I work as a chaplain and also volunteer
opportunities, how people handle grief, and
then volunteer
to speak on her relationship with patients and
with hospice.
Most of my work at Hillcrest, with whom I've
been for the last 30-something years, has
been with people, whether it's been with
members or with non-members, and I have attempted
in this time, of course, to involve as many
people as I can to those who are without the Lord.
And I don't know how many times people have
told me, you know, I don't know anybody that's
not a Christian, about the only people I know
are people even in the Church of Christ.
I work at ACU, I live in a neighborhood where
there is, most people who live there are Christians,
and I just don't have a lot of contact with
people who are not Christians.
And so when I completed the volunteer training
a few years ago, as I mentioned, Mary Jo asked
me to be a chaplain, and so she gave me my
first assignment, and one of the reasons I
wanted to do this was because being able to
minister to people that, who were, you know,
maybe not Christians, or maybe they were, or
just, you know, whomever it might be.
And so this lady lived out of town, of course,
I accuse her of giving me most of the patients
who live out of town, but nevertheless, she
lived out of town, so this is my first one,
and I guess that first one is always a little
scary, maybe all of them are a little scary,
but at any rate, I thought, well, I'm going to
call before I go.
So I called, and this woman's husband answered
the phone, and I told him, I said, this is
Bill Lockerill, and I'm chaplain with Hospice
of Abilene, and I wanted to know if it would
be okay to come by and visit with you this afternoon.
So he said, just a minute.
So he called his wife's name and said, ah, it's
the hospice chaplain, I said, okay, if
he comes by, and I heard her reply, ah, I guess
so, well, that just made me real anxious
to go, and so I said, I will be out, so I went
out there.
They were very cordial, and we visited, and we
talked for a while, and he told me all
about his race car experience, he'd worked as a
foreman driller actually on an oil rig
for most of his years, loved to take motors
apart, of which I know there is a motor and
you can take them apart, other than that, my
knowledge is a little limited, but I've
learned several of the same stories over and
over, I've learned through the time what's
involved with this, and he would tell me, you
know, just all about motors and about racing
and the oil field, so actually he and I had a
good visit, now remember, she's the patient,
but he and I had a good visit, and so I was
able to visit with her a little bit, and my,
her statements to me were mainly answers to
questions that I would just throw in now and
then, and then she would answer, and then he
would go back to car racing again.
So at any rate, I finished that, when we
finished our visit, which was probably 15, 20,
30 minutes,
he said, they both told me, they said, now you
just come back any time you want to, and
it was that type of relationship.
Now as we mentioned in the first session, in
order for a person to be a hospice patient,
they are to be, it is estimated by a physician,
and the physician refers them to hospice,
it's estimated they have less than six months
to live, so you know going into this that
that's the type of people you're going to be
working with.
Now as I said, I did this as the first
assignment, as a chaplain, that was in April of 1994,
the last time I talked with this lady was last
week, she just didn't go by the rules
at all, you know, she did not leave before six
months, she's still alive, she's experiencing
some other problems other than cancer, but at
any rate, she is very much alive, and we
are still visiting, and we've had a long time
to establish a good relationship with both
her and her husband.
My work as a chaplain has given me a lot of
opportunities to know people as I've said
that I otherwise would never have met, I've
been able to minister to people, visit with
people who had cancer, not all hospice patients
have cancer, there are other problems as well
that people can have that are life threatening
and life taking, I've had patients who had
AIDS, one of whom was a member of the Church of
Christ, I've had people with heart problems,
and seldom will you find people who are more
interested in prayer, and prayer for them,
prayer for their well-being than you will with
these people, they want the peace and
comfort of talking with God and with them about
their lives, about their hope of healing
or their hope of knowing God.
I want to share with you an experience that may
illustrate why this has been very beneficial
to me as a volunteer and as to a chaplain, as
we mentioned going into this people will
tell you in the training that this is not an
evangelistic opportunity, and for most
volunteers this may be true, but as a chaplain
I do have some opportunities to meet with
people and to share with them some things about
the Lord, and one day Mary Jo called
and said hey there's a guy out here who wants
to make sure he's going to Heaven, would you
go talk to him, and I said sure, so I went out
there and visited with him, Mary Jo paved
the way, she fell through the porch first, he
lived in a trailer house, and they had
the porch fixed before I got there, and so I go
in, I go out and I knock on this door,
and this guy has about 17 or 18 kids, and I
think most of them lived in the trailer
house with him, our next door, but at any rate,
knock on the door, the guy opens the
door, I walk in, and the trailer house is very
dirty, it is very crowded, it's full
of people, it's just people sitting everywhere,
and the poor guy had a lung problem, and he
was on oxygen carrying this tube around with
him everywhere he went in order to breathe,
and he came out of a little end room there, and
I told him who I was, and he said there's
a chair over there, so I got the chair, and I
looked, he didn't have a place to sit, and
so I gave him the chair, and he said you sat on
the couch, well there was a little room
on the couch, so I sat down, and I thought, you
know, this is just a get acquainted meeting,
I mean, I can tell this, you know, and they had
a TV on, and everybody was watching TV,
and had four bird cages lined up on some
magazines that were stacked on a shelf that was stacked,
well anyway, you're going to get the picture,
and so I sit down on the couch, and I think
we're just going to get acquainted, I'm going
to talk to this guy and find out a little
bit about him, tell him who I am, and we'll
make an appointment to get back. We sat down,
and we, you know, I told him who I was, and a
little bit about this, and then all of a
sudden he says, well the reason I want to talk
to you is I want to make sure I'm going
to Heaven, and all of a sudden I looked around,
and there wasn't anybody else in the room,
they cleared, I mean, they left, there was one
guy asleep on the couch, he didn't hear
him say that, so he stayed asleep, and I
looked, and I thought, well maybe this is the time
we can talk, and he told me what he felt some
of his needs were, and so we shared some things
together, and he said, I was baptized at an
early age, and you know I have cancer, and
I know I'm going to die, and I just want to be
sure I'm going to Heaven, and so we visited,
and we talked, and I went back again several
times, and we talked, and he concluded that
his baptism was valid, and so I took some tapes
out of some sermons, and he made the
statement one day, he said, I just wish I could
go to church one time before I die,
and I said, we can arrange that, and it never
came about, but that was his wish, and then
he told me one night, I said, is there anything
I can get for you, and we'd have prayer each
time I went out there, and while I think about
it, that first time we talked about prayer,
and he said, I'd like for you to pray for me,
I'd like to have a prayer, and I said,
so I led a prayer, because you don't know that
other people want to pray at that particular
time, I led the prayer, and when I finished, he
started praying, this is on our first visit,
and he said, I don't think I have ever heard a
more sincere, penitent, soul-searching,
Lord-searching, searching for the Lord prayer
than I have that that guy said at that time,
he talked about his life, he talked about his
sins, he talked about his need for God,
he asked for forgiveness, he told God he was
sorry, it was a very, very great prayer to
my ears.
Later, I said, what else can I do, he said, you
know, he said, I don't have a Bible, and
I said, I'll get you a Bible, so I came up with
the bookstore and bought him a Bible,
we have a lot of Bibles around the church
building, I wanted him to have one brand new,
so I went and bought a Bible for him, took it
out to him, took it in, this time he was
in bed and had the sheet pulled up and I said,
here is a Bible and it's yours, and he looked
at it and he smiled and he took the Bible and
he put the sheet back and he put it right
next to his heart, pulled the sheet back up and
put his hands over it and just held it
like that.
The next time I was out or a time or two later,
I went out and I said, have you had a chance
any to read in your Bible, and he said, well, I
can't read, so he'd never read.
He had listened to some of the tapes, he died,
I did his funeral, it was a county funeral,
the one where the county pays so much to a
funeral home and they do it, there was no
viewing for the family, which I didn't know
until I got to the cemetery, and family did
not view the body until they got to the
cemetery and I said, this will not ever happen again
if I'm aware that it's happening because I
said, we will pay if necessary for the family
to have an opportunity to go to the funeral
home and to do this grieving and process the
grieving experience there rather than have to
wait until you get to, at least it was
a sunny day out in a cemetery with no tent over
your what have you, and I determined
that would never happen again.
There were probably 35 or 40 people or more at
this service and we had his service.
I talked about his soul.
I talked about what he had told me those first
few days, first few times that we visited.
We talked about his needs and his hope of
eternal life.
These are some of the things that make this
type of work valuable to me and hopefully
to those that we serve.
Mary Jo, are you next?
You are next, aren't you?
I want to introduce Mary Jo Stevenson.
Mary Jo is volunteer coordinator for Hendrick
Hospice Care and she is going to come and
share some things about volunteer opportunities
just to give you an idea of what takes place
with hospice and some of the things that,
opportunities for people to work in this particular
I don't have any time, so don't talk loud, talk
as if I don't have, no don't take that, that's
my note, hi welcome, I told Bill you know
talking in this type of setting makes me very
nervous and his reaction was just be yourself
and the staff said
no be somebody else. I'm going to see if I can
be somebody else. I want to talk a little bit
about volunteer opportunities for hospice and
continuing a ministry that's very needed in all
communities and throughout the United States.
Volunteers are the heart and soul of hospice
care. With the smallest act of kindness they
sure make a difference. Our volunteers bring a
wide variety of gifts to hospice, most
important they bring the gift of a special kind
of caring.
Volunteers not only build new relationships,
but hopefully enrich their own lives in
continuing their ministries and understanding
of people with the terminal illness.
Hospice volunteer opportunities consist of a
wide variety, okay, to become a listener.
Patients and families are not always looking
for answers when we talk about being a
listener, they just want someone they can share
their feelings with and their frustrations.
Volunteers are friends. The volunteer's
presence can be extremely comforting to a
patient in a family with a terminal illness.
Sandy had mentioned earlier this morning about
how important presence is when you're dealing
with such a wide variety of illnesses in people
being alone.
So hospice volunteers are a link to the hospice
team. Patients and family members tell
volunteers, who are basically friends of the
family, things that they may not tell their
nurse, which is a very important part of the
patient's care and also caring for the family.
They may respond to the nurse about, you know,
not being able to sleep that night from being
in so much pain, you know, may not respond to
the nurse by being in so much pain they didn't
sleep and this is a link for volunteers to be
telling the nurse so we can make it more
comfortable for the patients.
Volunteers are a support system for families
and volunteers because not only do they go into
the home to help ease the journey, but they
also build bonds and new friendships and
relationships with patients and families.
Volunteers are often the ones patients and
family members turn to for comfort, help, and a
lot of information.
Volunteers are the ambassador and friends of
hospice by out in the community as Dr. Joe
Hodges had spoke earlier, he is not an active
volunteer, but he is a wonderful ambassador for
hospice care into the community and also with
his ministries in his church.
They support the hospice organization by all
kinds of different activities, maybe typing or
filing, you know, raising money to help with
our patient care.
We have quite a few patients that don't qualify
for Medicare or Medicaid or insurance
reimbursement, so we have fundraisers for these
people where they continue to have the quality
of life.
We have volunteers that answer the phones and
serving as advisors to committees and
coordinating support groups and bereavement
groups and there is just such a variety.
We can always find something for you to do, you
know, cleaning out storage sheds, making
bulletin boards, there is always something.
Volunteers are helpers to the patients and
families too. This takes the pressure off of a
lot of family members.
We had one lady that she did not have a
caregiver with her in the home, she was an
elderly lady.
She got a lot of pleasure out of watering her
grass and keeping her grass clean, I mean green
and just, you know, she really loved that.
But she couldn't get outside to water the grass
anymore, so we had a volunteer that would go
and water the lawn for, you know, at least two
to three times a week.
And after about the second week of watering the
lawn, he came to me and he said, we have a
problem, you know, what's the problem?
He said, the grass comes up to my waist. He
said, I'm not sure if I need to be watering anymore.
But she did not want to inconvenience him by
mowing. And so we talked her into letting him
mow and he mowed and he edged and he, you know,
ragged and this brought her so much comfort and happiness.
It could be just little things like walking the
dog, raking leaves, lot of housekeeping.
I don't mean to go in and say, oh, let me clean
your living room when the living room may not
be dirty to them.
You know, you have to be really careful. Yeah,
babysitting, staying, picking up a child after
school because the mother is taking care of the
father and just really cannot leave the house.
Picking up medical supplies, you know, picking
up medications, going and picking up some milk
at the grocery store for them.
Taking the patient to the doctor for radiation
treatment or chemotherapy treatment or taking
the caregiver to the doctor.
We have one lady now that has never drove
before. I know in the 90s we feel that that's
kind of an odd thing that she has never drove.
And so we have volunteers that take her back
and forth for transportation.
Volunteering is, it's the little things and the
not so little things volunteers do that make a
positive experience.
Volunteers in the church setting, volunteers in
any type of setting continues a wonderful type
of ministry.
And it is a journey and it is a process. And
volunteers cannot be treated as just or
volunteers cannot feel like they're not doing
anything when the rewards are so high
and the rewards are so good and so comforting
and a lot of times volunteers say, you know,
I'm really not doing anything.
And then later on they come back and they talk
about the spiritual movement that they had and
how wonderful it was to take care of this person.
Even if it was just walking the dog or walking
out in the garden with a loved one. It's a
wonderful ministry.
I could talk all day about volunteers and what
a wonderful asset they are to any program,
especially for hospice care.
Thank you, Mayor Joe. Now Betty Bowen is going
to come and talk to us about how people handle grief.
Betty is the bereavement coordinator for
Hendrick Hospice Care and has been doing this
for some time and I don't even know how long.
But when people have loss, they grieve. I mean,
that's just a natural process of this.
But they handle it in many different ways and
she's going to come and share with us some of
those things.
At Smile Children, we've been taught that death
is not the end of life.
Merely it's the passage where the soul enters a
more glorious place in Heaven.
We know this and because of this we have a
sense of comfort that our loved ones are no
longer suffering.
They're no longer struggling. They're safe in
another life.
But the pain from being separated from that
person is very real and oftentimes it's
overwhelming, devastating.
As we travel through life, we also learn that
loss is inevitable, inescapable. It's just part
of life.
But when we lose someone who is so dear to us,
someone that we love so deeply, we hurt.
And sometimes that sorrow becomes so intense
that we wonder if we're ever going to survive it.
But we do and that's why we're called survivors.
Because grief throws us into an amazing state
of intense emotions and feelings, it's seen as
something that we want to avoid.
But grief is a good thing. It's normal
reactions to loss.
It's a friend that helps us heal our hurts. It
helps us make adjustments to the changes in our lives.
It helps us heal. It helps us find
understanding and meaning through our losses.
When our leg is broken, healing must occur. And
the same is true when our hearts are broken.
Healing must also occur. So grief allows healing.
After the death of someone, we're left with
just a magnitude of feelings and emotions.
One way this affects us is a physical reaction.
Sometimes we feel numb, tired, I mean totally exhausted.
There's nervousness. Our body hurts. Our heads
hurt. Our chests hurt. And our heart hurts.
We can't concentrate. We can't remember things.
We drive to the mall. We can't find our cars
when we finish.
Sometimes we run through red lights. Oftentimes
we write a check and where did that go?
So that's a real problem when we're grieving.
Sometimes there's no motivation, no desire to
even get up, get dressed for the day.
Sleeping and eating problems. Maybe we do this
too much or maybe not enough.
But overall there's just no sense of purpose or direction.
On an emotional level, sometimes we feel
helplessness, intense sadness, loneliness.
We're scared. We're confused, depressed,
guilty, angry.
And sometimes that anger is at the person who died.
Oftentimes there's a sense of relief. And then
we feel guilty because we're relieved that
they're gone.
Overall, with all these feelings and emotions
surfaced, we feel like we are going crazy. We
are totally out of control.
Grief also affects us on a spiritual level.
Sometimes there's a feeling of abandonment.
We feel angry. Maybe angry at the church. Maybe
the minister. Maybe even angry at God.
Sometimes feelings of disappointment, betrayal
are also surfacing.
Sometimes grief has the opposite effects. We
may feel strengthened, maybe comforted by our
belief systems.
But all these are very normal reactions,
although they don't feel very normal.
But we all want a quick fix to make that pain
go away. But it's not that easy.
Our lives have changed and we have to adjust to
those changes.
It's important that we face grief, that we not
ignore it, that we don't pretend it's not there
or avoid it.
Because grief doesn't go away. It's like when
you have a broken leg, you have to face the
pain, the changes, and the adjustments.
So unfortunately that takes a lot of time, a
lot of patience, courage, and strong spiritual connections.
This statement is so very true. Healing is a
process that you participate in. It isn't
something done to you.
Healing is an inside job. So to survive the
pain of grief, there's several things we need
to do.
And one thing, we need to feel what we feel. We
need to face our losses and let ourselves
experience the emotions that are associated
with it.
We also need to express those feelings. Maybe
talk about it. Talk about what's happened to us.
Talk about that person that we've lost. How we
feel about that.
Reminisce. For many, prayer is what gets them
through grief, what gets them through tough situations.
This is a very, very difficult journey and
prayer is important.
And also, I think that sometimes we just need
to experience the presence of others who truly
care about us.
So it's important that we reach out for support.
It's also helpful to find specific activities
that help us ease this distress and this
despair that we're experiencing.
For some people, going to the cemetery is
helpful. Maybe putting out pictures. Maybe
taking away pictures, putting them up.
Writing down feelings. Maybe exercising,
listening to music. Sometimes staying busy with
work and hobbies helps.
Reminiscing is also very, very important. With
time, the pain does Lessen and the memories
will remain, although we sometimes wonder.
As caring, concerned people, we want to help
those who've gone through a tragic loss.
As Christians, we want to minister to those
people who are hurting, who are lost, who are broken.
We want to live God's Word. But how do we do it?
Some of us, or most of us, are pretty
uncomfortable with death.
We're uncomfortable being around people who are
grieving. You know, what do we say? What do we do?
Do we avoid them in case we say the wrong thing?
Do we act like nothing is wrong?
Do we not even mention the name of the person
who's died for fear it may cause a lot of pain?
Maybe make them remember what's happened to them?
What do we do to reflect God's love?
I could supply a list of Do's and don'ts. I
mean, I could give you pages and pages of them.
But unfortunately, what works for some doesn't
always work for everybody.
So there's three important things to remember.
In Doug Manning's book, Don't Take My Grief
Away from Me, he talks about the three H's.
The first H is you need to hang around.
Presence, and we've talked about that
throughout the whole day.
Be there for those people. I personally think
that your presence is a gift from God.
What it does, it tells folks that you're not alone.
I truly care about you, and I want to help. I'm
going to help you through this.
People don't always remember what is said to
them, but they do remember who was there and
what was done.
The second H is hush, listen.
Let these people express their grief. Let them
reminisce. Let them talk about what's happened.
Don't try to give advice, just listen. You may
try practicing the laying on of ears.
And the last H is hug. Touch has healing power.
It's communication without words.
It provides comfort and reassurance.
I think the effects of touch were demonstrated
in the Bible when Jesus healed the leper.
And that's powerful stuff.
The three H's, these are effective ways that we
can help folks who are grieving.
God's presence helps us understand that out of
sorrow and grief comes the promise of hope and healing.
I think the following words truly reflect God's
word through Hospice ministry.
I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do
everything, but I can do something.
And what I can do, I ought to do. And by the
grace of God, I will do.
So I hope that you, in some capacity, will be a
part of this hospice ministry.
Oh, sorry.
Thank you, Betty.
I want to introduce Monterey Bruce to you at
this time.
Monterey went through our training, when, 95,
96, 90-something or other, somewhere back there
at Hillcrest.
And she has done a lot of volunteer work in a
lot of different ways, not only with patient care,
but she helped put this book together that's
over here that's not for your taking, necessarily.
But she has helped to organize a lot of the
training materials that have taken a lot of her time.
So she has just done a great work for hospice.
Thank you.
Hospice care, do so because they've had someone
who has been a patient associated with hospice,
and they know something about it.
I've never heard anyone say hospice didn't do a
good job.
Last night, I was at a meeting with about 70
people, and I heard several people say,
well, my mother lived in Ohio, and hospice took
care of her there.
And at Christmas time, I sat out in the mall,
sometimes with the tree,
and you listen to stories, people come by and
say, oh, I want to give in memory of,
and you're not out there five minutes before
someone comes by and tells you a story.
And it's rather wonderful.
I'm a hospice volunteer, but I did it out of a
sense of duty.
When a friend in my Wednesday night Bible class
told me about hospice classes, she said,
oh, you need to go to those classes.
It doesn't matter if you ever volunteer for a minute.
You need the classes.
And so I enrolled in the classes, and I knew by
the middle of the first one that I was hooked.
They were great.
The classes were really wonderful, and I
enjoyed it.
But I had no intentions of ever volunteering
for anything.
I had too much to do.
I was too busy.
And when I retired from school teaching, my
90-year-old mother came to live with me,
and my sister's husband had just died, and she
needed help desperately.
I have seven grandchildren.
I volunteer at the school three days a week to
help kids that have some school problems.
And I didn't feel like I had time for anything else.
Two days after the sessions were over, I called
Mary Jo, and I said, I'm ready to work.
I felt an obligation.
So she called me a few days later, and she
said, I have a patient for you.
And of course, my terror scale went up, you
know, 95%.
And the what ifs that I had just made me
scrunch up.
What if I said the wrong thing?
What if she needed something?
What if I didn't know what to give her?
What if I was there?
And of course, none of these things happened.
Here was this tiny little Vietnamese lady, no
bigger than my nine-year-old granddaughter,
who was in the very last stages of cancer.
I think she died about 10 days after I was
there, and she slept the whole time.
So I thought, well, that's not too scary.
My next assignment was a little tougher.
I went in a nursing home who was in the last
stages of lung cancer,
and the conversation went to problems.
She couldn't talk.
She didn't have the strength, she didn't have
the air to even say anything.
So I talked to her son, but that wasn't what
she needed.
She just needed somebody to be there with her.
And she died after my fourth visit.
Okay, so I thought, oh, I'm ready for another patient.
But just a while after this, a hospice received
a letter,
and I'd like to read it to you.
Dear hospice people, last Monday I went in to
see the doctor for my regular yearly exam.
He asked his usual 20 questions, and I made the
remark that I'd never felt better in my life.
The doctor sent me for my regular yearly blood
work and my regular yearly mammogram,
all routine and mostly inconvenient but necessary.
And that ended my regular yearly health
examination, almost.
The next day, Hendrick Hospital called and
asked me to come in for a sonogram.
Seemed something was not quite right about the mammography.
And then I recalled how the doctor had examined
one breast and then the other,
and back again to the first one.
And I also remember the technician taking three
more x-rays after she had looked at the pictures,
and my thoughts and feelings were not regular
anymore, and neither was my heartbeat.
After the appointment was made for the sonogram,
a million questions circled my mind like
vultures, moving into my head and then drifting off,
only to reappear again and again.
Do I need to talk to my husband now?
After all, I know nothing for sure.
Will I die?
How long will death take?
What do I tell my sons and my daughter?
How can they bear to watch me leave them?
Do I have to wear a seatbelt?
What do I tell my mother?
Can I ask my grieving sister to come and be
with me?
Can I quit pretending that I like broccoli?
How can I spend time with my grandchildren
without scaring me with sickness and tears?
How can I pray?
What do I pray for?
Do I ask this father in Heaven who has known me
since I was knit in my mother's womb,
please God, grant me patience and dignity?
Or do I yell at the top of my lungs and tell
him that I'm not finished here?
I need at least 20 more years.
I went through hospice training and I've seen
people waste away with cancer.
It seems too often anymore that someone else I
know and love has been diagnosed with a disease.
And when I learn about these people, my first
thoughts are always the same.
What did they do to themselves?
Or why haven't they taken care of their bodies
like they should?
These notions don't enter my head.
I've never smoked or drank and never have I
committed any really black sins.
I've always eaten well, worked hard, drank lots
of milk.
Why should something like this happen to me?
I know not what the test results will be
tomorrow, but I do know one thing for certain.
I shall never again view a cancer patient in
the same way I have in the past.
And this letter was signed by me.
And since that time when I visit a patient, I
still have lots of what ifs.
What if my mother had to attend my funeral?
What if I couldn't watch my grandsons play ball?
What if I would never see my precious
granddaughters grow up?
Hey, Zin, don't cry. I love you.
What if I had to tell my children goodbye, if I
had the breath to do so?
What if my husband came to the hospital and
said, I don't want you coming back home.
I don't even want to see you again.
And this happened to a lady the other day.
Mary Jo calls me once in a while and I go to
work in the office.
And I've never seen such a loving and dedicated
and caring bunch of people that are there.
In fact, I mean, even you that are out of town,
if you need a hug, go by there.
And you'll get two from those people right there.
But there's never a Kevorkian question to ask
of how can I assist you to die?
But it's always a very Christian attitude of
what can we do to help you have quality living?
I'm a hospice volunteer, but most certainly not
for duty's sake.
I love to work with patients, with the
exception of maybe one.
I love the people at hospice, and I really love
what I do.
That's why I'm a volunteer.
Well, folks, this gets real.
I'd like to thank General Ray for sharing this
with us today.
This is a real work, and it may be volunteer,
but it remains real.
And because you're dealing with real people,
this is not something you see on television,
this is not something in the movies, this is
not just a make-believe deal.
These are real people that you're dealing with.
And people with different thoughts, people with
different emotions, people with different backgrounds,
economic differences, whatever, they're all different.
They're all different to some extent.
And when you get to a point in their lives
where they are faced with death,
in a sense, this may be the first time you see
the real person.
It may be a time you don't see the real person
because they face it differently.
But thanks to all of you for sharing this today.
This afternoon, we're going to be talking as
the theme, How Can Churches and Hospice Be Partners?
And I'm going to talk about the Hillcrest Church.
And we're involved in our fourth training
session, even as I speak, this very day.
Tonight, we have a three-hour training session
from 6:30-9:30.
And I'm going to talk about that type of thing.
Alvin Kelly is going...ooh, I'm about to pull a
quarter off.
Alvin Kelly is going to come and share some of
his experiences with hospice.
Hospice is also involved in working with
children who have had loss in their families,
some by divorce, some by death.
And this is called Rainbows.
And so he has been involved as a facilitator in
that area.
And so he's going to come and talk with us
about that.
I'm going to talk about some of the chaplain
services that are available with hospice.
And Mayor Joe is going to come and talk about
the training outline that is used in the
training sessions.
So we have a pretty full day even left.
Any of you have any questions?
If you do, all these experts over here will be
glad to answer those.
But we have a little time.
And if you have some questions you'd like to
ask, I'd be glad for you to do so at this time
in one of the questions.
Anything else you want to say? Here's your
chance, Betty.
Then let's close with a prayer.
And again, those who have spoken here, if you
want to come visit with any of us,
we'd be glad to talk with you on a more
personal basis.
Let's pray together.
Dear God, we thank you for the opportunity to
be here today.
And we thank you for the opportunity to serve
in this capacity.
And Father, we are grateful for these who have
come today and shared a part of their lives,
a part of their work, a part of their concern,
a part of their involvement in the lives of
other people.
And we just pray, Father, we will continue to
be able to be used to your glory and to your honor.
And it's in our Lord's holy name we pray. Amen.
Thank you. Amen.
That's good.