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Eight Ways the Church Can Care for the Mentally Ill

by | Dec 8, 2020 | Caregiving, Suffering

Eight Ways the Church Can Care for the Mentally Ill

Dear Friends,

It’s not surprising that the holiday season can be hard on those afflicted with a mental disorder. The church is uniquely placed to respond, and now is the time to learn how we can better love the afflicted. I hope this blog helps us all consider how we can serve the least and the lost in this season.

Stigma, Shame, and Misunderstanding of the Mentally Ill

One of the greatest catalysts to our pain was the sense that we are alone. Amy Simpson, Troubled Minds: Mental Illness and the Church’s Mission

When author Amy Simpson’s mother was diagnosed with schizophrenia, church leaders and members didn’t know what to say, so they said little, leaving her family feeling alone and helpless.

“Can you explain to me why Anna’s bipolar disorder and her dependence on medication is not an issue of weak faith or sin?”

A church leader asked this question of psychologist Matthew S. Stanford, author of Grace for the Afflicted: A Clinical and Biblical Perspective on Mental Illness. As Stanford points out, the question arose from the leader’s ignorance of the neurochemical component of mental illness.

As both vignettes suggest, the church needs to be better equipped to respond lovingly to people who suffer from mental illness.

Before COVID-19, one in four North Americans and one in five people worldwide suffered from a diagnosable mental illness; experts predict the post-COVID numbers will climb. Mental illness, defined as “‘medical conditions that disrupt a person’s thinking, feeling, mood, ability to relate to others and daily functioning” includes such disorders as “major depression, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), panic disorder, post traumatic stress disorder, and borderline personality disorder” (Simpson, Troubled Minds, 37). Because of the many barriers the mentally ill often face in finding help, the church is one of the first places they may turn. As Dr. Stanford explains in his book, “The involvement of the church in mental health is the missing piece necessary to transform our broken system, making it accessible and more effective” (Stanford, Grace for the Afflicted, 254). Churches are well-placed to minister to this segment of the least and the lost—how can we rise to the challenge?

Is the Church Equipped to Respond to Mental Illness?

A Lifeway Study of 2014 revealed that most churches are ill-equipped to respond to the mentally ill. The following struggles were noted:

  • Lack of plans to come alongside families (note: 17% of youth suffer from a mental health disorder).
  • Lack of counselors on staff.
  • Lack of training for leaders on recognizing and responding to mental illness.
  • Lack of communication to congregations about mental health resources.
  • A “stigma and culture of silence that leads to shame” (Lifeway Study of Acute Mental Illness and Christian Faith Research Report)

Eight Practical Ways the Church Can Care for the Mentally Ill

As members of the body of Christ, what steps can we take to care well for the mentally ill and their families? Let’s consider the following eight possibilities:

  1. Educate and equip pastors and ministry leaders to recognize and respond.

The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI.org), has programs (Nami FaithNet) specifically designed to educate clergy and religious organizations on how they can help.

  1. Educate the congregation.

An adult education class about mental illness could focus around a book like Matthew S. Stanford’s Grace for the Afflicted or Amy Simpson’s Troubled Minds. Some churches hold classes led by professional counselors on mental health and a biblical perspective.

  1. Speak out with compassion.

Pastors and ministry leaders can speak openly about mental illness in sermons, Sunday school, Bible studies, and small groups. As they communicate care and concern, the afflicted recognize a safe place to share struggles.

  1. Make mental illness part of pastoral care ministries.

A pastoral care ministry could develop and publicize a list of mental health resources that includes local counselors, support groups, and the number of local warmlines as well as suicide hotlines (e.g., The Florida CLEAR warmline, which is, “for individuals with a mental illness who want to talk with someone who shares personal experience coping with mental health issues”).

  1. Address biblical misconceptions.

Pastors and ministry leaders can address biblical misconceptions about mental illness, particularly as related to suicide. As Dr. Stanford explains, “When an individual comes to a saving faith in Jesus, they are made righteous and forgiven for every sin; past, present, and future, including suicide (Ephesians 1:7)….Suicide is not the determining factor for eternal life; a saving faith in Jesus is.” (Stanford, p. 232).

  1. Offer support groups.

Many churches have begun support groups for the mentally ill and their families. At New Heights Church in Vancouver, Washington, pastor’s wife Cindy Hannan began a group after experiencing profound loneliness when her son was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. She partnered with a physician on staff of the church medical clinic, Dr. Elaine Tse. They believe that “with medication, counseling, and good support, people with mental illness can flourish” (Simpson, Troubled Minds, 212). For more information on beginning a support group in your local church, check out Grace Alliance and Fresh Hope.

  1. Listen well and offer the hope of Christ.

One of the most valuable ways to offer community support to the mentally ill and their loved ones is to listen empathetically without trying to fix.  Hope is essential to recovery and healthy living. We as Christians have the hope that surpasses all understanding, the firm conviction that Jesus Christ will return to restore all broken creation.

    1. Pray.

Finally, we should always begin and end with prayer. Pastors and ministry leaders can be intentional about praying for the mentally and emotionally afflicted as well as the physically afflicted. We as individuals can make a regular practice of praying for all people affected by mental illness.

In this season, which often intensifies suffering, may we pray and act to come alongside the mentally ill and their loved ones.

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Knowing the Knowledge that Changes the World

by | Oct 13, 2020 | Bible study, Caregiving, Devotional

Knowing the Knowledge that Changes the World

Although this excerpt from The Waiting Room: 60 Meditations for Finding Peace & Hope in Crisis was written about seeking certainty in the midst of health crisis, it applies to all of the ways we may seek to “know,” “to have certainty,” and how God calls us to trust him, even when we don’t have all the answers. In this election season, I need to ask myself where I am putting my trust. Maybe you do too!

Knowledge That Will Change Your World

Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer,
    who formed you from the womb:
“I am the Lord, who made all things,
    who alone stretched out the heavens,
    who spread out the earth by myself….

Isaiah 44:24, ESV

“Knowledge that will change your world…”

It is a brilliant tagline for a hospital. I first noticed it on a sticker in the parking deck of the medical center. It plays right into our deepest fears and fiercest desires in the season of a health crisis. I do not fault the hospital for using it. Instead, I thank them for the hope it offered us.

After all, many of the world’s experts were gathered at this medical center, and they knew (almost) everything there was to know about brain tumors. Our neurosurgeon operated exclusively on brain tumors. He had performed thousands of awake craniotomies. Surely these people had the knowledge that would change our son’s world.

And yet…I recognize my own idolatry in that way of thinking. Idols are things we trust in more than God to deliver us. Long ago, I heard a speaker suggest we uncover our idols by asking, “Where do you find your security, significance, and sense of safety?” As we played the waiting game, I would have had to confess, “I am seeking my sense of security and safety in these world-expert doctors.”

The Bible warns us about putting our trust in idols, in earthly things that do not really have the power to save us. Isaiah 44 describes foolish people who take a piece of wood, use half of it to make a fire and the other half to carve an idol. They fall down before the idol and worship it, saying, “Rescue me… you are my god” (Isaiah 44:17, NLT). But the idol neither blinks nor moves, for it is merely a piece of wood. Isaiah observes, “The poor, deluded fool feeds on ashes. He trusts something that can’t help him at all” (Isaiah 44:20, NLT).

Please don’t misunderstand me – I do believe doctors and medical experts have much knowledge and skill to offer us. Still, the gospel invites us to trust fully in the one, true GOD who can and will deliver us, the God who made all things and knows all things. God, who has the knowledge that will truly change our world, invites us to come to him and rest in him.

Prayer

All-knowing, ever-loving Father, you are our Creator and Redeemer. You know us fully, and one day we will fully know you and fully trust you. Thank you for the knowledge you have given to medical personnel and their faithfulness in acquiring it. Help us to trust in your knowledge more than theirs. In the name of your redeeming Son, our Savior, Amen.

Further Encouragement

Read Isaiah 43:9-20; Proverbs 3:5-6.

Listen to “He Is God” by Susan Calderazzo at https://www.reverbnation.com/susancalderazzo/songs.

For Reflection: In what things are you looking for a sense of security, safety and significance during this season?

A Good Read for Hard Times: The Waiting Room Devotional

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Worth Waiting For

by | May 12, 2020 | Bible study, Caregiving, Devotional

Worth Waiting For

In some areas of the world and our country, quarantine has ended. Meanwhile, many of us wait. Either we wait for lockdown to end, or we wait until we think it’s safer—for others and ourselves—to begin going out more. If you’re stuck in an endless wait, you’ll appreciate today’s devotional, excerpted from The Waiting Room.

“I will tell of the Lord’s unfailing love. I will praise the Lord for all he has done. I will rejoice in his great goodness to Israel, which he has granted according to his mercy and love.” Isaiah 63:7, NLT

After our son’s second brain surgery, a small piece of his skull had become infected, and the neurosurgeon had removed it. Six months later, they would implant a synthetic skull piece to replace the one removed. We were all eager for our son to have this fourth, and hopefully, final surgery.

The day finally arrived for this surgery. When we arrived at pre-op at the appointed time, ten a.m., there was a delay; we were asked to remain in the surgical waiting area. Finally, around noon, our son was taken to pre-op. Forty-five minutes later, my husband and I were invited back to wait with him. An hour went by, then two. We were told that the neurosurgeon was involved in a very complex surgery; we’d have to wait a while longer. As the wait was extended, my restlessness increased, but my husband and our son remained fairly calm. Finally, at six p.m., eight hours after he had been told to report, our son was taken back to surgery. Less than two hours later, the surgery was over, and all was well.

Amy Carmichael, missionary to India, puts words to how I felt in that “longest wait”: “…sometimes we are tempted to discouragement. So often we have believed that what we asked was about to be given, and then have been disappointed. But delays are for the trial of faith, not for its discouragement.” [emphasis added][i]

In the delay, my faith had indeed been tried. I held my tongue, because I did not want to infect our son with my anxiety, but internally, I was fantasizing about running down the hall of pre-op, screaming, “We can’t take this anymore!” I later asked our son, “How did you stand that long wait?” He answered very simply, “I knew they were going to come get me eventually.”

In order to wait well, we must know that the Lord is “going to come get us eventually.” As Isaiah 63:7-9 reminds us, we have every reason to believe in the Lord’s unfailing love. Despite Israel’s repeated disobedience, the Lord has shown them “great goodness,” “which he has granted according to his mercy and love” (Isaiah 63:7). As Isaiah also reminds us, “In all their suffering, he also suffered, and he personally rescued them….” (Isaiah 63:9, NLT).

Indeed, we have every reason to trust. God did not delay in sending Jesus to rescue us from the suffering of our sin. And, though it may seem like a long wait, God does not delay in sending Jesus back for us. When Jesus arrives, we will affirm, as Amy Carmichael so eloquently writes, “‘Lord, this was worth waiting for.’”[ii]

Prayer

Lord, in our longest waits, help us to remember your unfailing love and abundant mercy. May we never forget that you are coming back for us and that the sweet reunion will be worth the wait. Amen.

Further Encouragement

Read Isaiah 63:7-9; Isaiah 65:17-25.

Listen to “It’s Hard to Wait” by Flo Paris at https://youtu.be/HbMsm328cu8.

For Reflection: What delays have you experienced during this season? What helps you to wait well?

 

 

[i] Amy Carmichael, 258.

[ii] Carmichael, 258.

When God Changes Our Plans

by | Jan 28, 2020 | Caregiving, Devotional, Gospel Coaching

When God Changes Our Plans

​This month, as we complete our series on planning and as I recover from hip replacement surgery, I am sharing an excerpt from The Waiting Room: 60 Meditations for Finding Peace & Hope in a Health Crisis.

 ‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ says the Lord. ‘They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.’ Jeremiah 29:11, NLT

  • I was planning to write a devotional or perhaps a book on how to keep a prayer journal.
  • Our son was planning to move to Ithaca, NY to begin a masters program in vocal performance.
  • My husband and I were planning to travel to New York City to celebrate our 35th anniversary.

Before the CT that changed everything, we had plans, and they weren’t bad plans. But God had something different in mind. There is nothing like a health crisis to redirect our attention from our plans for life on this earth to God’s plans for our eternal lives, starting…now. As 88-year-old J.I. Packer, renowned theologian, affirmed after learning that he had macular degeneration,

“God knows what he’s up to…. And I’ve had enough experiences of his goodness in all sorts of ways not to have any doubt about the present circumstances…. Some good, something for his glory, is going to come out of it.”[i]

I’m afraid we too often quote Jeremiah 29:11 and its hopeful note of “plans for good, plans with a future and a hope” without considering the context in which it was written. The Israelites, God’s people, have been exiled to Babylon from their home in Jerusalem after repeated disobedience and multiple warnings to repent. The Lord directs the Israelites to seek and pray for the welfare of Babylon, to build houses and marry and have children there, even as they wait for the Lord to return them to their home. The stint in Babylon was all part of God’s greater plan to bless the Israelites and to bless the world.

Just as God planned redemption and restoration for the Israelites, he has worked his redemption plan for Christians. The plan is for our Christlikeness to be magnified and for his gospel to be multiplied. If we trust in God’s plan, we have hope when disaster apparently befalls us. We are to continue seeking his face, even in the exile of the waiting room. As we wait, we know that God is completing the good work that he has begun in us (Phil. 1:6), and that one day soon Christ will return and restore all broken things. Such are God’s glorious plans for a future and a hope that we are looking forward to as we wait.

Prayer

Lord, help us to understand that our plans too often focus on building “houses” here: careers, families, wealth. Your plans far exceed ours, as you are intent on building us into a temple, a people who glorify you in all that we are and all that we do. Thank you that you have a better plan for us. Amen.

Further Encouragement

Read Jeremiah 29:1-11; Philippians 1:6, and 1 John 3:2.

For Reflection: What plans of yours or a loved one have been disrupted? Ask God to help you trust him as he works his good plan in your life.

[i] J.I. Packer, in interview with Ivan Mesa, J. I. Packer, 89, “On Losing Sight But Seeing Christ,” Gospel Coalition, January 14, 2016, https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/j-i-packer-89-on-losing-sight-but-seeing-christ/. Accessed May 2, 2018.

A Good Read for Hard Times: The Waiting Room Devotional

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When Your Longings Are Unfulfilled: A Devotional

by | Jun 25, 2019 | Caregiving, Devotional, Suffering

When Your Longings Are Unfulfilled: A Devotional

Are you longing for fulfillment? There’s good news!

What are you waiting for? A job, a spouse, a child to return home (whether spiritually or physically)? Maybe healing in a relationship or healing of a broken body? Discover the good news as you wait: one day, your longing will be fulfilled! Today, I share an excerpt from The Waiting Room devotional. Even though this was written about a health crisis, it applies to any unfulfilled longing.

Unfulfilled

And we believers also groan, even though we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, for we long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering. We, too, wait with eager hope for the day when God will give us our full rights as his adopted children, including the new bodies he has promised us.  Romans 8:23-24, NLT

“I’m sorry. We are unfulfilled. There is no diagnosis.”

Two days after our son’s first brain surgery, his neurosurgeon delivered this unwelcome news. The doctor had stopped the surgery to remove the brain tumor when he discovered what he believed to be a venous malformation. Further tests were done, an angiogram and an MRI, in an attempt to discover exactly what was going on inside our son’s head. The results were back, but they were inconclusive.

I loved the fact that our neurosurgeon shot straight with us: at this point, they still did not know if our son had a tumor. I hated the words, “unfulfilled” and “no diagnosis,” and the anxiety they aroused. In this life, what we most desire, what we most yearn for, is fulfillment, a resolution to the story.

Romans 8:18-25 helps to explain the tension we feel. In the fall, creation suffered extensive damage. Weeds would grow from the once-fertile ground; sin would spread in our once-glorious beings. The whole creation, and we ourselves, now long for release from the “bondage to decay” we now endure. Romans 8:22 compares the longing for that final glorious freedom to the pangs of labor. As theologian John Stott puts it, “The indwelling Spirit gives us joy, and the coming glory gives us hope, but the interim suspense gives us pain.”[i]

When the neurosurgeon first used the word unfulfilled, I thought it was strange, but now it makes sense. Because of his vast knowledge of the brain and extensive experience with diagnoses, he confidently expected that our hopes for a diagnosis and thus, a cure, would one day be fulfilled.

In the same way, we have powerful reasons to hope even as we groan for glory. We know that Christ has been raised from the dead; that knowledge gives us hope that we have been raised to new life with him (1 Corinthians 15:19-21). The Holy Spirit works in us, transforming us into new creation. This is the hope for which we were saved (Romans 8:24).

This saving hope points us toward our future hope, the day of resolution. When Christ comes again, our longings will be fulfilled. Our son’s diagnosis will no longer matter, because he, and we, will be fully released from sin and suffering, in body and soul, in heart and mind. This is the hope that helps us to wait eagerly and patiently (Romans 8:24-25).

Prayer

Oh, Lord, you hear the groanings of our hearts; you know what we long for most is you. We thank you for your Holy Spirit and your Living Word, which sustain us as we wait. Amen.

Further Encouragement

Read Romans 8:18-25.

Listen to “Our Hope Endures” by Natalie Grant at https://youtu.be/n1mu3F0dQz0.

For Reflection:

What hopes do you have that are as yet “unfulfilled”? How does the future hope of Christ’s return help you wait well?

[i] John Stott, The Message of Romans (Downer’s Grove, Il.: InterVarsity Press, 1994), 242.

Photo by Patrick Pierre on Unsplash

A Good Read for Hard Times: The Waiting Room Devotional

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What the World Needs Now: Forgiveness

by | Feb 5, 2019 | Caregiving, Devotional, Suffering

What the World Needs Now: Forgiveness

Scarlet red and pastel pink candy hearts are popping up in stores everywhere; Pinterest is loaded with 1001 creative and crafty ways to tell someone “I love you.” It seems like a good time to focus on love. What ignites love, and what sustains love? My husband and I both have the same answer to those questions, or the question of how our marriage has not only survived, but thrived for over 36 years:

Forgiveness. Today I share a short little story about forgiveness and the waiting room, excerpted from my new devotional. It’s called:

You Are Forgiven

In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace. Ephesians 1:7, NIV

One day, in the waiting room of my Dad’s oncologist, I happened to sit next to an (annoying) angel. The very word angel in the Greek indicates a messenger, and this unlikely angel had a message from God for me and my dad. My dad, who was now immobilized by tumors in his hips, was sitting in a wheelchair facing me. He chose this particular time and place to reveal a crucial piece of information he had previously withheld: his oral chemo pill was no longer defeating the cancer from the prostate, and he had stopped all treatment.

In that moment, I felt undone by rage at my powerlessness to help my dad, so I left my chair and walked to the edge of the crowded waiting room in an effort to calm myself. When I returned, I said quietly to my dad, “You did not tell me the truth when I asked. You told me you were ‘tiptop.’” He began to make excuses, to explain that he was only thinking of me and the burden I was carrying. I cut him off: “You should have told me.”

At this point, the angel entered the story. A sturdy, middle-aged woman, she sat stuffed in the pleather chair connected to mine. Suddenly I felt a pat on my shoulder and heard her speak in a rough, country voice, “It’ll be okay.”

She continued, “Just so long as you know where you’re going, it’s all okay.”

I nodded and looked pointedly at my dad, who frequently fought me on this point. I still wasn’t sure if he was a Christian. She repeated her message, “Just so long as you know you’re saved. Jesus makes it all okay.”

My dad turned back to me and repeated his apology. “I’m sorry.” No excuses this time.

I still couldn’t look him in the eye. I said, “It’s okay. You’re forgiven. I just wish you had told me.”

The angel in the waiting room was right, even if I wasn’t eager at first to hear her message. That day, both my dad and I needed the comforting knowledge of Ephesians 1:7, the knowledge that Jesus shed actual blood so that we might be forgiven. I needed forgiveness for my unkindness to my dad. Dad needed a Savior to take the burden of guilt he had carried over a lifetime of unconfessed sin. As the angel had assured us, it would all be “okay” if we believed Jesus’ ultimate sacrifice for us.

Prayer

Precious Lord Jesus, thank you for shedding your blood for us, for bearing God’s wrath on my behalf. Thank you for lifting the burden of our guilt from us. Help us to live and love in the freedom of your forgiveness. Amen.

Further Encouragement

Read 1 Peter 1:18; 1 John 1:7; 2:2.

Listen to “Forgiveness” by Matthew West.

For Reflection: In what ways do you and/or your loved one need to know forgiveness in this season?

Photo by Evan Kirby on Unsplash

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