Group Visits To Hospitals And Homes (Part 1)

by Martin Archibald, Glasgow, Scotland | Category: Group Visits To Hospitals And Homes | Mar 1989

First let us outline three likely purposes in group visits to hospitals or homes. In our Lord's instructions to His disciples about their testimony and service towards others, first place was given to the preaching of the gospel and the truths of the kingdom of God, both by word and by conduct.

So the apostle rejoiced:

thanks be unto God, which always leadeth us in triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest through us the savour of his knowledge in every place. For we are a sweet savour of Christ unto God, in them that are perishing... a savour of life unto life (2 Cor. 2:14,15).

The words "every place" include the hospital-ward or sickroom, where those of all walks of life often first appreciate how frail is their hold on this present world. When the sufferer is thus sobered, the Scriptures with their assurance and relevance can often be welcomed as at no other time.

For an assembly's witness, hospital units or wards can offer a larger number of fresh hearers than may now be expected at most gospel meetings indoors, and an opportunity to take our message to people. Again in hospitals there can be considerable turnover in fresh listeners from month to month. The reading of scriptures and the accompanying prayer and song, seem to gain in significance when the audience is not just one or two friendly neighbours looking for some company, but people who have been shaken in their confidence and are in evident need. Besides, there is the possibility of conversations at bedsides that can profit in seriousness and depth from the circumstances of the patients, giving much more scope to those skilled in personal witness rather than public speaking, and to sisters as well as brethren.

An important purpose in visiting hospitals and homes is to find opportunity to "work that which is good toward all men" (Gal. 6:10), simply as a cheering and supportive service, whose high place in the Master's esteem was powerfully taught in these words:

Then shall the King say ... Come, ye blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom... For I was ... sick, and ye visited Me: I was in prison, and ye came unto Me (Mat. 25:34-36).

Three times over the point is made before the chapter ends, and though the immediate context is the dire circumstances of Israel's tribulation to come, the value of compassionate ministry to human need is clear to all who honour the King. How can we, who know the power of the Word of God to calm and strengthen the spirit, withhold it when we have access to others in their extremity? We remember also that some in hospital, and more in old people's homes, have few or no visitors.

A third purpose may be to show practical respect for the past working lives of the aged, and for the contribution they once made to the life of their

community. There is in Leviticus 19 a choice series of instructions for the social life of Israel in which Jehovah God as it were enters the verse with one category after another of the weak, the disadvantaged or the disabled, and enjoins upon His people that their conduct towards these should answer to the character of their just and loving God:

Thou shalt rise up before the hoary head, and honour the face of the old man, and thou shalt fear thy GOD: I am the LORD (Lev. 19:32).

Moreover, in our time the aged are becoming an increasingly important sector of society, as the following excerpt from The New International (1984) warns:

A silent population explosion is building up for the beginning of the twenty-first century. The baby boom is finished, and the growth of the over-60's is now outstripping all other age-groups. By 2025 there will be more than a billion people aged over 60 - and for the first time in history, they will outnumber the young.

It seems we cannot afford to neglect the need of many of the ageing for the gospel, and we may be wrong in assuming that they have all had their opportunity long before.

The Problems

If, then, there are such strong arguments commending this type of work, we might ask why hospital witness has ceased as an organized exercise in some assemblies. One reason, of course, is lack of numbers, which also affects communities other than our own. But we should now examine some problems that are in the nature of the work.

First, preaching to the ill could be regarded as taking people at a disadvantage, when they do not feel or think at their best. The patient will tend to be reserved and guarded in attitude, and if he recovers he usually wants to forget as quickly as possible about the period in an institution. Looking back, a poor view will also likely be taken of any profession made under those conditions about spiritual matters, unless they have been very genuine. It also can be particularly difficult in the case of believers to arouse interest in the truths of divine service. Fellow believers are often delighted simply to hear the scriptures read, and know that witness is being borne. They often have no thought for any challenge in the reading or subsequent conversation to their view of the responsibilities of the disciple.

So, if we take for example the older British hospital ward, with beds arranged in partitioned bays, we might expect to speak within the hearing of about two dozen patients. But we find in fact that some may be critically ill, some may be sleeping, some under sedation, and others are so upset by illness that they cannot listen with understanding. The alert audience might thus be reduced to a dozen, and the sympathetic to even fewer. In a home for the elderly, there can be various stages of the breakdown of memory and mental competence. For many, there is outwardly to be seen little hope for the future, and this can be depressing to them and to the visitor.

Opportunity to read and speak may also be curtailed, with no further contact in a hospital on the next occasion of visiting, since another ward is often chosen. Hence, our message can easily be disregarded as over4amiliar, or confused with services on T.V. or radio, or with sermons from past churchgoing. (The writer therefore deliberately avoids drawing on Christmas or Easter for themes, since these can be threadbare of interest through overexploitation, and too often are a confusing connection with indefensible teachings and traditions of the national 'Churches').

A further weighty problem is the apparent lack of response that this work has met in proportion to the regularity of witness over many years. In hospital visiting it is astonishing how seldom we hear of even a letter being written to the assembly address with a word of thanks, far less any who, when recovered, seek us out in our halls.

What then can we do in the face of such difficulties?

Martin Archibald, Glasgow, Scotland | Mar 1989
Group Visits To Hospitals And Homes