A how-to guide for responding to sickness & grief
When asked to pray in public, I am tempted to add after the prayer, “I am a professional. Do not try this at home.” After all, aren’t all Christians to pray? But the area where this is most noticeable can be in reaching out to those who are sick, dying or grieving. This is usually left to the priest and perhaps also to one or two persons in a congregation who seem to have the gift for what is sometimes called “pastoral care”, but that is really the duty of all Christians to live out loving our neighbors.
To assist in lowering the bar a bit, I will share a two-part Loose Canon which is my version of a guide for anyone who feels that he or she doesn’t know how to respond when tragedy strikes a friend or family member. As Christians, we are to share God’s love with those in need, but how can we make a difference in the lives of those who are hurting? While you won’t be able to take all the pain and suffering and make it go away, you can have a positive effect on those suffering emotional or physical pain.
In his Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37), Jesus shows that God does not start with me as the person who wants to provide aid and answer with limits on who I have to help. God begins with the person in need and asks, “Who do I have in the area who can help?” Looked at in this way, you will sometimes be the person God has in the area who can respond in a time of tragedy.
How you respond will depend on the gifts God has given you. As the Apostle Paul taught in writing about the Body of Christ (I Corinthians 12), we each have differing abilities given to us by God. The key is to discover your gifts and then use them to help others in time of need.
Beyond “Let me know how I can help”
The most commonly heard statement in the wake of some personal tragedy is “Let me know how I can help.” It is generally sincere and almost universally unhelpful. This statement gets the response all wrong as it puts the burden on the one in need.
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Try something more specific based on your abilities. For a cancer patient with young children, if you have the time and talent, offer free childcare. To the caregiver of a dying spouse, offer to mow the grass. Or to the family in grief offer meals, or to handle phone calls coming into the house, or to keep up with the help coming in to organize thank you notes. When the offer is more specific, the answer will more frequently be “Yes.”
This is where I find we men, who often find we have nothing to offer in the midst of tears and suffering, are well equipped to offer direct assistance. Find the way that you can best help others and then be open to making the offer as needed. You might come to be a grass cutting, or medicine picking up specialist in no time.
Next week, I will cover what not to say and then move on to how to write and speak to those in the midst of suffering.
The Rev. Frank Logue
Canon to the Ordinary
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