Frontline workers risk contamination
John 11 v43-44 “When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” 44 The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”
Recently I met a few people who have been trapped behind grave clothes for many years. I only had a short time with them and I wasn’t able to do a great deal but before we said goodbye one of them thanked me for helping them deal with some past issues.
The love of Jesus is still drawing men and women from their graves of pain every single day.
Today our brilliant frontline workers are going to work risking themselves being contaminated. We all know so many of these workers who simply keep going because it is the right thing to do.
Lazarus is a risk to the Church from the grave clothes, death, decay and contamination.
I pray the Church will learn from what the frontline workers are demonstrating and take up the responsibility to help those who have been in dungeons of despair.
Yesterday for the first time church buildings were locked down because of the contamination. I was in one building getting ready for a live stream service and I looked out at the empty chairs and wondered who would normally sit in that row, in that chair. We will come back to a gathered worship service and when we do we will be really grateful for them. We won’t mind the technical glitches, we won’t mind if the band was too loud or whether they played our favourite song, just being together will be worth everything.
However, the frontline workers teach us that we are not in our buildings to warm seats and fill pews. We are there to be equipped to then selflessly lay our hands on death clothing and say, “We are going to unravel your nightmares. We are going to stand with you and untie the bondages of hurt and anger, lust and abuse, pain and bitterness. You are not going back into that grave!”
There is a greater contamination than the corona virus and God has a frontline army, the Church and the call is still the same and that is to take off the grave clothes.
We need to risk being contaminated more.
Missions Paul 