What Will Your "New Normal" Look Like?

For the better part of a year, the world has been waylaid by a global virus.

We have all tried to learn and adjust to new ways of life—keeping our distance, avoiding public gatherings, wearing masks. It’s put a heavy burden on everyone from healthcare workers to everyday people. Many have died, others got sick and lost loved ones. But the night won’t last forever.

Every night is followed by morning, whether that takes 12 hours or a few years. Potentially helpful vaccines are already hitting the market. Soon we will emerge from this pandemic. And then what?

What will we have learned? Will we go back to normal? And what is normal?

2020 is nothing new. The world has experienced plagues and catastrophes before.

And then when things become normal again, humans tend to slip back into our regular way of life, too often typified by living for ourselves and failing to care for others. We forget. 

Jesus came to Earth more than 2,000 years ago to show us a revolutionary new way we could live. Love each other. Forgive our enemies. Die to ourselves in order to glorify God and help other people. If nothing else, this most recent pandemic has provided us an opportunity to put that vision back into action. That’s a silver lining if there ever was one.

Early in the pandemic, a man I know went door to door offering to bring groceries to the neighbors on his street. Others have spent time in isolation to refocus on their relationship with God. Others have opted to wear masks, just in case, even if they weren’t fully convinced that the virus is real.

Sure, we miss going to the movies and sporting events. We miss going out to eat at restaurants. But we’ve also learned that denying ourselves these things has reminded us we are responsible to our neighbors. We are our brother’s keeper.

The amazing thing is that we can continue to do this even after the virus vanishes and life gets back to normal, which it eventually will. 

And once it does, how will we emerge from what we experienced?

Have you ever been desperate and promised God you would turn your life around if he would just heal you, save a loved one, or bail you out of some hazardous situation?

Most of us have been there and done that. But as soon as our situation changes for the better, we quickly forget what God has done for us and we go right on living, mostly unaware, like we always did. Even after a miracle, we forget and move on.

Maybe most of the world will do that again after COVID-19 subsides. It seems to be in our nature to default to self-centered living, even if we are good people. But we have a choice. Each one of us gets to choose to learn the good lessons from this pandemic and put them into action. 

It may take consciously reminding ourselves—of what we lost during this time: people, mobility, the freedom to go to a concert or simply hug someone without fear.

We will have to intentionally recall that these “little” things were huge, and appreciate them now for what they are: glorious blessings, the stuff of life.

Galatians 5:22-23 says that “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.” 

Against such no global virus can prevail. Nothing can prevent us from living out these fruits in our lives.

We can express them during the pandemic in a unique way. And we can live them out, with a renewed and refreshed perspective, once it has passed and we all get back to “normal.”

Let’s make the new normal as old as Jesus’s command to love one another and live the abundant life he came to give us (John 10:10).

When the smoke clears, let’s go out and enjoy being in public with others. Let’s squeeze our loved ones and be kind to our neighbors. Let’s “live in a manner worthy of the Lord, so as to be fully pleasing, in every good work bearing fruit and growing in the knowledge of God” (Colossians 1:10).