Spiritual COVID

 

If you read the most recent entry you know I have been pondering the Holy Spirit and the air we breathe, this led me to what happens when we don't breathe. Naturally I started with COVID, according to WebMD, "the illness is caused by the coronavirus, it starts with droplets from an infected person’s cough, sneeze, or breath. The droplets (called fomites) could be in the air or on a surface that you touch before touching your eyes, nose, or mouth. That gives the virus a passage to the mucous membranes in your throat. Within 2 to 14 days, your immune system may respond with symptoms that may include:

  • Fever
  • A cough
  • Shortness of breath or trouble breathing
  • Fatigue
  • Chills, sometimes with shaking
  • Body aches
  • Headache
  • A sore throat
  • Congestion or a runny nose
  • Loss of taste
  • Loss of smell
  • Nausea or vomiting
  • Diarrhea

The virus moves down your respiratory tract. That’s the airway that includes your mouth, nose, throat, and lungs. Your lower airways have more ACE2 receptors than the rest of your respiratory tract. So COVID-19 is more likely to go deeper than viruses like the common cold.

Your lungs will become inflamed, making it tough for you to breathe. This can lead to pneumonia, an infection of the tiny air sacs (called alveoli) inside your lungs where your blood exchanges oxygen and carbon dioxide." Literally these are little vessels in your lungs that fill up with air. When inflammed they can't stretch like a balloon and fill up or in some cases recoil and exhale.


Lets focus on that inflammation response, which is caused by an effort of the body to remove the foreign object in this case the COVID virus. There are several symptoms: 

  • Redness
  • Heat
  • Swelling
  • Pain: or tenderness
  • Loss of function:

What if we weren't talking about a virus, what if instead we were talking about sin. The inflammation response would be the body's attempt to protect our spirits. The redness is Jesus's blood that covers the sin. In our bodies an increase in temperature denatures the foreign proteins. The heat in our spirit's is like the fire removing the dross or impurities from gold. The swelling I associate with pride which is often our source of sin. The pain is the gift that God gives us that says turn away, but while we are inflamed there is a loss of function.

I've had walking pneumonia and asthmatic bronchitis in both situations  you literally wheeze when you breathe because the airways are so inflamed it is challenging to inhale and exhale. Just as it is difficult to breathe when you have COVID it is difficult to walk in the Spirit when you are in sin.

Fortunately acute inflammation usually turns things around after a few days but in some cases it doesn't then it turns in to chronic inflammation which has its own set of symptoms.

  • Fatigue: and insomnia
  • Joint stiffness: and body pain, or aches and stiffness in muscles
  • Skin problems
  • Gastrointestinal issues, such as constipation, diarrhea, or bloating
  • Mood changes, including anxiety or depression
  • Unexplained weight changes
  • Frequent infections
  • Elevated blood markers: indicating an ongoing immune response 

Does sin have such a stronghold that you have thees symptoms? Have you ever been spiritually weary because you are running on your power not God's. Is your faith stiff? robotic? Do the cracks in your faith appear on the surface? Are you not digesting enough of the Word to nourish your Spirit? Frequent struggles and fights with temptation? Does it seems like its just getting worse?

My question is what is infecting you? What sin is affecting your ability to breathe? Our lungs are like an empty vessel. They work passively we don't have to fill them just like God will fill us, we don't have to do anything, we only need to be an empty vessel. It is His gift to us. 

But let's look at the lesson of the widow in 2 Kings 4. The widow borrowed many empty vessels to receive a miraculous amount of oil from the prophet Elisha. Being an "empty vessel" means acknowledging one's weakness and spiritual need, surrendering personal plans to God's will, and opening oneself to be filled with the Holy Spirit and God's gifts, which results in an abundance of God's power but there are three requirements of the vessel. It must be empty, clean and available.

So if your life is not manifesting the power of the Holy Spirit, if you are not walking in the gifts of the 1st Century church, the question becomes what condition is your vessel in? Have you been infected does it need to be emptied and cleaned out? Is it avaiable or filed with something else?

The Bible uses breath as a metaphor for the Holy Spirit, highlighting the divine presence within believers. Our first breath is at birth and our last breath at death frame our human experience, highlighting the cyclical nature of life and our spiritual journeys.

It has been said that the Jewish sages believe that the covenant name of God, Yahweh, is associated with breathing. The idea is that the name itself, when pronounced, is the sound of breathing: the two syllables of the name correspond to the intake and outtake of a single breath. In this way, our breaths evokes the name of God. A naturally voiced inhalation sounds like “Yah,” and a voiced exhalation sounds like “Weh.” Thus, with every breath we take, we are speaking God’s name. He breathed into us the breath of life (Genesis 2:7), and we still retain that breath.

According to the view that with every breath we say the name of Yahweh, we constantly have God’s name on our lips. Consciously or unconsciously, speaking the name of God is the one thing we do every minute of our lives. “In his hand is the life of every creature and the breath of all mankind” (Job 12:10). “In him we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28).

So if you have inflammation, identify the sin, repent and breathe and let your vessel be filled.

Hold  Me Lord

Hold me Lord (Hold me Lord)
In your arms (IIn your arms)
FILL ME, LORD (FILL ME, LORD)
WITH YOUR SPIRIT
 

With Your love (With Your love)
Let my life glorify your name
Singing

CHORUS:

ALLELUIA, SINGING ALLELUIA
SINGING ALLELUIA
SINGING ALLELUIA
ALLELUIA
ALLELUIA
ALLELUIA
ALLELU


 

 

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