Together, remind one another of the hope you both have in Christ despite the hardship of this life, and look forward together to the hope of the renewal Christ will bring at his second coming.
“Thus in our own distress, when we find it easy to doubt God’s grace and provision,” writes Kapic, “the body of Christ gives shelter and sustenance under the canopy of their faith. The flame of individual faith weakens when it is alone, but in true community the fire of faith illumines the night.”
In Life and Death: In the Valley of the Shadow, Simonetta Carr speaks of the challenges of being a Christian mother with a son battling schizophrenia. She speaks of the real struggle of seeing her son hospitalized and of doing research and learning patience, love, and hope in such a dark and frustrating situation. Throughout the process, she was not alone.She explains how her church was involved supporting her every step along the way, and she speaks about how the ministry of the church gave her a sense of encouragement and hope.
She writes about how her pastor would visit every week to play “a few rounds of chess” with her son, who had “prepared the chess board in anticipation.” When the church came alongside her family during these challenges, she writes, “I was surprised to discover how many of them had similar experiences: so many had children, siblings, parents, or close relatives suffering from mental illness. Some of their stories were disquieting. I realized most of us bear heavy burdens, often alone. It gave a new meaning to the word hospitality.”
Her church became a place where she could share her burdens and experience hope, and through her experience she could see that “Enormous encouragement came from knowing my son belongs to the Lord. He was baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and publicly professed his faith, and God faithfully proclaimed the gospel to him week after week for many years through word and sacrament. I can rest on the promise that ‘he who began a good work in [my son] will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ’” (Phil. 1:6).
Simonetta Carr’s story shows how the church can help by simply being a loving church that knows Jesus and responds to the gospel of grace with love and compassion. This ordinary week-in and week-out pattern of church life can bring a sense of stability and comfort. In this way, the church can be a place of sharing, hope, love, and mercy—this is what people who suffer from mental illnesses like depression need. This is an important part of what families who suffer need.
A church, a pastor, or a group of Christians can’t fix mental illness, but they can help in all sorts of ways. They can pray. They can show hospitality. They can be listening ears and embracing hands. They can show up and bring with them the love of God, showing the goodness and mercy of the gospel in physical, tangible ways. It is easy to look at these ordinary realities and question their power, but for people who are suffering, the ordinary is exactly what they need, and it’s through the ordinary that God often works in extraordinary ways to save, assure, and love. This is Paul’s point in Romans 12:3–8. He writes,
For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. For as in one body we have many members, and the members do not all have the same function, so we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another. Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, in proportion to our faith; if service, in our serving; the one who teaches, in his teaching; the one who exhorts, in his exhortation; the one who contributes, in generosity; the one who leads, with zeal; the one who does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness. (Romans 12:3–8)
The grace of God working in these ordinary ways is a gift from God to help demonstrate the love that he has for us: the love that sent Jesus Christ to live and die for our salvation.
Footnotes
Kelly Kapic Embodied Hope, 127
Simonetta Carr “Life and Death: In the Valley of the Shadow” Modern Reformation, July/August 2014.
Simonetta Carr “Life and Death: In the Valley of the Shadow” Modern Reformation, July/August 2014.
