In 1984, Bill Goodrich attended a Christmas Eve service at his church. A choir of cognitively impaired adults from local group homes sang Christmas carols. The people around Bill thought their performance was beautiful, but Bill was troubled. A new Christian at the time, he spent the rest of the service asking the Lord why He allowed some people to suffer the way they do.
What about the people he’d met in nursing homes, for example? Why did God allow them to spend their last days suffering from pain and totally dependent on others, often strangers?
Those questions transformed Bill’s life that Christmas. God removed scales from Bill’s eyes. He began to see the elderly in nursing homes as God’s beloved children. Far from turning His back on their weakness and brokenness, He was working through it to teach His Church how to love as He loves.
When Jesus walked the earth, He freely gave to the blind, the poor, the deaf, and the physically disabled. Likewise, we learn to embody compassion, love, and grace by ministering to “the least of these” (Matthew 25:40).
We also come face to face with the value of every human life, from the womb to the tomb. Christians focus a lot of attention on the preborn because it’s such an important issue. But so is the value of those in the later stages of life. Scripture tells us to be defenders, protectors, and providers for the weak (Acts 20:35).
Given that there are 1.3 million seniors in nursing homes around the country, and many of them need to hear about Jesus, Chaplain Bill Goodrich, the founder and president of God Cares Ministry, is with us on our Focus on the Family Broadcast “Caring for the Elderly” to share how to touch the lives of what is in many ways a forgotten generation.
Listen on your local radio station, online, on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, or take us with you on our free phone app.
Bill Goodrich’s book Nursing Home Ministry: Where Hidden Treasures are Found is available for a gift of any amount. For more information, click here. | 
