2 Chronicles 20:12 

New International Version (NIV)

Our God, will you not judge them? For we have no power to face this vast army that is attacking us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you.”

For Encouragement

Sometimes, the Lord reveals our powerlessness in unusual ways. The year 2020 was one of such moments. The world was helpless against the coronavirus pandemic and desperate for a cure. Cut it however you may: God had affirmed His Sovereign power over the world by the fear, uncertainty, and devastation the pandemic rained on humans since December 2019.

One lesson stood out for the world during the crisis. We are powerless without the mercy and grace of God! We have nothing of our own, not even the intelligence we claim for ourselves and boast about. If we did, we would have come up with a cure immediately after the virus broke. We would have found a vaccine quicker than we did.

Look back at the faces of people in the airport queues, waiting to get back to their homes in their countries before their borders closed. Remember the helplessness of health workers struggling to help the infected. Tune your ears back to politicians digging into their bottomless bag of lies and deception to confuse the poor citizen. We watched TV news commentators and experts doing their best to reassure a panicked audience. Consider all of those efforts, and you can only conclude that we are the most vulnerable and pathetic beings because of our pride and rejection of God.

But God is merciful. He forgave our sins, as the church cried to Him to remember mercy in His wrath (Hab. 3:2). As when a plague broke over Israel, the result of David’s prideful counting of the fighting men of the nation and God prescribed a cure to David (2 Sam. 24:1-19), God, by grace, gave the world a cure. He opened the eyes of scientists who sought the antidote for a vaccine. The temperature of the world came down as millions of infected people, women and children in vulnerable countries, got the relief they needed.

God knew scientists would take the glory for the vaccine and the cure. Yet, for the elects’ sake, He did it, though He shares His glory with no one (Isa. 48:11). The Lord heard the worldwide church’s cry and timely intervened, but do not tell the world now that God did it. Science was king then and continues to rule the mind of the world. After the relief, the world behaved like Pharaoh each time God relented during the Egyptian plagues under Moses (Exodus 5:1-10:29). They still hardened their hearts and refused to bow to the Lordship of Christ Jesus. But one day, every knee will bow to Him, and every tongue will confess that He is Lord to the glory of God the Father (Romans 14:11).

So, like the men of Issachar, the church must understand the times – what God has done and is doing – and know what she must do (1 Chron. 12:32). Our mission is clear: To give glory to Jesus and proclaim the Gospel everywhere.

Maranatha

Prayer

Our dear heavenly Father, we thank you for your grace that is in Christ Jesus and has saved us from sin and death. Please, help us to see our nakedness and to know how desperately we need your grace everyday. May we respond to your gift of life in Christ with profuse worship and praise of you who alone deserves it. Amen!