I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying him, and holding fast to him; for that means life to you and length of days, so that you may live in the land that the Lord swore to give to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. ~ Deuteronomy 30:19-20
There are times when the choice is plain.
When Moses spoke to Israel as they prepared to cross the Jordan into the Promised Land, there was a clear choice for the people to make. They could live by the Covenant they had made with the God who had saved them from slavery, or they could reject it. Choose the former, and their success in their new home was guaranteed; choose the latter, and disastrous consequences would follow.
Most of the time, our choices in life aren’t quite so binary. Whether we take a particular job, go to a particular college, move to a particular city, there will be good things about it and bad things. When we are very sick, we often have multiple treatment options, and it’s not always clear which one is best. When we marry, we cannot be sure that the relationship will remain healthy and strong for a whole lifetime, no matter how firm our commitment at the outset. Most of the time, we live within the ambiguity of Robert Frost’s poem: “I took the road less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.”
But every now and then, we get a choice between life and death, blessings and curses. Every now and then, we receive an answer to a prayer that is so exactly what we prayed for, our next step should be obvious.
For over a year, I prayed for God to send us something that would allow us to turn aside the threat of the novel coronavirus. Because I have a basic understanding of how viruses work, I prayed for scientists to receive insight in their quest for a vaccine and for wisdom for elected officials as they figured out the best way to use our resources so we would be ready to get it to millions of people as soon as we had that answer.
And lo and behold, my prayers were answered. It turned out that scientists had been studying this kind of virus for many years and thinking about how they could use new technologies to make vaccines. They were able to put all those years of study to use to develop a vaccine for COVID-19 faster than had ever been done before. (Surely, God had a hand in inspiring them to study such things even before they knew what would be needed?) Elected representatives and public health officials made bold bets that such efforts would pay off and spent millions of dollars gearing up to manufacture a vaccine that they couldn’t be sure would even work. (Surely, God gave them the courage to risk public anger and professional ridicule if their confidence was misplaced?) And praise God, when the vaccines arrived, they proved to be miraculously effective, turning a deadly illness into something closer to a nuisance for almost everyone who receives the vaccine.
When the vaccine proved to be everything we had hoped and prayed for, I expected that our only challenge would be getting it to everyone – that everyone would want the blessing God had given us. I expected there to be massive disappointment and frustration when people couldn’t immediately get the vaccine, because it takes time to immunize millions of people. I expected to have to reassure and comfort those who couldn’t get the vaccine for medical reasons and to have to remind my brothers and sisters in Christ that we still needed to be careful for their sake. I expected, after everyone got their shots, to have to urge the now-protected to act just as urgently to get the vaccine to those outside our communities and beyond our borders who still did not have access to it.
I did not expect to have to persuade people to receive the blessing of the vaccine. I did not expect that after all we have been through, so many people would have to be convinced that getting vaccinated was not just in their best interest, but in the interests of their family and friends and neighbors. I did not expect to have to explain that getting the vaccine is a moral imperative for all who are able to do so.
And yet, here we are. So like Moses, I call on heaven to witness that I set before you today life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life, so that you and your descendants may live.
The vaccine has proven remarkably safe and effective. But you don’t have to take my word for it: go to your primary care doctor and ask them. Do not listen to the false prophets on the Internet who want to plant fear in your heart – go and talk to the person you have trusted for years to advise you on how to stay healthy.
Do not believe people on Facebook or in the grocery store who assure you catching COVID is no big deal: talk to the people who have cared for the sick and the dying for the last 18 months. Listen to the doctors and nurses who are still holding the hands of unvaccinated patients as they gasp for breath and as they say good-bye to those they love, knowing that many who are intubated never get to speak to their families again. Trust the funeral directors and the clergy who are still caring for the bereaved, when they speak of the deep regret so many feel that their loved one did not get the vaccine while there was still time.
But if those stories do not convince you, consider this: our faith teaches us that even if you remain certain that you are taking a risk when you get the vaccine, the clear benefits to others make it a moral imperative to get vaccinated anyway. In the gospels, we are told that that no one has greater love than to offer one’s life for one’s friends; that Christ’s commandment is to love one another as he first loved us; that to be followers of Jesus, we must be willing to take up our own crosses. If we are to follow Jesus, we cannot refuse to take steps that we are assured will save the lives of others because we are afraid there is a slight risk to ourselves.
In June 2019, before anyone knew about the new virus just over the horizon, the Executive Council of the Episcopal Church passed the following resolution:
Resolved, That The Episcopal Church has long maintained that we are guided by faith and reason, and that scientific evidence helps us to better understand God’s creation, our place in it, and ways to alleviate suffering and pain. …
Resolved, That the proper and responsible use of vaccines is a duty not only to our own selves and families but to our communities. Choosing to not vaccinate, when it is medically safe, threatens the lives of others.
(You can find the complete text of the resolution here: https://www.episcopalarchives.org/cgi-bin/executive_council/EXCresolution.pl?exc_id=EXC062019.12)
This vaccine is no different from any other, except perhaps in the urgency of its use. Whatever unknown risks there might be, the known and verified benefit of lives saved from a deadly disease that continues to result in devastation and death among the unvaccinated makes the choice to receive the vaccine a simple one, between life and death, blessings and curses. Like the Israelites as they stood on the banks of the Jordan, gazing into the Promised Land, we must grapple with a future that is not perfectly clear, and may contain dangers we cannot currently see. But the God of Life has answered our prayers. God has provided for us in the wilderness and led us to this moment. And now it is up to us to choose: will we reject the blessings God has bestowed upon us and return to the wilderness? Or will we choose life, and trust God to continue to save us and sustain us in this new landscape?
As Moses says: Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying him, and holding fast to him; for that means life to you and length of days.
