For a moment, I would like you to consider the population of your local church community. How many of these fine people are dealing with life-threatening illnesses? How much are you involved in their suffering? How many of these illnesses are affecting children? How often do you pass them by justifying in your mind that what they are enduring is just not in your ministry profile?
There is no easy way to state this: We’re all selfish. We think about our own needs long before we’ll even consider the need of others. I’m not picking on you because it’s an indictment on myself just as much as upon any of the rest of you.
Personally, I hate sick people. Not in the way I hate cantaloupe. More in the manner that I just find it difficult to be around whiners – not in the sense of someone who listens to Adele’s music – but in the sense of someone whose pain and suffering is something I can’t remedy. I hate that the promise of,”…greater things than these shall you do…” hasn’t manifested in my life particularly when I’m around the very people that a “greater thing” would certainly help. I’m willing to give, they’re able to receive, we don’t see the end of our…faith?
Don’t think that you can get away with it either. A promise is a promise – it has no respect for who hears it. Yes, I know that we have to step out of the boat of logic and in faith pray for the wholeness of those who are less than whole. But, sincerely, I’ve spent over 23 years out on the storms of less-than-whole life calling out as waves tossed me to and fro, desperately clinging to a promise as a preserver, and well, the condition in the boat is no drier than in the water – I just do not plunge down as far.
“…As you’ve done it for the least of these…” Who is the least in your life? The sick are. The single mother who has a child with a rare disease who treks every day to therapy and doctor’s offices all to keep a little one from experiencing the dread of not be able to be around friends who don’t understand what’s happening. The grandparent who has to spend the final days of a well-deserved retirement huddled on the couch embracing a feeble grandchild dropped at the doorstep every morning so the parents can attempt to make enough money during the day to pay for the medicine the child needs to make it through the week. The list goes on and on, the circumstances unfold in varying degrees of suffering and despair.
How many of these stories can you even relate too? How many are just in your community, your circle of acquaintances alone? How many are you just plain old oblivious too? Before you go and get your condemnation all jacked up realize that we’re all unaware of these things for one reason: people in despair don’t tend to publicize it very much. They’re stuck in it and its all they can do to keep their heads above water.
How do you help? Don’t ask; do something, anything, no matter how little it seems to you. Size is not measured by volume of work accomplished but by the volume it shows just that you care enough to help. IF you’re really looking to score points, come back tomorrow and do something else. And the next day too. And next week. It’s easy to alleviate your sense of guilt the first couple of times, and then justify your absence due to the hectic schedules of a life dealing with normal. Try abnormal for a change, then you’ll know hectic because that is where it got its true definition.
Additionally, get that humble attitude out of your gullet. Pride has no place here. If you can’t stand the smell of vomit or diarrhea, so what. Your ego doesn’t smell any better to a family facing the existence of another sleepless night trying to soothe a crying child lying in pain. Giving them the opportunity just to take a shower can often give them the additional stamina to deal with the mess one more night.
Yeah, I hate sickness. I hate having to deal with it and how it bends you to meet its demands rather than the demand of wholeness. I hate that you never seem to get a break, a leg up on it even when your eyes are all puffed up from tears that never seem to stop flowing or blood shot from 36 hours of never seeing what a fresh bed looks, or even feels like. I hate that lovers get lost in parenting to the point of losing each other at a time when each other is all you’ve got left since friends left you weeks ago. I hate that the least you could do is more than you’re willing. I hate how begrudgingly you hope someone takes your place just so you can have a life, any life, just not the life you presently have.
What I really, truly hate is that many reading this will skip right along without missing a beat and remain ignorant to the souls around them who I’m trying to point out to you. My only consolation regarding this comes from a preacher who once said that God doesn’t put any more on you than you can handle – which is why most of your friends leave you – because in the midst of your suffering, the little they offer is the last thing you need to handle.
My rant is over. Now, try to carry on with grace. I dare you.
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