Caring for the Sick

Boma’s mother had a stroke on a Sunday afternoon in July, at the dining table, halfway through a sentence about the price of crayfish. One moment she was talking. The next, the left side of her face had fallen and her spoon was on the floor. Boma, who works in a bank in Port Harcourt, drove her to the teaching hospital with the hazard lights on, praying aloud the whole way.

Her mother was on the medical ward for five weeks. Anyone who has kept vigil beside a hospital bed in Nigeria knows what that means. Boma slept on a mat beside the bed, or on a bench in the corridor. Every few hours there was a new list: gloves, syringes, a particular drug that the hospital pharmacy did not have, a scan that required a deposit before it could be done. She learned which pharmacy outside the gate stayed open all night. She learned to feed her mother through one side of her mouth, and to change the sheets without lifting her.

Many people visited. She was grateful for most of them. But some visits left her more exhausted than before. A group from a neighbouring church came at ten o’clock one night and prayed so loudly that the nurse asked them to leave, and the man in the next bed, who was dying, could not sleep. A woman she barely knew told her, in front of her mother, that the stroke was an attack from a jealous relative in the village, and that her mother must be taken to a prayer camp. A deacon came with his Bible, preached for forty minutes about faith, and left without asking how either of them was. Someone took a photograph of her mother, mouth drooping, and posted it on a WhatsApp group with a request for prayer.

And then there were two people who said very little.

One was Onyekachi, a young nurse from Boma’s church who worked at a different hospital. She came on Saturdays after her own night shifts. She showed Boma how to turn her mother every two hours to prevent bedsores. She washed her mother’s hair, gently, with a basin and a cup. Then she sat by the bed and held the old woman’s hand while Boma slept for three hours in the corridor.

The other was Ismail, the Muslim neighbour who lived across the road from Boma’s mother and had known her for twenty years. When the hospital pharmacy ran out of a drug one night, it was Ismail who drove Boma around Port Harcourt at two in the morning until they found it. He would not let her repay him. “Your mother greeted me every morning for twenty years,” he said. “This is nothing.”

Punchline

When Boma told me this story months later, she said something I have not forgotten. “Pastor, the people who helped us most were the people who talked the least.”

What the sick person actually needs

Compassionate care begins by paying attention to what the sick person is actually experiencing. That sounds obvious. In practice, we often bring what we think they should need, rather than what they need.

Think about what Boma’s mother was living through. She was frightened. She could not speak clearly, and people often spoke over her as if she could not understand. She was in pain. She had lost control of her own body and depended on others for the most private needs. She was bored, lying in the same bed day after day, watching the ceiling fan turn. She was worried about the cost of her treatment and about the daughter who was sleeping on the floor beside her.

And think about what Boma was living through. Exhaustion. The constant pressure of money. Fear of what the doctors might say on the ward round. Guilt that she could not be at work, and guilt that she was thinking about work at all. Loneliness in the middle of a crowded ward.

The sick person and the carer need different things at different times. Sometimes they need prayer. Sometimes they need a meal. Sometimes they need someone to listen while they describe the pain, without trying to correct it. Sometimes they need someone to stay with the patient so the relative can go home and bathe. Sometimes they need silence. Compassion asks, notices and adjusts. It does not arrive with a fixed programme.

This teaching is about that kind of care, and about why Jesus considers it so important that He describes it as care given to Himself.

“I was sick, and ye visited me”

Near the end of His teaching ministry, Jesus described the day when He will come in glory to judge the nations. What He says next has shaped Christian care for the sick for two thousand years:

When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory: And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats: And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left. Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me. Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee ? or thirsty, and gave thee drink? When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee ? Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee? And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.

The King lists six needs: hunger, thirst, being a stranger, nakedness, sickness and imprisonment. These are ordinary human needs, the needs of bodies and of people in hard places. And the King says that whatever was done for “one of the least of these my brethren” was done for Him.

The word translated visited means more than a short appearance. It carries the sense of looking upon someone with care, of coming to see how they are in order to help. The same family of words is used in the Gospels when Zacharias praises God, who “hath visited and redeemed his people” (Luke 1:68). When God visits, He comes to help. When we visit the sick in that sense, we come the same way.

Notice the surprise of the righteous. “Lord, when saw we thee an hungred... Or when saw we thee sick?” They had not been performing. They had not cared for the sick in order to be seen, or to earn a reward, or to prove their spirituality. They had simply helped people in need. Their compassion was so ordinary to them that they did not even recognise it as service to Christ.

That is the heart of Christian care for the sick. Christ is present in the suffering person. When Onyekachi washed Boma’s mother’s hair, she was doing it for Him, whether she thought about it at that moment or not. Care for the sick is one of the most direct ways we can express the love of Christ, because He has identified Himself with the sick.

Nugget

Christ has identified Himself with the sick. When you visit, feed, wash and sit with a suffering person, you are doing it unto Him.

The neighbour who stopped

When a lawyer asked Jesus what he must do to inherit eternal life, the conversation led to the command to love your neighbour as yourself. The lawyer, “willing to justify himself,” asked, “And who is my neighbour?” (Luke 10:29). Jesus answered with a story:

And Jesus answering said, A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, which stripped him of his raiment, and wounded him , and departed, leaving him half dead. And by chance there came down a certain priest that way: and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. And likewise a Levite, when he was at the place, came and looked on him , and passed by on the other side. But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was: and when he saw him, he had compassion on him , And went to him , and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine, and set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And on the morrow when he departed, he took out two pence, and gave them to the host, and said unto him, Take care of him; and whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come again, I will repay thee. Which now of these three, thinkest thou, was neighbour unto him that fell among the thieves? And he said, He that shewed mercy on him. Then said Jesus unto him, Go, and do thou likewise.

The priest and the Levite both saw the wounded man. Both passed by on the other side. We are not told why. Perhaps they feared ritual defilement if the man was dead. Perhaps they feared that the robbers were still nearby. Perhaps they were simply busy. Jesus does not explain their reasons, because the reasons do not matter. What matters is that religious people, people with every theological reason to care, walked past.

Then came the Samaritan, the one person the lawyer would least have expected to be the hero. Jews and Samaritans despised one another. Yet “when he saw him, he had compassion on him.” The Greek word for compassion here describes a feeling in the inward parts, a gut-level movement of pity. It is the same word the Gospels use for Jesus’ own compassion.

Look at how practical the Samaritan’s compassion was. He went to the man. He bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine, the first aid of his day. He put the man on his own animal and walked beside him. He brought him to an inn and took care of him through the night. In the morning he paid the innkeeper two pence, roughly two days’ wages, and promised to cover any further costs on his return. His care involved closeness, practical skill, his own resources, inconvenience, and a commitment that extended beyond the first day.

Then Jesus turned the lawyer’s question around. The lawyer had asked, “Who is my neighbour?”, wanting to know whom he was required to love. Jesus asked, “Which now of these three... was neighbour unto him?” The question is not who qualifies for my care, but will I be a neighbour? And the answer is uncomfortable: “He that shewed mercy on him.” Then the command: “Go, and do thou likewise.”

When Ismail drove through Port Harcourt at two in the morning, he did what the Samaritan did. That should humble us, and it should stir us. The neighbour is the one who shows mercy. Let Christ’s people be known for showing it.

Moved with compassion

Jesus’ own ministry to the sick began with compassion. Matthew summarises it like this:

And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people. But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd.

Before Jesus healed, He saw. And when He saw the crowds, He “was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd.” The healing flowed from the compassion. Jesus did not treat the sick as opportunities to display His power. He saw people who were weary and scattered, and He was moved.

The Gospels show this compassion again and again in the way Jesus touched the sick. When a leper begged to be made clean, “Jesus, moved with compassion, put forth his hand, and touched him” (Mark 1:41). He could have healed with a word. He chose to touch a man whom nobody had touched in years. When He came into Peter’s house and found Peter’s mother-in-law sick with a fever, “he touched her hand, and the fever left her” (Matthew 8:15). At sunset in Capernaum, “he laid his hands on every one of them, and healed them” (Luke 4:40). Every one. Not a general wave over the crowd, but personal attention to each sick person.

That is our pattern. We pray for the sick with faith, because Jesus still heals. James tells the sick to call for the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil, and promises that “the prayer of faith shall save the sick” (James 5:15). We should pray boldly and expectantly. But our prayer, like His, should flow from compassion, and it should come with attention. Touch the hand. Learn the name. See the person in the bed, and not just the condition.

Presence before explanation

When Job lost his children, his wealth and his health, three friends came to comfort him. Their first response was beautiful: “So they sat down with him upon the ground seven days and seven nights, and none spake a word unto him: for they saw that his grief was very great” (Job 2:13). For a week they simply sat with him in the ashes.

Then they started talking, and everything went wrong. They explained his suffering. They told him what he must have done. They defended God against him. By chapter 13 Job cried out, “ye are all physicians of no value. O that ye would altogether hold your peace! and it should be your wisdom” (Job 13:4-5). Their silence had been a gift. Their explanations were a wound.

The Lord Jesus shows us something even more remarkable at the tomb of Lazarus:

Then when Mary was come where Jesus was, and saw him, she fell down at his feet, saying unto him, Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died. When Jesus therefore saw her weeping, and the Jews also weeping which came with her, he groaned in the spirit, and was troubled, And said, Where have ye laid him? They said unto him, Lord, come and see. Jesus wept. Then said the Jews, Behold how he loved him!

Mary fell at His feet and said, “Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died.” It was a question as well as a lament, and there was pain in it, perhaps even reproach. Jesus did not correct her. He did not explain why He had delayed. He did not say, “Do not cry, Mary, because in a few minutes I will raise him.” He knew what He was about to do, and still “he groaned in the spirit, and was troubled.” He asked where they had laid him. And then: “Jesus wept.”

The shortest verse in the Bible may be one of the most important for anyone who cares for the sick. Jesus entered the grief of His friends before He acted to end it. He shared the sorrow even though He held the answer. If He did not hurry past the tears, neither should we.

Paul turned this into a command for the church: “weep with them that weep” (Romans 12:15). Presence before explanation. Tears before solutions. A person lying in a hospital bed seldom needs a theology of suffering at that moment. They need to know that someone is with them.

Not a stage for someone else’s spirituality

There is a temptation in caring for the sick that we must name honestly. It is the temptation to make the sick person’s suffering into a platform for our own spirituality. The loud prayer that wakes up the ward. The prophecy that names a village enemy. The sermon delivered to a patient who cannot reply. The photograph posted online so that others can see that we prayed. In each case the focus quietly shifts from the sick person to the visitor.

Compassion keeps the focus where it belongs. Here are some simple guard-rails for anyone who visits the sick.

• Ask before you pray, and keep bedside prayer brief and gentle. Respect the ward rules, the nurses and the other patients, some of whom may be very ill.
• Never photograph or film a sick person, or share details of their condition, without their clear permission or their family’s.
• Never tell a sick person or their family that the illness is caused by their sin, their lack of faith, or a named relative. Jesus refused to assign blame when His disciples asked who had sinned to cause a man’s blindness (John 9:1-3).
• Never advise anyone to stop medical treatment, discharge themselves from hospital or abandon their medication. Pray for healing, and let the doctors confirm what God has done.
• Leave room for questions. Mary asked, “Lord, if thou hadst been here...” and Jesus received the question with tears. The sick may ask why, and they may ask it angrily. You do not need to answer every question. You need to stay.
• Keep your visit short unless you are clearly wanted for longer. A tired patient may be too polite to ask you to leave.

Punchline

None of these guard-rails reduces our faith. They protect the dignity of the person Christ has identified with.

Making the bed in sickness

Psalm 41 contains a promise that has comforted many who care for the sick, and many who lie on sickbeds themselves:

Blessed is he that considereth the poor: the LORD will deliver him in time of trouble. The LORD will preserve him, and keep him alive; and he shall be blessed upon the earth: and thou wilt not deliver him unto the will of his enemies. The LORD will strengthen him upon the bed of languishing: thou wilt make all his bed in his sickness.

“Blessed is he that considereth the poor.” The word considereth suggests giving careful, thoughtful attention. It is the opposite of passing by. And the psalm promises that the Lord will strengthen such a person “upon the bed of languishing,” and then: “thou wilt make all his bed in his sickness.”

That is a picture of God Himself as a nurse. He turns the sick person’s bed, straightens the sheets, makes them comfortable. The Lord who rules the heavens bends down to attend to the bedding of the sick. When we care for the sick in practical ways, we are doing what God Himself is described as doing.

What does this look like in a Nigerian setting? It may look like contributing to a hospital deposit, or quietly buying the drugs on the latest list. It may look like organising a rota so that the family receives a cooked meal every day of the admission. It may mean taking a night shift on the bench so that the relative can go home and sleep in a bed. It may mean running to the lab with a sample, or sitting with the patient during the ward round and writing down what the doctor says. It may mean washing hands carefully before and after a visit, and staying away when you have a fever or a cough, so that you do not add an infection to someone’s illness.

When the patient comes home, the needs change. A stroke survivor may need help with the physiotherapy exercises the hospital has taught. Someone may need to turn them regularly, help them bathe, help them eat, and keep track of their medication and follow-up appointments. A ramp at the door, a commode chair, a good mattress, a fan that works when NEPA has taken the light: small practical gifts can transform a sick person’s days.

And remember the carer. The family member who carries most of the load can become exhausted, isolated and ill themselves. Ask them how they are. Offer to stay with the patient for an afternoon. Bring them food. Pray for them. Caring for the carer is caring for the sick.

Faithful over the long haul

Near the end of his life, imprisoned in Rome, Paul remembered one man with particular gratitude:

The Lord give mercy unto the house of Onesiphorus; for he oft refreshed me, and was not ashamed of my chain: But, when he was in Rome, he sought me out very diligently, and found me . The Lord grant unto him that he may find mercy of the Lord in that day: and in how many things he ministered unto me at Ephesus, thou knowest very well.

Onesiphorus “oft refreshed me.” Not once, but often. “And was not ashamed of my chain.” Paul’s imprisonment was a public disgrace, and associating with him carried risk. Onesiphorus came anyway. “When he was in Rome, he sought me out very diligently, and found me.” Rome was a vast city, and finding a particular prisoner was not easy. Onesiphorus kept looking until he found him.

Sickness can feel like a chain. It can bring embarrassment and isolation. A long illness is often accompanied by a gradual thinning of visitors. They come in the first week, fewer in the second, and by the third month the family is largely alone. People with chronic conditions, disabilities, mental illness or slow recoveries are especially likely to be forgotten.

The church is called to be like Onesiphorus: often refreshing, unashamed of the chain, diligent in seeking out those who have disappeared from view. That requires long-term commitment, the kind the Samaritan promised when he told the innkeeper, “when I come again, I will repay thee.” John urges us, “let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth” (1 John 3:18). Paul adds, “As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith” (Galatians 6:10).

Every church can ask itself some honest questions. Who in our congregation has been sick for a long time? Who has stopped coming because they cannot? Who is caring for a sick relative and slowly running out of strength? Then the church can do what Onesiphorus did. Seek them out. Refresh them, often.

Boma’s mother was discharged after five weeks. She can walk again with a stick, though her left hand is still weak and her speech is slower than before. She goes to the physiotherapy clinic twice a month, and Boma and her brothers take turns staying with her.

Onyekachi still visits, less often now, but she calls every Saturday. Ismail still greets Boma’s mother every morning across the road, and when her generator broke down in the rainy season, he fixed it before anyone asked.

Some months after the discharge, Boma’s church asked her to help start a small care team. They called it “the bench,” after the hospital corridor where she had spent so many nights. Its members take turns visiting church members in hospital. They ask before they pray. They bring food, run errands, and sit through the night so that families can rest. Boma trains them using the lessons she learned the hard way: listen first, keep it short, never post a photograph, never blame, and keep coming back.

“I used to think the best thing I could bring to a sick person was the right Bible verse,” she told me. “Now I think the best thing is to bring myself, and then stay.”

Christ said, “I was sick, and ye visited me.” He is in the bed on the medical ward, in the room upstairs where an old man lies after his stroke, in the house where a mother is caring for a sick child. Go to Him there. Bring your presence, your practical help and your prayer. Leave your explanations at the door. And keep coming back.

For reflection, practice and prayer

Teaching Companion

For Reflection

• Think of a time you were sick or caring for someone who was. What kinds of visits helped most, and which ones made things harder?
• What does it mean to you that Christ identifies Himself with the sick in Matthew 25?
• In the parable of the Good Samaritan, what costs did the Samaritan accept in order to care for the wounded man? Which of those costs do you find hardest?
• Why do you think Jesus wept at Lazarus’s tomb even though He knew He was about to raise him? What does that teach you about presence before explanation?
• Who in your church or community has been sick for a long time, or is caring for someone who is, and how could you be an Onesiphorus to them?

This Week

This week, identify one person who is sick, recovering or caring for a sick relative. Contact them and ask a simple question: “What would actually help you this week?” Then do what they ask, if you can, whether it is a meal, a lift to an appointment, an hour of company, help with a bill or simply a phone call. If you visit, ask before you pray, keep it brief and gentle, and resist the urge to explain their suffering. Put a reminder in your phone to contact them again in two weeks.

A Prayer

Lord Jesus, thank You that You were moved with compassion when You saw the sick and the weary, and that You touched those whom nobody else would touch. Thank You that You wept with Your friends before You raised Lazarus. Forgive me for the times I have passed by on the other side, and for the times I have made someone else’s suffering about me. Give me eyes to see the sick around me, and a heart to be moved. Teach me to listen before I speak, to pray with gentleness, and to help in practical ways. Make me faithful over the long haul, often refreshing and never ashamed of anyone’s chain. Let me see You in every sickbed I approach. In Your name, Amen.

Truth received brings freedom. Truth believed establishes the heart.

Scripture quotations are from the King James Version. · Illustrations using first names only are composites unless stated otherwise.