Past Sermon

Sermon Title: "Comfort, O Comfort My People"
Date: September 23, 2007
Minister: Rev. Charles E. Ensley, Jr.

Lesson:  Jeremiah 8:18-9:1

Sermon request:  “What is the best way to comfort people who have lost a loved one or are coping with a terminal illness?”

As I reviewed the Instant Sermon requests I received two weeks ago, and determined which ones I would be using in upcoming sermons, I decided this one was most appropriate on this Sunday, a week after the death of Mary Sandberg, and the day after her memorial service here.  It is the most current encounter we have had with a person with a terminal illness, and a husband and family who now need comforting.

The Bible is filled with stories of people and their grief and mourning.  Perhaps it is most poignantly portrayed by King David, who upon hearing of the death of his son Absalom in battle, “was deeply moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate and wept; and as he went, he said, ‘O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom!  Would I have died instead of you, O Absalom, my son, my son!’”  (2 Samuel 18:33)

The prophet Jeremiah is intimately aware of the travails of his people, when in today’s passage, he cries out, “My joy is gone, grief is upon me, my heart is sick.”  (Jeremiah 8:18)

In one of the most touching and longest Gospel stories, Jesus arrives too late at the home of his friends Mary and Martha when he learns their brother has died.  In the midst of ministering to them, we are told, “Jesus began to weep.”  (John 11:35) 

So the various writers of the books of the Bible seemed keenly aware of the emotional stress and pain we experience as we see those we love fail in health, go through debilitating or terminal illnesses, and die.  It is natural; our bodies are not designed to last forever, and death is part of the cycle of life.  Yet we are asked how to comfort a dying person or their loved one who is in mourning.  I have selected a number of actions, or options for you to consider.  They are not so much based on religion as on my experience as a pastor, my own personal experience as someone who has lost loved ones, and on what others have told me has been helpful to them.

First, make yourself available in either situation.  Do not avoid putting yourself out there.  If the person who is dealing with a terminal disease was your friend in life, why would you want to avoid them as they die?  Because you’re uncomfortable with death?  They’re the one going through it.  They’re the one taking the drugs, undergoing the treatments, going back again and again to the doctor or hospital, going to lose their life.

Depending on their condition, you can call, you can write, you can go and visit in person, you can ask them what they need for you to do for them.  Which brings to mind the second response.

Don’t avoid the subject.  One of the most valuable courses I took in seminary was a semester spent at a hospital in Philadelphia as a chaplain intern.  In this Clinical Pastoral Education course, we were to visit patients, type up our conversation in verbatim form, turn that observation in to our supervisor and engage in a discussion and evaluation of our pastoral visit.  If a patient said, “I’m afraid of dying,” did I look around the room and ask how the food was in the hospital, or did I follow-up their statement by asking, “What makes you most afraid?”

I still use techniques gleaned from that course 35 years later in my pastoral calls.  I try to stay focused on the patient’s lead, or what anyone is saying in such a visit.  Don’t worry, I won’t try that technique on you if we’re chatting over appetizers at Fellowship Club or Bay Shore Friends.  But I commend the practice to you as you seek to comfort someone, whether terminally ill or in mourning.  Listen to what they are saying, and help them, and yourself, stay focused on the subject.

Third, don’t avoid the person.  When I ministered back east, and the rituals around attending the calling hours or viewing the night before the funeral were much more established, more than one person said to me, “I never know what to say.”  My reply was to go anyway.  Unless you say something wondrously profound or terribly inappropriate, the family is not going to remember what you said.  But they will remember you were there.  Or they will later see your name in the guest book and recall that you were there.  Your presence says more than your words.

It is also important to make contact with the mourning family at that point in time.  If you do not, and a month later encounter them in the same aisle while shopping at Ralphs, you’re inclined to pull your cart back and head two aisles over because you didn’t contact them at the time of death, and it may seem to you too late to say anything now.  Although it never is too late.  Two weeks ago I saw an organizer of our CROP Hunger Walk at a meeting.  I had not seen her since her husband died just over a year ago.  So that is how I began my conversation:  “Margo, I haven’t seen you since Bill died.  I’m so sorry.”

Fourth, send a card, a letter, a message.  Let the person know you are thinking of them, whether or not you are in a position to visit.  Make sure your card is appropriate.  A cheery, “Hope you’re feeling better soon,” is not appropriate for a dying person.  But there are many more card choices now that deal with encouragement when facing difficult times.  People in this church have told me how much the thoughts and wishes of church members mean to them.  Yesterday, it was meaningful for Steve Sandberg to have his sons place upon the altar all the cards Mary received in the past six or eight months.  He mentioned that as they looked them over again and again, they received a lot of hope and encouragement.

Write a letter telling how that person influenced your life.  When I read in my seminary e-news that the retired professor who recommended I take that Clinical Pastoral Education course died, I wrote his wife a letter, and told her and his family what an influence he was on my life choices at that time and my subsequent ministry.  If the person is still living, but terminally ill, either write or tell them in person the qualities in their life you appreciate, or how you will always remember them.  Who of us doesn’t want to be assured we’ll be remembered?

I received 100 sympathy cards when my mother died last year, many of them from you.  The first week, when most of them arrived, was busy as we made preparations for her memorial service.  I know I looked at them each day.  But a month later, on the night before her interment at Forest Lawn, I sat down and read through every card again.  I was most touched by those who had known her some years and wrote how she had welcomed them to her church when they first attended some decades ago.

Fifth, don’t abandon them.  There are always lots of people around to console you in the time immediately surrounding a death.  If the death was expected, they rallied their support in advance.  If death came suddenly, they, of course, showed up out of love and support.  But in the week after the service, the family returns to their homes and work.  The casseroles, first lovingly delivered, begin to wane.  Time begins to pass, as the mourner deals with all the decisions and paperwork associated with a death.  And sometimes it gets very lonely.

And then the special days begin to come around—the birthday, first Thanksgiving, first Christmas, wedding anniversary, first anniversary of the death.

In 1980, our dearest friends from my last church had a son born on my birthday, Easter Sunday that particular year.  But he was born with hypoplastic left heart syndrome, and died two days later.  It is always easy to remember when he was born, because it is my birthday too, and every April 6, still these 27 years later, Peggy sends them a card letting them know we remember Ian’s death and we are thinking of them.

Both my mother and mother-in-law were widowed, but each August on their wedding anniversary, we acknowledged the date.  I remember our family taking my mother out to dinner at Five Crowns in 1995, on what would have been her 50th wedding anniversary.

At the memorial service I attended at another church for Monty Maples’ mother in August, the pastor remarked that all of our lives would go on, but the family would not forget their loss.  Take them out to dinner.  Ask how they are doing.  Remember them on those first holidays without her.

If the person who died was part of a couple who did things together with you or other couples, don’t drop them because they are no longer a couple and “they wouldn’t feel comfortable with us.”  I can tell you, from what I’ve been told, that they feel a lot more uncomfortable being dropped than they would have attending alone.

Finally, don’t forget the promises of your faith.  I’m not a big believer in forcing death-bed conversions, but if the person who is dying or is mourning shares your Christian faith, remind them of Jesus’ promise of eternal life.  Steve Sandberg, in selecting a Gospel passage for yesterday’s service, said nothing was more meaningful than John 14:  Jesus said to his disciples shortly before his own death, “In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places.  If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.”  (John 14:2-3)

“Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God.”  (Isaiah 40:1)  God is still saying that to us who hear it.  Let us be true to the ministry of comforting other people.