Our Correspondent
Kohima | May 28
The Nagaland Joint Christian Forum (NJCF) called upon the Nagas to make the month of June as prayer month for COVID-19.
“As a Christian majority state, Christians have a major role to play in mitigating the virus,” stated Rev Dr Zelhou Keyho, chairman NJCF.
The Forum thanked all the churches and believers in joining “our hearts together in prayer seeking God’s mercy and intervention.”
“We are in a difficult and challenging time. As we pray, we believe that God is the ultimate healer. Our faith rest on this unshakable truth. But God has also given us the responsibility to exercise and do all that we can to protect ourselves and the community,” Rev Keyho stated.
During prayer month, the NJCF requested the local church pastors to come out with a daily prayer roaster for the members.
A convenient time for the members can be set forth with daily or weekly prayer points, he stated.
While “social distancing” might be the order of the day to mitigate the spread of COVID-19, spiritual and non-physical closeness in these times of isolation and quarantine is called for more than ever before, he said.
“Prayer is a potent force in this. In prayer we are profoundly connected to God and one another in deep and meaningful ways that passes all understanding. In prayer we are never alone. In addition to continuing our deep, personal prayer practices, we invite you, with the assistance and direction of your denomination leader and pastors to develop specific ways to reach out and connect with one another, and neighbors near and far, using available technology,” he said adding “intercessory prayer lists, telephone chains calling on the sick and shut-in and those in self-isolation because of the coronavirus, texting and using social media platform are all important ways that we can stay connected to God and our neighbors.”
‘Do away with the mindset that the church is closed’
He also challenged the people to “positively use what we have in our hand and remember Christians of old faced a situation such as our without any of what we now have. In prayer, we connect to one another and to God as people of hope in this challenging time. This is a time to learn to be Church, the Body of Christ, in new ways. Let us do away with the mindset that the church is closed.”
He said that the responsibility becomes greater in a Christian majority society like Nagaland where 90-95% are Christian.
“We are certainly called to pray and intercede for our leaders and policy makers and our people. As we do so, we must do our part by listening to the advice given by the experts and the professional. A lot has been said and talked regarding suspension of community worship. It has gone out widely that we have close down the church. The church is not closed, but the nature of the pandemic is as such that mass gatherings become super-spreader-agent. If we are sure who is carrying the virus it could have been much easier for us to contain the pandemic but that is not the case. Therefore, in this given context, we must hold on to the faith that God will help us fight the virus yet, we also must do our part by cooperating with the authority, the experts and the professionals who are sacrificing their own safety and comfort to protect us,” Rev Keyho said.
We who are living in the midst of the realities of the COVID-19 pandemic are living in uncertain and difficult times, not unlike the experience of the early Christians. We have never been in the situation we now find ourselves. Our world is turned upside down. Fear, insecurity, and anxiety concerning how COVID-19 will affect us, those we love, and our communities -including the church - consume us. Overwhelmed by a plethora of information coming at us on social media, television, radio and newspapers, we seem to be awash, confused, and paralyzed by not knowing what to do, he said.
‘Vaccines or medicines are for our good and not to harm us’
The NJCF reminded the believers not to become experts in forwarding and disseminating information that are not authentic.
“We have made our stand clear that we must educate our members about vaccination. We will remember well that last year, we have prayed for the vaccine, we prayed for the people who are responsible. We must believe that God has answered our prayer. We must not allow faith and prayer to become a mockery by becoming agents of falsehood,” he said.
He also stated that vaccines or medicines are for our good and not to harm us.
“The simple purpose of this is to protect us. A lot of stuffs that are going around are to create fear and confusion in the minds of the innocents. We acknowledge that the evil forces are at work too and we admonish our members not to become the agent but to be prayerful and discerning and not grief the Holy Spirit,” he said.
‘We must do away with discrimination and stigma’
NJCF called upon the Christian majority society to fight against the pandemic by doing all they can as God leads.
“Let us educate our members of the basic things we can do and not add burden to the authority. This we can do by disseminating the right information. We must do away with discrimination and stigma that seems to be creating another epidemic in our context. It calls the church to reach out beyond her border to any member who are in need around them,” he said.
The church must do away with discrimination and stigma which is becoming another epidemic in our context, he said and called upon the people to reach out to the bereaved, the affected and the sick.
The church must educate our members to appreciate each other and not be carried away with myth and falsehood that are doing the round, he said.
‘Be part of the solution and not the problem’
Rev Keyho also stressed on the need to cooperate with the authority and “do all we can to help each other to fight against the pandemic.”
Let us be part of the solution and not be part of the problem.
“Help the less fortunate and the needy around us. Educate our people to seek timely help. This includes vaccination medical help,” he said adding “The church is not closed, community worship is suspended to protect the community.”
He also stressed on the need to follow the SOPs diligently and “trust that God will be gracious and merciful to us.”
Continue to pray, keep the faith, and trust that God is our ultimate healer as we do our part, he added and quoted 1 Peter 1:21 as “Through him you have come to trust in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are set on God.”
