Is Your Loved One's Suffering Due to Sin?

Looking for that perfect Christmas gift for the family? Why not a chicken? Stick a bow on top, put the chicken under the tree, and who knows, you may even have a couple eggs to fry up for breakfast Christmas morning.

Give the gift that keeps on clucking. A chicken. Okay, maybe it's not the perfect gift for your family, but it is the perfect gift for a poor family in Asia. A chicken can break the cycle of poverty for a poor family. Yes, a chicken.

A chicken's eggs provide food and nourishment for a family, and they can sell those eggs at the market for income. When you donate a chicken or any other animal through Gospel for Asia, 100% of what you give goes to the field. And the best gift of all, when Gospel for Asia gives a poor family an animal, it opens the door to the love of Jesus. So give the perfect gift for a family in Asia this Christmas. Give them a chicken. Call 866-WIN-ASIA or to see chickens and other animals to donate, go to crittercampaign.org. Welcome to Hope for the Caregiver here on American Family Radio. I am Peter Rosenberg.

The show is live. And the number is 888-589-8840. 888-589-8840. This is the show for the family caregiver about the family caregiver hosted by a family caregiver. It's all things related to being a caregiver. How are you feeling as a caregiver? How are you doing? How are you holding up?

What's going on with you? That's what this show is all about. And I'm bringing almost three and a half decades of experience to help you stay strong and healthy as you care for someone who is not. And the plight of 65 million Americans is what prompted this show. And I'm very grateful that we're leading the charge here on Christian radio to be able to speak with clarity to this situation with the power of the Gospel, with understanding, and help point caregivers to safety.

What does this mean to be a person of faith while you're caring for someone who is out of control, who is spiraling down, who is suffering? All these kinds of things. These are important conversations to have, and we have them here. And if you want to be a part of it, it is 888-589-8840. Don't wait until five minutes before the end of the show.

That's what a lot of times people happen. We can't get to all the calls. So if you want to be a part of it, if you've got something on your heart, something that's troubling you, something that is bothering you or that you're struggling with, whatever, I'm not going to give you solutions because that's not what I do here. I can't tell you how to take care of your loved one any more than you can tell me how to take care of mine.

But what we can do is bang out some ideas here. Put it in the context of Scripture. Share the light of Scripture on it. What does God say about this? And I promise you, everything that is troubling the human heart is dealt with in Scripture. Now, there's no situation where it's going to, in Scripture, where it covers, you know, my, for example, exact situation. My wife's a double amputee, 80 surgeries, both of her legs. You know, it was just a horrible wreck she had back in 1983. And never-ending pain, all these kinds of things.

A hundred doctors. There's nowhere in Scripture where that is addressed specifically, but the turmoil that's in the heart as we struggle with things, that is addressed very specifically with great clarity all throughout Scripture. And we're going to talk about it today. We're going to start off with the verses we want to do, but I want to, well, let me just read the verse and then I will tell you what prompted this. As Jesus passed by, this is John 9, the Gospel of John chapter 9. As Jesus passed by, he saw a man which was blind from his birth. And his disciples asked him, said, Master, who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?

And Jesus answered him, Neither hath this man sin nor his parents, but that the works of God should be manifest in him. Now the reason I'm giving you this Scripture today is because last week I do the broadcast here on Saturday mornings here on AFR. And then I also do a live podcast that's free that you can go out and check it out.

It's at HopeForTheCaregiver.com. And I interviewed a wonderful author. Her name is Diane Langberg, Dr. Diane Langberg. She's a psychologist of more than 45 years of dealing with trauma victims. And we talked about suffering in the heart of God. And you can hear that interview and I would really, really, really recommend you go out and listen to this. It is, I think it's maybe the most important interview that I've ever done. And I gave her the entire hour of the podcast without any commercials, without any breaks or anything. It's a very important interview to listen to what this woman has to say.

And I try to get out of her way. But after the show, we talked about how, in the show, how people can be abused in the church by pastors and so forth, and how people can say things to people who are suffering that are so cutting and so cruel. We got a letter that a woman who has a child born with spina bifida, and she was told that this child was born because of sin in her life. And what surprised me, before I could respond to her, my wife Gracie jumped onto that one. Because she posted it on her Facebook group and she jumped onto that and she said, that is a lie from the pit of hell. And I was really quite moved by Gracie jumping on that because that is a question that has plagued people who suffer, who have children who suffer, all these things.

What did I do that God would do this to me? When Gracie was born, her eyes were terribly crossed and she had five surgeries on her eyes long before her car wreck. And she showed up and just by showing up on this planet, she caused people to question the goodness of God. Well, why would God do this to such a little baby? And her eyes were, she had multiple operations, she's still basically legally blind in one eye. And she didn't have any say so in this whatsoever. Just by showing up, it causes people to have a theological conversation.

She walks into a room though with her artificial legs uncovered without skin covering. So they look real robotic. It causes people to have a theological conversation in their minds. Why would God do such a thing? And in our minds, we try to somehow rationalize this thing out on why this makes sense to us. And you know, you go back and you look at what Jesus said, this man didn't sin nor his parents, but that the works of God may be manifested. And so one of the things that I want to do on this show with great passion is make sure that you clearly hear this type of message and this passage from scripture and these principles of God. So that as you are struggling with this, or maybe somebody is saying to you terrible things about why your loved one suffers, that you will be able to anchor yourself back in the truth of God and not succumb to those things. When Gracie had her car wreck, this is before I met her, and she was laying in traction and you know, someone came in and said, well, what did you do that God would do this to you?

Gracie's laying in traction. She's 17 years old. And that's a horrible thing to say to somebody. It reflects a terrible theology. And we weaponize scripture. Have you ever been the victim of weaponized scripture before? Have you ever had that happen to you?

I bet you have. If you've had any kind of track record of, of walking through painful things, somebody's going to come along and just as Dr. Lambert's in the interview and just their projectiles of scripture, they're not meant to comfort you or strengthen, meant to wound you. And that's what we're going to hopefully in this show today and in coming shows, be able to deal with more effectively so that you're better equipped to deal with that kind of stuff and then help others be better equipped to deal with it. I hate that, that we, we weaponize the promises of God.

We weaponize the word of God against one another, but that's what we do. And, and, and you go back and look at, at Job. Go read the book of Job. You know, you sit there with, for two, Job's friends came and sat there with him. They were just aghast at what had happened to him. And they sat there with him silent for seven days. I got a friend of mine who's a rabbi who talks about the seven days of silence, why that's important. And, but then theologically, all the wheels come off for the next 30 something chapters while Job's friends try to figure out why this happened.

But when they were quiet, they just sit there quiet, but things didn't go wrong until they started talking about it and figure it out. And we can't figure these things out. So we trust.

We're going to talk about that some more. 888-589-8840, 888-589-8840. This is Peter Roseburger. This is Hope for the Caregiver. We'll be right back. Welcome back to Hope for the Caregiver here on American Family Radio.

This is Peter Roseburger. This is the nation's number one show for you as a family caregiver. We are glad that you're here. Aren't you glad, by the way, that there is a show for caregivers?

And if you are, would you say something to American Family Radio? Would you support this network? You know what? This is what they're doing. They're putting out great content to help people in all kinds of situations.

And don't just be a recipient, be a participant and let them know that as a caregiver, you appreciate this because we are the nation's number one program for this. There's nothing like what we do here. And why shouldn't Christians be leading? One of the things, I was talking with Jim Stanley, who subs in for me on this show.

And he's the general manager of American Family Radio. And I was talking about this and I lamented a little bit that the world has taken over pretty much every social issue except this one. And I was like, you know, we've got to start fighting back a little bit and start regaining some ground. As believers, if we care about these things, then let's act on it.

And the world co-opted everything. I mean, our marriages, everything that's going on, the whole LGBTQ, I don't even know what all those things stand for. Everything that's out there, pro-life, pro-abortion, you know, all this stuff out there, the world has got a stake in these things planted.

And Christians are constantly playing defense on this, on trying to regain some level of high ground to be able to talk about these things. But not this issue. This issue, we are on offense and we are moving this ball down the field and we are making progress into the life of the family caregiver. And why is that important?

Because it's a two for one deal. And when you have 65 million people who are struggling with this. And then one of the things that I do here on this show that nobody else does is I lump and bring in the family members and loved ones of alcoholics and addicts into the equation and the mentally ill.

So when you're dealing with somebody who has any kind of impairment, any type of chronic impairment, wherever there's a chronic impairment, there's a caregiver. And what we're doing is we're speaking to that massive crowd who feels so isolated. It feels like they're the only ones that are dealing with this. And we're bringing the message of the gospel with clarity, with precision. And we're not playing defense.

We're playing offense. We're taking it and going into these places where people are so alone and they're so discouraged. And that's what we do on the show. So if you like what you're hearing, be a part of it.

You can go to afr.net, you can get involved that way, or you can go to hopeforthecaregiver.com. And you can see a little bit more of what we're doing. And I would suggest that you follow along on our podcast as well, because there's a ton of information. We just hit our 50,000th download this week.

And we've got over 450 episodes that we've put out there. And we want you to take advantage of it. Why would you, you know, caregiving is hard enough.

Why do you try to do it alone? Been there, done that. And I got the scars to prove it. Anyway, back to our scripture day, John chapter 9, verse 2. And the disciples came up to this guy. They saw this guy that was blind.

And it was, you know, it ended kind of amazing. Now scripture, of course, doesn't tell us all the details of it. But they were trying to wrestle with why this has happened to this guy versus, hey, let's, can we do something to help this guy?

Which I thought was kind of interesting. Because, you know, as a caregiver, you've been on the receiving end of people who are questioning why this happened to you, but they're not really helping you. I don't need people to question why this happened to Gracie, or Gracie certainly doesn't need it. We know why. She had a car wreck. Okay? We got that.

But what is God doing in it? And can you help? Can you be a source of help to people? Had a lady just call in right now.

She didn't want to go in the air, but she did call in. And the note came and says, how can I help my friend who is a caregiver? Well, part of the, the first way you can help them is just let them know that you see them. And somebody said, I don't know what to say sometimes. Well, here's the, here's the way to start that conversation. You look at them square in the eye and you say, very quietly too, by the way, for those of you who are of the Pentecostal persuasion, calm down. Just say it calmly.

Don't prophesy over them or anything else like that, just because they're already on the cliff. You're liable to scare them right off. So just calmly say to them, say, look, I see you. I see you. And I see the magnitude of what you carry.

And I hurt with you. Start there, but don't feel this need to fill up the entire space with words. You can just learn to be with them. Just be, just be. You know, that's what Jesus does.

He is with us in this. And if they need to sob it out, don't try to get them to stop. Let them sob it out.

Sob with them. That's how you help a caregiver. That's the first way to start is just to let them know that they're in a safe place to get that out. That's what we try to do here on the show is create an environment where you're safe as a caregiver.

The other thing that you can do is look around them, look at their car, look at their home. If the caregiver is stressed out, the car is probably stressed out. The home, the house is probably stressed out. The yard is probably stressed out.

The gutters may be stressed out. These are things that can be quickly and effectively addressed with minimal difficulty for a non-caregiver. So look at those things. You know, people come up with things that they think what they would like. They said, Oh, you know, wouldn't you like to be able to go on a cruise as a caregiver?

Are you kidding me? You know, I have certainly the COVID-19, but that is just not something on my radar. That's not where caregivers live. Caregivers often don't know what they want. They don't often know what works. Even if you give them a day off, they don't know how to handle a day off.

They're too busy fretting about what's tomorrow going to bring because we've got to go back and pick up all the pieces again. So these are things that that we need to be aware of as we interact with a family caregiver. You're not going to fix this situation and don't project what you think works for you.

Just start noticing things. You know, let them know that you're at the grocery store and you'd be happy to bring them something. OK, give them a copy of my book. I mean, I'm not trying to be self-serving, but I wrote the book for caregivers. I literally have written the book for caregivers. It's called Hope for the Caregiver.

You can go see it at my website. Get them that get that for your pastor. Because it's all it's Rosetta Stone for caregivers. I speak fluent caregiver. And the point of it is, is to be able to speak into people's lives with clarity, purpose, passion and efficacy. We don't want to just just drone on. They're hurting. They don't necessarily have the ability to articulate some of these things. They may be so wrapped up in guilt that that they don't want to say anything. I feel guilty for for saying something. I don't want to say anything because they're suffering so much. And I get that. But the hurt of a caregiver is important, too.

Let me put it in context. My wife has two prosthetic legs. OK. She doesn't have any feet. If I cut my foot.

I need to treat it. Well, I shouldn't do anything. She doesn't even have any feet. I mean, I'm not going to, you know, do anything about this. But I don't say anything about this particular injury because it's nothing compared to hers.

Well, that's not the right attitude. These are the only feet that she can depend on. And so it's important for me to address those issues as well. They may not be as overpowering as hers are, but they're still important.

And when it comes to matters of the heart, we're all on a level playing field. And so these are things that you can start doing with a caregiver, let them know, ask a caregiver, when's the last time you saw your doctor? When's the last time you got a physical? Those are those are important.

When's the last time they went to the dentist? And I know that in the covid-19 world, it's hard to do all those things. And I get that. But that doesn't mean it's not important. And that doesn't mean that you can't do it or that you shouldn't do it. And so these are things that you can do to help a family caregiver offer to sit with their loved one if needed to. You know, they can go and do those things. Work it out, but call them, just just check in with them. These are things that you could do to help a family caregiver.