Hi, it's nice to be back with you again.
I hope you're having a great day today.
I'd like to talk to you about the Amish
herd immunity and moral injury.
Now moral injury is a new term that you might not be familiar with,
but I would talk a little bit about the concept because I think it's
very important that we think about this and apply this to our lives.
But as usual, I want to point you to the big picture,
and the big picture is that we can communicate with God in scripture.
He has a plan for healing for our lives.
And the text I've chosen today from the new King
James version is Iziko. 36 verse 26.
I will give you a new heart
and put a new spirit within you.
I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh
and give you a heart of flesh.
So God's going to give us a new heart.
We are genetically not so good.
And when he talks about heart, that's our mind, that's our soul,
that's our spirit, and he's going to put a new spirit.
We can't do this.
God's going to do this for us, and he's going to take that bad
genetic heart, that bad genetic spirit, that genetic attitude that we're born with
and that we developed.
And he's going to give us something new.
That's better than anything.
I want you to hold that with you today as we talk about the Amish
herd immunity and moral injury.
Well, why are we talking today about the Amish?
Well, this month there's been lots of articles in the media
from Emerson, the New York Post
and our investigative reporter named Cheryl Atkinson.
The full measure, which can be seen on YouTube, the reports about the Amish.
Now I've had experiences with Amish when I practice in parts of Tennessee,
especially in Lawrence County, there was Amish that occasionally
I would see when I was doing my residency in Wilmington, Delaware,
I'd frequently take trips into the Amish country
in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania , and see the Amish people there.
one time we even had a Thanksgiving with Amish.
So the Amish, our population in the United States,
a unique population of about 350,000 individuals.
Large populations can be found in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana,
but they're scattered in communities throughout throughout the United States.
They have a unique form of living,
you know, some of the more famous Amish that you might have heard
of the quarterback, Jeff Hostetler, he was came from Amish background.
Jerome Smuckers of Smuckers Jelly.
Carl Yoder of just to name a few.
So this investigative reporter Cheryl Atkinson,
she talked to a Allen Hoover who works within the Amish community
and there weren't exact statistics.
But this health professional was noting that 90% of Amish
have immunity to the COVID 19.
And they noticed that in the Amish community,
the cases of SA's COVID has gone down recently.
So it was suggested that the Amish were a group of people
that had reached herd immunity.
You've heard this term, but what is herd immunity?
Well, herd immunity implies
that we have protection from a contagious infection
when a sufficient number of people have become immune.
So what does immune mean?
Well, immune means our body can fight off these viruses so
we don't get it and we have less chance of spreading it.
We've heard about the natural immunity that we get two things
from measles, mumps, all the colds that our kids grow up with.
We also have heard very much in the news about vaccination immunity,
so they have concluded that the Amish had reached herd immunity.
So the Amish experience in March of 2020.
The virus swept through the community.
In fact, the Amish
in 2020, in April, they had all got together in worship,
and they interviewed this gentleman, a Mr Lab .
Atkinson, the investigative journalist,
interviewed Mr Yap and this is where my information's coming from.
He said they had a communion.
They got together in church and basically they spread it
to the whole congregation, the whole population.
We know that, you know, one of the reasons it spreads is from,
I guess it could spread from the communion comes that they all shared.
But it also could have been spread
just from the viral droplets, the air that they all shared together.
But regardless, it spread through the community very rapidly.
People did get sick.
People did, you know, die from this?
But the Amish community, Mr Lappe, says they're very, very
leery of the government.
They're very careful about public education
and they don't do health the way that we do in traditional America.
They they believe that less of government, public education, health
less is more and they develop a community based on this over years.
They don't use some of the modern technology that we use.
So to them, according to Mr Lapp, that their culture
and spiritual beliefs are of the highest importance.
And I'm going to quote him when he says he says, we're not afraid of dying,
but we are afraid of not working,
not worshiping, not seeing family,
not being with loved ones when they are sick.
So this goes against the next thing I want to talk about is moral injury.
It did not make sense to go against
their sincerely held beliefs, so they didn't do that.
They did get sick.
But there's no real hard data on this.
But this hoover that Atkinson and them are quoting.
They suspect that the rates of death and illness
were similar to the population at whole that had had everything else done.
But couple differences one they didn't shut down for long periods of time.
They continue to live life.
There wasn't a reported increase
in depressions and suicides and mental health problems,
and they didn't suffer large amounts of economic damage.
In fact, Mr. Lap's said they actually
had a better year than ever before economically.
So going through this, the Amish developed herd immunity,
and they avoided this concept of moral injury.
What is moral injury and why is it important?
Well, moral injury is a concept
that in stressful situations, people may cause something
they may fail to prevent something or witness events
that can't end that contradict
their sincerely held beliefs.
Now, this might be a direct action.
We call that an act of commission, something that you do directly
that you can measure.
Or it might be that you fail
to do something in line with your belief system.
That would be an act of omission, something that you don't do that you.
That goes against what you sincerely believe.
The Amish did not believe in a lot of modern medicine.
They didn't believe in shutting down their society.
They didn't believe in stopping worship or stopping their culture.
So they avoided this concept of moral injury.
I'm thinking now
that you can sort of think about moral injury like,
you know, this is a crude analogy, but it might be referred to as even
a spiritual virus, something that gets in you and damages you.
Well, moral injury can lead to different types of emotions
are feeling that comes from our old heart, our brain, so to speak,
and that can cause feelings of guilt.
It might cause people to feel stress
when they go against their sincerely held religious beliefs.
It might create shame.
It might create disgust.
It might even create anger.
But no matter what, this happens when when something inside
goes against what we sincerely held believe it creates a change in physiology.
The original concept of moral injury came
from many of the soldiers that saw war and saw terrible things happen,
that they didn't do things about this morally
injured them and caused some of these feelings that they had.
This led to what we call the post-traumatic stress physiology
that look like lots of the chemical epinephrine.
And we know that when epinephrine is high, people don't sleep good.
Their blood pressure changes their body ages.
We have processes like oxidation goes on the immune system's damage.
It's just not a good thing.
People that have post-traumatic stress physiology, it's
it can create all sorts of medical problems, and it can accelerate
medical problems that might not show up for many years down the road.
For instance, if normally you were going to get this genetic problem at 70,
you might get it many years earlier because the body is being stressed
from this, these type of emotions.
Well, this moral injury,
as we look at some of the world we're living into
and some of the processes we're up against, this is another aspect
that we just need more data on these risk groups.
We need to study the Omeish.
We need to study other people that have different practices.
For instance, vegans and vegetarians are there's something about them
that can protect them from viruses and pandemics and illnesses.
one of the interesting questions that I think we need more research is this.
Well, why do some people, young people
even die from the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine and others don't?
Well, we need to do studies and find out who is the most vulnerable.
We need to look at the cells of those that don't do well.
Some of the cells that do well and study these groups and get more information.
Instead of just focusing on one tool, we need to look at all the tools.
So the Amish herd immunity, natural immunity and now natural immunity
is being recognized as a form of immunity from the viruses.
St Luke's Hospital in Pennsylvania, the Lehigh Valley have now recognized
that natural immunity is equivalent to vaccine immunity.
We still are searching to have, well, develop vaccines.
We know that the vaccines out there, they have their limitations.
We're looking for better vaccines that can be used as a tool
even more effective.
But what can today we learn from the Amish?
Well, one of the things we can learn
that moral injury is important to people's physiology.
It's important in this pandemic.
Sure, no one wants to get sick from COVID or die from COVID.
But there's also danger of going against your sincerely held beliefs.
Which brings me back to the texts we started with today Ezekiel, 3626.
I will give you a new heart, a new brain and put a new spirit within you.
We can't do it ourselves.
We need to ask God to create this new physiology.
I will take out your genetically bad
heart, your genetically bad brain, your genetically bad thoughts.
The damage that's happened.
But God has promised that he's going to do something about it.
He will take this, this heart of stone
that's been morally injured that has this spiritual virus.
Take it out of you and give you something that's beautiful and perfect
that leads to healing. That's the big picture.
So we need to make sure today
that we're not getting moral injury, the spiritual bias.
We also want to make sure that we're not passing on moral injury or spiritual
viruses to other that can take us away from true
healing in Jesus.
My last thought, I want to leave with you today
as we talk about the Amish natural immunity.
As we talk about these things today, is this no matter
what is happening in your life?
No matter what moral injury you might have suffered, no matter
what is happening in regards to the pandemic, no matter
what's happening in relationships or your job or whatever's going on.
Following Jesus is always better.
Well, thanks for spending time with me today.
I hope this has brought you some measure of encouragement and hope.
There's always hope and God is
giving it to us and we want to spread this to the entire world.
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as we grow in the body of Christ.
Understanding where
the source of true healing is, where we really need to go for answers.
Learning to love each other.
Not judge each other.
Looking at the big picture.
So thank you for joining me today, and I hope to join you real soon
with another biblical prescription for a life.