It's Time for the Shutdown to End - Part 2

The Numbers are Wrong

We’ve been lied to. It goes without saying that any loss of life is tragic. Telling a Christian life is valuable is like telling a man stranded in the Sahara that water is valuable. But people die, and they die from many causes. And you can’t stop a virus; all you can do is slow the pace. To do that actually makes matters worse as herd immunity is suppressed. But worse still, we’ve shut the world down over a virus that so far has infected less than a tenth of a percent of the population of the state in which I live, South Carolina. The death toll is less than one-hundredth of a percent. In fact, right now it’s just over two one-thousandths of a percent. And I’m using inflated numbers, as we’re now categorizing as COVID-19 deaths all deaths in which we merely suspect someone may have been infected. No confirmation required. More ridiculously, we’re categorizing as COVID-19 deaths in which the individual had COVID-19 but actually died of something else. It’s time for the shutdown to end.

It’s the Economy, Stupid

Perhaps the biggest understatement in all of this is the cure is worse than the disease. The economic fall-out of the shutdown will not only bring tragedy of all manner upon the world, but it will literally kill more than the virus itself. It’s not just the people who are out of work that will be hard-pressed to buy food, shelter, and clothing, not to mention health care, but all of us will be in danger if migrant workers aren’t allowed in-country to harvest the fields across our land. When crops rot in the fields, watch out. In order to avoid that kind of calamity, the shutdown must end in a matter of days, not weeks. Those calling for social-distancing and stay-at-home measures to remain in place for the next eighteen months display a colossal ignorance that’s only surpassed by a frighteningly totalitarian impulse. Liberty be banished to Hell!

It’s a Liberty Issue

And that’s the real issue isn’t it. From a biblical perspective, no one has the right to simply wave away the rights of another. Not Anthony Fauci who brazenly declared he’s not given a thought to the economic consequences of the shutdown. Not Bill Gates who wants to cull the population through vaccines among other means. Not the MSM which one week called for the President to shut down the country regardless of what the Governors of the States said, and the next week called for the Governors to override the President when he claimed authority to open the states. The politics alone of this thing should cause even the most casual observer to say, “Wait a minute, what’s going on here?” But they don’t. It’s the proverbial blind following the blind who are following the one’s gouging out their eyes. Again, no one has the right to override the God-given rights of others, not even the majority. That’s why we operate on principle, not the whims of a blinded majority.

Civil Disobedience

If those in power won’t end the shutdown, it’s time for Christians to end it. The Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches has now said they’ll engage in civil disobedience if the shutdown is not ended in a matter of days or weeks. They’re right. Christians everywhere have sought to be good citizens. They’ve given the powers that be the benefit of the doubt. But it’s clear we can no longer do such. Our liberties will be gone if we don’t do something now. As I write this post, protests are breaking out across the country. That’s a welcome sign and a good start.

We’re in a Romans 13 moment. We submit to earthly government because they’ll bring out their sword if we don’t. But there comes a time when submission is sin. One individual could not succeed. The State would simply take him away, and he’d never be heard from again. But if thousands unite, there’s a possibility of victory. Let’s join together, not in armed revolution, but arm-in-arm, literally – away with social-distancing – to put political pressure on our leaders, that they might abandon their totalitarian impulses and actually govern with the consent of the governed.

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