Called to Love

We have a few residents who will be passing away soon, and I've been thinking about what this calling means, to serve the elderly. Of course, in my many years of working with seniors, I've experienced a lot of loss. Some people ask me how I can stand to work with an age group that is so close to death. They ask, "Have you gotten used to it? Does it get easier?"

My answer is complicated. No surprise, right? Nothing is ever as straightforward as it seems. I fall in love with most of our elderly clients. A few just plain sweep me off of my feet. I feel called to love and serve these people with all of my heart, and it's easy for me to do just that. For as long as they are with me, whether that is days or weeks or months or years, I will do my very best to love them and meet their needs. It feels natural and is clearly a part of who I am as a person.

Of course, in my mind always is the knowledge that death is imminent for all of them. Well, really for all of us, right? But for our seniors, it seems closer and more real to most of the world. Truthfully, it never gets any easier to see families and individuals go through the pain and sorrow of physical death and saying their earthly goodbyes. My heart aches for them. I miss people when they die. (I still can't do my morning announcements or lead my exercise class without thinking of one of the most wonderful ladies I have ever met.)

Fortunately, though, I am blessed to know that all of this here on earth is part of God's plan for us. His plan of happiness contains a lot of sorrows, and earthly death is part of that sorrow. The sorrows and pains of this world are here as a result of this mortal sphere, and are tools God uses to refine us and make us better than we ever believed we could be. He created this world and placed us here to exercise our agency, to learn and to grow. Every part of this plan from his perspective is to "bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." In other words, to overcome sin and death so that all of us - his children - may live with him again in glory. If I look at death as a doorway (in the same way that birth is a doorway), and if I truly know who waits on the other side of that door, then death loses some of its sting and I can rejoice spiritually in the crossing of a soul, even as my mortal mind and heart mourn at the loss of these new (old) friends.

I think it's a bit like foster-parenting. I have the privilege of loving and caring for these individuals who may or may not have a support system. I provide physical, emotional, social and spiritual care while they are entrusted to me. Most of them like me or love me, and some of them tolerate me. I know going in to the deal that it's for a short time. Some of the people (many, in fact) have health issues that make caring for them a challenge at times, but under all of that is a person, with the richness and the layers of life clinging to them.

When death comes, it is an occasion with many attributes. Sorrow for the family and for myself. Relief for the individual who no longer suffers pain. Joy for the soul gone on to reunite with family and with God and our Savior. Knowledge that death is a doorway through which our physical bodies cannot fit. Excitement that this person I love gets to know and experience the truthfulness of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Confidence that every person will be resurrected and receive a perfected and glorified physical form. Peace that permeates my soul and lifts me as I go about the business of loving and caring for the next senior entrusted to my care.

For some, home is a place with walls and a roof where their family lives. For me, home is serving others. It is the place I feel most useful, most like myself, most like the person my Father in Heaven wants me to be, and it is the place where I am prepared to enter my Heavenly home. This place of serving my elderly friends, this place of transition and joy and sorrow...this is my home. No, it's not easy to say goodbye, and no, death doesn't get any easier. In fact, there are days when it seems more than I can bear. But then God through his Holy Spirit reminds me and cradles me, and I feel at peace. This is my calling...a calling of love. And with God, all things are possible.