"You Would Have No Power Over Me..." Why John 19:11 Can Be A Game-Changer For Caregivers

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Call 866-WINASIA. Or to see chickens and other animals to donate, go to CritterCampaign.org. Hi, I'm Gracie Rosenberger, and I'm the wife of Peter Rosenberger, who hosts a show called Hope for the Caregiver. He's a great caregiver. He's only dropped me a couple of times, but he really makes me laugh in the emergency room, and I can guarantee you he'll put a smile on your face. Live on American Family Radio, this is Peter Rosenberger. This is Hope for the Caregiver.

This is the nation's number one show for you as a family caregiver. How are you feeling? How are you doing? How are you holding up?

What's going on with you? The show is about the person pushing the wheelchair, staying up late at night, doing laundry, back and forth to the doctor's office, standing in the corner of the hospital room when you can, back and forth to rehab, all kinds of things that are going on with individuals who are putting themselves knowingly, voluntarily, between a vulnerable loved one and even worse, disaster. And if we don't speak to the needs of that person, then we risk losing two people. A family caregiver is an at-risk individual, and this show is dedicated to them and helping them navigate a better place to safety and to a life of calmness, of healthiness, and even joy in the midst of all these things.

You can do this, but we can't do it alone. I'm Peter Rosenberger, 888-589-8840. 888-589-8840 if you want to be a part of the show, if you want to watch us live on Facebook Live and streaming on social media, and that's very easy as well. Over at Facebook, you just go ahead to Hope for the Caregiver. Hope for the Caregiver, and you can watch us live on the show, and then the podcast is Caregiver Podcast. You go out to Hopeforthecaregiver.com, and you'll see right there on the front page of the podcast, you can listen to all the episodes we have. We have quite a library that we've developed. We have not only the number one broadcast show for family caregivers, and we're here on American Family Radio.

We are also on the Truth Network, as well as some other stations that are starting to pick this thing up. It is a growing need among the entire country of family caregivers. Nothing like a global pandemic to change the way we think about caring for the most vulnerable among us.

How do you help somebody who helps somebody? And that's what we talk about on the show. We deal with everything from Alzheimer's to autism, but you know what?

One of the things that we add on this show that a lot of people don't talk about, in fact, I think that we're the only significant platform addressing caregivers that actually talk about this, and that is those who are dealing with alcoholism and addiction issues in loved ones. See, those are chronic impairments. There's a lot of people that'll say, well, you know, I got delivered to this and I never touched it again, yada, yada, yada, but they don't understand that their behavior was forever marred by this impairment, and all the people around them know it. You know, alcoholism, addiction is the only disease out there that convinces you or tries to convince you that you don't have it. If you have diabetes, you're going to know you got diabetes, you know? If you have cancer, you're going to know that you have cancer, but addiction tries to convince you that you don't have it.

And all the family members around are certain of it, and so even if you say, you know, I haven't touched a drink in 10 years, that's fine, and I'm happy for you, grateful, way to go, congrats. Don't think for one moment this doesn't affect the people around you, and those of you listening who are in a relationship with someone like that, you understand exactly what I'm talking about. So this show wraps in that and the mental illness component because there are people out there dealing with all kinds of mental illnesses. You know, look at the rates of depression right now are soaring, and there are people in the orbit of those people who are struggling with these things. They're caregivers, and this show is dedicated to them.

888-589-8840, 888-589-8840. I'd like to start off with the scripture. John 19, the Gospel of John 19, verse 10 and verse 11.

Now this is going to sound real odd on the show for caregivers, but stay with me on this. So Pilate, remember Pontius Pilate, said to him, Jesus, you do not speak to me? Jesus wouldn't answer. Do you not know that I have the authority to release you and I have the authority to crucify you? Verse 11, Jesus answered, you would have no authority over me unless it had been given you from above.

Now why am I reading that for caregivers? Jesus was standing there before Pilate, and he probably at that time was pretty banged up, beaten and scourged and all the things that had been going on with him. And if you saw Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ, you got a picture of what had happened to him prior to getting to Pilate.

Slapped around, spit on, everything else. So he's probably saying this through bloody lips. And he was so direct, so focused, knowing who he was. And he understood that God was sovereign in this, that his father, our father. Had not just had this thing, the rug pulled out from under him, this was purpose.

This was why he was sent there. And so Pilate is thinking he's in charge. And Jesus, with great clarity, reminded him, no, you're not. You're not in charge. And don't think for one moment that you are.

Now, it's that kind of singularity of focus and purpose that's available to us as caregivers. And I look at the way that the world is going right now, and you know, the Christian community is a punching bag for the left. You know, if they went after the Muslim community with the same level of distaste and disdain that they go after the Christian community, there'd be war. And they're not going to do that. And Jesus said, you know, look, they hated me, they're going to hate you.

And I get that. But do we have to cower about this? Do we have to walk around in fear about this?

I don't think so. I'm getting a little bit tired of it myself, personally. I see all these people capitulating to the craziness of this world. And Jesus is clearly modeling, hey, I'm not capitulating to you. I'm here on a mission, I'm here on a purpose. And my Father is in charge of this thing, and you're not.

And don't think for one moment that you are. You know, that's the weight of who He is. And that same weight is available to us as we face the trials we face, as we face the day in and day out challenges of being a caregiver, or the day in and day out insults that come at us for who we are and what we believe. And I look at the left in this country, and they are so comfortable insulting my faith and my beliefs and my journey with Christ. They don't know me, and they certainly don't know Christ. And yet they feel this freedom to mock and deride our journey as believers. They don't understand what has sustained me through the 34 years as a caregiver I have for my wife Gracie, through her 80 surgeries, through both of her legs, watching her being wheeled down to surgery year in and year out, more times than I really want to remember. They don't understand that when she came out of surgery, halfway under anesthesia, with both legs now amputated, and she's got her hands raised to heaven singing, praise God from whom all blessings flow. They don't understand what that type of faith means to someone, what that type of awareness of God's presence means to someone, and yet they mock it. Do we as believers, as the American church, we feel okay with this? I don't. And I'm getting a little bit annoyed and tired about it. They can do all kinds of things, but it's time for us to stand up and say, you know what, you don't have a clue to what it's like to walk with this Savior. We're going to talk about this a little bit more. Hope for the caregiver. 888-589-8840. 888-589-8840. We'll be right back.