Recently I shared some practical tips on how to help those who are in crisis. However, when you are in the “inner circle” of someone going through pain, the opportunities you have to help become even greater. That is because you may have the responsibility of helping to figure out how others can help. Stated differently, you may become the “gatekeeper” that others turn to for how to best assist the person who is grieving, or who just received a devastating diagnosis, or who is facing an uncertain and scary circumstance. When this is the case, some additional tips may help you fill this role in a way that not only aids the person in need, but also helps you bear their burdens without getting crushed by them.
So if you are close to the person in pain and people are seeking your direction for how to help, here are some tips on what to do:
Be Prepared
It may seem antithetical to be prepared for something you don’t know is coming, but this is exactly what you should do. This is especially true if you are a ministry or small group leader, or in some other way you are naturally the point of contact for some collection of people when they face an emergency. Some specific ways that you can be prepared include:
- Have emergency contact information for people in your group – If you have single adults that you are in some way shepherding, please make sure you know how to contact their extended family members if something happens to them. Tracking down contact information for children or parents is difficult to do if you have never met them. Hopefully you will never have an occasion to utilize someone’s emergency contact, but it is better to have the information somewhere readily accessible in case you do.
- Have meals in freezer – One of my standard ways of being prepared for crisis is to make sure I have a prepared meal in the freezer that I can bring without much notice. I usually try for something hearty (like lasagna or enchiladas) so that if I don’t have a lot of “sides” readily available in my fridge, I can still bring something that is substantive and will feed a family.
- Know favorite restaurants or food orders -In the small group that my husband and I lead, there are a lot of food restrictions. It would be nearly impossible for me to always keep meals on hand that would meet the requirements of each family. Therefore, if I know that someone in our group is unlikely to be able to eat our “go to” freezer meal, I try to know their favorite restaurant or meals they grab when they need something quick to eat. In the cases when I can’t bring a homemade meal on short notice, I usually can pick up something at a restaurant or order a meal to be delivered to their door.
- Be familiar with your church’s support structure – If there is a crisis in the life of someone in your small group, one of the things you want to be able do is alert a pastor or ministry leader. It is helpful if you know the method for doing this before the emergency occurs. Perhaps your church has a pastor of the week that is on-call during that timeframe. Perhaps there is a help line that all needs are funneled through. Maybe there is a prayer chain contact that needs to be alerted. Whatever the process is for getting others in the church involved in praying for and supporting the person in need, make sure you know it.
Get Organized
When you realize that you are going to become the point of contact in a crisis, it is important to get organized as soon as you can. This may not happen immediately upon hearing the bad news, but as soon as you start to get an idea of what help is needed, and how long it will be needed for, it is helpful to start creating a process for ensuring those needs are met. I have used a few different methods to do this including a Google Doc that can be shared as people offer to help, or an online sign up form like takemthemameal.com or signupgenius.com. The best method to use is one that you are familiar with and that you can easily add additional needs to as they arise. While a text thread is often helpful when the situation first occurs, I recommend not relying on it if the needs extend beyond a day or two. Some type of form that you can access and that allows people to see the needs without you needing to continue to send them out as more offers for help come in is beneficial. Plus, depending on the situation, the person in need may also want to see the form. For example, there are times when we have done meal signups for a few months, and it is helpful if the person receiving the meals can see who is bringing them and what they are bringing. You want a system that is clear, that is easy to access and easy to share, plus adaptable to changing circumstances. The more organized you are, the more help you will be to the person in need, and the more you will be able to ensure others can help too.
Make Needs Known
Part of the reason it is important to get organized is because you want to have an easy way of making needs known. My personal philosophy is that you want to let others know of the needs that arise as much as possible, so you can take care of the things that the person in the difficult situation needs only you to do. I think it is wise to throw as many needs as you can on your sign up list, so that you can focus on the truly urgent or the very personal needs. As I mentioned in my previous post, in one situation that I was the point of contact for, one of the needs that arose was getting the dog a bath. Of course, I could have done that and would have done it, if no one had stepped in. However, by making the need known, it allowed another friend an opportunity to help which she desperately wanted to do. And it meant I could help my friend who was grieving with other pressing concerns that had come up. A meal sign up is great, but perhaps there is other practical help that the person in pain needs. Whether it is watering a garden, running errands or bathing a dog – when you are made aware of a need, make sure you let others know of it too.
Let Others Help Too
Of course, being organized and making needs known requires a commitment to letting other people help. Just because you are close to a person doesn’t mean that you have to or should do all the work. As intimated in the paragraph above, if you are close to the person in need, there may be some things that they only want you to do. Therefore, you need to concentrate on those things, and let others help bear the burden with other tasks. My general rule – if someone offers to help, try to think of a way that they can. For example, a while ago my mom’s friend was in Australia when she found out my mom was hospitalized. Obviously, she couldn’t bring a meal or run errands, but she asked if there was anything my mom could use from Amazon. This made me realize that my mom’s hospitalization may be a bit easier with Bluetooth headphones, which she previously didn’t have. If you can prevent it, don’t let an offer to help go to waste. Let people pitch in. It will not only make things easier on you as one of the frontliners, but both the person in need and the person providing the help will be blessed as a result.
As I shared previously, the above recommendations are just that – my recommendations. I am sure that the list is not comprehensive, and I am sure others can come up with more creative ways of helping people in need. Also, as I emphasized in the original post, all of these actions need to start and be undergirded with prayer. As you prayerfully consider how to best serve the person in crisis, God may direct you to different ways of meeting their needs. But I hope that if you are on the frontline of ministering, these suggestions here may help you engage in that service even more effectively.
