Stages of Life...Tuesday

12/16/14

Last night (Monday) our Bible Study group members were involved with a local home for elderly people to have a Christmas party in their home, which is called Quail Gardens. We did it because we wanted to reach out in a personal way to a group. It was amazing to say the least! Since September we have  done two Bible Studies that were written by Priscilla Shirer. The first one was on Gideon, and the second one was on Jonah. In both we learned that God calls on us to do things that we did not think we could do. However, both studies said that, when God calls us we must answer.

The one on Jonah  suggested that we must reach out to others and do something special. For us this was not a difficult task. We took on two tasks for the Christmas holidays. One was to participate in the effort of a woman in our church who has a ministry to the homeless. She provides bags to the homeless filled with things they need to keep clean. The bags include shampoo and other items that are needed. We filled up many bags for her ministry.

The other thing that we did was to reach out to this nursing home and give them a party complete with Christmas presents that we bought that were especially chosen according to their interests and needs.

It was lovely! Usually we have our party as a group and exchange prezzies to each other according to the names we have chosen. This had only a slight twist to it. We chose names, but the prezzies were not for us. Our party this year still happened but it was at this nursing home. The presents were not for us. They were for these amazing elderly residents. The premise that "it is better to give than to receive" stands out loud and clear here. 

I do want to draw some conclusions here about the stages of life. The residents of Quail Gardens include twenty three women and one man. They are at a point in their lives where they have come to various challenging states. All of them need some type of help to live and be safe. Most of them have physical challenges and some of them have mental challenges.  Whatever the reason for their need to live in a place like Quail Gardens, there is a need. What we all saw was that they are in a stage of life that is beyond precious. Their courage and joy is overwhelming. The oldest person is a woman who is 102 years old. Lois ended up sleeping for some of the time during the party. One woman has hip issues where her surgery was not successful. Flo is confined to her wheelchair. Sometimes she is plagued by sadness, but she still carries on. 

One could do well to learn the type of courage that these precious people are called on to live under. It is not always easy for them I guess one could say that they have no choice. However, as we played musical Bingo, they all sang the words to the old songs (and so did we), and we all were had fun. It was the little things that counted. We need to take joy in the little things of life and to be courageous. We are not done until God calls us home. It is how we deal with each phase of our lives, not only the  blessings  but also the challenges, that help us to make our lives be a testimony to  God as He gets ready to call us home. He will meet us at heaven's gate with the words, "Well done, My good and faithful servant." We all were blessed by these wonderful people and the example the showed us last night. When we do what God asks us to do we are as blessed as the people that we are trying to bless, and, best of all, we learn an amazing lesson from God in the bargain.

We all were blessed by these wonderful people and the lesson they taught us last night.

Written by 

Corinne Mustafa