Daily Devotions for Caregivers

  This is my second attempt to do the blog post today! I had one about half-written. It was all about something that happened to me this week. It was a good thing - a great thing really. But I stopped. I thought  I don't need to tell my story - I need to tell His story. As interesting as "my story" and your story may be, it really all comes down to His story - not ours. Instead of giving you all the details of my life - I'd rather be talking about how He gives life. God is so good at it that He breathes life into so many circumstances, relationships, thoughts, dreams, visions, even ideas long thought dead. We've seen Him do it over and over again. Just when we think we cannot possibly take one.more.step. He breathes. He glances our way. He touches us with His strength, mercy, and love, and all of a sudden we have what we need for that part of our journies. Instead of focusing on my shortcomings and failures, for they are many, I can shout out loud about the grace ...

Last week while I was writing one of the devotions I made some sort of statement about how God is our ultimate caregiver. So this week I will be taking a closer look at how He caregives for us.... We've talked many times about how we look like Him  when we care for our loved ones. We exhibit several qualities when we demonstrate our love for our loved ones by taking care of their needs. We are up-close-and-personal with our loved one and totally engaged in making sure their needs are met - usually long before we ever even acknowledge any of our own needs...that's just the way it is. One of the characteristics of a caregiver is as provider. I do everything in my power to provide whatever my son needs. As a caregiver - their needs are of the utmost importance. Sometimes that means just covering the basic stuff like food, shelter and love. But we also do whatever else is necessary like range of motion, creating social outlets, shopping, just about anything needed that is in ...

I've talked a lot about seeing God. My favorite story used for reference is Hagar when she realized God saw her and her son. But until this week, I hadn't thought about the flip side of that. I was reading in Genesis about Abraham offering up Isaac. In chapter 22 verse 8 Abraham said "God will provide for Himself the lamb for the burnt offering." I know God does indeed provide  for us and I have certainly experienced that on my caregiving journey. But the margin caught my eye as it gave an alternate interpretation of see for the word "provide ."  My loose interpretation is God will be seen. I often rejoice in the fact that God can see me and knows my situation intimately. But I paused to ask can I see God? Honestly, there are those times when I don't feel I can see Him at all. Usually it's at 3 or 4 in the morning when my son is running a fever or moaning in pain and I feel out of options. I must admit I have not acted much like a believer...

When tragedy struck and my world was shaken I had to find a way to figure out what was going on. I have to admit my faith (or what I thought had been faith) was shaken as well. There were times I was angry with God and didn't understand how He could let awful things happen. I began to read His word with new eyes. It didn't take long to realize that the Bible is full of stories about hurting people and our heroes are our heroes because  of the things they faced - not the things they avoided. This morning I found this scripture as I was reading Isaiah. In chapter 48 verse 21 it says They did not thirst when He led them through the deserts.  I'm thinking there are several key points here the first being that they didn't thirst  even in the desert. He provided all along the way and this is something I can attest to. I've always seen God provide and never questioned it at all, but when my son was injured in an accident and my world turned upside down I sat in a hospita...

The birds are just singing and chirping away outside this morning. They at least sound happy! Jesus used nature a lot in His parables as He explained the kingdom to the crowds and His disciples. Hearing the birds this morning brought to mind the passage in Matthew 6 where Jesus was explaining about how the Father takes care of the birds, and He will take care of us as well.  Jesus started by telling the crowd no to worry about life, food or clothes. He instructed them to consider the birds. They do not have to grow a garden, or reap a harvest. He went on to say yet your heavenly Father feeds them. And He followed that by saying are you not worth much more than they? There has never been a time when I looked out the window and saw a bird wringing its wings worried about where the next meal is coming from! lol! Jesus is careful to tell us that it is God, the Father, who is feeding and caring for the birds of the air; and we are worth so much more to Him than these little critte...

Well, of course you are! And the birds are still singing too! These two things are sure signs that God is still at work and has not forgotten us. Matthew 6:25-33 is a familiar and wonderful passage about God's concern and care for us, His children. He explains that we cannot add one little inch to our height or one hour to our lives by worrying about it. Of course, we actually know the opposite. Worrying effects our body in very negative ways and it can actually mean a shorter life if we spend lots of time worrying. I found out early on in my life of caregiving that worry didn't help anything! It didn't bring in money, make my son better, or for that matter, make any part of the day better. And in this passage, we are reminded that God sees all of that ...and more! He is fully aware of our troublesome situations, He is aware of the loneliness, and He is not ignorant of our struggles. If He takes such good care of birds and grass why would we think He would do less for u...

Psalm 15 is a short psalm but it is powerful when we can get ahold of it. David begins with a question in verse 1 and then the other 4 verses are his answer. His question is Who can abide in Your tent? Who may dwell on Your holy hill? Then he lists the qualifications. There are several but we'll only talk about the first one today. David said that those who walk with integrity can dwell in God's tent. Let's add to this thought another Psalm David wrote. In Psalm 101:2 he made a commitment to walk within my own house in the integrity of my heart. If there was any place we don't have to put up appearances it is certainly inside our four private walls! But David said decided that he would have integrity with God - whether anyone was around to watch or not! There are many things that change around us all the time. Many of us became caregivers because of one incident that happened suddenly. In one moment our worlds changed. But two things did not change just because th...

I'm wondering right now if the energizer bunny was on steroids...the commercial always said it keeps going and going... and of course it was advertising long battery life! Well, I'm not on steroids and I'm not really too full of energy but you all know that as caregivers we really don't have any other choice other than to just keep going and going...and going... What are we supposed to do when we don't feel like going on? There's no choice - we keep going. What do caregivers do when we get tired but it's morning anyway?  - we keep going. What if we don't feel like cooking or doing laundry? - we keep going... And the list of things we do could literally go on forever I think; with transfers, feeding, purchasing incontinent supplies, looking for the best prices online for various supplies, bathing, etc....we just keep going.There's really no time to consider our own needs or how we are feeling, things have to be done for another and we are the on...