Written By Dr Ivor Poobalan

On December 30, 2019, Dr Li Wenliang posted a message on a social media group of college alumni. He warned that the seven people quarantined from a seafood market in Wuhan, China, were probably infected by a novel coronavirus, “whose specific categorisation is yet to be known”. He only asked that everyone should be careful and take preventive measures. The authorities were displeased and accused Dr Li of “rumour- mongering” and spreading irrational fear among people. On February 7, 2020 the 34-year-old doctor died; a casualty among the medical personnel that tried to save at least some from the disease that was by now well on its way to being declared a global pandemic.

None of us likes bad news, because it makes us uncomfortable; it spoils our plans and spreads a feeling of gloom. But what if the rumour is about something true? Ignorance is dangerous. If we refuse to recognize what threatens us, we are unable to protect ourselves. It is vital to pay attention to the truth.

This intangible, unseen coronavirus is a sneaky microbe. It invades a person’s body and initially does nothing except to attach itself firmly into the respiratory system of the host, multiply itself thousands of times, and successfully infect several new victims. Soon enough however, the symptoms appear, threatening the health and even life of the patient. And the effects are not limited to the infected individuals. The pandemic has knock-on effects: community spread and the shutting down of schools, workplaces and airports; social-distancing and quarantine; overstrained healthcare systems and supply-chains; the lockdown of cities and even entire nations; the collapse of companies and the bankruptcy of national economies. We now realise that if the effects of such an outbreak cannot be mitigated, the consequences will be catastrophic, threatening the very survival of human civilization as we know it.

The 2019 novel coronavirus pandemic story illustrates what the Bible calls ‘sin’. God had warned the first humans, our founding parents, about the catastrophic effects that sin would have on the whole human race. Describing sinful disobedience and rebellion against God in terms of eating from a forbidden tree God had said:

“You must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil,
for when you eat of it you will surely die” (The Bible, Genesis 2:17).

Yet they did, and then sin, like an intangible and invisible virus, infected all humanity, and resulted in immediate alienation from God and eventual death for all. Again, like the novel coronavirus, its consequences were not limited to individual health alone. The infection destroyed trust in homes, broke down the peace of communities, caused unending international conflicts, and impacted the natural environment. In short, sin has shattered the harmony that was intended and existed in God’s good creation. But most of all, sin has fatally compromised our ability to hear from and respond to our Creator. It has distorted our impression of the Father God; our self-centred choices to sin has threatened to separate us forever from his care and loving reach:

“Surely the arm of the Lord is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear. But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear” (The Bible, Isaiah 59:1-2)

Although, for a few weeks some experts and governments made light of the COVID-19 infection, the vast majority soon agreed that the danger was real and that Dr Li Wenliang’s warning had been well-founded and spot-on. They realised that the most effective solution to the pandemic and the greatest protection against the threat of a future outbreak would lie in discovering a treatment capable of neutralizing the power of the virus.

The Bible is God’s revelation. Its aim is not just to report the bad news of sin (and how this threatens our eternal wellbeing); its primary purpose is to give us the good news that God has provided a solution to our human predicament. He has made a way by which everyone who turns to him can be cured of the infection of sin and given a clean bill of health and the opportunity to live a full and meaningful life.

The Bible calls this remedy “salvation”, and explains that God’s Salvation- Plan for sinful humanity cost him dearly because it cost him his only Son:

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (The Bible, John 3:16)

The Lord Jesus Christ is God’s Son who became like one of us so that he could take on himself the full force of the infection of sin. This is the reason he died on our behalf, experiencing the pain and shame of a Roman crucifixion and the terrible loneliness of being separated from God the Father. Although fully human, Jesus was uniquely sinless, and this enabled him to neutralize the effect of sin and overcome its consequences: sin’s power to spoil our relationship with the natural world, one another, and God. On the third day God raised Jesus from death and he now lives forever as the Saviour who alone can cure us of the infection of sin:

“He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed”.” (The Bible, 1 Peter 2:24)

For two thousand years countless people, in every part of the globe, have discovered this glorious fact: The Lord Jesus Christ heals us from sin and restores us to an intimate relationship of joy and peace with God our Father. The key to experiencing this amazing salvation – the remedy for sin that threatens to rob us of an eternity with God – is to believe in Jesus: “Whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life”. Don’t you long to know more about how you can believe in Jesus Christ and experience the joy of an abundant life with God?

“To all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God” (The Bible, John 1:12)

Dr Li Wenliang is now hailed as a hero because his “rumour” was in fact a truth about the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic of sin is surely another universally-accepted truth. Perhaps what has been lesser known is that the remedy is now available. In the very words of the Saviour Jesus Christ:

“I am the way, and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (The Bible, John 14:6)

For more information contact: ivorger@gmail.com