Creative Destruction

I think that Resurrection (what ever it exactly means) is so much profounder an idea than mere immortality. I am sure we don’t just “go on.” We really die and are really built up again. — C.S. Lewis

I was out for a walk with my daughter on a beautiful early spring day when I noticed it.  

The neighborhood was being reborn. Restaurants, closed for over a year, were full of patrons sitting outside. Boards were being removed from storefronts, brown paper torn off the windows, presumably by new optimistic owners. A profound sense of resurrection enveloped me — not just the city’s but my own. This surprised me.

In retrospect, I hadn’t realized how much I had died. 

My family has been very fortunate through the pandemic and our faith has provided a beachhead for nourishment and joy in the midst of so much death. Frankly, I may also be a “stiff upper lip” guy when it comes down to it. But in that moment, on that walk, I experienced more acutely some of the death of Covid-19. I experienced it through the lens of resurrection that was bursting forth all around me. It reminded me that resurrection after death is not a one-time event we witness only in the first Easter. Rather, creative destruction is a pattern sewn into the universe by the Creator God.

It made me think of some areas in which we’ve experienced destruction over the last 18 months. It has been a valley of dry bones. Some of us have felt deeply isolated; some of us have suffered injuries to relationships or careers; some of us have lost our sense of security, safety and well being. Some of us are experiencing mental health issues, including health care workers afflicted with PTSD from serving through the crisis. Many of us have lost loved ones or mourned with those who have. Our afflictions are diverse and very personal. But it has been a long, dark climb for everyone — I think even those of us who don’t realize how deeply we too are affected. I am learning I should own my suffering and loss better. After all, even know all that would happen, Jesus wept over Lazarus. 

And yet. 

Lazarus lives. Resurrection follows death.

So as I reflect on the pandemic, I realize I should perhaps weep more with my friends, and over the condition of our city, our country and our world. But I am also reminded by the resurrection of our neighborhood that: 

The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom (Isaiah 40:28).

And I cling to the hope that He is recreating us daily, especially when we sense the most destruction in our lives.

This is what the Sovereign LORD says to these bones: I will make breath enter you, and you will come to life (Ezekiel 37:5).