Recently, I wrote about the need for us as Christians to take a Biblical lens to our culture, examining what we do, why we do it, and whether it’s Biblical. As I pointed out, we pick up our own culture from how we grew up, and from those around us – both inside the church and outside it – and it’s important to test that against the Scriptures. Times of culture shock provide a good opportunity to reassess.

The present COVID-19 epidemic serves to help us examine our culture and habits. Many of us have had a lot of our old way of life suddenly stripped away or dramatically changed. Depending on our career, school, and family situation this looks very different for different people – but I think it’s safe to say that all of us have been profoundly affected. So now’s the time to ask:

What was the good and bad about our old way of life? How should following Christ look different when the current restrictions begin to ease up and we have the option to go back to the way we used to do things? … how does God want us to change?

Let’s not spend our time wanting things to go back to normal, but instead ask what our new normal should look like.

The Gospel Coalition recently posted on somewhat related lines, looking at the old normal and whether we really want to go back to it. There, Trevin Wax highlights some problems with the old normal, like disconnection from neighbors, waning involvement in community, lack of family time, political polarization, and a great focus on entertainment. He then moves on to ask a number of key questions including:

What if this crisis is a divine disruption that allows us to rethink ourselves, to rethink our lives, to reconsider our habits?

What if this crisis is a divine opportunity to reflect on what matters most and to order our lives accordingly?

What if this season of total reliance on technology for spreading communication helps us see the limits of technology for building and sustaining community?

What if this period of forced isolation can help us see the end result of radical individualism’s trajectory, so that in the end we come out of our enclaves and homes with a stronger commitment to our communities, our churches, and our country?

These are clearly important questions for us to be asking, evaluating, and answering for ourselves. But I want to go a bit further and give some of my own thoughts in a couple of areas. First, though, I want to give a principle.

Circumstances don’t result in happiness

The Bible is clear that real, lasting joy is only to be found in Christ, not in our circumstances, and secular history and studies back this up in part. I won’t dig up the source literature right now due to limited time, but countless surveys find that beyond a certain base income, increased income doesn’t correlate with increased happiness. Indeed, it may correlate with increased discontentment. Yet so often, I think we find ourselves thinking that if our circumstances were only different a bit in a certain way, then we would be content; then we’d be happy. And that’s the lie the world offers to us, and one which is so prominent in our society, which often has a “life for the weekend/live for vacation” type mentality.

I like to remind myself of what I think of as the “beach house” principle. I remember running with a friend in an early morning along Newport Bay just above Corona Del Mar beach and admiring the houses with amazing views of the beach and the Pacific Ocean, and being tempted to wish I could live in a place like that. Then, he and I began talking about what it would be like and quickly realized – we enjoy it far more by visiting occasionally than we do if we lived there. With a week in a beach house (or an occasional day there or run there) we delight in the view and really enjoy it. It’s truly awesome. But, if we lived there, it’d quickly become normal. We wouldn’t enjoy it as much.

Surely you’ve experienced the same thing. You bought a new car and it was amazing for a week, or a month, or a few months, but then you get used to it and it’s no big deal. Or the same happens with your new house, or your new job, or when you begin dating, or have a child. These are big events, but once you adjust, it’s still the same YOU there and it likely hasn’t profoundly affected your base level of happiness. Yes, getting rid of huge problems in your life can make a big impact – that’s not my focus here. I’m just pointing out that we all pass through these major changes in circumstance and come out largely the same. Our expectations adjust to our surroundings, making it the new normal.

If circumstances don’t result in happiness, then we should design our circumstances so we can glorify God

How does this all relate to COVID? Well, if our circumstances don’t result in our happiness, then we, first, ought to pursue Christ who is the source of real lasting joy – the living water (John 4). But secondarily, we ought to design our circumstances (and rethink our culture) so we can best pursue Christ and best glorify and serve him.

Let me give some specific areas that we might want to look at (in each area, thinking of our time and our money, some of the major resources God has entrusted to us):

  • How much do we spend on entertainment?
  • How much do we spend on eating out?
  • What about pursuing Christ and prayer?
  • Or training our children?
  • How about helping others?
  • Our choice of job, commute, work, and home?

Are there areas where we’re spending a lot of time, effort, or money, without real benefits, so that we ought to readjust? Or are we pursuing money at the expense of what really matters?

In my own case, I’ve been really challenged about family devotions and worship, and I’m working to rethink things – especially my own attitude – so that these will be a more central part of our life than before. We already had a commitment to them, but I think we’ll really benefit from trying for a set time we do them almost every day (except when things like Bible study intervene). And this ought to be a much higher priority than, say, letting the kids watch a movie or something similar.

I’m also challenged, with respect to my work, to reassess my travel. I normally don’t travel a lot by the standards of an academic researcher, but it’s still a lot for my family. So I’m challenged to be more careful in what travel I agree to take on – to ensure it’s something which is really going to matter, not just something I take on because it’s expected of me or because I don’t want to let a colleague down or similar. Because when I travel, I’m missing out on a lot of things at home and in my church that are very important.

One of the other questions Wax asked, above, also challenges me:

What if this season of total reliance on technology for spreading communication helps us see the limits of technology for building and sustaining community?

I’m a technologist by career, and as a bit of an introvert, I tend to use it for a lot. But I think he’s right – COVID-19 is a great reminder that I need to be with God’s people, serving with them, and encouraging/challenging one another. This is also a great reminder that the people I’m WITH are far more important to really connect with right now than the people I could interact with on social media.

What are your thoughts? How should your new normal be different from the old one?