Hope in the Age of the "New Normal"

If one phrase could define the COVID-19 era, the “new normal” would likely be a leading candidate. This phrase has a suffocating ring of finality to it, as though it will be impossible to go back fully to the “old normal” ever. That old paradigm encompassed things we took for granted – such as unrestricted human physical contact including handshaking and hugging, unlimited mass gatherings for prayer or for pleasure, and largely unhindered movement whether merely outside of the house or between countries and continents.

For just a few minutes, let us set aside the ongoing debates on what the response to the Corona Virus should have been from the beginning and what it should be going forward. For the sake of the discussion, let us even assume that steps such as “social distancing” and the usage of facemasks are the correct response to a public health crisis (at least at some point on the timeline). While I realize that many question those policies on philosophical and scientific grounds, my intent here is neither to attack such measures nor to silence the concerns of those opposed to them – but rather to reflect on the situation from an eternal perspective.

What strikes me more than anything else about the “new normal” is the underlying message that this is the unavoidable fate awaiting human beings here on earth. There is no hope for a brighter future in this new world, with the only viable option seeming to be complete surrender to the certainty of increasingly restrictive controls as envisioned by the experts as the only way to battle the possibility of unending and unpredictable outbreaks of disease. Hope in the human heart suffers “death by suffocation” when it is overwhelmed by a worldview that depends on human manipulation for survival – instead of submission to the source of life himself.

To quote Dostoevsky, to live without hope is to cease to live. Make no mistake, friends; the enemy himself is the true author of the underlying philosophy of the “new normal” – for he realizes that his time is short. He knows that the extinguishing of hope is one of the most powerful weapons in his arsenal, and he will stop at nothing to “spiritually isolate” the believer from the living hope that has already been given to him or her (1 Peter 1:3). This spiritual principle applies to the overall situation, whether or not wearing a face mask is a reasonable response to this specific virus.

Even as the shadows deepen around the world, the hope of the true believer cannot be extinguished. Even if the circumstances of this life worsen, we cling to the promise that “surely there is a hereafter, and [our] hope will not be cut off” (Proverbs 23:18). Even though the enemy taunts us with the utter impossibility of it all, we can “rest [our] hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to [us] at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:13). And even if we never fully recover those human blessings of physical connection and coming together in this present age, we know that “we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and thus we shall always be with the Lord” (1 Thessalonians 4:17).

Someday the “new normal” will become nothing but distant memory – conquered by the God who not only gives the human heart hope, but is our hope (Psalm 71:5). Let us fix our eyes on him unswervingly in whatever time we have left on this earth.