Thinking Biblically About the COVID-19 Pandemic: An Interview with John MacArthur

hi I'm Phil Johnson and it is my great privilege to be your host each day on grace to you and with me in the studio today as always is John MacArthur but today we're going to keep him in the studio a bit longer than usual to discuss the kovat 19 pandemic and we want to talk about some of the challenges and the opportunities that are facing believers in this time of distress and inconvenience John we're now several weeks into a long period of international quarantine and I have to say that for me as well as for lots of our listeners I know that your sermons each Sunday have been a lifeline of encouragement and strength and while it seems we're swimming in this ocean of dismay and inconvenience and concern about the future lots of bad news you've sort of given us God's Word to keep us anchored and thank you for that thanks for keeping us anchored well it's my joy to do that I think one of our politicians are one of our philosophers made the comment don't ever waste a crisis well that from a spiritual standpoint that's true as well this is a global crisis and you've got to speak to it we've always done that you know this goes back to member 911 yeah and I 9/11 happened on a Tuesday and by Sunday I had to be prepared to speak and it wound up being an hour-and-a-half message on Islam jihad and the Bible to explain what was going on I remember but before that there was a there was a national incident over the fall of Jimmy Swaggart and I gave a message trying to help people understand what can happen to a minister who's unfaithful and then the Supreme Court decision to legitimize home homosexual marriage same-sex marriage was another crisis moment to which I spoke through the years of my ministry there have been times when you had to stop whatever you're doing because the whole world was giving its attention to something and it needed to be explained from a biblical standpoint and certainly that that was my intention the first couple of Sunday's to give a divine perspective on what was going on and comfort God's people the third week however I wanted to turn and take the opportunity to give the gospel and that I did last Sunday and I will do it again this Sunday yeah you know you mentioned the sermon you gave in the wake of September 11th that is I believe the longest sermon in our catalog and for years it was the most distributed sermon the most requested of all your sermons maybe you should start preaching longer sermons yeah I would love to preach longer sermons but I'd have to lock all the doors to keep everybody in there and the nursery ladies would be crying blue murder on my back there was another one that was virtually that long and it was called a jet tore through revelation yes and I think trying to do a jet tore through the whole book of Revelation in one one run did take an hour and a half as well yeah and for those who may not know John is preaching every Sunday morning as usual and the sermons plus some special music are being live-streamed to every corner of the globe but John you're preaching to a nearly empty auditorium what's that like well first of all I want to say thanks to you and Darlene for sitting out there you are the only person on the left side of a three thousand seat auditorium we thought you might need somebody that and some of my kids were scattered on the other side and yeah we I think we have about a dozen people yeah preaching to an auditorium that seats 3,000 and there's only a dozen people there's a little bit different people have asked me what what is it like to do that without an audience and to be honest with you Phil and you would know this because you're a preacher I'm not really that conscious of how many people are in an auditorium right way that the whole of preaching is basically an exercise going on between my two years it's a it's a mental battle it's a mental struggle to capture the essence of biblical truth and convey it to the people you know you don't really interact with people you don't really catch the eye of people you're not having a conversation you're proclaiming the word of God and so whether there are ten people there or 10,000 people there sometimes you might assume that would change the dynamic of how one preaches but it's it's never done that for me because I'm just trying to struggle to make sure I communicate that's the best way I can and I I have the same energy for the troop my energy doesn't come from the audience it comes from the truth right I'm driven by the love for this truth that I want to communicate yeah and I noticed that as I sit there and watch you preach to this virtually empty auditorium you you're as focused as ever you're as energetic as ever as lively as ever and it's like you're are you thinking of those thousands of people who are live-streaming no no I'm thinking of this truth which I love and which I'm so passionate about that has to be understood and conveyed the passion comes from the truth it rises from this incredible divine revelation that I have the privilege of explaining no I am aware I think last Sunday 85 nations were connected 60,000 separate devices and if you if you had somewhere between five and eight people for those you maybe have three four hundred five hundred thousand people listening so I'm actually preaching to hundreds of thousands of more people in an empty auditorium but that I know that but that I'm not thinking about that I'm thinking about what it is that I'm trying to draw out of the word of God and make clear to whoever is listening it's ironic isn't it that that pandemic though it's emptied the auditorium has actually increased the size of the audience of people who are listening to you live yeah and that again is the blessing of technology this is just an astonishing thing to realize and you also have a very rapt audience a very intense audience because there's fear and doubts and questions and people are face to face with their mortality there's a certain fear of death you know I've been doing a few things that I have to do and yesterday as I was moving around for the first time almost everywhere I went people were wearing masks so that's kind of just new right and it speaks to the issue that people walking all by themselves with no one else on the street are wearing a mask yeah what what do they think is going to happen but it speaks to the issue of this this almost irrational fear that something could strike them and that that that sense of mortality and the reality of death and things out of their control makes them more interested in I think transcendent ultimate spiritual answers and answers about eternity now I know there are a lot of people who are also concerned about something striking you because I am getting lots more questions than ever from people who say how's your health holding up my health is really wonderful I for the last two years I think are three years after every Shepherd's conference I was sick with the flu last year I was very sick with the flu and by the way last year the normal flu killed 80,000 Americans Wow that's more than will die from this corona virus in America it killed 80 thousand so that was last year and I got that flu and I took z-pak and you know chicken soup and went to sleep and I was fine so yeah the Lord has given me strength and good health and so this year at the Shepherd's conference purposely they kept me away from the tight crowds that sometimes press in on me Ryan typically because after two or three years of getting a bug after each Shepherd's conference they said you know we don't want to do that and so since that time everybody sort of evaporated out of my world and now I've been great I don't know how much more time I can spend at home because there are so many house chores that I have now been assigned to do by Patricia cleaning the garage and all kinds of other assorted things been kind of fun really to have some downtime and do some of those things that you have on your little domestic checklist but yeah Kingdom issues prevent you from getting to them but now I'm getting to them and getting them done it's a little bit like a domestic reboot you know I'm doing yeah stuff that I thought for years I'll do that when I get around to it and and now I finally can get around to it yeah and the good news is being 24/7 with Patricia we've decided we like each other a lot that's good is working out really well after all these years she's had to sacrifice time with you for years because of your ministry and hopefully this will make up help make up for that without making her get tired of you yeah well the question went from are you ever going to be home to are you ever going to leave it's a little bit different yeah I kind of doubt so now talk about the the rationale of the elders decision to suspend our regular church services I mean you must have considered what about Hebrews 10:25 let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good works not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together or acts 5:29 we must obey God rather than men I was there so I know we discussed those those verses talked about that well first of all the clear demand of Scripture is to be subject to the powers that be because there are deigned of God Romans 13 Romans 13 and first Peter talks about the same thing honor the king and those are an authority over you God has set them in that authority the Apostle Paul tells Timothy that were to be good citizens where we live a quiet and peaceable life we aren't rebels we don't start protests we don't defy the government we conform we we're submissive to the government as as basically ordained by God so that was an easy call for us what would have made a difference would have been if this was persecution of the church if all of a sudden the government decided to shut down churches as an act of persecution against churches we would defy that because now you're into acts 5 where Peter actually says do we obey God or men you say we don't meet God as we do we must meet you say don't preach the gospel we say we must preach the gospel so when the government gets to the point where it basically persecutes the church the church has to take that persecution and still do what God has commanded the church to do the the other thing that we talked about with the elders was if we defy this and if we say we're gonna meet anyway we run the risk of exposing people to this illness needlessly and why would we want to do that because this is a health issue this is a health crisis and since like any Church many of the people in our church are older we wouldn't want to expose them to that we we've only had as far as I know and this was up to yesterday we've only had one couple in our church in the Spanish ministry who actually got the coronavirus but that couple and not not an older couple either wound up in the hospital mmm because it was such a virulent experience for them so we wouldn't want to say well let them come to church and mingle with everybody else let it be whatever is gonna be is gonna be that doesn't make sense we wouldn't purposely expose our people that's not caring for your people we wouldn't purposely expose them to that and just we wouldn't have known you know we we just said look we're not going to do that in Shepherds conference which was pretty amazing that we actually got it in because after Shepherds conference the week after every conference was shut down right everywhere but we had Shepherds conference and post Shepherds conference there was a ninety-year-old pastor Russian pastor from Washington who it was discovered was ill and died and they thought it was the corona virus and it turned out to be the corona virus some days later the report came back that was after the Shepherd's conference that's the only person that we know of that came out of the Shepherd's conference and had that virus and and ultimately died and the interesting thing about that is when he was here it was his birthday when he was at the shepherds come as it was his birthday and have a doctor friend who said I hugged him four times because I know him and I hugged him because it was his birthday and that's what Russians do and he said I could tell you he was a picture of health he was in there was no reason to think that he was at all ill so it may have been that he contacted that virus when he got back home to Washington and through that the Lord took him to heaven well we wouldn't want to needlessly why would we want to expose people to that so it was a pretty easy thing to think about and the other side of it was this if this is happening at this level this is in the plan of God this is in his purpose so what would we what would we do that would maximize the impact that we could have in a different environment and that's where we said I'd it didn't take me two seconds to immediately say hey I'm gonna preach on Sunday we're gonna preach on livestream and we'll just let it go and as I just said a few moments ago it's covering the globe so we're reaching people we never would have reached by not having the service in the normal way right with the prospect of this going longer and longer do you think the elders will reconsider you know when do we when do we get back together are we just going to wait until yeah world opens up again yeah I don't know the answer to that I don't know the future I do know that those people who defy that order in this litigious society are going that this country is going to see lawsuits the likes of which it has never seen every person who is at the disposal of an attorney is going to be marching in the direction of suing somebody if they contacted this illness somewhere in a public place or you know whether it's a market or what I'm it's already starting yeah there are lawsuits so the you don't want to expose yourself needlessly to that either but how it's going to end I don't no I think in all honesty the thing is over exaggerated I mean we all know that an initial reports were that two million to four million Americans could die now as of today it's down to 50,000 and that's less than died of the normal flu last year so you know we've been dealing with information and misinformation and chaos and confusion and messed up models so I don't know how they're gonna resolve it but my assumption would be that this is going to the quarantine aspect of it stay-at-home aspect of it is going to shut down sooner rather than later I would like to think that by May things will start to loosen up and will certainly by the end of May hopefully get back to a meeting together in the meantime however as you know our church is very active we're going to open up a video studio and all of our pastors and all of our teachers of all the fellowship groups are teaching video lessons the seminary all the courses are in video the University all the courses are in video we are yesterday we took groceries we do every week to 60 homes of the older people who don't want to go to the grocery store and we're meeting all of their needs all kinds of ministries going on zooom everybody's zooming all over the place with these zooms green conversations so that you can't keep our people apart right so they're finding ways to connect by phone and by you know video yeah in some ways it sort of stepped up the the amount of hands-on shepherding that some of us are doing and of course we're still preaching as you say yeah and I've even actually been to the hospital where a dear friend's wife Lance Quinn yes was dying and now she's gone to be with the Lord Beth and you loved her like I did and we who knew Lanson death and so yeah I'm trying to minister to that family in that situation so life has gone on as usual but it is true that the the Lord will accomplish his purposes and his will through this we don't we don't have to defy the powers that be in order to accomplish the will of God we can conform to what the Lord is doing in the world and allowing in the world and find ways to I feel it's sort of like Paul that my imprisonment has fallen out for the furtherance of the gospel right now on the other side of that equation though does it not concern you that with all the government overreach and and exaggerated you know predictions and and even the mayor of New York said that he was going to permanently close churches if they didn't strictly adhere to the social distancing things does it does it concern you that this could open the door to future persecution that this could be a harbinger of bad things to come well we're the church from the perspective of the elites in our culture the educated the university the literati you could say the elites they hate Christianity they hate Christianity because Christianity has morality that they completely reject so they hate Christianity so any excuse they could have for attacking us I don't think they particularly care about attacking some religions because there are religions that aren't a threat to them that don't throw the Bible in their face and and demand that people live according to the Word of God so sure I mean we're I think as a nation and as a world we're headed toward the persecution of the church we're headed toward greater hostility toward Christianity the government we've learned one thing for sure in the government's action that you don't you don't need an army to conquer a nation all you need is fear mm-hmm you don't need an army you don't need a troop you don't need to fire a shot just terrify people that they might die and they'll all roll over in complete compliance they'll give up their freedoms they'll put on silly masks they'll put gloves on their hands and they'll sit in their house for as long as you tell them to sit there you can conquer an entire nation with fear so we've seen an illustration of that that we love our freedoms in America we love the idea that we are given freedom in America we love capitalism in America we resent Christians certainly resent the idea of communism we're you're not the person who determines your own fate you you know you you don't you don't work for your own bread and if you don't work you don't eat as the Bible says so we like that as a political system as a social system and so we don't like the government control and we wonder whether now they've got control of they ever gonna let go but that is purely political that's sociological economic stuff that's not Kingdom stuff that's not kingdom matters so I think we just whatever happens in terms of the future of America we're gonna enjoy probably less and less freedoms anyway there may be speed ups to the robbing us of those freedoms coming through something like this and maybe things that are even more dramatic in the future that would take away freedoms but we do learn one thing that if you can terrify people if you can make them afraid you can control them and that's how basically that's how Hitler operated I mean you made people fear Christianity and then he wiped out the church made people fear the Jews and he massacred the Jews so there's there's a fear factor in all of this but as Christians whatever the political structure is whatever the economics and whatever the sociology of it all is it's all temporary and the king is coming and he's going to establish the kingdom of righteousness when he arrives and we're gonna be a part of that so you take every opportunity that you're given in the world and you use it to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ and I think as a shepherd and a pastor I want my people to be joyful I wanted to be encouraged I want them to be hopeful because as you sometimes the environmentalists make a big issue about what's going to happen to the earth and global warming and all of that and if you want to see a real global warming you go to the Peter's epistle where he says the elements are going to melt with a fervent heat and the whole heavens on earth is going to go out of existence and that's not going to happen because you use hairspray by the way that that reality has come so we look at everything that happens in the world from a divine perspective this is a disposable planet the Lord is going to do what he's going to do in his time in his plan I said that one of the questions that came up recently was is this coronavirus a fulfillment of eschatological prophecy and the answer is of course not we have the flu every year the flu is just this is life and you know a hundred thousand people die every day and so there's always a pandemic of death going on all the time that's the way it is in the world of so whatever may be the forms that these things take we need to keep the gospel focus and proclaim the truth right alright so now we've curtailed our fellowship and yet as you've mentioned you're still preaching we've stepped up our shepherding and compassion ministries and and all of that one question that people frequently ask and I've gotten this by email phone calls people asking how are we going to do the Lord's table and there are churches that are that are trying to devise means of doing virtual communion what are your thoughts about that there's a phrase used in 1st Corinthians and it's this phrase when you come together and it's used four times when you come together when you come together when you come together that's a simple phrase but I think the lord's table is an experience for the church that is gathered I wouldn't do I look there's no prohibition against a family doing the lord's table led by the father I don't think that's the that's the plan the plan is for the gathered church to come around the Lord's table it's a collective it's a collective experience that where we consider our sin and the greatness of the sacrifice of Christ to provide for our sin it's a time of self-examination hard examination all that but I think it's for the gathered church and so as a church we have just said when this is all over we're going to have a gathering and we're going to have a great celebration and we're going to come to the Lord's table but in the meantime virtual Lords table is a poor excuse for for the reality it reminds me of a I was in Colorado and I visited a megachurch a kind of charismatic mega church and was with Patricia and some of my grandkids and the guy preached and you know they had the typical mega church music and lights and show and all that and in the sky preached and at the end he said oh by the way this is communion sunday and there's a table by the exit door and when you go out grab some crackers and and and juice Wow my grandson looked at me and said did I just hear what I heard grab some crackers and juice Gramps let's get out of this place so I'm not much for the grabbing crackers and juice approach to the Lord's table and I think I think it's better to do it right right wait till we do it right and that's what we've decided to do good yeah and in fact there's something valuable I think in in letting people wait and and maybe for the first time in a lot of cases and appreciate the significance of this ordinance yeah because for half a century at Grace Church it's been a regular part of our life as a church and now this is the longest we have gone without having the lord's table it'll ya it'll be a couple of months by the time we get back together yeah in fact in that vein this is an extraordinary thing this quarantine there as you said there have been worse pestilences you know that have gone global and all that but in the long history of humanity there's never been a crisis that's been dealt with quite like this one where the entire economy of the world instantly shuts down and it's one of those seismic world-changing crises where I think even after this is over the world will never be the same did you foresee any major changes that are going to affect the church even after we do come back together well human hearts aren't going to change the people in power aren't going to change they're still going to try to keep their power they may have they may have ratcheted up their control to some degree because they've they've taken power where they never had it before I don't know but that's sort of irrelevant to me I don't really know I don't really care what the form of the government is I mean have prefer certain things obviously but we are Kingdom people and you know My Kingdom is not of this world is exactly what our Lord said and if my kingdom was of this world My servants would fight right so but we don't fight we say okay this is what God is doing in the world he's in charge this is this is within his framework and his plan how can we live as lights in the world and make the gospel the issue and again that that 911 experience was dramatic because all of a sudden people saw a vulnerability and the reality of their mortality and the imminence of death and being beyond their control and there was a new openness to am I ready to die you remember I think was in the 90s earthquake we had a massive earthquake young and that within the next week or two the church was packed with all these people who this is completely out of my control yep the Northridge earthquake and so a previous earthquake back in 1972 affected people because it it frightened them I remember saying to Larry King when he said what's the lesson of 9/11 when I was on that Larry King show I said the lesson is you're gonna die and you're not in control of win that's the lesson I mean people in a tower and all of a sudden they're dead that's what frightens people so I think these kinds of things the Lord can use to awaken people you know what Jesus said in Matthew 11 he said come unto me all you who are weary and heavy-laden and I'll give you rest it's the people who can't carry the burden it's the people who can't find rest who come to the Lord yeah so this is a good thing actually well in fact in that same vein talked about some of the spiritual lessons that we can learn from this pandemic it certainly reminds us for example that life is tenuous not only like you say we don't have control over it but it's short James 4:14 you're just a vapor that appears for a little while then vanishes away what other spiritual reminders would you see in this current crisis well I think just touching base with what you just said and the thought from James the life is a vapor we don't know how many millions of babies are aborted and then you add all the illnesses and all the diseases and all the natural causes and as I said death is all around us death is all around us and it's it's not just death that's all around us but this is a very despairing culture we live in today and what makes not death fearful but life so vapin and empty is the inability to make meaningful relationships marriages are disasters in any kind of relationship between men and women basically is assumed to be temporary short live and even a marriage and so people say why did I get married I don't want to get a divorce I don't want all the the hassles that go with divorce and kids don't get along with their parents parents don't know how to train their children they don't want to discipline them they've been taught for generations now that spanking is a crime against your child it's child abuse and the Bible is really clear that if you don't do that you're going to get a rebel and so we have all that rebellion marriages are in disastrous condition families are shattered and we're starting to see that even in this Cova 19 thing that what's escalating is violence in the home home violence violence between husband and wife and parents and children abusive parents now aren't leaving home and the kids don't get any relief they don't get any protection so what is happening is it isn't just that we might die it's that life just is not fulfilling there's no joy there's no happiness and and then you add another factor to it which I think quite interesting there are there are no sports yeah so you've got the usual escapes aren't there and the bars aren't open and that's another escape that's not there and I don't know maybe even getting drugs is more difficult than it normally would be because they can't get out on the streets and do that I don't know to what degree but the normal devices that people use to take them away they can't go to the movies television looks like a pile of reruns all the time nothing nothing that they usually fill their void with is the way it used to be and I think in all this emptiness we just need to take every opportunity we can to proclaim the gospel this is a prime opportunity for Christians to be bold evangelists isn't it because people are facing their mortality with an unusual sense of immediacy the threat of disaster hangs over the whole world and our economy hearts are full of fear and the only real solution to what is humanity's biggest problem is the gospel people are I think ready to hear it yeah and there's another thing as well you remember the final message I gave at the Shepherd's conference was a call for unity in the church yes Graham talked about how all these identity groups in the the the racists issues the feminist issues the homosexual issues that have now come into the church and you've got all these identity groups and all these victim groups everybody needs to be victim we've talked a lot about that that you don't have any leverage in the culture unless you're a victim and that that's the the then the more victim categories you fit into the more power you have because you're a victim right you know we've talked about that that's called intersectionality where this category of victim and that category of victim intersect with each other and you're double triple victims and that that was that was dominating that the dialogue in evangelicalism you know we've got to do reparations for this and we've got to let women be what they should be and we've got to pay back people who were abused in the past and we've got to have a space for people who are celibate homosexuals because that's normal for them and all this identity and it was it was caustic it was mean it was divisive and I made the statement in that message at Shepherd's conference that when people don't have the real enemy in view they fight each other hmm when when an army doesn't have a real enemy to fight they fight each other when a team doesn't have a real opponent to fight they fight each other and all of a sudden that has completely disappeared you just don't hear anything about it yeah where did all those people go where are all the people who are saying the most important thing in the world is to give women their place and let women be preachers and make sure we do reparations for anybody that suffered in the past some of them still are on Twitter yeah but their tweets are oblivious that's the reality sort of shows the pettiness doesn't it people are really dying and you're claiming to be a victim because someone holds a different opinion and by the way Twitter is an appropriate term to describe all that stuff that's it doesn't send beyond that but it but it is it fades when there's a greater enemy it fan what happens all of a sudden is people aren't concerned about who they are and about their group identity honestly this is a good thing they're trying to help each other they're trying to survive they're getting groceries for each other they're taking care of older people they're complying there they're serving people they can their people are coming up with all kinds of ways to help people and all of a sudden that stuff that occupied them is gone because they have a real enemy that they're they're fighting and they can't they can't see the they can't see the importance of the pettiness and for at least for at least a little while right I think when it fades away the pettiness may come back but maybe in the meantime they'll cross some lines and make some relationships that will moderate that in the future right and you would agree right that the gospel ultimately is the only real solution to to all of these problems well of course it's only when you're heartened and life is transformed that you love that's that you know with the world knows us by our love Jesus said they'll know you by your love you love one for another so the only the gospel transforms the heart into a heart of love so with that in mind let me ask you about an article that appeared in Time magazine just a few days ago many of our listeners that magazines still exist it does I don't know if they only publish online but I saw this article online and many of our listeners will know the name of the author NT Wright he's an anglican bishop an academic formerly I think the Bishop of Durham and now he's a professor of New Testament and early Christianity at the University of st. Andrews and so Time magazine asked him to give church man's view on the pandemic and he wrote an article with this title this is his title Christianity offers no answers to the coronavirus it's not supposed to it's rare to see someone get so much wrong even before he gets into the past the title don't you think yeah I I know you could take that title a lot of ways Christianity is not a drug Christianity is not a vaccination Christianity is not going to save you from the virus by the way just thinking about that Phil isn't it amazing how little the healers the supposed healers have to say right in the middle of a coronavirus where did they all go yeah what wait wait a minute where are they when we need the most in fact I think it's Bethel Church that that stopped all their healing meetings during the coronavirus what kind of a crazy oxymoron is that yeah but I think maybe I didn't read the article by ante right who's not trustworthy by the way and who does really let me summarize this point for you here's here's I'll read you part of what he says this is his basic thesis he says that instead of trying to understand why there is suffering in the world what we need he says and this is an exact quote he says quote what we need is to recover the biblical tradition of lament he says lament is what happens when people ask why and don't get an answer it's where we go when we move beyond our self-centered worry about our sins and failings and look more broadly at the suffering of the world and further he says the point of lament is that God also laments so he's basically saying the the right way to look at this is that these things are beyond anyone's control including God he's lamenting there is no answer to the question of why and I know you've given whole sermons yeah taking the opposite that that is a very irresponsible way to look at anything because essentially what he is saying is I don't see God active in this situation I see God outside of it lamenting over the fact that it's even happening yeah in fact this is a bizarre view of God there was another well-known Christian leader I won't name him but he was interviewed and asked why would God allow this to happen this was his answer and again I'm quoting his exact words he said well I don't think that God planned for this to happen that wouldn't be your answer would it well look if God didn't know about this if God didn't plan this if God isn't in every single aspect of this then God's not God somebody else is God the coronaviruses God or the devil is God but but but God by definition is the sovereign over everything and if you deny that the true God of Scripture who claims over and over and over and over to be sovereign over everything and to do good and to allow evil in the world if if you believe that the Bible takes everything back to God everything then you know God is in this if you deny that God is in this and you see God outside weeping about it then you have denied the God that is revealed in Scripture you've denied the true God it isn't that God finds pleasure in punishment and all consequence to sin in some form all right punishment indirectly we see Jeremiah weeping you know in a sense those are the tears of God but but to think of God as someone like us who just sits in a corner and feels bad because stuffs happening that he can't control there's no comfort in that well yeah the only comfort we all have is because God is sovereign and because he transcends everything and in everything he has his purpose and his purpose is good yeah good for us and glory for him right right now you touched on this earlier you mentioned it in passing but I want to come back to it a few of our listeners have written are called to ask if you think this current plague is one of those endtime pestilences that is described in Matthew 24 or the book of Revelation you said earlier no I mean we have the flu every year this is a similar manifestation of that could it be a harbinger of worse things to come now I think biblically this-this-this doesn't connect with anything in the in the Bible you I'm hearing people say this is the judgment of God on homosexuality or abortion or you know our failure to put God in the right place listen when that judgment comes it's not going to be the flu it's not going to be the flu last time that judgment came he drowned the entire world the whole human race except for eight people in Genesis 6 there is coming the judgment of God and when the whole world is burned up prior to that there is a series of judgments that occur they are described in Revelation from chapter 6 through 9 in the return of Jesus Christ but those are things that also described by our Lord in Matthew 24 and 25 that happened in the time of tribulation but that's after the rapture of the church and the rapture of the church the catching away of the church which is the next event is a sinus event so this is just life so if if 50,000 Americans die of the flu is that apocalyptic no no I mean people are dying all the time you would have to go back to 1918 and said well what about when a hundred million people died of the Spanish flu back in 1918 was that apocalyptic or you'd go back to the bubonic plague when millions across Europe died and you can go back to well go back to two wars the world war one world war two millions died does that mean that because millions died in world war 2 that was the wars and rumors of wars event no that's just life that is life life involves death and it involves death by many many means and part of the fall is bacteria and virus and corruption and all of that so I don't I don't see this in any sense being apocalyptic or dealing with the the last days just before Christ establishes his kingdom far more horrifying realities will come then you know then you have a fourth of the earth dying and a third of the earth dying in the book of Revelation and you have the heavens collapsing and darkness coming and that great balls of fire out of the sky hitting the earth and the waters being corrupted and those are massively different than the flu right I have a shelf full of books that I've collected they go back to the the 19th century the middle of the 1800s really where people have been trying to shoehorn what were then current events into biblical timelines of future events and it's interesting to read I mean pretty much every world crisis every war every disease every major ruler in the history of the past 200 years has been identified by somebody as possibly the Antichrist yeah right No so far all of those predictions have proved wrong so there clearly there's a danger in that kind of speculation we're not entitled to read meaning into divine providence that isn't clearly there in Scripture on the other hand there there's a danger of becoming so apathetic about the return of the Lord that we're not ready for it when it happens it is getting closer well yeah every day is closer of course but but let me to reconstruct the way to look at this virus okay some bats in China have this this corona virus they're in a lab some guys working in the lab he gets it few other people get it they go to town they spread it around if they had better controls in the in the lab we don't have it if they if the Chinese government told the truth about what was going on we don't have it if the models were different that were assumed that millions of people all over the earth were gonna die we're not going to have this if we had stopped people coming from China from spreading around the world at the first this isn't going to happen so youyou cannot attribute all of those things to God if we heard this too some years ago people were warned even American previous presidents were warned that we needed to get more ventilators if we'd had more ventilators fewer people would have died this is this is not how the divine judgment of God works you you can't stop the judgment of God the eschatological apocalyptic judgment of God by having more ventilators so this is just life this is life it's appointed a man wants to die you don't know when it's going to happen it could be a car accident it could be an illness it could be the flu and maybe it complicates itself and it attaches to something some other weakness and so forth but when the judgment of God is described in the Bible it is if it's a plague it is a plague like in Egypt it is it is a plague that basically has no explanation but a divine one this this could have been prevented by better preparation and in fact the outcome of this is probably going to be that will be better for better prepared in the future for this too so that would mean if it was a judgment of God we figured out ways to hedge against the judgment of God so this is just life this is the flu this is life in the fallen world and we have to deal with virus one of the obvious effects has been widespread fear you see that in believers and unbelievers alike and I know you've dealt with that a lot recently fear we're told in Scripture not to fear is it a sin to fear in a situation like this yeah it's a sin to fear if you mean by fear the sense that everything's out of control it's sensible to say drive carefully because you fear that if you're irresponsible or you don't drive carefully it's you could get in an accident it's it's sensible to fear texting when you're driving right you don't want to do that it's sensible not to get in an airplane with a guy who just got his license and wants to fly you over the Rockies that's a normal fear yeah I think there are there are fears that we would put in the category of sensible protections you want to be careful about certain things that's that's normal but the fear you're talking about the sinful fear is that the world is not in the control of God that way if you divest God of His sovereignty over everything that's a sin so whatever comes into your life your response as a Christian is God has this it's in the plan it's in his purpose it fits what he's doing all things will work together for good to those who love him and are called according to his purpose this is for our good counted all joy when you fall into various trials because they have a perfecting work God is using everything in this world to fulfill his will fulfill his purpose and conform us to Christ that takes the fear out of it I don't have any fear of dying because I'm gonna be with the Lord I don't have any fear of what would cause me to die because that's the way I'm gonna go to be with the Lord I don't have a fear of anything else that would alter my life in some permanent way because that too would be the purpose of the Lord look I don't I I wouldn't want to be I would like to be able to live the way I'm living now with strength and energy and able to do everything I've always done but that may not be the Lord's plan for me he might extend my life beyond my ability to do anything and you know nobody wants a lingering life where you're just somebody everybody has to take care of but if God has a purpose in that that's his purpose that's his will so I think what takes the fear away is that God is your protector God is the one who has your life in his hands and he knows every single thing that goes on in your life and he has a purpose and a plan and he will bring that to its fruition and it's inevitable he's in control that is the ultimate confidence that removes all fear and if you if you are afraid it's because you don't trust God in that process of accomplishing his will that's a great encouragement and you know as we're talking about these things I I'm realizing there are undoubtedly hundreds if not thousands of our listeners who are going to be affected in devastating ways by the shutdown of the economy people will lose their jobs their businesses people who we love and and know and listen to speak to those people and and if you would close in a prayer for them sure and again it's it's what I said the first Sunday that I did the livestream in Matthew if the Lord takes care of the grass of the field which flourishes today and tomorrow has burned up will he not take care of you if he feeds the birds will he not feed you oh you of little faith I think it was David who said in the Bible I've not seen the Lord's people begging bread my God shall supply all your needs so everything that happens in our lives is in his control I can't say that about unbelievers who aren't his children but those of us who are his children are in his care he will supply all our needs he will never leave us he will never forsake us now your life may change you know you may have to live in a different place you could end up in a bankruptcy situation that would cause you to restructure your life but the way you want to respond to that is that this is meant for my good and God's glory and I've got to find the pathway to the next phase of his will in my life nothing is forever anyway I remember a a friend who is a builder in Colorado a home builder and there was a huge fire and burned up hundreds and hundreds of homes and he was involved in the rebuilding and he said the most interesting thing about that whole process was I never met a single person for whom I was building a home who was sorry the other one built burnt down and I said really and why said because it ended the necessity to make so many decisions about stuff yeah I understand that I get that yeah so life can get unnecessarily complicated and it may be that the Lord is putting you through something that will simplify your life and here's the bottom line life consists not and the things we possess right doesn't consists in the relationships we enjoy you know I don't care what kind of car I Drive I really don't care what kind of house I live in but I do care about the people that enrich and fulfill my life so let the let your life be defined by the relationships that are most precious to you and don't worry about the other things the Lord will take care of them maybe this is a good time to have a word of Prayer together right father we thank you again for the confidence we have in you you are our God you are sovereign over everything you hold us in your hands our life is hid with Christ in God says scripture though we know that you will meet all our needs that we will never go begging that you care for the grass and the flowers and the birds and you care for us far more than that we thank you that everything you do in our lives is to conform us to Christ's likeness we thank you that we learn the most from what we lose and where we fail far more than what we gain and where we succeed help us to trust your providence and your purpose in the end that we might be more like Christ so in the times when we maybe even lose the things that are important part of our lives may we let them go readily may we hold everything that we have in the world of possessions as a very light thing may we hold everything with with loose grip so that you take it away and bring us to even a better place may we not be concerned about things in this life temporal things but rather be concerned about that eternal weight of glory may we set our affections on things above and not on things on the earth because it's above in heaven where our father is our Savior is and where our reward awaits so give us heavenly perspective and bring us joy in that hope we pray in Christ's name Amen

Channel: Grace to You

Views: 413,698

Rating: 4.7767811 out of 5

Keywords: John MacArthur, Bible, Preaching, Christianity, Expository, Exposition, Sermon, Jesus, Christ, Grace to You, sovereignty of god, coronovirus, corona, virus

Id: izr7uySLwPc

Length: 55min 36sec (3336 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 23 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/rratedreligion]

Do you agree or disagree? Some people feel the churches should be open.