Why I wrote “From Pandemic to Renewal”
In early 2020 I was working on a book project which suddenly seemed unimportant after the pandemic interruption. This interview with my publishing team at InterVarsity Press (which they are sharing with media outlets) is about why I decided to write a different book – From Pandemic to Renewal: Practices for a World Shaken by Crisis.
What about your personal experiences during the pandemic prompted you to write this book?
Chris Rice: After the pandemic hit, I had a front-row seat at the United Nations and with a global ministry working in fifty countries. I saw firsthand many new crises unfold in the world. Meanwhile my wife was putting her life at risk as a nurse at the frontlines in New York City, and she saw many American realities firsthand. I was also living with my father in small town Vermont, seeking to protect him, and that experience opened up pain in my family I hadn’t seen before.
On every front—global, national, and personal—I began to see that the pandemic was like an x-ray revealing many new challenges such as frantic anxiety, rising disparity, surging polarization, political mediocrity, and brokenness in private life. But my life’s journey also taught me that crises can ignite incredible new growth in our lives. All this convinced me that this is an unprecedented new time in our world that can become a time of great renewal. That gave me great passion to write this book.
Do you believe there are pathways toward renewal coming out of the challenges of the pandemic?
Chris: The pandemic has been the crisis of a century, exposing a new time in our world that will reshape our lives for decades to come. But this challenging time we are in is also the opportunity of a century—for renewal in our lives, churches, and world.
My book is about eight challenges exposed by the pandemic and eight pathways to renewal and fresh growth. There is much we can read about Covid-19 as a health and economic crisis. But using a moral and scriptural lens, my book gives readers a bird’s-eye view, revealing great challenges that were exposed or accelerated by the pandemic, how the world has been changed, and how a new time has come, which, yes, presents a remarkable opportunity for the renewal of Christian life and public witness in our families, churches, and the world.
What do you hope readers might take away from your book?
Chris: I want readers to understand and to be gripped by the unprecedented new time the pandemic has opened in our world for decades to come. I want them to gain deep insight into eight extraordinary challenges facing our lives, communities, and churches, which have been exposed or accelerated by the pandemic. I hope people will learn how engaging these challenges—from personal, to social, to political—can become ground for drawing closer to Christ. I want readers to be inspired with hope by gaining fresh knowledge about faithful and effective steps they can take for positive action and change and for becoming border-crossing people. More than educate readers, I want this book to spark renewal in their lives.
Here’s where to order From Pandemic to Renewal: Practices for a World Shaken by Crisis.
(featured image by Mark Weber, Op-Art)
