As a part of my church ministry, I often have opportunity to visit our church members in the hospital, in rehab or in their homes. Most visits are similar: “How have you been feeling?” “What are your next steps?” “Let’s pray together.”
But one visit I had recently stuck with me. “Will you button my shirt for me? These old fingers ….”
Grace Sosa
As a pastor, I often feel I am the least useful person in a hospital or rehab room. I can’t do surgery or prescribe medicine. I can’t even bring people food most of the time. Of course, I offer prayer and a hand to hold. But I sometimes wonder if I am really doing anything to help.
But as I slowly and gently buttoned the shirt of this sweet eighty-something woman, I felt grateful for that moment. She was in a vulnerable position. Maybe feeling exposed or unkempt in the presence of a minister. Perhaps too embarrassed to ask someone who worked at the facility to help. I even wondered if she would have asked me if I weren’t a woman. But I was happy to oblige.
She was a massage therapist in her career days, so she had used her hands to help relieve others’ pain. As a mother, she had used her hands to change diapers, prepare meals and bandage boo-boos. The hands that had served so many could no longer perform simple functions. But mine could.
“Those who neglect pastoral care miss out on a blessing.”
I have heard of some mega pastors who never visit parishioners. They are too busy writing sermons and bestselling books, attending strategic planning meetings or shmoozing with politicians. But those who neglect pastoral care miss out on a blessing.
Is it difficult? Of course. What do you say when a parishioner says she is dying? What do you do when a church member shows you a photo he took of the blood in his stool?
But I count it a blessing to provide a ministry of presence. Because it is doing something. It is telling someone, “It doesn’t matter how busy I am. I care about you.” It is bringing flowers to brighten up an otherwise dreary rehab room. It is reminding people they are in the hands of the great physician and bringing them to God in prayer.
Some people say my denomination is dying or Christianity as a whole in America is dying. And maybe it is. So is my church member. So is everything and everyone, really. From plants to animals to people to institutions, we all have a life cycle and an eventual death. But that does not make us any less worthy of dignity and care.
Just as I count it a privilege to button the shirt of an elderly woman, I count it a privilege to shepherd a church. Sometimes that means baptisms and babies and new ministries. And sometimes it means funerals and dwindling numbers and closed doors. But either way, there are people to be loved, mouths to feed and buttons to be fastened.
Grace Sosa serves as associate pastor for youth ministries at First Central Presbyterian Church in Abilene, Texas.