‘In the Time of Any Common Plague or Sickness’ – Heal Our Land, Lord

Today’s Two-Minute Warning is a social commentary feature at tristatevoice.com. This column (which can be read in two minutes) is written by managing editor Tom Campisi. To subscribe to this column or other tristatevoice.com articles, click here.

By Tom Campisi

The Book of Common Prayer includes an intercessory section entitled “In the Time of Any Common Plague or Sickness.” The prayer was penned in England in 1662 in response to centuries of plagues and death, but could easily have been written in the United States in 2020. As I meditated on this prayer and thought about the current pandemic, I wondered if we have the same humility, fear of God, and urgency:

O Almighty God, who in your wrath sent a plague upon your own people in the wilderness for their obstinate rebellion against Moses and Aaron, and also in the time of King David, sent a plague of pestilence which killed seventy thousand, but remembering your mercy spared the rest: have pity upon us miserable sinners, who now are visited with great sickness and mortality; and in the same way that you then accepted an atonement and commanded the destroying Angel to cease from punishing: so it may now please you to withdraw from us this plague and grievous sickness, through Jesus Christ our Lord. 

As a nation, we may be thankful for the vaccines and signs that brighter days are ahead, but have we repented for our rebellion against God? We have prayed for Him to heal our land (2 Chron. 7:14), but have we turned from our wicked ways? Ancient Israel was delivered mightily in Egypt, only to soon forget God in the wilderness. I pray that we will not be forgetful. I pray that we will remember the honor due to Jesus Christ, our mighty deliverer.

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