Treading on Lions

Easter is different this year, or, at least our celebration of Easter is different. Instead of gathering with our families of faith to worship together, we worship around the computer screen. Instead of the traditional Easter brunch with families and friends, we eat alone or with our immediate family living with us.

Though the celebration is different, the significance is the same. Christ is risen. He is risen indeed. In the face of continuing grim news about Covid 19 and the economy, we receive anew this beautiful assurance. Because Jesus conquered death, all who look to Him as Savior have also conquered eternal death. We celebrate the greatest victory in all of human history on Easter Sunday.

While we pause to celebrate and reflect, we know it’s back to more Covid 19 news tomorrow. I have been praying Psalm 91 over my family every day. That Psalm promises deliverance from the deadly pestilence.

It also promises that we will “tread on lions and adders.” As I meditated on what that verse could mean for us today, I asked, “What are the lions and adders (poisonous snakes) in our lives?” For me, the lions and adders are the negative reports - the grim news we hear and read.

In my last post, I shared a story from the Old Testament book of Numbers. There is another one I’d like to share today. In Numbers, chapters 13 and 14, Moses sends out 12 spies to scout out the promised land which God had promised to the Israelites. After a forty day excursion, ten of the spies reported back that, while the land was productive, lush and abounding with all good things, the inhabitants were far too strong, fortified and ferocious to overcome. Two of the spies, however, Joshua and Caleb, agreed with the other ten about the desirability of the land, but said the inhabitants could easily be overcome with God’s help. The Israelites listened to the ten with the negative report and God was not pleased. It took Moses’ ardent intercession for God to forgive them. Because Joshua and Caleb looked to God, not the circumstances, they alone of the twelve would go into the promised land.

I choose to be a Joshua or Caleb. Instead of looking at the people in charge and Covid 19 decisions they make that seem to me to be mistakes, I want to tread on those lions and adders as Psalm 91 promises. I want to keep my eyes on the God who loved me enough to send His son to die for me and raised Him up victorious on Easter Sunday. As the Apostle Paul reminds us, “He who did not withhold His own Son, but gave Him up for all of us, will He not with Him also give us everything else?” (Rom. 8 32) Everything else includes safety, security, protection, and eternal life. That is good news for Easter Monday.