I was sick and you took care of me.

September 5, 2007 by Pastor Dan.

[Listen to this!]

Yesterday afternoon, I raced to E.R. in a nearby hospital, to the bedside of a member of the church. They are doing tests to see if he has had a heart attack. He has been living with HIV for a number of years, but now some of the ailments of old age are also too close for comfort.

We prayed. We talked about God’s grace and purpose for his (long) life, about the gift of healing, about the 42 pills he takes every day, and about his community of support – faithful care-givers who have never given up on him, who are also members of our church community. His own life partner died of AIDS two decades ago. Now he relies on the love and care of his friends.

Care-givers teach me something about faith. Christians place our faith in God, or so we say. Sometimes we pray for more faith, greater faith, deeper faith—as if faith were some kind of repellant that, when sufficiently applied, will keep doubts from stinging us.

Maybe faith is better understood through the eyes and hands and feet of Christian care-givers. People who are sometimes family members and quite often not family members, who are there for a person in need. Week after week, year after year. In them I understand faith, because it is the steadfastness of love that will not quit or even count the cost of remaining in the game.

“Then the King will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, you that are blessed . . . for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me. . .” — Matthew 25:31–46

Faith is not simply agreeing to a set of mental propositions that have been presented without any proof.  Faith in God, and faith in the goodness of God and the grace of God have ample proof, if we need proof in order to hold to those propositions.  The proof is that there are selfless, caring, generous, steadfast people out there, who have decided on their own (or through the inspiration of the Spirit) that they need to be a care-giver for someone because he or she is in need.The proof of God’s existence, and God’s loving-kindness is found in the countless angels who make that love real for someone in need.

— Pastor Dan Hooper, Los Angeles

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