With regard to Coronavirus... mankind has experienced many plagues throughout its history. The most famous, probably, is the bubonic plague. One wonders how much damage the bubonic plague might have done if the people of that day had the technology we have now; the Internet to forewarn one another, and the medical knowledge to organize proper quarantine and testing? And even though we have these things, the Coronavirus is taking a serious toll on the world. You cannot escape the purposes of God. But what is God's purpose?
Let me make it clear, first of all, that I don't presume to know what God's specific purposes might be. What I do want to do is share what the Bible says about plagues and God's purposes behind them. The first would be what people think of when they associate such a plague with the end of the world... to punish the world for their sins. This is in keeping with various Biblical references to plague. For example, when the Philistines stole the Ark of the Lord (that is, the same artifact depicted in the Indiana Jones movie), God sent a plague on their cities. Or when the Israelites built an idol in the desert, a plague broke out amongst them. A plague was one sign that God was punishing people for their sins. So was famine and war. Nobody wants these things, and the response should always be to turn to God. When King Solomon spoke at the opening of the Temple, he said:
If there is famine in the land, if there is pestilence or blight or mildew or locust or caterpillar, if their enemy besieges them in the land at their gates, whatever plague, whatever sickness there is, whatever prayer, whatever plea is made by any man or by all your people Israel, each knowing the affliction of his own heart and stretching out his hands toward this house, then hear in heaven your dwelling place and forgive and act and render to each whose heart you know, according to all his ways (for you, you only, know the hearts of all the children of mankind), that they may fear you all the days that they live in the land that you gave to our fathers.
1 Kings 8:37-40
Note especially that it says "hear in heaven your dwelling place and forgive..." In other words, the assumption should be that these things are God's response to sin. This is all the more clear since, in a few places in Moses' writings, God literally says that if the people obey Him they will be prosperous, but that if they disobey Him they will see curses like plagues and famines and so forth. The thing we need to remember here is that mankind is always guilty! Does the world, right now, deserve a plague for their sins? Of course it does. But it has always been deserving of this, and we ought not to forget that God has shown mercy all the years that we haven't had a plague on our doorsteps.
Now, we should recognize that it is a good thing for God to withdraw His mercy a little from time to time. There's a verse which says:
Because the sentence against an evil deed is not executed speedily, the heart of the children of man is fully set to do evil.
Ecclesiastes 8:11
If God never reminded us that there is a punishment for sin, who would turn from their sin? The greater purpose of God in sending the plagues and the famines is to remind us that we are at His mercy, and that He will indeed judge sin. Many turn from their sins because they believe the Word of God when it says that there will be a coming judgment, and they believe the Word of God that speaks of the judgments which God brought upon the Earth in the time of Noah, upon Sodom and Gomorrah, and upon Israel. But it is right and just for God to give us a very real reminder in our own lives from time to time. In fact, any time that a person dies of anything it should be a reminder of "the wages of sin", as the Bible calls it. What difference does it make how and when we die? Let no one say there was a lack of evidence of the consequences of sin; not when God Himself has told us through His Word, if we will believe it, why there exists death and suffering. Coronavirus may not be the end of the world, but it serves the same purpose as the plagues of the Bible, along with the famines and the wars... and it has the same purpose as the bubonic plague, or the Ebola outbreak... all of these things point to God's judgment of sin. That's the most Biblical answer I can find. These things are designed to provoke us to turn to God for salvation.
Finally, I want to draw our attention to how God, even while punishing us, can have a purpose for good. When Italy went into lock down because of the virus, it was widely noted that the canals in Venice and other water ways around the country, began to clear of all their silt. With no one using them, the water became clear and fish could be seen swimming around in them. And it occurred to just about everybody... though they put it in more sort of New Age terms... that "the Earth was healing itself." Or that "mother nature was taking back what was hers." But to my Christian sensibilities, it reminded me of what God did when the Israelites went into exile in Babylon. God had declared in His laws that Israel should keep the Sabbath; that is, that no work be done on the 7th day of the week, and also that the land rest from farming every 7th year (Exodus 23:10-12). But Israel hadn't done that. So when the Israelites went into exile and the land of Israel itself became essentially uninhabited, the Bible explains:
He took into exile in Babylon those who had escaped from the sword, and they became servants to him and to his sons until the establishment of the kingdom of Persia, to fulfill the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed its Sabbaths. All the days that it lay desolate it kept Sabbath, to fulfill seventy years.
2 Chronicles 36:20-21
Not that I'm saying that our sin has been not keeping the Sabbath, but simply to note that it is of a similar vein. The people hadn't let the land rest as they ought to have, and so God's punishment served the secondary purpose of giving the land that rest. We're all so aware these days of how we have exploited the Earth's resources, and industry just marches on and on, never ceasing to consume and pollute. It may well be that God's purpose is very much about giving the Earth the rest it needs as we all hunker down in our homes. The economic ramifications of this may be significant, but we ought to read and understand the Words of Jesus in the Book of Revelation. According to my understanding of the Book, we are to expect famines, wars, plagues such as this Coronavirus... and economic collapses. Consider Revelation chapter 18 about the "Fall of Babylon", (which I think is symbolic of all society)...
As she glorified herself and lived in luxury,
so give her a like measure of torment and mourning,
since in her heart she says,
"I sit as a queen,
I am no widow,
and mourning I shall never see."
For this reason her plagues will come in a single day,
death and mourning and famine,
and she will be burned up with fire;
for mighty is the Lord God who has judged her.
...
And the merchants of the earth weep and mourn for her, since no one buys their cargo anymore
Revelation 18:7-8,11
Again, I'm not saying that this passage refers specifically to current events with Coronavirus, but rather that the Book of Revelation speaks of the kinds of things God will do in the world, so that when we see them we might remember His words and turn to Him in repentance for salvation. The end is coming. This may not be it, but this is a reason for people to write posts like these and for people to be thinking about these kinds of questions. And that's really the purpose of God in all this, I think. Seeing the disasters which God brings upon the world for its sins, the sensible thing would be to repent. But sadly there are those who still will not...
The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands nor give up worshiping demons wand idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk, nor did they repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts.
Revelation 9:20-21
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