It seems everyone has a personal story about the pandemic. Whether your long-term health has been affected by the virus or the vaccine (or both), your business was forced to close because of lockdowns, or your relationships were forever changed by differences of opinion, it is a nearly universal truth that we were all changed when the world shut down in 2020.

Two key questions that have haunted us for years are: a) Did government authorities do the right thing (or even act with good intentions) during the pandemic? and b) Was the global response as effective as we were made to believe? Both were definitively answered in the negative just in the last few months.

First, in May of this year, a study was published in the International Journal of Public Health entitled, “What Lessons Can Be Learned from the Management of the COVID-19 Pandemic?” Here’s the Cliff’s Notes version from The Liberty Sentinel (The same link includes a 30 minute interview with the two co-authors of the study):

It’s official: The Covid pandemic response by authorities from the top to the bottom was a disaster on multiple fronts that must not be repeated, according to information compiled in a shocking new peer-reviewed study by dozens of scientists and experts from around the world in a wide range of disciplines.

The article later states,

The interdisciplinary team of 37 co-authors from 13 countries found “critical flaws” in the global management of the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings are shocking, from suppressing the safety signals surrounding the mRNA injections to using totally discredited “models” to undermine health and freedom.

On the domestic front, just a few days before the IJPH study was published, a report from the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations found that the Biden administration lied to the public about serious health risks associated with the COVID-19 vaccine. According to The Washington Stand,

…[I]nstead of informing the public about the deaths and the known health risks associated with the vaccine, U.S. health officials “downplayed the health concern” and intentionally “delayed informing the public about the risk” until June 2021 out of concern that the information would cause “vaccine hesitancy” in the public.

At this point, it’s almost mainstream to admit that the pandemic was not handled well, but this proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that lives were lost, or perhaps better said, sacrificed, to ensure our government could justify massive overreach into the lives of private citizens. This is a prime example of what former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel meant when he said, “Never allow a crisis to go to waste.”

Finally, earlier this month, the Telegraph reported on new modeling on pandemic statistics that show

COVID vaccines saved far fewer lives than first thought … Overall 5,400 people needed to be vaccinated to save one life, but in the under-30s this figure rose to 100,000 jabs, the paper suggests.

Researchers criticised “aggressive mandates and the zealotry to vaccinate everyone at all cost”, adding that the findings had implications for how future vaccine rollouts were handled.

Now we see in black and white the appalling truth, bearing out what many brave scientists and physicians risked and sacrificed their credibility to say: That vaccination programs should have been focused on vulnerable populations only, and that the risks to the healthy far outweighed any misguided attempt to achieve herd immunity.

This post-pandemic era feels like the Twilight Zone, with recent revelations that should qualify as bombshells largely being met with shrugs. Congressional committees may do their due diligence. There are rumblings of accountability from the White House and the DOJ…even down to and including Anthony Fauci’s preemptive pardon-by-autopen. But for those of us who were vilified, cancelled, put out of business, threatened, and whose relationship with family and friends has been forever altered, some things will never truly be set right.

In light of this new information–and the very real likelihood that true restoration is not coming in this life–we have a choice to make. Will our hearts become vindictive? Will we succumb to apathy? Will we choose bitterness? For the Christian, none of these is an option. We are to love one another, forgiving 70 times seven. That being said, we are also to be as wise as serpents.

If or when we face another cause for widespread panic, let us lead with peace, wisdom, and a good dose of hindsight. Let’s pray that those around us will resist the urge to revise history or stop their ears against the truth. Let’s lift our government officials in prayer and ask God to lead and convict them. And let us stand with spines of steel, inviting the Holy Spirit to help us correctly render to Caesar what is his and to God what is His.