The care for fellow human beings touches the heart of every Christian. Meanwhile, “care,” in our country has to deal with many shortages: too little money, and a shortage of caregivers. The pressure of work is high, and there is scarcely any time for people. Is there a calling in this for us, as Christians?

The Christian and Care⤒🔗

The care and mercy of God is determinative for the life of every Christian. That is also apparent in the double commandment to love. In answer to the question as to which was the greatest commandment, the Lord Jesus says, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart…and a second is like it: You shall love your neighbour as yourself” (Matthew 22:37-38). These are not the two most important commandments; it is the greatest commandment in two parts. Therefore there is also the phrase “and a second is like it.” It is the second, for the love towards God must be the first, but whoever thinks that it is therefore less important, is called to order by the words “like it.” It is not possible to love the merciful God without being moved to that mercy for the neighbour. Care for the neighbour is the thermometer for the love towards God.

Our God is merciful (Psalm 116:5). When we learn to know the Lord, we learn to know him in this way. Our whole relationship towards God is determined and characterized by that mercy. Therefore knowing the Lord makes one small, amazed, thankful. It is thanks to the compassion and mercy of the Lord, that we receive grace, peace with God, and a renewed life.

Compassion for our neighbour belongs to that new life. This compassion shows itself, first of all, in care for those who need care. In the Old Testament, those are especially these five: the poor, the oppressed, the stranger, widows, and orphans. In the New Testament, we see how the Lord Jesus is moved to compassion. He touches a man with leprosy (Matthew 8:3). That was a touching moment. The Lord Jesus does not maintain the usual distance. How much it must have meant for that man, that someone touched him. How long ago was it that he had ever experienced that loving touch? This gesture of mercy stood at the beginning of healing.

In the first centuries, the Christian church grew rapidly. If we look for the reason for this rapid growth, we may not forget Christian care. The Christians continued to look after the sick even when there was the danger of contagion. When others left the sick alone, they did not fear death, for they had already died (died with Christ), and shared in eternal life (resurrected with Christ). Christians cared for foundlings, administered care to prisoners, and buried deceased people who had not received burial. That sent a strong witness into a world in which self-enforcement, self-protection, and egoism were such strong forces. Those forces are still with us, so also today the care for the neighbour is one of the strongest forms of witness.

In a time in which Christians are busy with demanding careers and also hobbies, this must again receive our attention. Christian care, for example in the form of volunteer work, demands that you make choices and actively involve yourself. We can do what our hand finds to do, but sometimes that hand does not find much because the hand is always busy. How beautiful and good it is when people, selflessly, out of love for God and thankfulness for his mercy, exert themselves for the neighbour, for the lonely in the street, for the one who, without certainty, seeks asylum, for the dying in a hospice.

Christians in Care Positions←⤒🔗

Working in the field of care has not become more attractive in the past years. Because of budget shortages, severe cuts had to be made. People were let go. Everything had to become more efficient. There were also those who, although they were not let go, left of their own accord because they had lost the joy in the work. The pressure at work became so high that there was hardly time for the patients as persons. The human element of the care, the conversation, the listening to the patients, was to a large degree cut out, at times together with the joy in the work. Towards 2019, there were frightening reports about labour shortages in the field of care. In the first half of 2019, there was relief in the news that it was not so bad: only eighty thousand vacancies instead of the projected one hundred twenty thousand which they had feared. But the fact that there are and remain shortages is clear, and that with the increasing aging population and increasing need for care for the elderly.

Is there a calling in this for Christians? Should Christians specifically choose the field of care, now that there are such shortages and the need for care touches the heart of Christians? It is not that simple. Whereas previously, care was first of all the task of families, care is now regulated by the government in a complex team-work of those who offer care, health insurers, and naturally also citizens who look for the cheapest offer. We are blessed with good care, but the care is no longer directed (only) by mercy, but also by the market of demand and offering bids. Christians who consider a career in the field of care may make decisions around work pressure and salary. Working on the basis of mercy does not lessen the need for good employment conditions.

Christians who do choose to go into care, meanwhile, do choose work in which they can truly follow their heart. Care for the neighbour may be their daily work. How important it is, in times when care is under financial pressure, and thus also under time pressure, truly to have an eye for the people who need help. In spite of sometimes miserable work conditions, they may, out of the compassion of the Lord, stand at the beds of the people.

The aging of the population continues. How much time and money will there be in the future to offer good care to the growing number of the elderly? How moving it is to hear the stories of couples, who after having been married fifty years or more, must be separated because one of the two needs care and can no longer live at home, but there is no space or money to allow them to go to a care facility together. Should we as Christians and churches not increasingly consider that the government can not organize all the help that is needed and step into the breach for good care?

Christian Care←⤒🔗

The time for the institution of “own” care and nursing homes is probably behind us. It is a question whether the Christian homes that exist will be able to continue, if the present loss of membership in the churches continues. Often the elderly must go to a care home where little or nothing of Christianity may be found. Family visits can not compensate for the lack of a Christian environment. Moreover, practicality sometimes indicates that a mother can care for five children more easily than five children for a mother.

In care and nursing homes, there is not always enough time, attention, and understanding to log into the computer (or church telephone) on Sunday so that the elderly can follow the church service. The Christian atmosphere that there was at home is not there. Reading is often no longer possible. Christian music, that is so important for the life of faith and determines its atmosphere, is, at best, traded in for folk songs.

What role can the church play? I am thinking of visits where someone reads out loud from the Bible, from a good book and from church magazines and newsletters. That is beautiful volunteer work. It is so wonderful when someone comes to pray with you, because you yourself can not put the words together anymore, someone who turns on music, keeps you company, or sings with you. Such visits are often received with great thankfulness.

Maybe that is also necessary where there is a Christian care home, where the pressure of work has become great. The government can not care for everything; the nursing and caring employees can not either. The congregation has an important task here. Who knows; perhaps we can also mean something here for those who no longer belong to a church. At times there is great loneliness. Have we again come into a situation where the neighbour can be won for Christ, precisely through Christian care?