Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: You.
[00:00:00] Speaker B: Hey, thanks so much for listening to this message. My name is Jason, and I'm one of the ministers here at the Madison Church of Christ. It's our hope and prayer that the teaching you hear today will bless your life and draw you closer to God. If you're ever in the Madison area, we'd love for you to stop by and study the Bible with us on Sundays at 05:00 p.m. Or Wednesdays at 07:00 p.m. If you have questions about the Bible or want to know more about the Madison Church, you can find us online at Madison Church.
Be sure to subscribe to this podcast as well as our Sermons Podcast Madison Church of Christ SeRmons thanks again for stopping by. I hope this study is a blessing to you tonight. We have had a long day here at Madison. It has been a very, very good day. And so tonight we are going to kind of summarize some of the things we've talked about this afternoon, and we're going to spend some time talking with two men who have been through some very challenging times with their parents and caring for them and have some spiritual discussions about that. So Jonathan Barkstell and Mike Baker will join me up here on stage, and we will have a conversation about the spiritual challenges that come with caring for your mom and dad. This afternoon we've talked about the financial challenges. We've talked quite a bit about some of the logistical challenges and the legal challenges that come, and just the host of overwhelming responsibility that comes with caring for our parents. And this morning, we were kicked off with a great lesson from Andrew. And one of the things that he highlighted is that when we're children, the idea of honoring your father and mother that we read about in Exodus and other places in the New Testament as well, really kind of sounds like, obey your parents, do what they say. But as you get older and as you become an adult and your parents continue to age, the dynamics of that relationship and the roles tend to change. If you're fortunate enough to have parents to live long enough, then you get to a point where you are now the caretaker, you are now the person that is responsible for making decisions, and you are the person that is responsible for possibly even taking away some freedoms. And now your parent, the person or the people that have been in that role for you all of your life are the ones being cared for. That can be a very challenging stage of life. As we were putting things together for this workshop, the ministers were talking about who could we get to help us talk about the spiritual challenges and some of the things that you face from a spiritual standpoint. And Mike and Jonathan both came up in our conversations multiple times. Both of these gentlemen have faced this particular challenge in their life fairly recently, and some of them are still going through some of these challenges as well. And so tonight, we wanted to bring them forward and have them talk about some of those experiences and walk us through some of the spiritual side of things. So, Mike, if you wouldn't mind, give us a little bit. We'll start with you. A little bit of a summary of your experience and how that impacted you spiritually.
[00:02:57] Speaker A: Okay.
Which is very aggressive. And so he's want to stay in Paris, but his treatments were in Nashville, and so they were to begin chemo in May and run through December of 2020. And so there was really no option. But I was his caregiver. My older sister Marcia was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2015. And so 2020 was a rough year for her.
She passed in October.
And so I was his caregiver. And after the fifth chemo treatment, he spent most of November and December in the hospital with pneumonia and with COVID And so in November, Amy and I decided we would move him down to Alabama.
And so we began looking for places, and we put him found Meryl Gardens.
He went there in February. In March of 2021, he was diagnosed as cancer free. And then in January of 2022, the cancer returned with quite the vengeance.
And so we went through radiation. I moved his treatment from Tennessee on ecology to Clearview here. So it just make it easier. He went through radiation and an oral medication. And then on Saturday, September 17, I found him on the bathroom floor at Merrill Gardens. We called an ambulance. He had pneumonia and was septic. And then on Monday, with me and Amy there in the room, he passed away. And I went from family of four to being just me.
[00:04:47] Speaker C: I may start a little bit more upstream, because to me, our journeys are so personal. What we go through, it's so unique and distinct for each of us. And when I think about the path that I've taken and we've walked through with my parents, it sort of has to start with really like where I came from. I was a little bit of a Hannah story with my mother. My mother tried for twelve years to have a child.
And then finally I came along. 1973, a year after I had been born, my dad contracted colon cancer. And so now my dad is in a battle with cancer. And because of those things, and of course, he overcame that to God's glory and is still here. But that left me in a state with my parents where I was an only child, and because of the things with my dad's cancer, they weren't going to have another child. And so I grew up with parents that were quite a bit older than me, maybe than some of my friends parents. They always seemed really young, so I never seemed to be a problem at all. They were great.
But for me, that relationship of an only child with my parents was always a really close one. But my mother, in every way, knew that she had one shot at raising a child. And so everything that she could pour into me from a spiritual standpoint, from a work ethic standpoint, from every lesson that she could try to teach me, she did. And she poured into me. And it wasn't just me. That's who my mother was. She poured into everyone, everyone in her life, her family, her friends, people she didn't know. She was definitely the definition of, if someone asks to go 1 mile, you go with them, too. And her influence is so profound on me. So this is all influencing me growing up. And I see how my mother was with my family. My mom and my dad were so sweet together. They loved each other.
It was a special relationship in my eyes. And I was always so proud of them. But I always told myself, when you're young and you're an only child, you don't really think about your parents growing older. It's off in the distance. And then at some point, probably in my began to realize, that day will come, and I'm an only child.
My wife and I'll talk about this more in a minute, but she was wiser than I, and she realized at a much younger age what we were going to face, I think, than I did. And I was kind of in oblivion about it, but you probably move into your 30s. It began to be something that I constantly thought about is, what is this going to look like? How am I going to walk this out when my parents are aging and it's me and it's Casey to take care of them? And so there's a lot of fear there about how you can manage it. But I always told myself, and I knew, because I knew, that I wanted to show to my parents that I wanted to put them on my back and to try to carry that burden for them, just as that was the people that I had always seen them be. And so I wanted to pay that back and to honor them in that way. And so that was the things that I told myself. Well, 2014, my father, who's five years older, than my mother was diagnosed with an early stage dementia. And we remember, we were all so devastated by that news, but especially, I think, so many times about my mother. And mom was just heartbroken. She was heartbroken. She loved my dad so much, and she wanted to wrap around him and protect him and take care of him and help him maintain his dignity, and she did that in such a tremendous way. But our focus then, from that point, in 2014, it became so much on my father and caring for him that probably around 2017, my mother began to show signs of cognitive decline that I honestly could not see.
Casey saw it before I did. I think I was in denial. I was thinking, this is the things that happens, okay? This is just. Or I would explain it away.
By 2019, it became very evident that there were some really serious issues going on with my mother.
And we began to make steps to try to decide, how can we handle this 2020 for us. Mike alluded to 2020. 2020 for us, COVID was a bad thing. But I'll tell you honestly, for us, COVID was the least of what we felt like we were dealing with. My mom was in a spiral.
We knew that it was Alzheimer's, but to try to get into a neurologist, to try to get the diagnosis that you needed to try to grasp for help to get through this, became so difficult in 2020. And so we spent 2020 trying to be with them every day in their home, trying to monitor what was going on. And mom was in such a severe decline that my dad was limited. My dad could only do so much. He was calling us all the time to come help. And it was just what I really describe as sinister, the neurological effects of what was going on with her. And it's heartbreaking. And through testing and some things that we were able to get to through neurology, it confirmed those things. But we were battling to try to show them what needed to be done to try to take care of their situation. And so we were basically over there living with them without living there. Finally, in August of 2020, we moved them in with us. We were trying to take some steps to make some preparations in our home. And I didn't want to separate my mom and my dad. And so we just made a decision with my wife Casey's support to move mom and dad in with us. And that was September of 2020. And it was okay for a time. And then it began to be really serious. About four months in, it became so evident to us, even trying to bring caregivers in to help us during the day, it became so evident that we were not equipped. No matter how much you love someone, you're not equipped to be able to carry them through in the way that you needed to. And I always thought I could be Superman. I thought that I could handle anything, that I could put it on my back and that I would carry it, because that'S what my parents had always showed me. That's who my mother was. And I was going to do that for her if it put me down. And you realize at some point that you can't have that cape on all the time, and you can't do that. And it's devastating to your family what you're trying to deal with. So we made a really difficult decision in early February, 2021. I knew through some providence of God, we had found, through some friends, Madison at the range. They had a memory care unit. We had talked to them. We felt good about it, and we thought, this is what my mom needs. And so we took her there, and we just had to make a decision that at that point in time, what each of my parents needed was different. Their conditions were different, their care was different, and that we had to separate them. And so we moved my mom into the range and walked that difficult road.
Mom didn't know where she was. Mom never knew that she was in our house. Mom didn't know that she was. And I say this all with utmost respect for her.
She didn't know. And we would go visit with her, and we would just spend time.
I'll talk about this more later, but just reading scripture, pray, talking to her, building her up, and trying to make sure that she knew that we were there. And I'm thankful she always knew how I was. But mom tried to move.
Mom was always a mover, like, she was always on the go, type A.
And mom would walk incessantly. Mom could not be still.
What was so sad is that it was almost like with mom is that she was trying to outrun the darkness that was going on inside of her, like, in her mind. And in the summer of 2021, she began to have a lot of falls getting up in the night, some micro fractures and things that began to make her more bedridden. And we had always known when mom faces, when she gets to the point that she cannot get up and she cannot outrun this thing, it's going to get her.
And that was the summer of 2021, and she went into a decline.
July and August of 2021, and we moved her home with us for about a week on hospice. And she passed on September 5, 2021. We were devastated.
Nothing in this was ever how I ever saw anything playing out. I thought my mother would live to be an old age. She was 79 years old.
My father was still living with us. And some of you may see him. He comes to church with us on Sunday mornings and he continued to live with us. We tried to kind of all help each other through our grief for the next couple of years. And then finally this past year, December and January, dad had two experiences where in consecutive months he was in the hospital, then in rehab, then home for five days. Back in the hospital, back in rehab.
We finally decided again not we felt like for him physically that what he needed at that point was maybe we could get him in assisted living. We were fearing that it was nursing home, but we were able to get him qualified for assisted living. And the good thing I can share today is that we're still walking through this with dad. But dad has thrived. Dad has kind of lifted. I see in dad that dad has, his spirit is better. He's happy and he's doing well. And so that's the good news to share about this journey. But again, you think in your mind, you think that you know how things are going to play out and you run these scenarios and things just don't happen the way that you envision. But God is good and he's gracious and he gets us through it. But that's our story.
[00:15:34] Speaker B: Thank you both for sharing. That gives, I think, good context to understand your spiritual perspective on this, on how to honor our parents.
I watched both of you, especially since 2020 on go through a lot of those things, and from afar, certainly I've watched my own parents and my in laws as well, care for their parents and sacrificing time, resource giving everything they have to care for their parents in various ways.
I think, at least from observation, the most difficult part of that process seems to be that point where you have to start taking away some freedom, some liberties that they've had. These are the people that have taught you the gospel, likely the first folks that taught you to pray and now for you to be in a situation still as their son. But having to take away something like the car keys, that represents a lot more than just a set of keys. Can you talk a little bit about how you navigated that stage?
[00:16:33] Speaker C: It's hard.
My mom was independent to a fault and strong willed, strong personality. I'm thankful for all those things. But her and dad, we knew with them, and it's sweet to see and it's also hard and sad to see, that, like, in our situation, mom and Dad was like, they had put the shields around themselves and they were going to protect one another, which I love, and I love that example, but it's hard to infiltrate that, and it's hard to get in and insert yourself. And so, for us, the way that really happened was more, it was gradual, and then it was sudden. And so for us, it was just a point where, through prayer, you just go in and you say these. First of all, with my mom, my dad saw it. My dad knew it was very evident that he could not help and provide. And so he started leaning on me and Casey, and that helped because that gave us kind of the point in which we could insert ourself a little more fully. I'll never forget the day when I realized there is never going to be a day that I'm not over at my mom and dad's house. You knew, like, that moment, I knew that they cannot anymore. And so dad could still drive a little bit at that point, or he did short distances, but he only went where, he knew where he was going.
And so when all this began to happen with mom, he kind of just conceded it to me.
The value of what we have, and I'm thankful for this, is you try to work hard to stay in a place where you have your parents trust, and they know that you have their best interest. And so for me, for us, I think just showing them a day in and day out, like, we're here, and we're here because you need us, and we're going to be with you through this. But they began to kind of make that concession.
[00:18:45] Speaker B: Mike, what about you?
[00:18:46] Speaker A: So, for me, dad left home at 16. He hitchhiked 300 miles to Detroit. He loved cars, and so I knew that was going to be my biggest battle, was this whole idea of when he couldn't drive.
The neuropathy in his feet got so bad that he knew he couldn't drive now, but he kept thinking he could drive in the future. And so he would say, let me practice in your neighborhood. And I'm like, dad, I don't want.
[00:19:15] Speaker B: You practicing in my neighborhood.
[00:19:17] Speaker A: Let's go to the neighborhood across the town to practice.
But him and I had an agreement that when I told him it was time that he would give me the keys. But for dad, for dignity, it was very important for him to do things and have tasks. And so at Merrill Gardens, I wouldn't let them do his laundry. And so Thursday was laundry day, and so dad knew that he had to do his laundry. I didn't let Meryl Gardens do the medication. Dad would do the medication on Sundays. I would double check it, but he would have tasks. He loved being outside. He loved sitting outside. And so outside his patio were four big planters, and Merrill Gardens said I could fill those up. So I filled those up with flowers, roses, and I bought him a hose and clippers, and he cared for those.
Know, he took great pride in that, because everybody would come by and look at that.
He knew at the time that his body, he would be so frustrated, because mentally, he was fine, but his body just couldn't do the things that he was used to doing. But, yeah, no, I didn't want him practicing in our neighborhood.
[00:20:36] Speaker B: A lot of wisdom there. He probably said the same thing when you were 15.
I remember that time when he was at Merrill Gardens, and the youth group then had some service projects as a result of him being there. They created some planner boxes throughout the grounds there. And so I think it's important both of you have alluded to this, to instill dignity and purpose still in their life. When they can't do some of the physical or even cognitive things, there's still purpose for them being here. They're still important to people, and I think that's an important thing to communicate. You guys have alluded to this. I think a lot of times, most of us, when we get married, there's something to the effect of in sickness and in health in our vows. Right? Some phrase similar to that. And I know I've always considered that to be, I'm sick or she's sick, I'm healthy or she's healthy. But talk about, just for a moment, what happens when that scales up to the sickness and in health is now your parents or her parents. How did becoming a primary caregiver to your mom and dad impact your marriage?
[00:21:42] Speaker A: So it's really tough when you're that caregiver.
There are times you're just exhausted. And in 2020, there would be days I would leave the house at 530 in the morning, drive to Paris, pick dad up, take him to Nashville, drop him off for a chemo treatment, drive to Mount Juliet, help my nieces with my sister, go pick him up, take him back to Paris. And there were times I left Paris at 08:00 at night to 09:00 at night to drive home because I hadn't worked the next day.
And so I think I was exhausted all of 2020. Well, then I was frustrated, and then you feel frustrated, then you get angry. And dad and I, when the cancer came back in 2022. We didn't agree on the treatment, and we actually had an argument about what treatment he would do. Well, then I felt guilty about arguing. So I had all these emotions. And unfortunately, Amy bore the brunt of those.
I took things out on her. I was difficult to live with.
I probably wasn't a good husband, wasn't a good father. But she stood by me the whole time.
When my niece was engaged, Marcia's youngest daughter was engaged. And we didn't think Marcia would make it much longer. And Marcia couldn't leave the house, so we had the wedding at the house. I performed the ceremony, and Amy worked behind the scenes, making sure everything went. She helped me decorate for Marcia's memorial. She went with me to plan Dad's funeral.
We cleaned out his apartment together. We cleaned out his storage unit together. I couldn't have done it without her.
The one advice I would give if you find yourself in a situation and you're married is share everything.
I kept a medical journal with every doctor's visit, everything on dad. And after that visit, I would sit down with Amy and we would go through that. And if there was something we didn't understand, we'd look it up. We learned how to read CAT scans. We learned how to know all the other scans. Everything I knew, she knew. And we would come up with questions for doctors, for us. It made us stronger. But I just feel like she needed all the information that I had.
[00:24:16] Speaker C: This is tough.
I shared with you when we talked about this, and I said it earlier, Casey knew.
She knew far better than me, way back in the past, what she was going to face when she married an only child in a way that I had never even thought of.
And I had one of my mother's younger sisters. She had a couple of sisters several years younger than her that told us when we were moving mom and dad in with us, and they knew everything going on. And this is scary when you hear this.
My aunt told me, Jonathan, I'm worried about your marriage. Like, I fear for your marriage and the toll that this is going to take. So when your aunt is fretting over that, telling you I'm fear for you, that's scary, because I thought, what can we do?
We have to do this.
What I saw. So with that in mind, I think that helped us.
We knew we had to lean on each other. We knew, and we wanted this to be a story, like, for us, that could be something. Like, let's turn this into something. Let's not let there be other victims of this. We're going to claim a victory in you. For me, I saw Casey serve my mom and dad, like, every day, every single day now, for years, selfless service. And I have seen her kindness to them at times when, like what you're saying, I'm struggling because I'm frustrated.
And her kind, sacrificial selflessness with my mom and dad.
And this is the thing that's amazing about that to me, is what I began to realize.
What God was doing with us in this was drawing us closer togEther, and he was doing it through what I was seeing. When you see your wife serving your parents, how are you not strengthened from that? And how do you not love someone even more for our story? And I will always look at that time, and that's something I can be thankful for, is when there's fear and there are people saying, I'm worried about your marriage. That what God did with us is he used it to draw us closer together and to strengthen us so that we could lean on each other. I could not have done it.
It was me, and it was her, that she was the only person that I could really lean on in this that knew what I was going through. And we got through it, but I don't know how I would have gotten through it on my own.
[00:27:07] Speaker B: I've heard it said recently that someone who had lost a parent and said, there's other folks that have gone through this as well, we're all in the same boat. And we sort of talked a little bit, and I think the analogy got clarified that we're all in the same water, we all have to row our own boat. And so I imagine having someone that lives with you, that lives through that challenge, they're in that same boat with you, because everybody's experience with this is unique and is different. But in order for you to really have someone that you can completely confide in, to be completely vulnerable with, to be angry with, and them not hold it against you, it's definitely something that. I think there's lots of reasons why God chose the analogy of marriage to describe the relationship of Christ and his church. Right? And this sort of thing highlights that. In Galatians, chapter six, verse two, we read the words of Paul, to bear one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ. We've talked about your spouses. Who else or what else was done? What were some meaningful ways in which people helped you bear this burden, even though it is something that really you were having to bear a great deal of what were some things that were done that were very meaningful to you, that impacted you even on a spiritual Level during this time. Mike. Wow.
[00:28:25] Speaker A: Where to start? So, if you took time to send me a card, send me a text to call me, send me an email, say something to me at church if you didn't know what to say, if you gave me a hug or a pat on the back, everything you did showed me that you cared.
I was given Kroger fuel cards because I was driving so much in 2020. I was given cards to cracker barrel in places because we were driving so much. The elders here, I don't know the number of times we went together into a room and prayed.
The men's breakfast on Tuesday became my anchor because it was there. I could take off this responsibility for a little while, and the men in that group would pray with me, and they would volunteer to take dad to the doctor or to treatments. You mentioned our youth dad in the dining hall. Everybody would talk about his flowers, and they would say, I wish we had flowers like that, but we can't afford them, or we don't have anybody to plant them. And so one day, I went there, and dad goes, I need a favor. And I said, sure. Anything you want. He goes, I want you to take your truck to a nursery, and I want you to fill the back of that truck with flowers, and I want you to plant every single planter at Merrill Gardens. And I said, dad, it's going to take me days.
And he goes, you just get the flowers, and the how will come about by itself. He had faith. He had faith that it would get done. And so I texted Jordan, and I texted Richard, and I said, do you think I could get a couple of young people to come help me? I wound up having 20 young people.
[00:30:15] Speaker C: Wow.
[00:30:16] Speaker A: And it took them 2 hours to plant every planter box in Merrill Gardens.
And then when dad moved here, you all welcomed him, and you would go to visit him. And never forget, he had a visit with Ronnie Misteldine. And Ronnie brought his book with his car pictures, and I had made an album of Dad's antique cars. And they sat and they talked about cars. And I discovered that Ronnie and my dad had something in common when they were younger. They had a lead fooT. I have never heard. I heard stories.
[00:30:50] Speaker B: Now we're getting to the good stuff.
[00:30:52] Speaker A: I heard stories about driving fast. I heard stories about drag racing. And finally, I said, if you guys keep talking this way, you're going to have to go forward on Sunday.
And then the number of people who drove to Paris for Dad's funeral.
I love Paris, but you got to go to Paris. You don't go through Paris going anyway. If I had known that many people were coming to Paris, I would have given you a heads up that once you get off I 40, there's really nothing between I 40 and Paris for you to stop at. It was just overwhelming.
My parents taught me to love the church, and I've loved churches in Paris and in Murray, Kentucky, and in Mississippi and in Mobile.
I started going to Hartsville when I moved here, and then I went to West Huntsville. But there's just something special about Madison.
[00:31:53] Speaker B: Jonathan.
[00:31:57] Speaker C: One thing that I think about a lot. So there were so many people that were just words of encouragement that were constantly checking, that began to know the things that were going on. And so they would always tell us, they would give us encouragement, and they would say, we're praying for you. And I think it's very evident to me now when I look back and I think about the meaning of when you say you've been propped up in prayer, because I'm telling you, we always look at that time and we literally felt like our hands were held, like we were propped up in the prayers of.
And when I said that about Casey and I being in this thing together, it was, more to your point, like, we're down in the trenches together, but we never felt alone in it in the sense that we had so many people that would reach out and to say when people would say things like when you would begin to realize that you could help other people through what you were doing and what you were walking through, that was something that was really good for us and very uplifting. But we felt the prayer. And when you are in a situation where you are truthfully feeling the prayers of others, at times when you're struggling even to know what to pray, but you feel that coming from others, we want to model that up, and we want to remember what that feels like so that we can implement that and so that we can do that for others. And from that time, Casey has said, and I love this phrase, she has, know, when you know better, you do.
And I love that idea about what you receive and what you feel from others. And I still need to do a better job with that. But we felt it.
[00:33:48] Speaker B: I think it's always meaningful to tell someone that you're going to be praying for them and then to do so.
I think it's moving to pray with them in that moment. And I've been on both sides of that, of people as you get through just sharing what's going on, they said, well, let's pray. You're like, oh, thank you for, oh, no. Okay. Right. We're praying now.
[00:34:10] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:34:11] Speaker B: But by the end of that prayer, you're both emotional.
Your hearts are softened and receptive to God and grateful. You've been bonded to that person through prayer as well. And so I think that's one thing that we have really tried to emphasize here. And if you talk to our shepherds over the last few weeks and months, you've heard that emphasis. We want to create a culture of prayer here at Madison. We want to stop in the moment and to pray with people, and you see what kind of impact that has, not just on the person you're praying for or the people that you're praying for, but on both people that are there in that moment. Can you share a little bit if or how your prayers changed over time through this process? And were there any particular passages that had a particular impact on you during this time?
[00:35:00] Speaker C: So the prayer was, you feel like you're in a battle.
You truly sense that. And the prayer for me was always that, first of all, just praying that God sees you through it.
You don't know what each day, the next day is going to bring. So your prayer becomes, Lord, you know that I need you today, get me through today. And I trust you in this process, that you care. I know you care, and I trust that you're going to bring us through this.
And you just say it, and you say it some days when it's harder to feel it, but you just try to offer it up. And there was a phrase that I heard in a song during that time with mom, in a song that says, even when the night is holding, even when the night is holding on to me, God, I know you're holding on.
And I would think about that a lot of when you feel that around you and you feel it constricting on you to know that God still cares and that he's got you, and so you just pray for those situations to say, I want to see your glory in this. I want you to be glorified through this, and I know something good is going to come from this. Help me see it.
[00:36:22] Speaker A: So for me, there was three very distinct phases in my prayer. So in 2020 was a roller coaster. I was on the road, actually.
I had an aunt who was very close to me. I did two funerals. I did Kate's wedding.
As I looked at 2020, my prayers were all over the map.
And I was so thankful for Romans, where it talks about the Holy Spirit interceding for us when we pray. I don't know how it works. I'm just glad that it works. And so in 2021, I really wanted to be more deliberate. I really wanted to be more focused. So I took that medical journal that I kept on dad, and I merged it with my prayer journal. And so that my prayers were very focused on if he was given new medication or if he was given changes in medication. So I tried to align that medical journal with the Prayer Journal. And then you.
So you convinced me.
[00:37:33] Speaker B: I'm very nervous.
[00:37:35] Speaker A: You convinced me to teach a class on prayer in the fall last year. That's right. And I felt woefully inadequate and didn't feel like I should be the person that would teach that class. And as I studied and as prepared for that class, I really realized my prayers had all been wrong, because all my prayers were based on what I wanted and what I wanted the outcome to be and what my desires were. And so I sat down, I talked to dad, and I said, dad, what is it that you want? And there were two things that just terrified my dad. One was him losing his memory of not being able to know me and my family. And then the second one was to have the long, drawn out event in pain and to be in pain. So in getting ready for that class, I changed my prayers. I started praying for Dad's wants and Dad's will and not my will. And I prayed that whatever happened, that I would accept it with the grace and the dignity that my dad was accepting everything that happened to him. And it just changed the way I prayed. It changed the way I felt. And he passed halfway through that class. And I'm not sure I would have handled things near as well if you hadn't had challenged me to teach that class and prepare that class, because, as usual, oftentimes, those of us who teach, we get more out of the class, and it's much more beneficial to us than to those in the class.
[00:39:12] Speaker B: I didn't ask you to do this, but that's a really good plug for our adult classes. We are accepting teachers. It'll change you.
Now, I remember that class. It was very impactful for everyone that was a part of that study. And that's what happens, right, when we study the word of God, and we immediately put it into practice. When we see the words of Scripture come to life in our own life, we don't read for knowledge. We read for transformation. Right. I believe that was one of the things that probably came up in that class of time or two. When we pray, it's the same thing. It's not our Amazon wish list. But as we grow in Christ, we start to see as Christ sees and pray as Christ prays. So thank you both for sharing that.
We've covered a lot this afternoon. We've talked about financial aspect, we've talked about a lot of practical, caregiving aspects tonight. We've talked more about the spiritual challenges and the spiritual aspect of going through a challenge like this. And our time has kind of flown by for folks that are here tonight that are going through this or folks that may be about to go through this, what is something that you want to make sure and encourage them with? What is a piece of advice or an encouragement that you want to leave them with tonight?
[00:40:26] Speaker A: So for me, I think it's two things today or when you read, you may read a statement that says at times it can be overwhelming.
That's not true. At times it will be. There's no can. You will feel so overwhelmed and you will feel so inadequate and that responsibility that you've chosen to shoulder will suddenly become this weight that it's even difficult for you to breathe.
And you will begin to feel all alone, that you'll think that you're the only one and you're all alone in this. And you're not. You're not.
Know, Jonathan and I, when we were planning know, we wanted to make sure that if any of you ever wants to talk to us absolutely. About our experiences, we're here.
You're not alone.
[00:41:27] Speaker B: Start with prayer.
[00:41:28] Speaker A: Prayer is one of the greatest gifts that God's given us. Turn to open your Bible. There are 7000 verses that are promises, 7000 promises in the Scripture. And God is faithful in those promises. Don't ever, ever think that you're alone. You're not alone in this.
The second thing is Mark. Chapter 435 through 41 is a story that we all know. It's the story of Jesus on the Sea of Galilee during a storm. And he calms the storm and we know that part. But in verse 35, Jesus says to his disciples, let us go to the other side.
And we don't read that part because if we did, we would know that if Jesus had intended to go the other side, he was going to make it to the other side.
He never promised us that it wouldn't be rough going, that we wouldn't be going through trials. But he has promised us that there's another side. There's another side. My dad believed in that other side. He told every nurse, told every doctor what was waiting on the other side.
Even though you feel so alone, you're not. And remember, there's a promise of the other side, and you can be confident knowing that there is another side waiting for us.
[00:43:09] Speaker C: And that's good.
[00:43:10] Speaker B: Mike, practice it all out as we stand in.
[00:43:16] Speaker C: That. It's hard to build on that. That was great.
One thing that struck me, and again, we have to understand everything that we're going through, you might go through with an aging parent. We can't do it on our own. And that comes from the standpoint of, from our prayer life, certainly, but also in ourselves, to accept help, to ask for resources, to lean on others, to lean on, to seek resources and help from experts. We're not loving our parents any less. To reach out and accept that. And that was something that I needed to understand because I thought, well, you show it by doing it all, and we're human, we're fallible. It's hard to do it. And as Mike said, when you feel the weight of everything on you, it's impossible to do it all because you're above your pay grade in a lot of ways, medically and things like that. So that's one thing.
That's what's so great about this. Today, 2017, when they had this event here, that was maybe the first time that Casey and I had ever been to Madison. We had no idea what we were facing at the time. We knew that we were headed in a direction. We had no idea where that was leading. But we came to this and we were able to gather some of those resources and learn things that ended up being immensely helpful to us, that we were able to lean on later on and help put things in order. So we have to have that help. So reach out and the things that, if you've been here and you've learned that today, reach out and accept that.
Someone wrote me a note after mom passed, and I thought this was just the best advice, and I would offer this to anyone to always remember this because it's easy to remember. But she wrote me a note after everything had happened and mom had passed, and she just wrote a note and she simply said, jonathan, be good to yourself.
And I think that that's advice that we all need because we're going to look at times with the people that we love and we're going to realize and we're going to see moments that we feel like, I failed, I messed up, I didn't handle this correctly, and we're going to beat ourselves up for it. And again, it's our effort, it's our love, it's our intent, so we can't do that. So that would be my advice, too. And finally, the thing that I would say in terms of offering a scripture, remember that a lot of times what we would do, and I do this with dad now try to just when realizing that they're having a hard time with Mom, mom wouldn't read scriptures.
You lose the ability to do those things. So we would read because I wanted her to hear the words.
I wanted her to hear words of life. And I remember one day that we were reading and we got into Revelation 21 and 22, and I was reminded where God is saying that God wipes away every tear, that there's no night there, and the reminder that God cares. And then at the end of Revelation 22, I distinctly sitting with mom one day in the final couple of months and reading and getting to the passage where at the end of the book of Revelation, when the words of Jesus, Jesus says, yes, I am coming soon. And then I love John's response because he just says, amen. Come, Lord Jesus. And I just think in our lives, especially when you're beginning to reflect and see it through the perspective of someone that you know their days are numbered, that hope of seeing that and having that attitude of John to just say, Lord, whenever you're ready, I'm waiting for you. But to be reminded that, as you said, that's what's on the other side, that's the hope. So that's what I would offer.
[00:46:47] Speaker B: I love it ending on hope. And that's really what this whole day was about, is to honor our parents, our Father and mother. And we do that because of the hope that is within us, because of the gift of salvation that God has given to us through his son. You guys have endured some extremely challenging times. And that's not to say that there's not more on the horizon, but the joy that I hear from both of you talking about your parents, it's very clear that that hope is firm and that hope is center to all of that. If you've been with us today and you don't have that hope, I want you to know that you're among family. And I want to thank both of you in particular for your vulnerability this evening. These are not easy things to talk about, especially in a room full of people, let alone just one on one. But I think Brandon said it this afternoon. We're nothing if we're not family. We worship together. We pray together. We study the Bible together.
But if we just stop there, those are just the things that happen here in this building. Life goes on outside this building, and we do life together as well. Because we are a family. We're going to spend eternity together. So we might as well get to know each other a little more comfortably here while we're at it. And that's what we want to do. We want to be vulnerable with each other, and we want to bring things before God. So tonight, it's very possible that you find yourself in a situation that's difficult, that's challenging, that is heavy, that is burdensome. It doesn't have to be a confession of sin. It could simply be a confession of I'm tired, I'm weary, and I need someone to hold my arms up in prayer. That's what we do here. We love each other with the love of the Lord. And so tonight, if there is anything that you need from your church family, won't you please come as we stand and as we sing, say a quick thank you to everyone that has helped make today a success, especially our guys in the booth. All of our afternoon sessions have been live streamed and recorded, so those are currently on our YouTube and Facebook pages. If you'd like to go and listen to those, if you missed something this afternoon, feel free to share that with people in your life that could benefit from it. Thank Gary Dodge, who I think is still with us. Julie and I believe Connie have already left. But Marshall, you as well. Thank you guys very much for sharing your experience, your expertise. Mike and Jonathan, both of you as well, please continue to pray for our folks that are hurting right now, that are in this life stage. As was shared this morning, we have a lot of families that have experienced a lot of grief this year in particular, and gone through these very things we've talked about. And the holidays are right on the horizon, so those will not be easy for many in our number. Let's keep our eyes open to the folks that are hurting and let's be in each other's lives. Ronnie Misadine is going to come and he is going to dismiss us in prayer. Hope everyone has a great week, Lord willing. We'll see you Wednesday.
[00:49:31] Speaker D: Before we pray, just before services began, I came up here to talk to Jason, to tell him that for me, as a deaf person, speak loudly and slowly, please, so we'll understand everything.
Little did I know that Mike was going to reveal secrets of my life.
So I don't know how you're going to respect me leading a prayer at this point. But I appreciate so much, you, brethren, what you had to say and do, the joys, the hurts, the help.
As most of you know, Sandra and I are going through some very difficult times in our lives with her and our son, Ron.
I feel for our children because they're going to have to deal with all of the things that y'all have talked about tonight with us, and we'll try to make it as easy for them, Shannon, as possible.
But my car keys are going to be tough.
Thank you for your love for the Lord.
Thank you for caring about us.
Both of you talked about this caring church, and by all means, it is you are. Thank you for that.
And as we close tonight with prayer, that living hope that we just sang about is really all I know to say. Bow your heads, please.
Oh, God, we thank you for that living hope that we have in Jesus, that there is something better than this life here on the earth. And though the joys of this life you have given us are certainly wonderful, the times come in our lives when joy turns to grief and sometimes to pain, and it's difficult, and you know that. But, Father, it makes us look forward with hope to that eternal life with you.
I especially ask you to help me, Father, to be able to have that hope and to be able to say, even with difficulty, your will be done and not mine.
In Jesus name, amen.
