Exloring Life Eternal

Okay, I will correct my spelling, to what I believe the above is really about: the ministry of delivering. It is the ministry of midwives. A ministry all mature Christians can share in to some degree.

This is the work of coming alongside the church (i.e. God's people) & helping them through the birth-pangs of change (repentance at the heart).

====== True story, retold as best I was able. ======

There were 4 or 5 CNA's across the parking lot from our house: hootin' & hollerin' trying to shew in a granny back into the nursing home. (I hope they wouldn't treat their own grandma's like that ... though I fear that they would ... and I think their own grandmas would be afraid too if they treated them in similar situations as they treated this woman.

The Lord was working way faster than I could, but I believed that He was wanting to help that dear lady. She feared God, but the devil's minions were attacking her for some reason. She is elderly. She was weak. But, Oh, my friend, the Lord Jesus loves her!!

I knew that. She knew that. But, for those who have never lived in a nursing home, let me tell you: it is hard for a God-fearing woman or man to remain strong in the midst of all that goes on in many nursing homes: CNA's discussing all their latest marital & relational woes, others gossipping about this, that, & the other. Also, the constant reality of seeing people hauled out of there on stretchers never to return in their site "to the land of the living." It can _seem_ like a scary, scary place! To top it all off, you have a bunch of pill-pushers, trying to get you to take drugs. Okay, I think you get the picture. It ain't easy to live for the Lord in a place like that.

The only way it is possible is the grace & mercy of our Almighty Father! Oh, that we might trust Him more.

Well, after watching these women "harass" the lady ... and I say that cause that's just how I would have felt if they had done that to me ... "Go inside, Mrs. ___" "You know you don't need to be out here, Mrs. ____." "We're gonna have to call your family, Mrs. ____."

I couldn't take it any more. The Spirit of the Lord moved me to walk over there & bend my face down so the dear Mrs. ____ could see me. "Uh, hello there Mrs. ____, can you help me?"

All of a sudden, the Spirit of God was released in her heart again! "Oh, uh, yeah, I remember you."

"Can you help me?"

"Help you? ..." Things kind a quietted down real quick there. Here I was, barefoot, short-sleeves in cool weather ... and the poor CNA's are probably thinkin'. "Oh, great, here comes that puddin' head preacher again!"

Well, by that time, Mrs. ___ looked down at my feet, and she said, "Son, what you doin' out here without no shoes on." Praise God! She had common sense even when I lacked it!! "Oh, well, uh, could you help me get in there and get some shoes on?"

"Uh, yeah, but take it easy, I go kinda slow."

"Okay."

We slowly shuffled back to the nursing home. The buzzer-alarm thing was turned off. With a little help, she made it into the main lobby, and I remembered how to get there too. The CNA's were in full form, as though this dear Mrs. ____ was royalty ... and here I was a little slave boy makin' sure that she didn't have any trouble following Jesus to a safe place.

It was scary. Technically, I'm not really supposed to be in the nursing home with barefeet.

Hey, who cares!! She's alive! She's safe! She didn't fall down in the street!!

A nurse or CNA said, "Whew, okay, we can call off the code blue, she's back in." (or whatever they call that code.)

Finally, I was standing an inch or two away from a pool of urine, but I just said, Mrs. ____ can you pray for me?

She sweetly prayed for herself. Which made my job a whole lot easier. I prayed & walked into the night ... full of the joy of the Lord and so, so happy that this one who was lost had been found. Not a young woman, a very old woman. But she found peace ... yet again!

And that is why we need to pray Matthew 9:37-38 for nursing homes ... cause they need folk in those places that know Jesus.