A few weeks ago on Easter we hit a big anniversary in this ministry to the Ojai Valley & Ventura, 20 years of Sunday services. On June 1 we will be at 22 years of ministry here – teaching the Bible verse-by-verse, chapter-by-chapter, and loving on the people of this community. We love our community. Ministering in the l
ives of many children, teens, adults, couples, parents, grandparents, families, & singles. Sometimes people need to be encouraged, offered guidance, corrected, taught, defended. Advocacy as taken me to the public square, private meetings with officials, to the courthouse, on various occasions. Being a voice for the voiceless or an advocate for the weak requires humility, and sometimes boldness, especially when standing against powerful people or public opinion.
I do not recommend you allow me (or anyone) to be your pastor because of education or secular credentials. I hope you will make that choice responsibly by choosing one that clearly has the anointing of the Holy Spirit and a commitment to the Bible, rightly dividing His Word of Truth, and passion for His people, a willingness to selflessly feed, lead, & protect God’s people. One who will not just feed an edible meal that will keep you from being hungry but a spiritually nutritious meal that you can grow thereby.
Because of my deep concerns for the weak and vulnerable in our society, especially these days during the COVID Crisis, I have been more openly wearing some of my other hats as well: as Sociologist, Developmental, Organizational, & Social Psychologist, with concentration credentials in social justice and information-based societies. Someone I was speaking to this week that is wrestling with isolation and depression said to me, I don’t want to hear the truth, I need good news. So today, please allow me to give you my report: I am calling this article/blog
A COVID CRISIS UPDATE FOR CHRISTIANS – SOME GOOD NEWS AND SOME BAD NEWS
GOOD NEWS:
The religious freedoms protections endowed by our creator, along with free speech, are not civil rights but inalienable rights identified in the Bill of Rights of our Constitution of the United States, protected, sacred, and cannot be taken.
BAD NEWS:
Oooops. That was before COVID-19. Welcome to your life.
GOOD NEWS:
Many governors have openly declared the churches in their states as essential services.
BAD NEWS:
Not in California. Still think your vote doesn’t matter?
GOOD NEWS:
Our church is considered an essential service because we operate an emergency shelter and a food program for the needy.
BAD NEWS:
They won’t let us gather. To save lives. That’s how much they love you.
GOOD NEWS:
Target, Walmart, Amazon, and all big businesses with powerful lawyers, big political donations, and lobbyists will be just fine on the other side of the Corona Crisis, often with increased market share, stock values, and executive pay.
BAD NEWS:
Your small business may be over, or never really recover. Sorry. No hard feelings.
GOOD NEWS:
Most churches will survive.
BAD NEWS:
Among those that survive, most will struggle, thousands will never reopen, or will soon be forced to close after a number of months. Sorry. No hard feelings.
GOOD NEWS:
Most people who have been tested do not have the virus. Over 90%.
BAD NEWS:
Some do.
GOOD NEWS:
Among those that do have the virus, most don’t have any COVID-19 symptoms.
BAD NEWS:
For those that have symptoms, they can be bad, especially if you are already not healthy to begin with or vulnerable due to age.
GOOD NEWS:
Among those that get COVID-19, the disease that comes from the virus, almost all recover.
BAD NEWS:
Not everybody recovers. Some die.
GOOD NEWS:
We are trying to track everything so we have accurate information & stats to study.
BAD NEWS:
Presumptive cases are counted as cases. Death certificates are filled as COVID without testing positive. If one has tested positive for COVID-19, it is being logged as an underlying cause, although there are no tests to know for sure, as it’s a best guess, and there are financial incentives to the hospitals, counties, and states to maximize COVID-19 statistics. The more cases you have, the more money you get.
GOOD NEWS:
The hundreds of thousand, even millions of people, that were predicted to die, didn’t.
BAD NEWS:
So far, no California policy has lightened as a result of this fact, but the opposite, they have flexed their muscles this week to show Californian’s who is in charge, forcing beach closures where stats don’t warrant it, and arresting protesters.
GOOD NEWS:
The death rate for COVID-19 is much, much, lower than the experts thought. On Friday the CDC compared the new death rate to the Flu, something socially unthinkable weeks ago.
BAD NEWS:
Most people still don’t know that and the officials and media are acting like we don’t know this. Many will never know.
GOOD NEWS:
There are many more cases than we thought out there, with a lot more people carrying the virus than previously believed.
BAD NEWS:
The media is trying to use this to scare you instead of what it should do to comfort you. This means it is much less deadly than previously presumed, many are likely immune already, we are further toward having a possible herd immunity than we thought, and we may not need the immunization as presumed.
GOOD NEWS:
We may not need the immunization as presumed.
BAD NEWS:
There is too much money and power at stake to stop this ship from sailing. An immunization will come and pressure to take it, whether we need it or not, is coming; to save lives.
GOOD NEWS:
They want to save lives.
BAD NEWS:
They are willing to lose lives to do it.
GOOD NEWS:
People are standing for freedom and expressing their 1st amendment rights to what they believe are overreaching, draconian, tyrannical mandates based upon unexplained or irrational reasons to take away basic freedoms.
BAD NEWS:
Some are being arrested for exercising their 1st amendment right to protest: to save lives.
GOOD NEWS:
There are some media covering these protest events.
BAD NEWS:
The media are focusing on those protesting the protestors, dressed like doctors, although they are actors, with staged photos, but we aren’t supposed to know that, and most people never will.
GOOD NEWS:
Our jails are not overflowing.
BAD NEWS:
This change is not due to lower crime but as part of our government’s Corona Virus response strategy to release prisoners. Some of the empty jail cells due to mandates to release prisoners and not to pursue certain types of criminals right now, are being filled by citizens who wanted to hold their leaders accountable for taking their lives, and livelihoods, and standing to save lives of the most vulnerable made desperate by despotic governing. A lot of people were arrested this week in California. Apparently, our jails are safe enough after all??
GOOD NEWS:
We get to hear about the evils of the Chinese government repression, probably accurately.
BAD NEWS:
While I had not an ounce of fear being in China on 3 occasions including this past November, at their seat of government Tiananmen Square, my great concern this week is my own government arresting me, desiring to make a spectacle and an example of me. I don’t need to hear another report about China until we have got some answers cleared up back at home.
GOOD NEWS:
Some churches are able to meet today in America.
BAD NEWS:
We can’t in California, because this has become ideological. You see, if we can’t rely on these models, it has implications on all other complex subjective projection computer models, such as those we are relying on for climate change predictions. A different explanation must first be found.
GOOD NEWS:
The Corona Virus & COVID-19 is not political – it effects all of us equally.
BAD NEWS:
COVID-19 is being made political. And we can expect it is going to get worse and worse. Further polarizing America among the existing entrenched divides.
GOOD NEWS:
Information is rapidly becoming available.
BAD NEWS:
There will be large swaths of our neighbors & fellow citizens who will refuse facts – and attitudes & beliefs will increasingly polarize along political & ideological lines. And there will be concerted efforts to suppress facts to uphold narratives that minimize embarrassment and advance agendas.
GOOD NEWS:
Many people that were paralyzed in fear will soon realize that they will be ok.
BAD NEWS:
Many people, especially young people, that trusted their leaders and gave up everything, will be angry, won’t ever trust again, and some will not be able to recover their careers or life course.
GOOD NEWS:
Some lives have apparently been saved. We think. We actually can’t know this for sure. We definitely hope so.
BAD NEWS:
We are in danger of losing more than we have saved. Suicides, addictions, domestic abuse are on the rise (as predicted), and many are expecting spikes in cancers and other ailments as preventative treatments have not been available.
GOOD NEWS:
People are spending time with their families.
BAD NEWS:
Some families will be living in their cars or homeless shelters by the end of the year thanks to our response to the Corona Virus.
GOOD NEWS:
Some people see things as they are.
BAD NEWS:
Most of the key decision makers seem to remain blinded.
GOOD NEWS:
We supposedly got free money. Even those who don’t need it.
BAD NEWS:
It’s not free. Thanks future generations for paying for this. Hope you can figure out a way to be more responsible than those who got you into this financial mess. But at least you’ve got Starbucks.
GOOD NEWS:
The government and large corporations have raised shocking amounts of cash selling bonds during this emergency.
BAD NEWS:
The Federal Reserve (a non-government banking entity) created the money, purchased the bonds, and now is the mogul/owner of massive Federal & Corporate debt, becoming a major stakeholder/creditor in both public and private bond markets, further empowering a board of bankers with immeasurable power, with money they created at the push of a button, that isn’t theirs, but the influence & power absolutely is theirs to wield, and they can further monetize this newfound expanded power at whim.
GOOD NEWS:
There is science involved and we are listening to the experts, their predictions and recommendations.
BAD NEWS:
We are not listening to those experts as they say “We do not know how this works because we do not understand this virus yet.” The experts are saying there are no actual experts on this virus yet.
GOOD NEWS:
We are taking advice.
BAD NEWS:
We are asking medical experts to dictate social & economic policy, and politicians to mandate religious policy, the media to advance political agendas. It seems that everyone is speaking outside of their expertise. And they still aren’t asking social scientists (including sociologists & social psychologists), clinical psychologists & psychiatrists, and pastors, how this is going to effect the mental & emotional health of individuals, families, communities, and societies.
GOOD NEWS:
Things are going to get better.
BAD NEWS:
Not if some people can help it. For some, the best chance at accomplishing their mission is to see everything fall apart for the rest of 2020.
GOOD NEWS:
Chances are extremely likely that you will not die of COVID-19.
BAD NEWS:
You’re going to die. Statistically, your chances are extremely likely that you will die of just about any other cause of death other than COVID-19.
GOOD NEWS:
We have got freedom to access News & Information.
BAD NEWS:
The news broadcasts can rarely be trusted and content depends significantly based upon what channel you’re watching or listening to. This is the information jungle and it takes tremendous work and critical skills to outwit the propaganda machines to uncover actual, factual, unbiased, unvarnished information about what is going on, if that would be possible.
GOOD NEWS:
We’ve got resources like VCemergency.com for accurate information.
BAD NEWS:
The data is glaring in its incompleteness, is skewed toward total cases instead of active cases, requiring you to do your own basic analysis to calculate the number of “active” cases. The localized data is so vague it is almost impossible to know the active cases by region, which is what most average people would actually need to know if they were to make their own risk assessments for going outside.
GOOD NEWS:
They are starting to investigate the Wuhan lab instead of continually blaming the Chinese Wet Markets, a practice thousands of years old.
BAD NEWS:
Most people have been so well sold that it was the traditional Chinese wet markets to blame, we are ready to castigate an ancient civilization, and demand a culture change their way of life, because we hate communism, or want to protect the immunologist profession. What happens if people learn that the very industry that has led our radical response actually brought the virus to us in the first place? Might this cause society to mistrust every lab where such viruses are being housed and manipulated, including those in our own cities in the United States?
GOOD NEWS:
The world leadership community knows how to handle a global corona virus pandemic, and recently gathered representatives of governments (including China) and industry (major corporations) hosted by Johns Hopkins University and the World Economic Forum (the most powerful people in the world) to run through a “fictional dry run hypothetical scenario of a global coronavirus pandemic ” testing their computer models of how many millions might die, and what the needs might be, predicting ventilator & mask shortages, drafting lockdowns, financial bailouts, and sample news coverage. They predicted that the current global attitude needed to shift to save lives. It’s called Event 201. This happened in October 2019, 2 months before our COVID-19 event began.
BAD NEWS:
We were told that nobody could have predicted this.
GOOD NEWS:
There is a power shift, economic shift, and global attitude shift happening.
BAD NEWS:
The wrong people are getting more powerful, the most vulnerable are being made more vulnerable, and many who thought they were doing ok, will discover that they are no longer. The biggest attitude shift is acquiescing irretrievable and hard-won freedoms to unknown entities and powers in the name of public health and safety. “Keep us all safe and we will do whatever you say.”
GOOD NEWS:
Most people know we are living in changing times.
BAD NEWS:
Few connect it to the election year, the not-so-well-hidden multi-national footprint of the globalist political agenda, and the UN 75th anniversary. Few connect it to the New World Order, the coming Global Government, anti-Christ, and the Biblical “Day of the Lord”. They think we had a random mutation of a random virus at a random time in history because Chinese people eat bats.
GOOD NEWS:
It will get better for awhile.
BAD NEWS:
It will be only temporary.
GOOD NEWS:
Many Christians know we are living in prophetic times.
BAD NEWS:
It seems there is a spiritual blinder, many are sleeping, and comparatively few are awake.
GOOD NEWS:
There are no surprises here to God. Not one. And for those that are letting God open their eyes, and have put on the mind of Christ, there are no surprises here. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. Everything has gone so far exactly as we identified months ago.
BAD NEWS:
These are uncertain times for most. (But not so for me & you.)
GOOD NEWS:
Jesus is coming back again.
BAD NEWS:
Some will fight against him. They will lose. It will be tragic. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth in heaven. It will be so sad.
GOOD NEWS:
God removes scales from our eyes so we might see what others might miss.
BAD NEWS:
Even God’s own children can be distracted, disputing, despondent, dismayed, and be blinded to the spiritual dynamic that is at play here.
GOOD NEWS:
There is a resurrection for the righteous.
BAD NEWS:
There is a resurrection of the unrighteous, only to receive the judgment of the lake of fire.
GOOD NEWS:
There is power in prayer and God has called us to pray for our leaders, the President & Vice President, the Governor, the County Supervisors, Drs. Fauci & Levin, the Mayors: to love them and to pray for them.
BAD NEWS:
Doing things God’s ways will be costly for some: righteousness & justice & salvation always comes at a price. If nobody speaks, evil will advance.
GOOD NEWS:
The gates of hell will not prevail against the advancing church and we are here not for a political goal but for an eternal goal – to assist Christ in gathering those that would be saved unto Him. And to represent Him against the lies, exploitations, and victimizations of the vulnerable, to be a voice for the voiceless, and to stand against evil, for the sake of the gospel, to proclaim Jesus’ love to the lost, to give hope to the hopeless, and life to the lifeless: to proclaim a Savior who forgives sin and makes one holy, who has made the way to heaven, who has become the door.
Jesus said: I am the door. Whoever enters by me will be saved. (John 10:9)
BAD NEWS:
There is no bad news here for the believer. It’s really all good news in Jesus, in light of the big picture. That’s why Jesus calls it “The Gospel.”