This is the Truth Network. Welcome to Hope for the Caregiver. Here on American Family Radio, this is Peter Rosenberg, and I am so very glad to be with you. Hope for the Caregiver dot com. Hope for the Caregiver dot.
Come every week. We take a foray—that's a journey—for those of you in McDonough into all things related to being a caregiver. More than 65 million Americans right now are serving as a caregiver. Maybe you're one of them. If you are, you're in the right place.
If you're not one of them, you're still in the right place because if you love somebody, you will most likely be a caregiver. If you live long enough, you're going to need one, and so the question then becomes very simple: How do you stay strong and healthy while taking care of someone who is not? And that's what this program is all about. And I'm bringing you four decades—that's a lifetime of experience—to offer a lifeline to my fellow caregivers to tell you that healthy caregivers do indeed make better caregivers. HopefultheCaregiver.com before.
We get to Peter's pile of papers that I have here on my on my desk. I um, and I always have things that I want to want to address here on this program, but I want to launch off with something different just here at the opening section here, and that is that this is November National Caregiver Awareness Month. It's a month set aside to recognize family caregivers.
So a couple of things for those of you who may have just joined for the first time. For those who've been here with me for a long time, it's going to be a tiny bit of review, but not much.
Okay, just just a tiny bit. What's a caregiver? People say, you know, you hear family caregiver and a caregiver. What's the difference?
Well, the difference is very simple. It's a paycheck.
So, those of us who are doing this voluntarily, without pay, for our loved one, simply because this is this is the journey in a relationship, whether it's a child, whether it's a parent, whether it's a wife, whether it's a husband, whether it's grandparents, whether it's a friend, neighbor, uncle, cousin, sister, brother, whatever it doesn't matter. The relationship you're doing this as a volunteer. You're not a trained professional that's doing this. Had caregivers, well, people that call themselves caregivers, to take care of Gracie over the years.
Some of them were CNA, some of them were just home health attendants, some of them were nurses, all those kinds of things. But they they leave and they get a paycheck. I don't. And I'm here all the time, just like you are, and that's the journey for us as caregivers.
Now, some of us do it from a little bit more of a distance. I do it from about twenty five feet away, at pretty much all times, and I that's my journey as Gracie's husband, and I've been doing it for forty years.
Some of you are doing this from you know down the street or across town.
Some of you doing across the continent, but you're still having to coordinate and deal with it. Either way, it is a challenge. To do this, to take care of somebody who has some type of chronic impairment, it's not going to necessarily get better. In fact, it may get worse. But the caregiver is throwing themselves recklessly at this, and into this mix is where I've waited with this program.
Waited. It's W A D E D, and that is to go and say, okay, what have I learned through this journey? What what have I found are the the points for us as caregivers where we get locked down into something where we just cannot somehow navigate through this easily or smoothly or even at all? Let me explain, or as Ricky Ricardo would say, let me splain. I I don't need a refresher course on a lot of the task of caregiving.
For example, you know, laundry, giving injections, dealing with pharmaceuticals, dealing with insurance companies—all those kinds of things. You learn that, and you learn it, you know, pretty quick. I mean, because it's a task; it's a set of finite tasks that you have to do. I mean, if you need somebody to come every day and tell you how to do the laundry, then we've got a different set of problems.
Okay, do you know how to make a bed? Do you know how to make a meal? Do you know how to grocery shop? Do you know how to meal plan? Do you know how to do all the things?
Yeah, of course, that's just part of being an adult. Do you know how to talk with a doctor? The first couple of times it can be a little nerve wracking. Yeah, I get that, but you do. You've been doing it now for a while, haven't you?
Most of you, if you've dealing with any kind of Physical ailment.
Now, if you're dealing with stuff of a caregiver of some sort, that you're dealing with somebody with mental illness, you're going to be dealing with more in the psychological realm. But you're still dealing with medical professionals who treat your loved one.
Now, some of you may be dealing with an alcoholic or an addict.
Now, this is where it gets a little bit more illustrative of what the real problem is, because when you're dealing with an alcoholic or an addict, it's one of those things that. You've got to look at this in such a way that you don't lose who you are in this, and that becomes really the lane for all of us as caregivers. It just becomes incredibly visible on what it does to the family member when you're dealing with addiction. Let me go deeper. If you've got, for example, with my wife Gracie, both legs are gone.
There's no way I'm going to expect her to stand up and walk without her prosthetic limbs. I mean, it's just not going to happen. But if you got somebody who is an addict, how many times if you found yourself or an alcoholic? Trying to take their bottles away, or trying to shame them into a behavior, or trying to somehow control them so that they won't participate in this destructive behavior anymore. I don't have to tell Gracie that she has to put her legs on to walk.
She knows this. That's just part of it. I don't have to do that. But there are a lot of times in caregiving when you're trying to control something, and you're saying to this individual, trying to use whatever tools you have, and it's not working. But we keep repeating it, and we get frustrated, we get angry, we get resentful, we get bitter, we get weary, we get despairing—all those kinds of things.
That's where caregivers live. I'm not really struggling as a caregiver for my wife because she's missing both legs. That is not where my struggle is.
Okay, we made peace with that a long time ago. It's part of the journey, but it's not where I wake up every day. That oh, you know. But when you deal with somebody who has chronic impairments, that tend to cause a roller coaster ride. In our case, I mean, think about last year.
For example, we went to the hospital to have two surgeries. She ended up having eleven. We we were supposed to stay maybe six weeks, six seven weeks in the hospital. We stayed for five months.
Now you now you're starting to get a picture of it, because it's hard to plan. You can't you you you don't really know how to function in this thing. And what do you do when you just keep seeing the gurney going back down to surgery, and and all these kinds of things going on? And when you have to deal with crisis after crisis after crisis after crisis, Gracie's legs are really not a crisis. If it was, but it's been dealt with, and now she learns to deal with with prosthetics.
But the rest of Gracie struggles and struggles mentally with severe, intractable pain that doesn't go away.
Well, if you're in a relationship with somebody who is hurting all the time, all the time, every day, and it's not going to get any better tomorrow, you know, it it changes you. It it. It takes you into some very, very uncomfortable places. If they're in physical pain, if they're emotional pain, how they deal with that pain, how they medicate that pain—all those things factor into our journey as caregivers, and that's why I started this program.
So, in this month, the the nation, for whatever reason, decides to take a month to talk about family caregivers. I'm going to share with you some more things that I'm still learning, things that I anchor myself on, things that I hold on to to give myself a safe place to stand, so that I can hopefully pass on to you things I learned the hard way that maybe you don't have to, maybe you don't have to learn with the kind of scars that I have, and and what stabilizes me in this. How do I deal with this every single day? What does that look like? What does that look like for you?
Those same principles. How would that apply to your life? This is why I started the program. And this month, as we go into the holiday season and so forth, it can be difficult for us as caregivers. The holidays themselves become a challenging time.
The days are shorter. The stress is higher. There's just a lot going on.
So how do you stay strong and healthy as you take care of someone who is not? What do you do? What does that look like? What do you do theologically with this? What do you do physically, emotionally?
All these things. We're going to explore this together, and I've got a whole series I've been working on of some things that I think you're going to find helpful. We'll get into that too. All of this and more on this program today. Hope for the Caregiver.
dot com. I'm Peter Rosenberg. Glad you're with us, and we'll be right back. Welcome back to Hope for the Caregiver. This is Peter Rosenberg.
Glad to be with you. Hope for the Caregiver dot com. Hope for the Caregiver dot com. By the way, if you want to go out there and take a look, you'll see the new ad up there, the new pop up on the website. For the caregiver calendar, the 2027 caregiver calendar, we have no fundraisers that we do for Standing with Hope.
I don't do golf tournaments. I don't do dinners. I'm too tired. I'm a caregiver. I only do one thing a year, and that is.
I go out and offer this caregiver calendar that I make. I take pictures of here in Montana where we live, and I put quotes on it and put it out there for you to have something year long that you could look at every day on the wall and say, "Okay, I can I can hang on to that." And it's all written in fluid caregiver.
Okay, so it's out there. You can go take a look and see the pictures. Take themselves. I'd love to tell you that I'm a great photographer. I just live in a beautiful place, and I'm grateful to be able to take them.
So, you go out to hopeforthecaregiver dot com. All this goes to Standing with Hope, and you can see how you get it. Standing with Hope is the is the presenting sponsor of the program. It's the ministry Gracey and I founded. We have two programs: prosthetic limbs for her fellow amputees, and the caregiver outreach for my fellow caregivers.
Period for the wounded and those who care for them. It's all out there. We're talking about what is a caregiver? Caregiver is somebody who volunteers to put themselves between a vulnerable loved one with chronic impairments and even worse disaster. That's that's who we are.
That's what we do.
Okay, we step up, and that's what you've done. And because you're listening to this program, you understand that.
Now I started a group out here, a support group here in our little community. We meet every Thursday morning at 10 a.m. at the local church where I go to church. When I first started this, I was the only one there for three weeks, and then people started trickling in. And I did this because I know I know a couple of things.
I know that as a caregiver, you could be surrounded by people who love you and still feel lonely in a crowded room. I know this. And you know this as a family caregiver. And people ask you how your loved ones doing. You give the update, explain the the latest procedure, describe what the doctor said.
Somewhere in the conversation, what you're carrying, though, disappears beneath the details of the person you're caring for. You know their chart, but do people know your heart? You follow me? And so when I started doing this support group, I wanted to offer something different. I wanted those who are caring for for loved ones with with chronic impairments to find a little respite, something solid to stand on while they caught their breath.
That's why I do this program. When I started this program, people looked at me like, you know, you're you're nuts.
Well, you know, let's full disclosure, I get that look a lot, but has nothing to do with caring. It's just because it's just me. But they they didn't get it. They thought I wanted to talk about nursing homes, which I don't. Gracie has I've been taking care of Gracie for forty years.
She's never been in a nursing home, so that's not what this is about.
Sometimes on this program, I'll swerve into culture, politics, or you know other things that kind of get my attention. But at the core of all that I do, everything that I write, everything I talk about, is a firm commitment to speak to caregivers. Who wonder whether or not anyone understands them? That's what I do. I know what it's like to be surrounded by people who cared about me but didn't quite know what to say.
I understand that feeling, and I remember how lonely it was for decade upon decade upon decade. It just it just kept adding up, and nobody really knew what to say to me. And that's why I started the group. That's why I do the radio show. That's why I do all these things because I remember that feeling and how discouraging it is.
And the first timers that come into our support group sometimes they arrive a little nervous, and sometimes they're already a little teary-eyed. I don't think many people appreciate how much courage it takes to walk into a room full of strangers as a caregiver. And bring all the things that you bring, but they do, and I appreciate the courage. And and the church has committed to keeping us supplied with tissues, so we always have a box of tissues on the on the table. And and the pastor and and his assistant will sometimes have coffee waiting before we we we arrive.
When when neither the pastor or the assistant is there, that responsibility falls to me, and I've been making coffee for Gracie for you know. Years, and she likes coffee that reaches out and slaps you.
Well, you know most of our attendees have learned to politely decline when I'm handling the brewing because it could get pretty strong. One fella bought recently a tin of really good cookies from Costco, and and we made a real sizeable dent. And there's big tin of them, and and I said, well, okay, let's be honest, I made a sizeable dent in it, but I've got to. I've got to watch that. I kept passing them around the table, but they kept coming back to me.
And let me tell you something: this is the tendency with me. I won't just eat one cookie; I'll eat so many, I'll get so big that the bears out here will have to start hiding their food.
So I got to be real careful with that. But we go around the table and check in, and I'll ask what's going on with various people. And sometimes the circumstances are pretty dire. We've had funerals. And lots of hospitalizations, and we've had lot of lot of challenges.
And the tissues get passed along with the cookies.
Sometimes we talk about ordinary things, but I will tell you this: we haven't had one meeting where the whole table, at some point in the meeting, has burst out laughing. Because each of us, you see, speaks fluent caregiver. Nobody needs a lengthy explanation of why someone is exhausted, frightened, or frustrated, or struggling to make one more decision. Around that table, people recognize the language because they live it. That's what I hope that I accomplish here on this program.
That if you're tuning in and you're not a caregiver, you're going to get something out of it. But if you are a caregiver, you're going to really hear somebody talk to you in a way that you can understand, that you feel understood, seen, heard, noticed, addressed. Look, I've gone decades where people really didn't know what to say to me, and to be quite frank, or Sammy, or Dean, or Joy. Many don't still know what to say to me, but I do know what to say to a fellow caregiver. I do know how to speak in a way that that caregiver will understand.
And sometimes it's it's just real simple.
Sometimes it's just hey, pull up a chair, have a cookie or three, or here, sign a waiver before you drink this coffee. You know, I can't offer bad coffee and cookies to you all. You'll have to supply your own tissues. By the way, if you run out, just get toilet paper. We've all done it, you know.
You have. My dad, when he he did pastoral counseling, I'll never forget this. He had his office filled with books. I mean, Dad was a voracious reader, and somebody being there just sobbing, and he's out of Kleenex, so he goes down the hall and he comes back with a roll of toilet paper. Oh, Mom, fussed at him about that, but you know, you got to do what you got to do.
But some some of us know. I mean, look, if you've been a caregiver for any length of time, you know what it's like to sob into a roll of toilet paper.
Okay, let's just be honest with it. And if you don't know, stay tuned. You will before it's all over. You'll you'll be you'll find yourself. Reaching for the charm and blowing your nose, so it's it's just the way it works.
But I know what to say to a caregiver, and I've been saying for fourteen years on this program, and I've said it to tens of thousands in live audiences, and I've written about it over and over and over. I've talked to caregivers at the store. When I see them at the store, I don't make a point of it. I just, if I see someone and and they come up to me or whatever, and I ask them how they're doing, the tears start sometimes right there in the grocery aisle, and that's okay. I know what to say to people, and I know how important it is to say to people, because we we struggle along in isolation, and I don't want that to happen.
To as many people as possible that I can be responsible for what I've learned to pass on. And I I want to speak honestly about the weariness, the fear, the resentment, the things that we're reluctant to admit. And you know what? I also like to talk about the laughter that kind of catches us by surprise. People asked me one time.
He said, "How can you laugh when you go through some of the things you've gone through?" And I've learned the answer to that question. It's not that I just want to be deliriously stupid or anything. I mean that.
Okay, look, some of you may say, "Oh, Peter, that ship has sailed." I mean, you're several exits past deliriously stupid, but it's it's not that you're being weird about it. It's just that you learn to live life and you realize this is life. This is my life. Gracie and I have had to wrestle with this and come to agreement that look, this is our life. And let's make the most of it.
Let's make the fullest of it, and we'll laugh. There is a scripture says, "There's a time to laugh. There's a time to cry." And I also want to remind you of something I regularly need to to hear myself, which is I don't have to feel better in order to be better. I'm not going to feel better about some of the things that we have to deal with. Gracie certainly isn't, but we can be better in this.
And this time of year is a tough year for family caregivers. It's a tough time. And so the expectations just keep piling up, you know. Even when we're feeling more and more depleted.
So if you're going to talk to a caregiver, and you don't know what to say, and you're stammering over it, start with this: I see you. I see the magnitude of what you carry, and I hurt with you. That's a good place to start. That's why I do this show. I can't physically see you, but I am talking to you.
And I'm giving you the best in my storehouse to say I recognize you as a family caregiver. Nobody else does a show like this in the entire country, in the entire world, todo del mundo for those of you south of the border. Nobody else is doing anything like this. I see you. I recognize you, and I recognize the magnitude of what you carry, and I do hurt with you.
I understand this hurt, and I want to give you things that I've learned along the way to deal with it.
So if you're just now finding this program, and I have a lot of people that send me things, I found your show by accident, which I'm kind of getting used to by now. Oh yeah, I found your show by accident. It's not like I was intentionally looking for you, Peter. But a lot of people find the show by accident, and they say, "A show for caregivers? Who is this guy?
What what's going on here? This must be some kind of communist plot." No, it's not. Look, if you show up here, you're frazzled, you're stressed, you're heartbroken, you're weary. You've met all the qualifications. You're in the club.
Welcome. I'm glad you're here, and I want you to understand something. Friends don't let friends care give alone. This is a very difficult journey, and for us as family caregivers, some of you are going to have some bad news coming up in the next week.
Some of you had some bad news this week.
Some of you may get it today. And I want to give you things to hang on to as best as I possibly can, so that when you are alone and there's nobody you can necessarily call at three in the morning when you're having a meltdown in the in the hospital parking lot, that you could speak to your own soul, like David at Ziklag when his own men were going to stone him, and David encouraged himself in the Lord. That you could say to your own soul, "Be still, my soul." The Lord is on thy side. Bear patiently the cross of grief and pain. You could say these things to yourself.
You could quiet your own soul down. I want to give you the vocabulary that I've learned. More importantly, I want to point you to the Savior, who understands this journey in ways we cannot. The church is referred to as the bride of Christ. You've you've heard this in Scripture.
Well, guess what. Our Savior's in love with a wounded bride. He is the ultimate caregiver of a wounded bride, and that's hope for this caregiver. This is Peter Rosenberg, and we'll be right back. Welcome back to Hope for the Caregiver.
This is Peter Rosenberg. Hope for the Caregiver. dot com. Hope for the Caregiver. dot com.
Okay, we've established what is a caregiver. What what what is this show all about? Why are we doing all this?
Okay, and now I'm going to return back to the series that I've started. Last week we we opened this up with things that people say to us as caregivers. That we hear this, we may say it to ourselves. We may have said it to others, and all I'm asking is: Have you considered the implications of this phrase? Have you thought about wait a minute, what what what are the words that just came out of your mouth, and what do those words mean, and what kind of implications are there to what you just said?
Last week we talked about follow your heart. People say that a lot. People say it on Hallmark movies. People say it at high school graduation commencements. People say it from the pulpit, and that sounds oh nice and lovely and all that kind of stuff.
Until you consider the implications of what Scripture says about the heart and what does it mean to follow that heart. You might want to think about that and go back and do some research on it before giving your heart to car keys.
Okay.
Now we're going to look at another expression. In this series of things that I say, have you considered the implications of what you just said?
Okay, now I've heard this from a lot of folks. I've heard this from a lot of pastors. Are you ready? Here it is: God's trying to get your attention. God's trying to get your attention.
Now let's stop at that word "trying." When did God start trying to do anything? Does God try? Is He making an attempt? Is the outcome uncertain? Could He fail?
Am I thwarting God? Remember, we talked about a couple of weeks ago the doctrine of divine concurrence. What what I may mean for evil, God purposes His purpose through this for good. And it's going along concurrently, even though I am fully responsible and culpable for my sin and mistakes and everything else. God still accomplishes His purpose in this.
He is not thwarted. Is God trying to do something? If if I'm trying something, the reasonable questions. Do exist. I mean, you know, I'm making it.
Am I making an attempt? Is it going to be uncertain? Could I fail? Yeah. I mean, I try to get through insurance companies.
Sometimes I succeed.
Sometimes I spend 45 minutes listening to music that makes me reconsider if it'd be faster just to write them a letter. I, I try to remember passwords. I try to get everything done by bedtime. My life contains a considerable distance between what I intend and what I accomplish. But does God have that problem?
When we say God's trying to get your attention, are we describing the God revealed in Scripture, or have we taken our limitations and assigned them to Him? And that's the purpose of this series. What do we believe? Why do we believe it? Have we considered the implications?
We can repeat an expression so often that it begins to sound biblical. We even hear it in church. We hear it on Christian radio. Not this program. We we find it.
Printed on a mountain scene on a card, but but we need to think about the words. Listen to Isaiah forty six verse nine.
Okay, remember the former things of old. For I am God, and there is no one else. I am God, and there is no one like me.
Now that's where the discussion begins. There's none like Him.
So we're we're attributing to God who is. There's none like Him.
Things that is common to mankind. He's trying to get our attention. Then verse ten, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, "My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure." And verse eleven, I've spoken it; I will also bring it to pass. I have purposed it; I will also do it.
Now, where in there do you hear the word trying? You hear, I will bring it to pass. I have purposed it. I will also do it. He knows the end from the beginning.
He accomplishes his purpose. There is certainty in his declaration. And now let's compare the way we speak in our culture. God's trying. If you consider the difference of what we're saying here, we try because there are things we do not know and forces we cannot control.
We encounter. Obstacles greater than our strength, but God has none of those limitations. Psalm 1:15:3 says, "But our God is in the heavens; He hath done whatsoever He pleases." How about that? Daniel 4:35: He doeth according to His will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth, and none can stay His hand or say unto Him, "What doest Thou?" That's the King James. Let me just translate it to the New American Southern version.
He's going to do what he wants to do when he wants to do it, and who's going to tell him no? None can stay his hand. Who has the strength to prevent God from accomplishing His sovereign purpose? Who can force Him to abandon it? And now let's go to Saul on the road to Damascus.
He was pursuing Christians. He was going to arrest them. He was convinced he was doing the right thing, and he was terribly wrong. Then the risen Christ confronted him, and Saul fell to the ground. Did Jesus try to have Saul fall to the ground?
When Saul hit the dirt, did Jesus need a second attempt? Did did Jesus think you know maybe I need to reconsider this, maybe I need a brighter light. Was Saul just simply too difficult? No. No.
Now you may say, well, Peter, people resist God. Yes, they do. Scripture says they do. People reject His commands. They suppress the truth.
They harden their hearts. They refuse to listen. I have considerable experience in disobedience myself. But we need to distinguish between disobeying God's commands and defeating His sovereign purposes. God commands us to tell the truth; we lie.
He's not trying to get us to tell the truth; He commands us. We lie; we sin against Him. He commands us to love our neighbors; we behave selfishly. He's not trying to get us to love our neighbors; He commands us to do it, and when we don't. We suffer the consequences, and we're called to repentance.
And if we don't repent, we suffer those consequences. Our disobedience is real; we're responsible for it. But it does not follow that we can overthrow His plan or place something beyond His power. The crucifixion demonstrates this. Those who condemned and crucified Jesus acted wickedly.
They were responsible for what they did. Yet Acts two tells us that Jesus was delivered up according to God's definite plan and foreknowledge. Their rebellion didn't force God to improvise. Even there, God accomplished His redemptive purpose. Let's go deeper.
This and this breaks my heart. I've heard pastors take this expression and go even further, saying God's trying to save as many people as you can. Have you ever heard that? God's trying to save as many people as he can. I understand that a pastor may be emphasizing compassion for lost people in the urgency of of evangelism.
Okay, I get that, and those are worthy concerns. But what does that sentence actually say? As many as he can. Words matter. I deal in the world of words.
I am a communicator on a radio program. I am a writer. I'm a speaker. I deal with words, and words matter.
So when we say God is trying to save as many people as He can, what what are we saying there? What establishes numbers? Does where does His ability run out? Is there a point at which the sinner becomes too difficult for the Savior? Does God not know?
Those questions come from the words themselves.
Now, listen what Jesus says in John six thirty seven: All that the Father giveth me shall come to me, and him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out.
Now, how does that reconcile with God is trying to save as many people as he can? This is already done. All that the Father gives to me, they're going to come to me. And the ones that come to me, I'm not casting them out. They're mine.
There's a lot of assurance in that verse. You know, we need a lot of assurance as caregivers. That's one of the things we talk about on this program a lot: is assurance. All that the Father gives, and Jesus is speaking with certainty. He's not.
Well, God's trying to give me a bunch of people. Christ gives the assurance that the sinner who comes is going to be kept. Remember, we did this last week. He will hold me fast in the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints. No, I'm sorry, we did that two weeks ago.
Sorry. Look, you know, look at me. You know, I lose my mind sometimes. But two weeks ago, we did that. If he saves you, he can keep you.
God gives that assurance. If if you're listening and wonder whether you may come to Christ, well, listen to His promise. Everyone who comes to Him will be received. And this, and then Jesus goes on in verse thirty nine, and this is the Father's will which has sent me, that all of which He has given me, I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again in at the last day. I should lose nothing.
Now, what part of nothing is tripping you up there? Christ ain't losing anything.
Now, that's my southern again. But consider the confidence of those words. There's no nebulous. God is trying to give me people that Jesus says. He said, "Look, this is happening." Isaiah fifty-five eleven, His word quote shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing where to I send it.
End quote. God's word accomplishes His intention. There is one other distinction I ought to make about the word try. In the older English, including the King James Bible, try can mean to test or examine. God tries the heart; He tests the people.
But that is not what we're using the word "trying" when we say God is trying to get your attention. When you're saying God is trying people's hearts, that is in the legal sense. What we get from our legal words: go to trial, and you'll be tried and. Found guilty or innocent, whatever you you follow what I'm saying. God, see a lot of these words get kind of jumbled up along the way in in English and everything else.
God tries the heart, He tests His people, but but that is a different use of the word. What we're talking about today is attempts, attempts. The word attempt. God's trying to, and and we also recognize that God is patient with certain things. God may call someone repeatedly.
He may work over many years through parents and pastors and friends and the reading of Scripture, but that doesn't mean that it's been unsuccessful experiments by God. He works through means and He works in His time. We are the ones who become impatient because we can't see what He's doing. Our limited view does not establish limitation in Him. Let me bring this home to caregivers.
We live with limitations every day. I can't make Gracie's pain stop by loving her enough. I can't guarantee the outcome of procedure. I can't prevent every complication. I can do everything I know to do and still face an outcome I desperately want to avoid.
If you care for someone with the chronic impairment, you understand that we try, we prepare, we ask questions, we make decisions with incomplete information, and then we lie awake wondering what did we miss. When I turn to God in those moments, I need the God Scripture reveals the one who knows what I do not. I am not praying to the God who tries. I'm praying to the God who does according to His own good pleasure. I am praying to the God who has said, "I have purposed it, and I will also do it." So, the next time you hear someone say, "God's trying to do anything," You remind yourself that God doesn't try; He speaks it, and He calls it to come to being, and He is sovereign over everything.
And that is hope for this caregiver. This is Peter Rosenberg. We'll be right back. Welcome back to Hope for the Caregiver. This is Peter Rosenberg.
This is the program for you as a family caregiver. Glad to be with you. HopefortheCaregiver dot com. HopefortheCaregiver dot com. We've been discussing things that people say.
Maybe we've said it ourselves, but we really haven't stopped to consider the implications. I mean, what what are we really saying here? Words do indeed matter, and if we don't use them properly, what are what message are we signaling? Are we communicating to people what we think we are? I remember in the Princess Bride, you remember that movie, and the guy kept saying "inconceivable," you know, and and Diego Montoya says, you know, you keep using that word.
I do not think it means what you think it means, and it's a great line. But how many of us do the same? How many of us use a word or phrase and we really haven't thought through what we're saying? And so last week we talked about follow your heart, and and this week we're talking about the phrase that I hear so many times: God's trying to get your attention. God's trying to get your attention.
And and I stop every time I think of that.
Now, the goal here is not to be the word police. The goal is not to go out and say, "Okay, you can't use that word anymore." No, that's not what I am trying to do. That's too big of a task. I am not going to try to police other people's words. I have a hard enough time policing my words.
But that's what I do. I actually do police my own words. I think about what I'm saying and why I'm saying it, and I don't feel this need to correct other people unless they're putting it on me. And I've had many people pull up, lower the window, drive by, and say, "God's trying to get your attention," and then they drive off. You know that kind of thing.
Then I will bring out a few observations. And one of those observation is what What are you saying here? And when we say God is trying to get our attention, are we saying that God is attempting something, and that there is a possibility that God will fail? Does God fail? Does His word return void?
What does the Scripture say? And all of this points to a lower view of God. That in itself is our problem. When we start attributing man's fallible nature, man's limited nature to God, we've gotten into real trouble, because God is not like us. He is other, and so I go back to the way I deal with this.
Is I go back to God's immutable characteristics, things about God that cannot change, who He is cannot change. Thou changest not. Thy compassions they fail not, as the hymn writer says.
Well, what are some of God's immutable characteristics?
Well, His self-existence; His existence depends upon no one and nothing outside of Himself. He has being in of Himself. Exodus three fourteen, John five twenty six. Self-sufficient; He needs nothing from His creation. A lot of people.
Well, we'll get into that and another thing that people say.
So stay tuned for that. He is eternal; he has no beginning or no end. Psalm ninety two, ninety verse two. He is immutable; he has immutable characteristics, and he is immutable. He does not change in his being or perfections.
He is infinite. He is immortal. He is incorruptible. He is invisible. He is triune.
Again, the hymn writer, God in three persons, Blessed Trinity, He is omnipresent. He is everywhere. He is immense. He is transcendent. He is near.
He is omnipotent. He is all wise. He is perfect in understanding. He is sovereign. He is incomparable.
He is incomprehensible. He is perfect. He is holy. He is righteous. He is just.
He is good. He is loving, merciful, gracious, compassionate, patient, abounding in steadfast love, faithful, true. The list goes on and on and on of who he is. And I suspect.
Now, you tell me if you agree likewise. Feel free to let me know, or if you disagree, let me know. But I suspect the reason we get into a lot of the quagmires we get into emotionally is because we have a low view of God. We do not have a higher view of God. We do not recognize him as such.
We we've gotten very familiar with God. We say God bless this or God bless that or God bless or God loves me or God told me this or God did this. God, we're very familiar with the Almighty, but He is holy. What are the implications of that? Because we are not.
We are called to be, and He is perfecting us and will present us spotless and blameless. But that's because of the righteousness of Christ, not because of ours.
So when we say God is trying to get your attention, go back to Isaiah in chapter six. When he saw the Lord, he was high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. What did Isaiah do? He said, "Hey, God's trying to get my attention." Oh no, God had his attention. When we encounter the living God, he ain't trying to do anything.
He's got our attention. And one day we will all stand before him and give an account, and there will be great gnashing of teeth in that day for so many who have spurned, and rejected, ignored, or even been derisive towards God, just like the people that were clamoring outside of the ark, once that door was closed. We have a low view of God in our society. In our culture, in this world, we want to bring him down to our level. God created man in His own image, and man has been trying to return the favor ever since.
And therein lies the problem, and that's why we use words and expressions that reflect a lower view of God.
So I thought today, instead of going to the caregiver keyboard, and even instead of going to Gracie to sing this, I thought I would go to something. A little more high church for us today, and talk about a hymn that every caregiver ought to know. When we are faced with saying things like "God's trying to get my attention," and we want to bring God down to our level, we need to lift our heads, lift our eyes, and look up.
So, today's hymn that every caregiver ought to know. I am going a little bit different. This this was written by a clergy member. He was a Scottish. Pastor named Walter Chalmers Smith.
He lived from 1824 to 1908. He published this in 1867 in Hymns of Christ and the Christian Life. And at the time, he pastored the Free Tron, not the Disney movie Free Tron Church in Glasgow. Part of the Free Church of Scotland, he was an accomplished poet, and the original hymn had six stanzas. And he followed a lot of the teachings of Paul.
When Paul would would teach something, then sometimes in the middle of a thought, he would just erupt into a praise because good theology always leads to doxology. And this hymn is that kind of hymn. It wasn't set to a tune until many years later. It was an old Welsh tune, but this is the London Philharmonic. Doing Walter Chalmers Smith's wonderful hymn that every caregiver ought to know to lift our heads, to lift our eyes, immortal, invisible, God only wise.
Of all the lights, the ancient of days, of distant and unharmed stars, of distant and unharmed stars, he is the light that sets the darkness at night.
Now I ask you: Does that sound like a hymn to a God who's trying to get your attention? I mean, think through that. I love that last chorus. Great Father of Glory, Father of Light, thine angels adore thee, veiling their sight. But of all thy good graces, this grace, Lord, in part, take the veil from our faces, the veil from our heart.
Go back and look at verse two. It's not in this recording here, but here's verse two. Unresting, unhasting, silent as light, nor striving, nor wasting, thou rulest in might. Nor striving, doesn't waste anything. Doesn't strive at anything.
Doesn't try. Thou rulest in might. Thy justice like mountains soaring above. Thy clouds which are fountains of mercy and love. To all life thou givest, both great and small.
In all life thou livest, true life of all. Thy blossom and flourish only are we to wither and perish. But naught changeth thee.
Now, do you see the difference?
So, you may not be able to remember the whole verse in the moments of crisis. I understand that, but if you can remember just the first line of this hymn, "Immortal, invisible, God only wise," immortal, invisible, God only wise, you know that that in itself will redirect your thinking. And let me show you the practical application of this. You can do this while mopping. You can do this while cleaning the kitchen.
You can do this while doing the laundry. You can do this while cleaning the toilet. You can do this in the ICU. These words can come to you in those places. Ask me how I know this.
Okay, again, I don't tell you all something that I'm not field testing myself or haven't field tested. And and here's the secret about this show: everything I say on this program is being directed to one person, me. I am preaching to myself. I have to be reminded of these things. Every single day, I have gospel amnesia.
I have to tell my own soul to lift up my head, to lift up my eyes.
Okay, that's that's what I'm doing. That's why I listen to these hymns. That's why I spend time with these texts. That's why I do what I do. And my desire is to pass on to others the same hope that I depend upon.
That's it. This is what I've learned in my forty years of doing this.
Okay, this is Peter Rosenberger. This is Hope for the Caregiver. By the way, go out to hopeforthecaregiver dot com. Look at the ad for the Caregiver Calendar. You're going to love this thing.
Take advantage of it. It's available for you. And remember that healthy caregivers do indeed make better caregivers. We'll see you next time.
