“Is COVID a part of biblical prophecy?”

Steve Brown:
Is, COVID a part of biblical prophecy? The answer to that and other questions on Key Life.

Matthew Porter:
If you think laughter isn’t spiritual or that faithfulness to God means conformity to Christian stereotypes. Then this program probably isn’t for you. But if you’re looking for honest, biblical answers to honest questions, welcome to Key Life. Here’s our host, author and seminary professor Steve Brown, along with Pete Alwinson from ForgeBibleStudy.com.

Steve Brown:
Thank you Matthew. Hi Pete.

Pete Alwinson:
Hey man. You doing alright?

Steve Brown:
Yeah. Wearing a mask.

Pete Alwinson:
And you don’t have COVID, you never had it.

Steve Brown:
No. Uh, no, I don’t think so, but you can have it not know it.

Pete Alwinson:
I know that true.

Steve Brown:
So you become a grandmother killer, and don’t even know you’ve done it.

Pete Alwinson:
Oh my goodness.

Steve Brown:
I mean, if I’m going to kill somebody, I want to know I did it.

Pete Alwinson:
Wow.

Steve Brown:
But if you’re asymptomatic,

Pete Alwinson:
That’s true.

Steve Brown:
You don’t even, you could give it to somebody.

Pete Alwinson:
Steve, we cannot mess around with this stuff. Cause people are going to get really angry at us.

Steve Brown:
I know. We’re just kidding around a little. It’s really, we’re going to talk about it in a little bit.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
And, as I’ve reminded you, but you never listen to me go to a ForgeTruth.com and you’ll find some very good stuff there. And if you live in central Florida, you ought to be a part of Forge, it’s one of the most important Christian men’s groups in the country, and it’ll change your life and you can go to ForgeTruth.com you can find out when and where the meetings take place. And, then you will thank me for having told you about it. By the way as you know, Pete comes in and we answer questions together on Fridays, and we love to get your questions. You can call 1-800-KEY-LIFE, 24 seven, you can write a question and send it to

Key Life Network
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Or you can email us at [email protected]. And if you can help us financially, that would be so good too. We would still answer your question, but you know, we would answer it in more detail, if you sent some money, no we wouldn’t. If you can, do help us and I promise we’ll be faithful and squeeze every dime for the glory of God. If you can’t, we understand, do say a prayer for this ministry. Oh, by the way, there’s a new way you can give on your smartphone. You can text Key Life at 28950 and follow the instructions. And I’m told by the staff that this is a really easy and cool way to do it.

Pete Alwinson:
And you’re not untechie. You do a lot of tech stuff.

Steve Brown:
Yeah, but barely.

Pete Alwinson:
I mean, well, you’re in the game.

Steve Brown:
Why don’t you lead us in prayer and we’ll get to these questions.

Pete Alwinson:
For sure. Our Great Father, we come to you at the end of this week and what a privilege it is to pray, what a joy to be able to pray, to know that we are not left alone in this, in this world, where there is is a great deal of chaos and difficulty and depression and suicide, and so many, so many issues on health. And so many people are without hope. And so Lord, thank you that as your people, we do have hope, we have forgiveness, we have a relationship with you that will last forever and we don’t have to be afraid. And that your Holy Spirit is the comforter who has residence in our lives. And so we come to you and we do pray that you would become more and more real to us every day as we live and breathe and serve you. Lord, thanks for Key Life. Thanks for our churches. Thanks for the pastors and priests and worship directors and leaders, who are going to lead us into your presence this weekend. And so we pray. Give them power. Give them the wisdom to share your grace with us, that we would be listeners and worshipers and honor you. Bless our time now with Q&A. We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Steve Brown:
Amen. Pete, this is an email and it says. Is COVID a part a biblical prophecy?

Pete Alwinson:
And your answer, Mr. Prophetic speaker.

Steve Brown:
Well, you were talking about some things, maybe, maybe not.

Pete Alwinson:
I know.

Steve Brown:
Is that part of the bowls of wrath? And the disease that is, the many, what were you talking about? The Matthew passage.

Pete Alwinson:
In Matthew 20, if you look at Matthew 24, we don’t see that that’s the many apocalypse of Jesus. Right? So, we don’t see him talking about that, but in Revelation, as Jeremy had mentioned, as we were bantering this back and forth, you know, there’s bowls of wrath and all that, could, could be, could be, What we can say definitively, I think, check me on this, is that, is that what sin has brought into the world, is continuing to unfold in physical, degeneration, in many ways, illnesses, disease and death. And so, at minimum, but this is a big deal. This virus is, should remind us of the curse of the fall. And that Jesus has come to reverse the curse. And he will, one day, he has in his work and one day he’s going to come, as you have often said,and clean up the mess.

Steve Brown:
Yeah, that’s true. And, please don’t think that I’m taking this not serious. I believe COVID is a serious thing.

Pete Alwinson:
Sure. We both do.

Steve Brown:
But we need to be careful and we need to do all we can, but there’s kind of an underlying assumption that Christians won’t have to deal with these kinds of things. As a matter of fact, we do. And it’s the curse of the fall and we die the way unbelievers die and we get disease the way unbelievers get disease. And I personally believe that that happens so the world can see the difference. I think Christians need to ask God to give them peace, to give them courage, to give them a strong witness. There’s probably not a darker time in our country’s history. I mean, this is, whatever you think about COVID, it’s pretty scary. And it’s been fanned.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
I mean, every news organization is making money on it and getting rich and so there is not only the actual and horrible danger of COVID, there is the way that fire is fanned for a lot of reasons that are less than compassionate.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
And so you don’t know who to believe you and isn’t that awful? No, that’s good, because that’s where Christians are able to make a witness.

Pete Alwinson:
Boy. You’re so right. And, you know, I heard the other day that Chinese Christians are saying two things, they’re saying don’t pray that persecution goes away, it’s making us stronger and more Godly. And we’re praying for American Christians that you guys would suffer a little bit more, so you can get tougher. And, that’s a missionary that said that, and that’s a powerful statement, because we can be so wimpy and so entitled. Then you look at the Christians that in the book of acts and after that spread the gospel, they were willing to suffer and die. So we need to go back. as you’ve said, you need to get a theology of death again, so that we’re not living in fear.

Steve Brown:
Yeah. But maybe, the short answer to the question is maybe, maybe not.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah. I don’t think there’s any way we can actually take any hermeneutical principles that can come to my mind and take it and apply it to Ezekiel or Daniel or Revelation. I can’t think of any way to actually find if this is a part of that, but in the broad scope, as you said, yes.

Steve Brown:
Okay. Matthew 24:13 says,

But he who endures to the end will be saved.

Saved from what? The penalty of sin or saved from the terrible tribulation of that time.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah. What do you think?

Steve Brown:
I think, I think there’s a main point that’s being made and it’s about perseverance. The question is how do we persevere? If you just take that verse by itself and don’t use any other Scripture, which is wrong, by the way, you’ll come out with another works salvation thing. And you have to be careful, because God has been so careful in telling us that’s not what it’s about. We persevere because he perseveres in us. And, when we get home, we’re not going to be able to say, I did it, I did it. We’re only gonna be able to say, he did it, he did it.

Pete Alwinson:
Right.

Steve Brown:
But perseverance is important. And that’s what that verse is talking about. It’s simply a way of God saying to you, hang tough.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah. So really, what I hear you saying, is that could apply to the penalty of sin

Steve Brown:
Yeah.

Pete Alwinson:
and the terrible tribulation of the time.

Steve Brown:
Sure.

Pete Alwinson:
But it’s probably it’s both halves.

Steve Brown:
Very good. Yeah, but it just says again, hang tough. Don’t shilly shally.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
You know, it’s easy to shilly shally, that’s an old phrase that only old people use, but it means being a wuss. And,

Pete Alwinson:
Where’s it come from? Do you know?

Steve Brown:
No, I have no idea and I don’t want to check, cause I might find it as a pagan connotation, that I didn’t mean by it, but,

Pete Alwinson:
It might be a cuss word. Steve, I don’t know? And you’ve been saying it for years.

Steve Brown:
I’ll look, maybe, someday I’ll Google it and see, but you know, this isn’t an easy time to back off. We’re not liked.

Pete Alwinson:
No, we’re not.

Steve Brown:
And it’s easier, just to be still and not say anything. And there’s never been a time, when Christians need to speak up and not, Johnny Cash had a song I’ll Never Back, I’ll Never, well, I’ll never shilly shally is what he meant. I’ll Never Back Down,

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah. Yeah.

Steve Brown:
is the name of the song. And, and he’s right, the world will do you wrong, but I’ll never back down. And I think Christians need to sing Johnny Cash’s song, and we need to not back down with the truth.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah, that’s right. Jesus was full of grace and truth, is full of grace and truth and we should be too.

Steve Brown:
Yeah. And not, yeah, don’t do a uncivil. I’m right. You’re wrong. And you’re going to hell kind of thing. But a comment, often should be made. Hey, if I disagree with you, can we still be friends? And then after you say that, you can say almost anything.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
But, you’ve gotta be gentle.

Pete Alwinson:
I like that. That’s a good, that’s a good way that we can all apply.

Steve Brown:
Let’s see, what else, we operate off of sheets here.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
And sometimes, I get caught up in the question, and forget to look at the next question. If a Christian falls into sin and continues in it, will God cause the Christian to lose that part of the body that offends? Now that’s not a good interpretation of that verse. If you’re eye offends you, rip it out and cast it cause it’s better than your eye go to hell than your whole body.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
That, it’s not to be taken literally.

Pete Alwinson:
Well, we, we take the meaning literally,

Steve Brown:
Yeah.

Pete Alwinson:
but not, but not the words literally. So the words are clearly hyperbole and metaphorical language, meant to convey something else. Right. And that’s, that’s an, that’s a Biblical interpretation principle. That’s very important.

Steve Brown:
That’s true. You know, there’s a cult that really takes this stuff literally.

Pete Alwinson:
Good night.

Steve Brown:
I know, people

Pete Alwinson:
Church on Sunday must be just,

Steve Brown:
Right. No, don’t even go there. And we don’t have time to go there either, it’s time for us to leave. And we’re so glad when you join us. And we’re so glad to hear from you and your comments. Gotta go. Key Life is a listener supported production of Key Life Network.