Coronavirus: The War on Two Fronts

Life Saving Patrol

1893

Edward Moran

Oil on canvas

36 1/8 x 54 1/2 in.

Smithsonian American Art Museum

I am posting this because it is a parable that speaks to those types of people that have had a generally cavalier attitude towards COVID-19. The attitude that says to one’s self, “It can’t possibly happen to me. I’m too healthy. I’m not in any of the high-risk groups!” Thereby missing the problem and the point completely. Your focus on yourselves is exactly what makes you and the virus so dangerous. You likely miss seeing that you are probably an asymptomatic carrier that will kill family a member(s) that is older or has a compromised immune system.

We all need to have a sea-change of thought. The COVID-19 virus isn’t about self. Its about others. Its about doing the right thing. I see the proper change in a few and the number is increasing but not enough. The totals of infection bear this out. The death toll sadly adds the explanation point like a hail of bullets. Your government isn’t going to save you. God is. Your behavior is the best indicator of what you are inside. What do you wish the world to see? How do you want to be seen when the crap goes down? Do you want to be the one who gave for others or took from them? Callousness or compassion?

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On a dangerous sea coast where shipwrecks often occur, there was once a crude little life-saving station. The building was just a hut, and there was only one boat, but the few devoted members kept a constant watch over the sea, and with no thought for themselves, went out day and night tirelessly searching for the lost. Some of those who were saved and various others in the surrounding area wanted to become associated with the station and gave of their time and money and effort for the support of its work. New boats were bought and new crews trained. The little life-saving station grew.

Some of the members of the life-saving station were unhappy that the building was so crude and poorly equipped. They felt that a more comfortable place should be provided as the first refuge of those saved from the sea. They replaced the emergency cots with beds and put better furniture in the enlarged building. Now the life-saving station became a popular gathering place for its members, and they decorated it beautifully because they used it as a sort of club. Fewer members were now interested in going to sea on life-saving missions, so they hired lifeboat crews to do this work. The life-saving motif still prevailed in the club’s decorations, and there was a liturgical life-boat in the room where the club’s initiations were held. About this time a large ship wrecked off the coast, and the hired crews brought in boat loads of cold, wet and half-drowned people. They were dirty and sick. The beautiful new club was in chaos. So, the property committee immediately had a shower house build outside the club where victims of shipwrecks could be cleaned up before coming inside.

At the next meeting, there was a split among the club membership. Most of the members wanted to stop the club’s life-saving activities altogether as being unpleasant and a hindrance to the normal social life of the club. Some members insisted upon life-saving as their primary purpose and pointed out that they were still called a life-saving station. But they were finally voted down and told that if they wanted to save lives of all the various kinds of people who were shipwrecked in those waters, they could begin their own life-saving station. So they did.

As the years went by, the new station experienced the same changes that had occurred in the old. It evolved into a club, and yet another life-saving station was founded. History continued to repeat itself, and if you visit that sea coast today, you will find a number of exclusive clubs along that shore. Shipwrecks are still frequent in those waters, but most of the people drown.

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Complacency and careless attitudes can kill. Complacency and carelessness are deadly. We as people have always prided ourselves on always remaining vigilant to any threats at our borders or within our populace. The current enemy is now inside our  borders and also within the bodies of many of the people. The war is now being waged on two fronts.

Viral and viewpoint. Diseased bodies and diseased thinking. At times our thinking is just as dangerous as the disease. Sometimes our thinking is the disease. Thinking can be a mitigator or a propagator of a virus' spread or of ideas.

1 Corinthians 7:1 ~ Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God

As in war we need to come alongside our fallen brothers and sisters and assist them to get them off the battlefield. Part of that help is remaining vigilant to the enemies both without…and within, both physical and mental. It is extending a hand to lift others up from the depths. Save them from drowning in their own bodies and sometimes in their own thinking. Nursing them back to health. Putting aside our differences and forming a single spear point to break the enemy. Creating a phalanx to protect the weak.

James 1:8 ~...a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

James 1:22 ~ But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.

1 Peter 5:8 ~ Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.