Reflection/Exhortation 3: The Pandemic Rumination (09.05.2020)

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The Pandemic Rumination by Jacob Ting (Youth Ministry)

We are living in some anxious and unprecedented times. We have all been affected by the Covid-19 outbreak and its impact is likely to keep growing and affecting us for a long while. But as we self- isolate, distance ourselves from others and generally stay at home, a whole new normal (a very trendy word nowadays) awaits and we as believers are trying (not to mention struggling) to adapt.

When Methodist churches in Sarawak started to go online for worship for the first time on 15th March, I have to admit I was a bit lost as to how should youth ministry continue. I was kind of scrambling to put plans together so that disruptions were kept to the minimum. Finally with the encouragement and advice of brother Johnnie, we began our first youth Zoom meeting on 29th March at 1pm and since then, we have meeting every Sunday.  Last Sunday 3rd May, the program was Sharing and Praying. We met virtually and shared about life during MCO. The struggles of the youth are mainly as follows:

  1. Online learning. Many have said they were given quite a fair bit of homework and assignments apart from their daily online classes. I can understand that not all youth have the necessary or sufficient electronic gadgets at home and some have to put up with slow internet speed. When parents also need to work using either PC or laptop and children need to go online for their classes, the shared usage of the limited number of electronic gadgets can be a challenge.
  2. Spiritual well-being. Despite texting them every day (not sure if they get bored with my messages or not, Lol), reminding them on the daily Bible study progress and to encourage them to draw near to God during this challenging time, I also tried not to interrupt with their lives too much. Of course, every now and then I would still forward messages/news from the church where updates were necessary such as the newly revamped TTMC web page and the weekly Shepherd’s Message by Rev Poh.
  3. Boredom. They complained about boredom, not being able to go out. That can be fully understood as you cannot confine the youth forever at home. Also, I guess there could also be tensions within the respective family (between siblings as well as between parents) which is only normal during this period of MCO as we spend literally 24 hours together. Frictions are inevitable, whether we like it or not.

Despite all the disruptions and our helplessness to worship together physically, I believe the MCO is being used by God to bless His people through live streaming (or delayed telecast) in a whole new way. When churches started streaming their services online, many were surprised at the audience they received. Take our weekly prayer meeting for instance, the number has increased. I also believe that our weekly Sunday live streaming worship from Masland Church, Sibu has reached Methodists, former Methodists as well as non-Methodists all over the world. It echoes what James Hudson Taylor have said, “the world is my parish”.

As I am writing this, it is day 50 of MCO. The Federal government has relaxed the MCO 2 days ago, calling it CMCO. We do not know about the outcome of the CMCO as it could go either way. But then again, there’s never a right time to lift the MCO. If we were to wait until it is ‘safe’ to lift the MCO, it could mean 6 or 12 months down the road or even longer (if ‘safe’ means no more Covid-19 virus out there). So my guess is that CMCO might be the way of the so called ‘soft-landing’ as proposed by our Health Director General and gradually we will go back not to normal, but to the ‘new normal’ where certain precautionary measures have to be strictly put in place such as personal hygiene, social distancing, sanitizing habits, restaurants or eateries that only allow take-away etc.

The message that I am trying to get through is that we need to prepare to walk slowly with our youth ( and our congregation as well), as we take the first delicate steps together back into what we used to call ‘normal’ few months down the road. Some of the youth or parents or even congregation could appear with long-lasting psychological indications of fear of converging. Therefore let’s have patience for one another. Let’s create a space for our youth and our congregation where it is safe to process this experience, even long after the pandemic is over.