The Speak Life Podcast, sharing Jesus in everyday life.
SPEAKER_01Hello everybody. Welcome to the live cast. My name's Glenn Scrivener. Welcome. My name's Paul Feasy. And uh we are coming to you from the Speak Life Studios here in Eastbourne in the UK. And uh we are talking about what everybody's talking about. COVID 19. Or is it COVID? I don't know. Uh that's neither more, I guess. That's the least probably the least of a concern, really, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, because uh 110,000 people infected with coronavirus virus, or or at least confirmed cases. Um the true number will be many, many times uh that number. Likely. Likely. And uh deaths are currently uh upwards of three thousand. Um you hesitate to give the figures because they're changing all the time and uh increasing at the rate at which they are increasing. Uh that's what exponential growth kind of is. And uh we just wanted to uh talk today about um plagues, pestilence, and pandemics because uh we've been here before. And uh the Church of Jesus Christ has been here before, and uh we wanted to highlight kind of seven different aspects of church history and how people have uh responded to plagues in Christian history. But uh what is the state of play today, Paul? What what are we facing?
SPEAKER_00Uh yeah, so um it seems I'm gonna pop these off. Don't really need them at the moment. Uh so I mean it seems to be I didn't touch my face. Oh, did he? He touched his face. No, I touched my headphone.
SPEAKER_01For those who are lit uh well, it it still counts. For those those following along at home, uh we we are trying not to touch our face uh during this live cast. Because apparently you touch your face 90 times a day, um, but this is not good for the spread. Well, apparently not, no.
SPEAKER_00So apparently it's yeah, you're supposed to limit touching your face. You are really miffed about this. I am distinctly miffed. Yikes.
SPEAKER_01One nil. So uh we'll try not to. And if at home you spot somebody and we haven't spotted it, then um yeah, do let us know uh on top chat.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Um yeah, so I mean, as you said, study play, we say about 110,000 cases confirmed. Yeah. Um but they're saying that they people don't people could be incubators or carriers for up to two weeks or so before uh symptoms show. Right. Uh so anybody could be spreading it around anywhere, quite frankly. Yeah. Um but you know, to try and put it a bit in perspective, um, compared to um kind of flu, uh they reckon that there's about two hundred and ninety thousand to six hundred and fifty thousand cases of flu each year. Deaths from flu. Sure. Yeah. So that's the the scale is quite different at the moment. Um and so um I'm not touching my face. Um it seems at the moment as well the most not all, but most who have been worse affected by it and maybe and the fatalities have come from those who have been more vulnerable either because of their age or because of underlying health conditions. Right. Yeah. Um no deaths from anyone under nine? I think yeah, I think that's right. Yeah, and I uh uh people have said it's a bit like um obviously many differences, but in like like chicken pox is much milder in children as a virus than it is in adults, and it seems to be the case with this that it doesn't affect children as badly, which is you know is a is a good thing. It's merciful.
SPEAKER_01It is merciful. Um I did read this uh tweet thread by uh Liz Sprecht uh just a few days ago, and uh she was really pointing to the risk of systemic healthcare failure. So so even if one or two percent um who contract the virus uh die from it, um actually, you know, 20% might be hospitalized, 10% might be in ICU units. And um this is going to um have a catastrophic effect on on healthcare services, you know. Yeah. Um if if you think of, you know, if let's say maybe 60% of of the population might end up contracting, and if 20% of that need to be hospitalized, we do not have the beds um for for that. And uh Liz uh Sprecht has said, let's talk math, um, because she's from the United States, where um they don't know how to abbreviate mathematics. So um what she really means is let's talk math math maths. Uh but she says, let's conservatively assume that there are 2,000 current cases in the US today. Uh she's writing on March the 6th. This is about eight times the number of confirmed cases. We know that there is substantially uh that the there is substantial underdiagnosis due to a lack of test kits. Um we can expect that we'll continue to see a doubling of cases every six days. This is a typical doubling time across several epidemiological studies. Uh here I mean actual cases. Confirmed cases may appear to rise faster in the short term due to new test kit rollouts. Uh, we're looking at about one million US cases by the end of April, and then two million by May the 5th, and then of course 4 million by May the 11th. Um this is the way exponentials go. And so she just in her tweet thread uh talks about what what would this mean for masks, what would this mean for beds, and she could have picked a thousand different factors. She picks those two and said, we will run out of those very, very quickly. Um and even if some of the percentages uh are out in her um calculations, um, well, the nature of exponential growth means that even if let's let's say hospitalization is only five percent of the population rather than twenty percent of the population, that just means we'll have to wait another two weeks. Sure.
SPEAKER_00And their their aim is to slow slow this down, isn't it? So that if if it is a majority or a significant proportion of people who end up having to be hospitalized, it doesn't all happen at exactly the same time to try and spread the load a little bit. So you know, I think I read uh someone commenting on her thing as well there about um uh you know, another thing could be issues of ventilators, you know, if if uh something like 10% of cases have developed need to be ventilated, there just won't be the ventilators, and people were saying you could see people sitting there with bags, you know, like family members having to squeeze bags. Um and other people talking about knock-on effects of you know, even if it's not the virus itself. Things like mm, you know, just the the chain of um uh getting kind of medication in from China, places like that. Yeah. So people talking about antibiotics coming in, which not sp you wouldn't be for the the virus because that's not what you use your antibiotics for, but for other things that potentially you know would people either become vulnerable to other illnesses because of coronavirus or they end up getting pushed to the back of a list because of it, and therefore there could be more ramifications.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and so anyone who is needing to use the hospital uh anytime soon, um there's great fear around these things. And and if you've got, for instance, uh a um uh surgery booked in in in hospital, um so uh Amand Amanda Kaminsky uh has just commented on uh TopChat here on YouTube. Uh she says, My baby's heart disease needs surgery in coming months. If hospital fills with coronavirus cases, what will we do?
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um so yeah, there are there are these you know, there are these systemic uh problems that uh that that could end up um well, they will certainly make us all pause for thought. Um and I think one one thing that this sort of thing does, and let's let's talk in terms of plague, because you know that's that's a more ancient definition um of what we're talking about than pandemic. Um what it does is it really puts its finger on our health and our wealth. And I think you know the stock stock market is tanked. Um we're all worried about our health. And and those are the two things that we kind of trust in.
SPEAKER_00Yes. Yeah, there there's the security. There's security right there.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Health and wealth. As my grandmother used to always say, as long as you have your health. As long as you have your health. Yeah. And then obviously mammon money is is this substitute god as well. And both of those things are being massively threatened by the plague. Um and uh and and how is it that people have been responding uh these days, Paul? Uh we we we've we've had footage from a uh a supermarket.
SPEAKER_00Yes, so um you've probably seen a number of people talking about uh people going to the shops and all the hand soaps gone, or people are stocking up on loads. Um and it all seems a little bit kind of crazy, but uh we've got a clip that shows I'm not sure exactly where this has come from. Yeah, but they're gonna be. I think particularly at the end when she says, I just want one pack, and the lady says, No, not one pack. Um and she's got I don't know, loads of packs there. You know. Um and yeah, I'm about to preach on Genesis 9. Okay. And um or and part of the end of chapter 8, and it's got the the line about you know, God saw that the the inclination of man's heart was evil all the time. And one of the things I've kind of written down in my notes was people will think this is too extreme. They'll go, not every inclination, you know, surely not. Um and then I saw this video and I thought, um, that's uh that was not my face, that was my head. Like 2-0. People will think that um you know that's too extreme. But that video is a perfect example of human nature. Yeah. That there once you scratch, you know, once the cracks in the thin veneer of respectability disappear, um, actually people are all out for themselves, right? You know, even to the point of getting enough loo roll. Yeah. Um and so, you know, that I think what this does, as we said, it it exposes things like our mortality and how we can't rely on health and wealth, yeah, but it also exposes human nature, yeah, yeah. Which is fascinating to see. And I I think most people a lot of the time would say, no, of course people aren't like that. But the reality is we're all like we're all like that person in the supermarket, yeah. Even if some of us it comes out in a different way. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So yeah, totally, totally. And if at one end of the spectrum we're fighting over Lou Roll and panic buying, at the end of the other end of the spectrum, uh, do we have Elon Musk's uh recent tweet? Uh he spoke about um uh he said oh yes, no, I I touched my hand. Yeah, okay. All right. Um Elon Musk uh spoke of uh panic over coronavirus is dumb, he says, you know. Multi-billionaire uh Elon Musk and uh and so uh the truth is probably somewhere in the middle.
SPEAKER_00Um sure, and I mean I think the the reality is we don't want to go we don't want to go too crazy because then you get the toilet roll situation.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um but I think you don't want to be too complacent either, because uh the the it strikes me that um the spread of how it the the way it's spread already probably could have been slowed even more had people gone had people said we should probably clamp down on this sooner rather than later, um, rather than seeing how it developed, should have just said, well let's just nip it in the bud as early as we can. Yeah. Um and complacency isn't gonna help anyone. You know, at the end and the end day people are saying, hey, well, it's not as bad as you think because you know it's not gonna kill lots of people, but it does kill some people. Yeah. And essentially I just seen an email pop through on my thing about uh just on my notifications from a care home I w do some work in. Yes, you know, saying like they're still happy for you to come, but there are having concerns from families of residents about stuff getting in. Because you know, those are they're all old people, yeah. Then they're incredibly vulnerable to any illness, let alone something which might be a bit more virulent than other things. Um and and to be honest, saying like saying, Oh, it's it's only these people or whatever is probably not that comforting to those who've lost someone. No. But also, I mean it's a bit of an issue saying, Oh, don't worry, it's only the old people.
SPEAKER_01It's right. And I I think this is gonna really exacerbate ageism, um, especially in this country, because you know, the the trouble is all the Brexiteers they're all old and they're all gonna die anyway, right? And that like a a lot of a lot of Remainers were kind of like, well, let's let's have a another uh another referendum now because all those nasty Remainers Brexiteers will have died. Yeah. Hip hip hooray.
unknownYou know.
SPEAKER_01And and now we've got this illness that is, you know, very disproportionately targeting the the elderly. And I just wonder whether this will exacerbate ageism. Um and whether one distinctive of the church might be that we actually could care about the elderly and might visit the care homes and might visit um not only members of our own flocks, but but others who don't have anyone to visit them and just make sure that they're okay. Um I think there might be a very counter-cultural opportunity for the church uh to minister to the elderly. Um we might think about that uh in a little bit as we think about how the church can respond. Um plagues in the Bible um are right there, you know, Exodus, obviously. Um the plagues used by gods um in order to topple lofty Pharaoh and save oppressed people of God. Um and that seems to be the way that plagues are used not only in the Bible, but but actually as a response to plagues, that seems to be what happens. Um that the the lofty and the secure um suddenly start to see, oh okay, my health and wealth are threatened, and I'm I'm not owed anything. Yeah, plague is no respecter of persons. Right. Yeah, yeah. And so obviously, um, you know, Pharaoh brought down through the plagues and God's people saved. But then you go on to Amos in the Old Testament, and the plagues are hitting God's people. You know, plagues are not just for the nasty sinners over there. Um, it's actually a judgment on God's own people. Uh and uh God says in Amos 4, I sent plagues among you, yet you have not returned to me. So, you know, what has been the intention of those plagues? That actually people would turn to the Lord, that they would flee the sinking sand of this world and and flee to the Lord, the strong refuge. And then in Revelation we see the the seven bowls full of the seven plagues that are poured out on the earth, and again they have that same intention. Um and in Revelation 9 it says the rest of mankind who are not killed by these plagues still did not repent. Um, and it's this idea, you know, you're meant to, in the face of plague and pestilence, um, renounce your own strength and return to the Lord. It's a bit like the C.S. Lewis said, you know, it's about suffering being a wake-up call to the world. A megaphone to rouse a deaf world. I think that's totally right. You know, I mean we saw that with the bushfires in Australia, um a very prosperous country, Australia, very comfortable, very nice place to live. And and suddenly you realize, oh, it can be hell on earth. Things can be unleashed, and the security that we take for granted could be could be snatched from us in a heartbeat. Uh and that's very confronting um for people to have to to cope with. Yeah. Um, you know, Psalm 90 teaches to number our days that we might get a heart of wisdom. And we don't number our days, usually. You know, we we think we are entitled to four-score year and ten, you know, or three-score year and ten or four-score. Um and then just finishing off plagues in the Bible, Revelation 21, um, one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues, came and said to me, Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb. And he carried me away in the spirit to a mountain great and high. He showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God. Um so there will be a time beyond plagues, um when they will have um finished their work in terms of uh diagnosing our weakness and and pointing us to Christ. And and there will be a time when there is no more sickness, and uh and we can't wait uh for those times. Um so that's kind of plagues in the Bible. Um what about plagues in in church history? Um one thing that's been very interesting, we we we've come up with sort of seven seven times in church history um where the church has responded to plagues in in a way that we think we can learn from. And uh the first two have come from Rodney Stark's book, The Rise of Christianity, how the obscure marginal Jesus movement became the dominant religious force in the Western world in a few centuries. Um very interesting book by Rodney Stark, just you know, okay, let's let's go from AD 33 and trace it through until Constantine in 312, and and and how how how does it you know become the case that by then he reckoned there were about 10% of the Roman Empire Christians when to begin with it's not point not one per cent. Um and one of his chapters is called Epidemics, Networks and Conversion, and he points uh in particular to a number of plagues um that plagued the uh the Roman Empire, that struck the Roman Empire, um, and uh and one of them uh do you do you want to do this one in in uh in 165, Dionysius?
SPEAKER_00Yes, uh so yeah, uh this was uh Marcus Aurelius was the emperor, so they're pr uh they're saying they're not sure 100% what it was, they think it might have been smallpox. Is that right? But I'm not 100% sure. So it killed over a 15-year period, a quarter to a third of the Roman Empire. Wow. Which is Yeah. I mean, that's just obscene. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01It's like what two billion dead or something?
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Imagine imagine that, you know, two billion dead from plague.
SPEAKER_00Crazy. Absolutely crazy. Yeah, and I mean we've got Dionysius' uh description here of the things that were going on. He says the intestines are shaken with a continual vomiting, the eyes are on fire with the infected blood, that in some cases the feet or some parts of the limbs are taken off by the contagion of diseased putrefaction. Yeah. So it sounds I mean pretty pretty grim, really.
SPEAKER_01Right, right. Um this is Rome in its pomp, and this is Marcus Aurelius, who who is the gladiator. He's like the emperor, isn't he? He's the gladiator emperor, right? Um and yet, yeah, this is this is very much, you know, bringing Rome low. Um but the Christians uh seemed to be reacting in in the right sort of way.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so I mean again we've got some quotes here from Dionysius, he said, Most of our Christian brothers showed unbounded love and loyalty, never sparing themselves and thinking only of one another. Heedless of danger, they took charge of the sick, attending to their every need, and ministering to them in Christ, and with them departed this life serenely happy, for they were infected by others with the disease, drawing on themselves the sickness of their neighbours and cheerfully accepting their pains. Many in nursing and curing others transferred their death to themselves and died in their stead. Sounds like anyone you know? Yeah, man, that's a very uh very kind of uh striking description, isn't it, of what they were doing?
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Taking on the disease of others and bringing it into themselves and dying their death with them and Wow, you know, so Christ-like.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. You know, and so so how how did the early church grow? Rodney Stark says a massive deal was the plagues, where the church lived out, didn't just proclaim the way of Christ, but lived out the way of Christ, which is totally opposite to the way of Rome. The way the way of Rome is if there are sick, you get away from them, you flee. Um, and you certainly don't allow them to give you their death. Um and you know, what does the way of Christ say? It says, you know, you contract the disease that they might be healed. Um, substitutionary atonement uh was not just proclaimed by the early church, it was lived by the early church. And what was interesting is actually the Christian communities survived better than their pagan neighbors because they didn't just leave, they actually ministered to one another. And sure, that might mean that that some of the carers contracted the illness and and they might have died. But actually, all those that they ministered to had a much better chance of surviving. Yeah, absolutely. Um and whereas the Roman Empire's death toll um from that uh 165 AD um plague uh w was between a quarter and a third, the the Christian death toll was more like 10%. Um and so they they emerged from that first plague um with proportionately, you know, greater numbers, uh, but also the deep respect of those who were looking on and seeing how Christ-like uh they were. So that happened in 165, and then in uh 251 AD, uh there was another plague, and who knows what it was, maybe it was measles, um, but it was pretty much the same estimates of mortality rates, uh a quarter to a third um of the Roman Empire killed um uh through this particular plague, towns in Italy were abandoned, some of them were abandoned forever. It massively weakened the military and all infrastructure. Um but whereas back in 165 AD, um uh Rodney Stark reck reckons that Christians were 0.08% of the empire. By the time we get to 251 AD, um less than a hundred years later, um he reckons they're 1.9% of the empire. Uh he reckons there are about 1.2 million uh Christians at that stage. And uh Cyprian, the bishop of of Carthage, um said this. He he said how suitable, how necessary it is that this plague and pestilence, which seems horrible and deadly, searches out the justice of each and every one and examines the mind of the human race, whether they care well for the sick, whether relatives dutifully love kinsmen as they should, whether physicians do not desert the afflicted. So plague is an opportunity to reveal the human heart. What's what a human's gonna be like? Are we gonna fight over the Lurole? Or are we gonna say, you know, let me let me give myself for you? Um and and this is this is sort of the sifting um that was happening through the plague, and and Christians had an opportunity to model something very different from the rest of uh of society. And so um Christians, through their strong social networks, um, through their higher rates of survival, um, and through their modeling of the way of Christ, suddenly became proportionately a much greater um uh number of of the empire and a much more attractive community to belong to. Because don't you want to belong to a community that looks out for each other? Yeah um that when the plague hits, they don't scarper, they hang around. And Rodney Stark says this is a massive, massive deal in terms of um uh in terms of the growth of Christianity. Uh we've had a couple of uh comments on the top chats saying um has it stopped? Has the live cast stopped? If you're still watching it where you are, uh let us let us know on top chat. Um but uh Rodney Stark says that by 300 AD um the Christian population was up to 10.9%, almost 11% of the Roman Empire. Uh when in just 251 AD they were about 1.9%. So um very interesting, Rodney Stark's work uh in all this. Um because he he in other work he kind of talked about how the the the church grew from uh the time of the apostles to the time of Constantine. And he reckons actually um the growth year on year was only about four percent. I think it might have been like 3.4% or something like that, in terms of um year-on-year growth. Now, obviously, compound interest adds up over time. Sure. Um but it was just Christians being faithful, living out the way of Jesus, um, not seeing massive spikes, but seeing their faithfulness rewarded and and seeing and and the rest of the world seeing the way of Jesus uh being very different. And this is the way that the um that it grew. So are we still going? Is it still Okay also do we have Belt embraces? Because do we are we recording the MP? Are we recording the audio? Cool.
SPEAKER_00Yep. Okay. That's right, well if it comes back on, it comes back on, if it doesn't, we'll put it out, that's all fine. Okay. So yeah. So they're kinda springing us forward in time again all the way up to the kind of fifteen hundreds. Um kind of bibionic plague striking Wittenberg. Um and it sounds like it was a particularly uh aggressive form of it, you know. This so so apparently the odds well the likelihood of survival was very low, and even on a like so your best odds of survival were that there was a a thirty per cent chance of survival. Yeah. And that's your best odds. Yeah. Like a 30%. 70% die. 70% were die, and that's on a good day. Like and it came on really quickly as well. Well, it said, yeah, you could be dead within so you could show symptoms in a day and be kind of loss of conscious by the end consciousness by the end of the day. And then you could be dead in as little as three to ten.
SPEAKER_01So we don't know we're born, do we? We just don't know where born.
SPEAKER_00No, absolutely, that's the that is absolutely true. We don't know how lucky we've you know, how good we've got it on the whole. Um, but you know, Luther speaks about kind of being in Wittenberg at the time with his wife, his wife was pregnant, um, and they decided to stay and help treat uh those who were infected. Um and you know, Luther felt that that was the right thing to do, although he said he didn't feel it was wrong for people to to leave as well. He saw that was a good thing. Um but uh again, yes, uh stayed there. Um and uh yeah, I mean he said if anyone is bound this is on the whole, should I stay or should I go? He said, If anyone is bound to remain in peril of death in order to serve his neighbour, let him commit himself to God's keeping and say, Lord, I'm in thy hands. Thou hast obligated me to serve here. Thy will be done, for I'm thy poor creature. Thou canst slay or preserve me here, as well as if I were in duty bound to suffer fire, water, thirst, or some other danger. So there you go.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And then like it was interesting because it cause he was often asked, you know, is the right thing to do to stay and minister to those who are facing the the illness or to get out of there. And he was like, Well, if you if you have any obligations, if they're family, you gotta stay. And if you're the the burgermeister, like if you're if you're in government um and you've been tasked in that Romans 13 sense of being part of the state apparatus, then again you should you should stay. Um But um if you can get out, get out. And then he very wisely he kind of said, and no one should look down on the other person for making the different a different choice. Yep. Um which which I think is a really interesting word for today in social media, and you know, we're we're very we're very quick to um to make presumptions about those who have bulk bought toilet roll, right? You know, I've I've seen on Twitter people kind of say, Um I know it's it's all those older people who are bulk buying toilet roll, and and they are the ones who are panic buying and and they're the problem. And you're like, well, I don't know. Have you done this the research? Like, what studies suggest that a certain sector of the population panic buys? I think we're probably all susceptible to panic buying, and different people responding differently to the plagues, and and and obviously Luther very sensitive to the problem of self-righteousness in the human heart. He's he's kind of saying, let's let's not look down on one another for the different kinds of ways that we respond uh to the plague. Um But uh let's let's skip on to uh 1542 and and Calvin there in uh Geneva. And uh and while Calvin was there, Geneva uh uh suffered five different plagues. Um and uh in the first outbreak in 1542, uh Calvin led visitations into plague-infected homes, and he he and he knew that you know he might be risking death by doing so. Um soon others in leadership said, Calvin, you can't risk yourself like this, and they took him off the front lines of doing that. But other pastors in his company of pastors would go in and they would minister to the dying and and they would report on on seeing loads of people actually turn to the Lord in in their final days and hours. Um, and actually there was there was great gospel fruitfulness um in in terms of all that they were um able to do. So so Calvin Um was officially taken off his sort of frontline duties, but apparently was just doing it covertly. And and so he would he would just go and visit people and he just wouldn't tell the other elders, you know, I'm I'm off to do um I'm off to play golf or something. But um so again, it's it's that very Christ-like thing, isn't it, of risking your life for the salvation of others. Um an entirely uh Christ-like thing to do. And then in 1665, we have this uh this other example.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, the village of Eam in Derbyshire.
SPEAKER_01So uh how is how are we spelling E in the B?
SPEAKER_00Well, it's E Y A M, which uh we did that we had to do a Google search to find the pronunciation is apparently EM, but not EM. EM or whatever, second EM. Apparently that's what we're going with. Say anything with enough confidence, it's all good. Um and so there was a village in Derbyshire that uh this again during the time of bubonic plague, um, that basically just quarantined themselves. Yeah. And it was actually off the back of the the rector, the pastor at the time, William Mompesson, who had kind of he was pretty recent to the village, um, and from what I understand, not hugely well liked actually, um, but felt that it was best for them to quarantine themselves so that the illness didn't spread out to kind of other places nearby. Um and somehow he and the the past kind of incumbents who also lived still living there managed to convince the village to to do this, and it meant that pretty much uh contact with people outside the village was almost entirely stopped.
SPEAKER_01Yes.
SPEAKER_00Um and food and things were being brought in. Um uh I can't remember who it says they were bringing it in, but it was coming in from the outside, uh, so they were still being supplied. Um but you know, it you know, it it was I think something like uh 260 of the village's inhabitants from 76, no fewer than 76 families, died. I mean there's a story of one lady, Elizabeth Hancock buried six of her children and her husband who had perished in the space of eight days. Yeah. Six children, and your husband in the space of eight days. Yeah. Um but you know, one of the as a uh the article we were looking at, there's a lady there who's a descendant of one of the ladies, and she said, Um, it must have been terrifying, but every single family would have had a strong belief in God and would not have feared death. Um and it seems actually that by what they did, it meant that actually it did greatly reduce the spread of the illness in the local area, even though they themselves suffered a far higher mortality rate than even London, I think they said.
SPEAKER_01So Yeah, yeah. So they're self-isolated. They again they they endured the the punishment that others might be spared and an incredibly Christ-like thing to do. And you've got to you've got to believe in resurrection to kind of do that. You know, if if you honestly think that this life is all there is, you're crazy to stay, aren't you? I mean really I mean Yeah, well you I mean you might think it's noble to to stay, but you you certainly you can you certainly couldn't fault anybody um for running and saving the only life that we know we have, you know, which is which is how agnostics and atheists often often speak. The one life we know we have, I'm just gonna make it as good as I can. Um and okay, that that makes sense, but but what what about the rest of society and and what about these kinds of situations where actually the giving of life for others um is is the only way that we're gonna survive. Um again, we need we need that hope in in resurrection, really.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Um and then do you do you want to do Spurgeon? Yeah, sure. So and then we've got Spurgeon kind of 1854 dealing with a cholera outbreak, um uh where he was kind of went down in London, and um he kind of took there were kind of five things that came out of it that it talked about how he prioritised during that time local ministry. He had various engagements around the country, but he kind of called those off because he felt it was his duty to spend time um with those who are part of his kind of under his care, right uh very specifically, so um in his in his community. So maybe there's something for us there as well about kind of that what where our priorities might lie in this. Um his his thing was very much to continue to keep meeting as a a church, but to make adjustments if necessary, so and things like that. But um he said that it was during those times that people were most receptive to the gospel. Sure. Actually, so he said if there was ever a time when the mind is sensitive, it's when death is abroad. I recollect when I first came to London how anxiously people listened to the gospel for the cholera was raging terribly. There was little scoffing then.
SPEAKER_01Ha.
SPEAKER_00Uh and you know, it it's like you say when people were confronted with their mortality, they might suddenly be a bit more open to thinking about the gospel.
SPEAKER_01There was a little scoffing then. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00But you know, he was you know, it like I say, although he wanted to continue doing these meetings, you know, there was sense to kind of exercise wisdom in how you do it and things. Right. And I was talking to you about, you know, like at our church at the moment, we've we we were told kind of yesterday, you know, if you're feeling unwell, don't don't come. We're gonna um stream some of the services. Please don't shake hands. You know, we're doing the bit it was the best piece we've ever done for an introduction. You don't have to yeah, you don't have to shake anyone's hands, you know, no awkward hugging. What's that gonna happen there? How disobedience is it? You know, it's so good.
SPEAKER_01Five times in the New Testament, greet one another with a holy kiss. It's the most disobeyed commandment.
SPEAKER_00And we've gone down to the you know, rather than when we did communion, we all had the individual cups. Okay, you know, um, just to avoid contamination and stuff like that. So, you know, there's wisdom there. Oh right. You know, being sensible about taking precautions, but you know, carried on meeting as well.
SPEAKER_01Because in in Singapore and in South Korea, the churches have been at the heart of spreading um the coronavirus. Right. Actually, in in in terms of the yeah, where where most people have picked them up from. It's been the church. It's been churches, actually. So I think I think we do need to be a lot more sensible in how we meet. Yeah, I'm I'm not saying we go all virtual and let's No, no, absolutely. Speak Life is your new church. So yeah. Yeah. Just watch just watch our videos. No, we're not saying that.
SPEAKER_00But we do have to be very wise. Sure. But you know, he was saying very much that there are people who are open to this. Um and also one of his big things was to continue visiting the sick and to point them to well, those who were sick and grieving, because people had lost people, and to point them to the gospel. Yeah. Um and he said, you know, more than just bringing the gospel content in his presence communicated something of God's comfort to his people.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_00So these visits were often fearful and full of grief, they were also glorious occasions of faith and joy.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So doing that. And and they were, he said, evangelistic opportunities. So even people who weren't part of the church and the community there were happy, you know, maybe the people had deserted them, and actually to have someone like himself and Christians come in, even though they themselves weren't necessarily believers, that you know, and i there were definitely occasions where people came to faith off the back of that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um and there were occasions where they didn't as well. But people were open to it. Um he talks about one man who'd actually been a someone who had opposed him, who got ill, and he was Spurgeon was summoned to see him. Um he said the man in his lifetime had been wont to jeer at me in strong language, he'd often denounced me as a hypocrite, yet he was no sooner smitten by the darts of death than he sought my presence and counsel, no doubt feeling in his heart that I was a servant of God, though he did not care to own it with his own lips. You know, and so I mean that particular story he goes on to say that wasn't a case where he said the guy very soon kind of became delirious and you know th it doesn't seem that there was any conversion. Um but there were those opportunities, and there were ones where that that did lead to things. So you know, in the face of suffering, there were opportunities to preach the gospel. Yeah, yeah. And I think it's where he just talks about uh entrusting his life to God in these moments, I guess, again being confronted with the frailty and fragility of life. Um what else can you do?
SPEAKER_01Yeah. It's an intensification of the rest of life, isn't it? So it's an intensification of our mortality, and we're we're staring down the barrel of our mortality a lot more. And it's also an intensification of the church's witness. If the church is gonna be the church, if the church is actually gonna be Christ-like, then hopefully the world will see that uh in a more intense way as we run towards danger rather than away from it.
SPEAKER_00I mean, because the reality is that we I mean uh it it should be no surprise that we're gonna die. Right. You know. But it is. It's just when it's just when the the schedule in our minds is seemingly moved up. Right. Could be moved up the scale, you know, quite a bit.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um the situation is no different, really. Yeah. That more, you know, the it's coming it's coming one day.
SPEAKER_01Right. It's an intensification. And uh what was striking about that Spurgeon stuff is is him talking about the jeerers and the sneerers. You know, much much less oh, I've just touched my face again, sorry. Uh there it is. Tool. It's too all. Um But there there is that sense of um oh I don't know. There there is that sense of jeering and sneering because you think you are Lord, right? And when death kind of bears its teeth, we we recognize, oh, I'm not I'm not captive of my soul and master of my fate at all. Death is Lord. Um and I mean I I'm in no position to jeer or sneer. Um and I just think you know, in in the West there is a lot of jeering and sneering at the church. Um and I think maybe maybe part of that is just forgetfulness about our mortality. Oh, yeah, I think that's absolutely the case. Our frailty, our weakness. So what's gonna be our seventh example of uh plagues and uh the way in which the church reacts? Well, perhaps we're living through it. Um maybe now is the chance uh for us to demonstrate that we are the church, and um maybe this could be another advance for the gospel. Um certainly in China, in Wuhan province itself, um there's there's that opportunity. It's very interesting that just touched my face again. Okay. Three, two, you're winning, Paul. Um just in in Wuhan province, it's very, very difficult to be a Christian. Um, but the way in which the Chinese government has wanted to suppress the knowledge of this outbreak and punish whistleblowers, um, and the the way that it uh uh to begin with at least did not acknowledge the problem and did not you know respond perhaps um in the most open way. Um there there was the the original whistleblower, uh Dr. Li Wen Liang, uh, who um was reprimanded for spreading rumors and making false comments and disturbing the social order, because on social media he was saying, hey, we've got this thing that's like SARS and it's gonna be deadly, this is a huge deal. Um But uh in January he continued to serve while China officially denied that there were any new cases. And while they denied that there were any new cases, on January 10th he contracted coronavirus and he died four weeks later. Um, interestingly, his sort of final social media post was Good my goodbye, my dear ones, farewell, Wuhan, my hometown. Hopefully, after the disaster, you'll remember someone once tried to let you know the truth as soon as possible. Hopefully, after the disaster, you'll learn what it means to be righteous. No more good people should suffer from endless fear and helpless sadness. Um and this started to get shared quite a lot, and people started to make claims for his Christian faith, which I think um they they have not been confirmed. Um maybe he was a maybe he was an inquirer. Um we're not we're not quite sure. Certainly what he did was quite Christ-like uh in terms of blowing the whistle, sh shedding light on the situation, and then moving towards the trouble, contracting the illness that others might live. An incredible Christ-like thing, and you can see why people might want to claim him as a Christian, but we we don't know uh whether whether he was one. Um but certainly he kind of points the way to what a Christ-like you know response might be. And I think um, you know, in in China there there are opportunities now, with the communist government the communist party not particularly dealing well with um the issue to begin with, um is there an opportunity for faith faith communities to to step forward? Uh and in the uh New York Times just recently there was a story uh about um how faith communities have stepped forward and they're very threatening to the Communist Party. Um so for instance, seven underground Protestant churches in Beijing raised $10,000 to buy face masks and disinfectants for those who are in Wuhan. Um and after sending the shipment on the 5th of February, the police called in church leaders for questioning and told them to stop their activities. Um you've got you've got the government wanting to keep a lid on things and not wanting to, you know, uh describe how bad things are, and you've got churches trying to help. And is there a population in China that's kind of comparing and contrasting? Okay, the Communist Party who don't want me to be a Christian, uh not dealing with the with the virus, the Christians are wanting to. Um, is there an opportunity for for Christianity in China to make even more headway? Uh could the plagues be an intensification both of the suffering of this world but also of the Christ-likeness of the church's witness?
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And maybe maybe in the UK, maybe wherever you're watching this from or listening to this from, um, maybe there's an opportunity to to be Christ-like. Um, I don't know what that looks like, but it it certainly looks like um faith, hope, and love, I think. You know, um it it looks like um not being swayed by the latest controversy, not being swayed by just panic, um, having a settled faith that Jesus is Lord and He is Lord through the storm, um, the anchor will will will hold firm. Do we have that kind of faith? Do we have that kind of hope? Um this life is not all there is. Uh and even even if we lose our lives, even if we lose our children's lives, um we have hope, we have we have such a hope that that becomes ever more precious when you see how this life can be taken away. And and do we have love? Do we have that that impulse to move towards the danger, to give ourselves in in love uh for those who most need it? Uh it's an opportunity for us to play our part, and maybe we are the seventh example of churches responding well to plays. But we shall see. We shall see.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER_01Um sorry guys, on the uh YouTube that uh we we dropped out our our internet failed at one point, but uh we're glad that it's back up and running, and uh we'll try and get you the full version without uh without the uh interruptions. Uh put up there. Uh but Paul, how can people get in touch with us?
SPEAKER_00Uh I mean you can contact us via um you can go via our website, speaklife.org.uk, you can contact us through there, but you can also find us on pretty much every social media platform. So if you want to uh be in touch through those things, we'll pick up those messages and get back in touch with you as soon as we can. Awesome. Awesome.
SPEAKER_01So uh yeah, do like and share and subscribe this video and get it out there. But uh thanks so much for joining us. Next time, keep speaking life.