we survived. Fear has become pathological in America, and that fear will kill a lot more people then the Coronavirus.
When I was a kid measles (rubella) was a true killer. About 3% of people that contracted rubella died in America, 1 in 1,000 children contracted encephalitis (swelling in the brain), and 1 in 20 contracted pneumonia as a result of having measles. In 3rd world countries the death rate is much higher. It is estimated that 3 million people died every year from the virus until 1980. The infection rate for rubella was 90%. 90%! That means that if a person was susceptible (no previous infection) they had a 90% chance of getting sick if they walked into a room where there was a person who had the virus. After a vaccine was developed in the 1960’s the infection rate went almost to zero in the United States. Its not that the Coronavirus isn’t serious, it is, but I wonder if the political reaction to this is feeding the panic and blowing it out of proportion?
When measles made its rounds every two or three years, people didn’t panic by buying out every bag of flour, every roll of toilet paper, every loaf of bread, and now, I’m told, every can of food they can get their hands on. There are lines of people at gun stores now buying up guns and ammunition in anticipation of a complete breakdown of civil laws. Also, the stock market didn’t collapse when the measles virus cycled through every couple of years, which is what is happening now.
The fear that has been engendered by this over-reaction to the pandemic may indirectly end up killing many more people then the virus was ever capable of doing. I am watching the stock markets plummet across the world. There is no way now to avoid a major recession, possibly even a depression. Companies are already having massive layoffs in anticipation of a giant slowdown in the economy. Frankly, economies are beginning to collapse. We are on the edge right now, and I believe the next few days will tell us which direction our economy will go. And fear is the cause of it all. Fear is the great virus here, like a cancer that grows with abandon eventually killing its host. I am reminded of Mormon 6:7: “…with that awful fear of death which fills the breasts of all the wicked…” Fear is contagious. The New York Times reported yesterday that panic buying is escalating. The article explained that when people see empty shelves when they go to the supermarket, they start to panic and start buying any food that is left on the shelves. People have reported seeing fights breaking out over food.
“…I will consume them by the sword, and by the famine, and by the pestilence.” (Jeremiah 14:12)
One of the definitions my dictionary has for pestilence is: “A pernicious, evil influence or agent.” Jeremiah could easily be defining the fear that sweeps across the nation like a plague as a pestilence.
What is the remedy? What can a sane person do? Do we let fear take hold in our hearts? Or do we look to the only one who can provide peace to our hearts and solace to our fears? The Lord has promised, and I personally believe His promises, “Those who belong to the Lord’s church need not fear.” (D&C 10:55) What is His church? I have come to believe that it isn’t an organized religion, it isn’t a building, and it isn’t a single organization of religious followers. It is as Christ declared: ” Whoever repents and comes to the Lord is His church” (D&C 10:67) All people everywhere that look to Christ, repent, seek the Lord, and feast on his words (2 Nephi 31:20), will be saved.
I like to tell stories. I like them because first, they do capture people’s attention–everyone likes a good story. Second, they help to illustrate complex ideas or thoughts –brings them down to earth where people can relate. My story is from an article I read in the LDS Ensign magazine 30 years ago. An LDS woman and her daughters were living through the invasion of the Russians as they overran Berlin at the end of the Second World War. It was a horrible time for them. Their husband and father was in the German Army and they were left to fend for themselves hiding from the hoards of Russian soldiers that were pillaging and molesting women and girls. They were able to escape the worst that the Russians could do to them through some miraculous interventions, mostly because of their faith in God. Soon the Americans came, since they lived in the American sector, but they still had to contend with hunger and the scarcity of food.
One day word passed through the local neighborhood that food was being handed out. The Mother and her girls rushed to the place and were confronted by a mob of people fighting over a mound of food that had been piled in the middle of the street. I think it was food found in a warehouse that had been stored by the German Army and given out to the people by the American Army. The mother didn’t want to get involved in the fighting for food so she had the girls wait on the periphery of the jostling crowd. She noticed that in their squabbling for food, the people didn’t notice packets of food being thrown about outside the circle of the mob. They started picking up food that flew to the outside out of the chaos in the middle of the pile of food as a result of the fighting. The girls calmly picked up the food laying at the feet of the people in the fray and came away with armfuls of food that they were able to survive on for a while. On another occasion an American serviceman showed up at their door with a box full of food and declared that he was led to collect some food and take it to a house that he was led to by the spirit. The Lord takes care of His people.
“And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them: they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.” (Mark 16: 17-18)
In November, 2017 the Lord offered a covenant to anyone that would accept. The Lord promised: “And I, the Lord your God, will be with you and will never forsake you, and I will lead you in the path which will bring peace to you in the troubling season now fast approaching. I will raise you up and protect you, abide with you, and gather you in due time, and this shall be a land of promise to you as your inheritance from me… And the angels sent to harvest the world will gather the wicked into bundles to be burned, but will pass over you as my peculiar treasure.” (Teachings and Commandments 158: 12,13 & 18)
For those of you who think this is the real deal, the beginning of the plagues that John writes about in Revelation 9, this is only a dress rehearsal. The Lord in his mercy has sent us this warning and if we pay attention and take heed we will prepare ourselves and seek to know Him. He has sent us a lot of warnings and the country took heed for a time, but things went back to “normal” within a few months. 9/11, and the market sell off and start of the great recession in 2008 were both warnings. This time we are being given a third and final warning. We will recover somewhat from the financial crises and the memory of the virus of 2020 will become a soon to be forgotten memory as the country attempts to return to business as usual. But the fourth crises that comes will be a real wake up call, because as Isaiah foretells, the troubles will come like a woman in labor, the contractions will become harder to bear and quicker between.
“Pangs and sorrows shall take hold of them, they shall be in pain as a woman that travails; they shall be amazed one at another, their faces shall be as flames.” (Isaiah 6:2)