Praying Through CoronavirusSample

Breath in a time of death

Today we are going to reflect on Ezekiel in the valley of dry bones, standing in a place of death and devastation, confronting a situation of total despair with nothing but the Word of the Lord.

We know by now that the Coronavirus spreads extensively through coughing, sneezing and breathing, and that it attacks the lungs. We are warned to maintain a two meter distance from one another, and to avoid breathing in close proximity for any length of time. 

Breath is a powerful metaphor in the Bible for life and the Holy Spirit. In Genesis 2:7 God makes Adam by breathing into his nostrils. In John 20:22 Jesus breathes upon his disciples and says ‘Receive the Holy Spirit’.  And here in this story Ezekiel prophesies breath into countless corpses turning the Valley of Dry Bones into the Valley of Resurrection. 

Acutely aware as I am that the Enemy wants to attack my breath, I take a few deep defiant breaths now in God’s presence, consciously exhaling fear, quietly receiving his Spirit afresh into my body, rejoicing that the breath of God brings hope not harm, health not sickness, and life to the full.

Pause and pray

I pray for those in my local hospital right now using ventilators, for those desperately needing ventilators and for those companies rushing to manufacture more ventilators in response to the sudden urgent demand. 

Lord, we cry out to you in the words of Ezekiel, ‘put your Spirit in these people that they might live.’

Pause and pray

The People of God in the world today are certainly saying ‘Our hope is gone and we are cut off’, but as in the Days of Ezekiel, the Breath of God is coming again in our time to counter the Enemy’s devastation and to raise us up once again as ‘a vast army’. 

Holy Spirit I invite you to come now from the four winds to revive and resurrect us in this place of such despair. I name particular churches other than my own in my village, town or city. 

Pause and pray

At this time of so much grieving and dying I receive God’s promise through Ezekiel again into my own life, allowing faith to rise within me for all that is to come: 

Hear the Word of the Lord: 

‘I will put my Spirit in you, and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the Lord have spoken, and I have done it, declares the Lord’