S10 E220 - The Why In Caregiving

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

This is Next Steps for Seniors with your host, Wendy Jones. Each week, Wendy brings resources and information to help guide you through those next steps with elderly parents and loved ones. If you have questions or topic suggestions, you can call us at 248-651-5010.

SPEAKER_01 0:19

Hello, and welcome to Next Steps for Seniors Conversations on Aging. So incredibly blessed to be here with you this Friday. And each and every Friday, our goal is really to talk through the emotional components of aging and how we can lean on God in a spiritual, amazing way, because that is what is going to bring you through any situation. It's almost impossible to face situations without somebody with you. And knowing that God, our Father, is standing right there with you makes all the difference in the world. And that is why Pastor Tim Helland is with us again today. We're doing a series on our caregivers and our people who are always giving and helping others. How do you find the strength? And that's why we're here today. So thank you, Pastor Tim, for being with us.

SPEAKER_02 1:07

It's always a pleasure and an honor to be here, Wendy.

SPEAKER_01 1:10

So grateful for you because we go through trials of many kinds and you just don't know what's coming your way.

SPEAKER_02 1:17

You know, and that's uh what I have found can be of a huge impediment in being successful and effective in helping our seniors and our loved ones. For me, it was my parents and my in-laws, is we get stuck on why is this happening? Or why do I have to do this?

SPEAKER_01 1:37

And so we kind of feel sorry for ourselves. Oh, we do absolutely and you know what?

SPEAKER_02 1:42

Not just kind of you kind of you deserve to feel sorry for yourself because it's a very difficult situation. But if you if you continue to go around that tree, you never move forward. You never ever move forward. The goal is not answering your question. Your goal is making sure that they that they have the best years, that they get the best care, and that what they need is procured for them in the in the most timely fashion. That's why we're here. We are their advocate. So we need to advocate for them. Advocating for a loved one is not answering your question, why? Because at this point, then I don't want to sound harsh, but it's immaterial. So, so so but now let's take some time. Let's talk about how do we get past that why. Now, being a pastor, being who I am, I want to give you, I want to use the scripture again as a as a platform to launch from today. And it's found in Isaiah, Isaiah 30, verses 20 and 21. And so uh God's talking to Isaiah, and he says, The Lord will give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction. How do you like that as the start of a conversation? You know what? You're gonna have adversity and affliction. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. I I already got that. But he he keeps thinking, he keeps speaking. So God says to him, Yet, he says, Your teacher will not hide himself anymore, but your eyes shall see your teacher. Who's the teacher? It's God. So, what's our text? It's the word, it's the Bible. He says, Your ears will hear a word behind you saying, Now get ready, folks. This is the way, walk in it. Now, what I want us to understand here, what I want us to see very clearly here, is God isn't saying, okay, I'll take that away from you. Let me let me show you, let me show you why this happened. He doesn't say that. Nope. What does he say? He says, Here's what I will do. I'm gonna show you the direction to go. When the Lord, we talked about this a few months ago, when the when the Lord opens a door for us to take care of our parents, it is not something we have to do, it is something we get to do. So as we as we adjust our perspective, now the dominoes are starting to fall to adjust our emotion, our reaction. So when when you realize that when you see somebody going through affliction, you you you you three you see somebody going through a very difficult time, human, the human reaction is to cross the street and avoid it, right? What is you know, you look at the uh the story of the good Samaritan. You know, he wasn't a priest, he wasn't a rabbi, who was he? He wasn't even Jewish, he was a Samaritan. He was he was someone that they despised. He stays on that side of the street, he goes to the person who's hurt, he bandages them up, puts them in a hotel, gives the guy medicine, gives him food, money, and says take care of him as long as you after numerous people already passed him. Right. After the the people who should take care of him don't take care of them. So, so the Lord frequently will give us opportunities. And now, when it's your parents, this is folks, this is one of the richest opportunities. It's sensitive, it's close, and it's emotional. And let's look at the reality here. You wouldn't be here without them. So you look at the decades and decades that they poured into you. You now have an opportunity to pour back, but it's not it's not evening the score. That's not what this is. It's an opportunity, which we talked about last week. Where are your greatest lessons? It's in the greatest adversity. So he's he's he's teaching us how to be not just amazing humans for humans' sake. Now he's he's touching that that that inner part of it. Oh, yeah, the spiritual part. This is where we really come alive, this is where we become highly effective humans being in this earth. We're not just humans doing, we're humans being. That's who we are.

SPEAKER_01 5:31

And and life, life is not meant to be lived alone. If he's right there with us, all we got to do is listen. He is giving us the direction, he is giving us the strength, and he is showing us what to do. But when we continue to do it by ourselves, it will constantly be difficult.

SPEAKER_02 5:49

Oh, it it will it won't wear you down, it will wear you out.

unknown 5:53

Amen.

SPEAKER_02 5:53

It will wear you out. Now, now here, let me answer the why question because I I put it in there, right? The title. You sure did. So Living Beyond the Why. So so we we we look at what Isaiah says, and God says, this is the way, walk in it. So God is saying, here you go, here's the path I'm leading you on. If you're asking me to lead you, here's where I'm leading you. And he leads you right into this opportunity to care for seniors, to care for your parents, to care for someone who's really struggling at the end of life. Then you go back to 1 Peter, which we were over here a little bit farther back the last time we talked. 1 Peter 5, verse 10. It says, After you've suffered, after you've gone through this very difficult time, this time of affliction, this time of difficulty, he says, the God of grace who has called you to his eternal glory. You want to know why? God is bringing us to a place to to to to not just share in his glory, but to live in his eternal his eternal glory with him and in Christ. So this this is the ultimate goal. This is this is where the real life is found with him. And here's what he'll do: he says, God himself will restore you, confirm you, strengthen you, and establish you. That's right. And in coming alongside folks, and learning how to deal with suffering correctly, God makes us more complete in every part of who we really are. You see, when we meet people who the sum total of their existence is what they own or how much they've earned or how good they look.

SPEAKER_01 7:22

Success. It's all about physical success.

SPEAKER_02 7:24

And and I'll be honest, I you know, I've just had a conversation with somebody the other day. That's me up through my 40s. You know when it stopped? When I started getting ugly, okay? I was there was no stopping it. Your hair falls out, you gain weight, it changes color. You know, all these things. It happens to everybody. It does, it does. And and so so you either you either you you get on this hamster wheel that never stops and never quite reaches it, and you're never quite happy, or we embrace these truths that God is giving us, and we become who God really called us to be. Because the I I don't want to be mean, but if we get on that other path, it leads to a very vapid life and an empty existence. It's all surface. But when we begin to allow God to say, no, here's where I want you to walk. I remember when you called me and said, I need you, I need dating us, but yes, it was. I need you to go to Martha T. Berry on a Thursday at 10:30. And I said, I I don't have time. Do you do you realize what I have going on? Do you know what my life is all about? I can't do that. And and all of a sudden I realized vapid Tim, shallow Tim, thought that going to all these people who can't even talk.

SPEAKER_01 8:35

The poor and the weary and the elderly and the hurt and the weak.

SPEAKER_02 8:39

How did Jesus define it? He said, pure religion is this the orphans and the widows. And and folks, the why, this is enough of an answer. Why do we go on that path when God says, here's the way I want you to go? Why are you in next steps for seniors? Because they need you. That's it. It's because they need us. And when we begin to pour into that arena of life, it's it's the opposite of that. It is the richest, fullest, it's the greatest expression of God in us that we can that we can not just show people that we actually exist in. Folks, purpose, why?

SPEAKER_01 9:21

Oh, purpose beyond your wildness means. Yes, all lining up and working in the right direction at the right time for the right reasons for his glory. This is look, I mean, I don't I hate politics.

SPEAKER_02 9:35

I do. Look at everything that's working happening in the world. I think everybody does. Right. At this point, everybody does. But but look at what's happening in the world. Imagine. Imagine if if even half of our of the population of the world was hearing the voice of God saying, no, no, this is the path walkie.

SPEAKER_01 9:52

Walkie in it.

SPEAKER_02 9:53

You know, I don't I don't want to hijack anything here, but but you know, when where did God call Moses out of a palace into the desert? Where does call Abraham? You know what? I want you to get with your wife at at a hundred and have a kid. Are you crazy?

SPEAKER_01 10:08

It's impossible to do, but only God can do it. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 10:11

Joseph, the favored kid, the the the top dog of his family. 13 years in prison. Right. In prison for 13. So what is what is God asking us to do? Difficult things. Why? Don't ask. Here's why. If I tried to get the answer for you that was accurate, none of us would understand it. And I will say probably the six hardest years of my life were taking care of aging parents while we were finishing raising our kids. Let me tell you something. The most I think the greatest lessons in life and some of the greatest foundation for ministry came from those years.

SPEAKER_01 10:50

Amen. So we look at it physically like it's a trial and it's difficult. And how am I gonna get through this and why is this happening to me? But when we flip the script and we lean on the Lord and we surround ourselves with Him and listen and pay attention and walkie in it, it changes everything.

SPEAKER_02 11:16

And and let me just say for the record, it's so rich. It's such a good life. I you know, I I was a broker, I was a builder, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, right? None of that begins to even comes close. People say, Why do you go to the jail? Because they need what Christ is offering. And some of my greatest moments in ministry are with the hardest felons.

SPEAKER_01 11:42

Amen. So I just want to encourage you today. This we are here because God called us 25, 30 years ago to minister. We used to go to Martha T. Berry every Thursday at 10:30 and just minister to these amazing seniors in their wheelchairs and walkers. And I mean, who would have who would have thought fast forward we'd be sitting here today talking to all of you and encouraging you? Because this is how God works. This is a perfect example because He does not, we do not do life alone. We do life with him. And and when I, when I when you lean on the Lord and when I think of the why, yeah, it's confusing. But when you lean on God, it is not confusing. You have peace, love, joy, all of those characteristics are surrounding you. So I just want to encourage you today, lean on him. Thank you for tuning in. If you know someone who needs to hear this today, please share it. Pass it, pay it forward, encourage someone else today with these words of the Lord. Thank you for tuning in to Next Steps for Seniors Conversations on Aging.