Daily Devotions for Caregivers

After talking about encouragement yesterday I studied it a little further. This morning's plan was to share Romans 15:5 which says: Now may the God who gives perseverance and encouragement grant you to be of the same mind with one another according to Christ Jesus. (NASB) First of all, it's pretty amazing that He just gives us encouragement. There's no stipulation - when you pray, if you ask, if you follow all the rules in the book; it just says He gives patience and encouragement. As a caregiver this is good to know, because if I feel that I am lacking in persevering or encouragement I know I can go to Him and ask Him to help me make it another day... and He will.   As I was meditating on this particular scripture I stopped on the phrase the God who gives and did a quick search. What I found was pretty amazing. He really gives us a lot! Here's a list of some of the scriptures that I found by searching the God who gives - these are only the NASB version too - if yo...

As caregivers we can spend a lot of time alone or with just our loved one. When they are non-verbal, it adds an extra dimension to the loneliness we can feel. Loneliness and depression can be major struggles not only for the caregiver, but for those who are going through life's trials that are continuing with no end in sight. There are lots of scriptures on encouragement in the Bible; but I noticed that about 80 to 90 percent of them involved someone encouraging another person. I had to chuckle since that's sort of part of the problem for caregivers - there's no person around to offer us that encouragement. This can add to the feelings of aloneness and loneliness. So once again - it's up to us to do it! And that- we can! First of all, it's important to realize that during those times when we become burdened beneath the load - it is not a lack of faith.If we take an honest look around - we run to Him and cling to Him more tightly when we feel that we cannot take ...

Why do bad things have to happen at all? Ever wonder that? I've given it a lot of thought over the last few years. Tragedy can certainly wreak havoc on what we are used to calling faith. I was always taught rather directly or indirectly that faith kept bad things from occurring. It made me feel like if I really trusted God, then things like traumatic brain injuries, strokes or any type of debilitating illness wouldn't happen to me or my family. That's just not true! Everyone of our Bible heroes are heroes because of the adversity they faced. But does every story have to have a good ending? Moses got the children of Israel to just outside the promised land - he didn't really deliver the goods. He also disobeyed God and didn't get to go in himself. We don't like to think about that though because it destroys our little "Disney" endings. Gideon is a favorite story of mine - but we don't like reading past the part where he wins the battle to learn th...

I've been out of the "main-stream" life now for about 4 and a half years and I am still rethinking faith. As far as God goes, there's no doubt in my mind that He is. But I frequently return to the topic of faith because as westerners I do not think we really get it. So last night and this morning during my devotions I read and reread Hebrews 11 - The Hall of Faith for believers. This time it was verse 13 that stuck out to me the most. Verse 13 states: These people all died controlled and sustained by their faith, but not having received the tangible fulfillment of God's promises... This statement is very contrary to our western church culture. We are taught to say it 'til we see it and when we see it somehow we think that we can measure faith by tangible means. However, here in Hebrews our list of Bible heroes never saw what they were praying for yet are respected for their faith. Faith is not so much believing 'til we're receiving as it is ...

There is no doubt that it takes courage to be a caregiver; it also takes courage to deal with many of life's toughest battles. I like the story in the Bible about Benaiah who chased a lion into a snowy pit to kill him. Now that's courage! He didn't just chase a lion away but chased him down and jumped into the snowy pit with him to attack him.Now I am not into chasing lions, but I do admire his courage. Check out his amazingly courageous story in 2 Samuel 23. There are days when we do not feel courageous at all and it can be very tiring to have to fight with various health related agencies over and over again; it can sap your strength if you're not careful. As believers we know we do not function in our own strength anyway - He gives us strength to face each day and to accomplish our tasks. But there is also a certain amount of want-to on our parts and it even takes self-motivation to follow Him. It will not happen without a conscious decision. Keeping ourselves goin...

This morning as I was reading about some of Paul's hardships in 2 Corinthians 6, I thought about the caregiver. He really nailed a few things on the head for us even though our hardships take very different courses. He talks some about having patience and working to exhaustion and  sleepless nights as well as our sincere love, purity and kindness all through the power of God. Verse 9 says we are close to death, but here we are still alive! Sound familiar? In verse 10 he talks about how our heart aches, but we still have joy and many spiritual riches to share. As I was reading this passage I thought about how much all of this seems to apply to our situations as well. But something else caught my eye - verse 7 says this - God's power has been working in us. We have righteousness as a weapon, both to attack and to defend ourselves. I thought about that a lot and even matched it up with Job and how he had to keep telling his "friends" that he was righteous before God. ...

God is so awesome! Yet sometimes it feels as though He has moved a long way away. Mentally, and in my heart, I know He hasn't; but it can feel like He is not working in the present. He is though. This is one aspect of faith that we forget about in our materialistic culture - it's not about getting stuff - it's about believing He's there and cares whether we can see Him, feel Him, sense Him or not. Yesterday, I was looking for a scripture that would remind me how awesome His is, how majestic He is and how present He is. I found this one in Deuteronomy. It's at the very end of Moses' blessing over the people before he died. This little phrase toward the end of his blessing caught my eye - verse 27 says: The eternal  God is your refuge, and His everlasting arms are under you. (NLT) I stopped and thought about that simple phrase a lot. He is my refuge - but He is an eternal being so that means He has been my refuge, is being my refuge and will continue to be my r...