I’m going public.  I’m vaccinated.  I got vaccinated very early in the process, when there were still lines of folks waiting for it and qualifications to get it.  Why did I do this?

I’m a Christian leader.  I am constantly called to directly interact with people closely whom I don’t always know well.  They are of all ages, health conditions, and social positions.  When I discovered that there was an “emergency” distribution of vaccine that would make me less likely to contract the virus and thereby spread it (perhaps unknowingly), I took the opportunity as soon as I could.

To me, it was a matter of love.  Christian love, specifically.  When I read passages like Philippians 2:3-4, I knew I had to make my choice with balance.  “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.  Each of you should look not only on your own interests, but also to the interests of others.”  Paul goes on to describe Jesus, who gave up his rights to his legitimate heavenly position and even his earthly life to purchase life for everyone else.

I don’t for a moment mean by this that those who have chosen against vaccination are somehow less Christian or don’t love others as much or more than me.  For me, though, the choice was fairly obvious.  Three factors were part of my consideration. 

First was fear, or rather a lack of it.  Although there was less known about the vaccination than I would have liked, I did not fear what it might do to me, either overtly or subtly.  If I contracted the virus, I might die, but, as Paul said earlier in the same letter quoted above (Philippians 1:21), “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.”  No fear there.  If the vaccination somehow turned out to be dangerous, the same held true.  My death was not what concerned me.  It was the possibility of infecting others that concerned me.  I don’t know and can’t tell what might be the eternal destination of everyone I meet.  Rather than risk sending them faithless to their graves, I would rather take the risk on myself.  It was compassion and love that drove that part of my reasoning.

Second was how my choice would impact others.  This was directly related to the first.  If I was vaccinated, regardless of whether I encountered someone who was vaccinated or so-called anti-vaxxer, I could be confident that I was less dangerous to them and them to me.  I respect that some people choose not to be vaccinated, and I celebrate that we live in a country that (so far) grants us the freedom to make those kinds of choices.  I recognized at the same time that I could only live within a world with both groups with a clear conscience if I took whatever precautions were available to me.  As a Christian leader, I also knew that my choice would influence others’ choices.  I hoped to model a love-based decision.

The final factor was politics, or rather the willful ignorance of politics.  I recognized early on that the whole circumstance related to the pandemic had been turned into a political jousting match.  Whatever one party suggested, the other party rejected.  The word “science” was used in manners that were completely foreign to my experience in scientific work (I graduated with a BS in Chemistry from my undergraduate studies and worked for over two decades in research and other science-related activities).  Mandates were handed down regardless of what people discovered about the virus or its subsequent variants.  Statistics were made intentionally vague and were used irrespective of context, and test result reporting was influenced by monetary policy.  In short, there wasn’t much in the information related to the pandemic that wasn’t biased or manipulated for some political advantage.  If I was going to make a decision, it had to be without considering the political aspects of it.  Ultimately, it didn’t matter to me who said what about it.  To be vaccinated was the loving choice in my mind, so I ignored the noise and went to it.

Ultimately, I would encourage everyone to be vaccinated.  However, I will not for even a moment demand such a thing, nor do I support coercive or manipulative measures intended to get people to submit to it.  It should be a choice every person can make for themselves, within their own medical, emotional, and spiritual context.  As I told someone recently, I will rejoice that God has granted us knowledge and wisdom to fight the pandemic in this way, and I will rejoice that I live in a place where people can choose not to do so.

May God grant us all the love to live in peace with one another under His graceful reign.  May we learn to more readily look not only on our own interests, but also to the interests of others.