Return to Normal
The following article originally appeared in Thann’s “The Equipped” Weekly Newsletter on September 18, 2024. For more information on Thann’s weekly email, click here.
In the latest sign the COVID-19 pandemic is fully receding into the history books, Amazon has announced a return to five-day in-office work weeks, beginning in January 2025. While much of the U.S. workforce long ago returned to full in-person schedules, many large technology companies have continued operating on a hybrid model. Amazon has been requiring employees to be in the office three days a week since May 2023, and the return to fully staffed offices will occur just less than five years after employees moved to a model of mostly working from home at the onset of the pandemic in March 2020.
Analysis and eternal perspective: Some call it a return to normal, while others insist there is a permanent “new normal.” There is no doubt the COVID-19 pandemic—and the ensuing restrictions—significantly altered the “normal” rhythm of life in a way that is still reverberating today. The issue ignites passionate reactions in us like few other issues, and for understandable reasons—the pandemic both took loved ones and dramatically restricted the normal course of life.
As this story reminds us of the return to “normal,” let us be mindful of Matthew 24, in which Jesus points to a growing turmoil on the Earth which will intensify until the day of His return. Jesus says there will be “wars and rumors of wars” (v. 6), and a variety of other “birth pains” (v.8). But even amid all that turmoil, the Gospel will reach the whole world (v. 14)!
You, my friend, are the vessel for that spread of the Gospel! It is quite tempting for this story to dredge up all manner of anxiety and bitterness and dread, but it should actually invigorate you toward the purpose for which you were created—telling the world of the glory of your God! Your “new normal” speaks not of things so small as Earthly calamity, but rather about something as large as an eternal security with the God who transcends it all!