He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.” Mark 16:15
After much anticipation, "trucks and cargo planes packed with the first of nearly three million doses of coronavirus vaccine fanned out across the country on Sunday as hospitals in all 50 states rushed to set up injection sites and their anxious workers tracked each shipment hour by hour. With the U.S. coronavirus death toll approaches 300,000, the majority of the first injections are expected to be given on Monday to high-risk health care workers. According to Gen. Gustave F. Perna, the chief operating officer of the federal effort to develop a vaccine, 145 sites are set to receive the vaccine on Monday, 425 on Tuesday, and 66 on Wednesday.
This focused and strategic plan to blunt the spreading of coronavirus is long overdue. With more than 16 million people infected with COVID-19, we need to marshal the political will and the medical expertise to neutralize the effect of COVID-19. The hope is that by the end of next year, the world will have defeated the virus, and a sense of normalcy can be restored.
Yet there is a virus more deadly than COVID-19 which is spreading at an alarming rate and destroying far more lives than any virus the world has ever experienced. It is called sin and spiritual disobedience. Thankfully, Jesus gave the world the vaccine (the gospel) before He ascended to heaven.
As with the coronavirus vaccine, we have to share the gospel with the people in our homes, neighborhoods, and place of employment. They are the high-risk individuals we should prioritize before going to other cities, states, and countries to spread the gospel. After all, they are our foremost priority.
The gospel is the only remedy for the deadly effects of sin and disobedience to God. It is unconscionable for believers not to share this spiritual vaccine with the world. This pandemic has reminded the world of the imminence of death. Human beings are not in control as we think we are. In a blink of an eye, our lives can flip upside-down. The only guarantee we have is in our faith in Jesus Christ.
Sadly, more than half of the world’s population is operating without that faith in Christ. Whereas many of them may be religious, they still fall short in their religiosity. Without a relationship with Jesus Christ, the sin virus will ultimately destroy anyone who rejects Christ. Believers have a God-given responsibility to proclaim the gospel. We cannot practice our faith in a spiritual silo. Our spirituality must be contagious to those living around us.
Jesus told His disciples to go into all the world to preach the gospel to all creation because He knew the gospel was the only remedy for the sin virus. This virus is extremely contagious and deadly. The gospel helps people to build antibodies against this virus.
The second part of the text says, whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. Currently, there is a lot of debate about the efficacy and safety of the coronavirus vaccine. Some people are afraid of the side-effects of the vaccine and have opted to postpone their inoculation until the safety and efficacy of the vaccine are beyond question. Fortunately, there is no side effect with the gospel. On the contrary, the sooner a person surrenders their life to Christ, the healthier and safer they become.
Let us be intentional about sharing this gospel so we can help inoculate the world against the sin virus. It does not matter the method used to spread the gospel. Our focus is spiritual herd-immunity so we can blunt the effects of sin in the world. Then we will not only help save those in our sphere of influence, we will also receive our eternal reward from our Father in Heaven.
Question for Personal Reflection
How are you helping to spread the gospel to all creation?
Prayer- Sovereign Christ, thank you for saving me and commissioning me to share the gospel to all creation. Please reveal to me the high-risk individuals with whom I need to share the gospel more urgently.