Paul Denikin
- Relationships , Understanding Your Faith
- July 28, 2021
- 1 views
Ideas for How Church Communities Can Care for Their Senior Members
Churches provide their members with more than just a place to worship. It’s also a source of community, a promise that there will be people there for you when you need it. If you have a substantial senior population in your church community, there’s a lot you can do to make sure they’re thriving. Aknowingspirit has created this guide to help inspire you to do what’s best for the seniors in your church family: Creating Social Opportunities Help the seniors in your church get the social time they need to thrive: Many seniors get very little social interaction, which can lead to serious health issues. Hosting senior-focused events is a great way to help facilitate friendships among your senior population. Mixed-age events help build intergenerational friendships, which offer many benefits for people across ages. Visiting at Home Seniors can benefit from a friend checking in. Encourage your community to visit one another – particularly older members – throughout the week. Learn these home safety red flags, and volunteer to help seniors create a safer home environment. Give seniors a hand finding local pros for window repair, plumbing, or electrical work. Encouraging Activity Help seniors stay active to encourage a longer, healthier life. Regular exercise helps counteract the damaging effects of aging. Create opportunities to exercise through active church volunteering, such as tending the church garden. You can also facilitate a church exercise group where members of all ages exercise together and hold one another accountable. These are just a few ways your church can be there for its senior members. If you’re looking for more ideas, the best thing to do is connect with the older members of your church community and ask them their needs directly. This way you can ensure your church is meeting the needs of its most vulnerable members. Take a look at the Aknowingspirit shop more on spirituality and following God’s call. Photo Credit: Pexels Please visit dadknowsdiy.com for more information.
Ann Lenaers
- Relationships , Spiritual Living , Understanding Your Faith
- October 16, 2019
- 0 views
Who Are You To Judge?
I have an evangelist friend who created a Christian alternative to yoga. She was formerly a dancer and loves a good stretch, so she infused her faith into a workout routine. I find it admirable the way she reminds us that our body is a temple for the Holy Spirit and that we should include Jesus in the way we care for our physical health! A few weeks ago she shared an article on social media talking about a new craze called “rage yoga” where people yell, swear, and drink alcohol during their workout. Accompanying the link to the article she simply wrote “This sounds like a really bad idea! A better option here” with a link to the page for her stretching program. After seeing this, a woman decided to completely tear into her in the comments. I have not seen such a bold keyboard warrior in quite awhile, and that’s really saying something in the modern world. She went off about how Jesus sat at the table with sinners and that is where she would be found. She accused my friend of not being a good Christian, suggested she was not fit for her calling in evangelism, and repeatedly condemned her saying she was passing judgment in a way that only God has the right to do – all for saying something might not be a good idea. This woman dug her heels into shaming my friend. Set aside for a moment my desire to defend my friend and sister in Christ. Looking at this objectively, this post said absolutely nothing about Jesus and did not actually criticize anyone. She just said she felt it was a bad idea without sharing her reason why. When she tried to reply to the accusations, she calmly explained to the woman that it’s not healthy to dehydrate and poison yourself with alcohol while working out and that swearing isn’t a good coping mechanism. These are just fact statements based on our knowledge of health. This further angered the woman as she continued to accuse her of passing judgment. This story paints a clear picture of something I’ve seen a ton of people do lately, especially in the Christian community. I’ve grown tired of the rudeness happening among the body. People get easily offended about things, then they jump to responding in a way that surpasses even an eye for an eye, becoming more like die for an eye. Christians are instructed to turn the other cheek, so I find these disputes hold a unique hypocrisy, lacking the grace in execution that they so strongly insisted wasn’t present to begin with. It’s time for us to mature in how we address our concerns. Point 1 – Our freedom in Christ is not a license for chaos. Even though we are under grace, we are still called to live a holy life to the best of our ability, letting our old spirit man die to the sins of the flesh and be born again in Christ. When Jesus sat down to the table with sinners, they were called to repent and follow him. Point…
Candace Paul
- Relationships
- December 18, 2016
- 1 views
Are they really JUST friends?
You’re in a relationship and learn that your partner has close friendships with the opposite sex. Should this be a concern? Well, this question comes up all the time and it’s a legitimate one: can men and women truly have platonic friendships? I think the short answer is yes, but with a few very important considerations. On a scale of “least threatening” to “most threatening” to a relationship, male and female friendships only fall into a few categories:
- Relationships
- October 11, 2016
- 2 views
Helping a Friend Cope with Loss
A good friend of mine confessed that he needed to speak to an old friend, but he didn’t know how. During this conversation, he would have to confront his biggest fear and he wasn’t ready. Even though they hadn’t spoken in years, this friend was the truest reflection of himself. As children, they looked alike and they talked alike. They got into trouble together, achieved milestones together, and genuinely had the highest hopes for each other. Like brothers, they stood by one another through life’s disappointments – of which there were many. But no matter how bad or how good, they could always count on the other’s support through anything and everything. Now, things were going to be drastically different, because this childhood friend was terminally ill. Sadly, one was slowly dying and the dynamic duo, that once planned to conquer the world together, would soon be only one man struggling to find his way in this world alone. The thought of this was devastating and my friend couldn’t handle it.