The Blue Ridge Visitation Team often visits people in the hospital, nursing facilities and at home. Here, they share their experiences. If you’d like to serve on the Visitation Team, sign up here.
I visited John several times in the Bedford Recovery Unit, and we struck up a friendship. He did not have a large print Bible so Blue Ridge provided him with one.
He told me he was really scared to go home because he didn't want to be an imposition on his daughter. He eventually did go home and died at home. His daughter asked me to do part of the eulogy for him, and I was honored to do so.
I was surprised to find out how much hospital visitation means to some patients. We talked and prayed together and apparently it was quite a comfort to him. God knows when and where we need to be to serve Him, and I was humbled by the importance John placed on my visits.
— John Pennington
I really began serving on the caring team because it was the only ministry that excited me. I remember thinking, “What can I do to get involved?” And just taking that next step.
I often questioned if it made any difference to visit once or twice a month, but that turned into once a week when I could. Sometimes the visits were super short as little ones can't be counted on to always cooperate. For a while I just visited hoping to put a smile on her [my new friend’s] face or the face of a nurse without knowing if it really mattered.
Then, about three months ago or so, after I'd been visiting over a year I think, I started to notice a change ... her face would really light up when she saw us visit. She'd say, “I could really use a cup of cold water and not in one of those baby cups.” (She never asked me for anything before.) One day as we were leaving, when my little one said “love you” as preschoolers sometimes say to anyone who is a friend, she said it right back.
Then some of the nurses started recognizing me. I never even thought until that moment what a witness we are to them as well. I feel like God is teaching me in this season that He is in the insignificant, the mundane, the little things that we think make no difference at all. And I am so thankful that HE let me see that.
What seemed to be so insignificant in the beginning has really turned into a lasting impression on my heart. HE gave me a little something to be faithful with, sometimes I was, sometimes I wasn't, but He is always faithful. And He's calling us to be faithful too.
I asked her once what advice a beautiful wise woman like herself would have for a young mom like me, and she said so simply yet with such conviction ... just be generous and kind.
My last visit was the week before she passed, and it's so ironic because Zoey happened to be with me that day and she said I want to take a picture of our friend. So because of that I have a picture of her! I'll have to print it for my journal and write, "be faithful in the little things!"
— Becky Neighbors
Even if a person, like myself, feels that they are not very compassionate or sensitive to the needs of others, God can still use you in spite of your self-perceived shortcomings. Just a desire to serve The King is motivation enough to go out to visit people in need. A lot of my focus is on Matthew 25: 31-46 in the parable of The Sheep and the Goats.
Preparing to visit a person whom you’ve never met can cause a bit of anxiety, but in most all cases I come away definitely having felt the Spirit of God. As we’re taught in Matthew 18:20, where two or more are gathered in His name, He’s there. There’s no other such times where we enjoy our faith more than when we’re laying on a hospital bed.
— David Beahm