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April 17, 2020 By Karen Engle   |   6 Comments

7 Ways Your Church Can Help People with Coronavirus

Because of coronavirus, many churches have fast figured out how to live stream their church services and create online small groups to disciple members. But now they are facing a new challenge: How do you love people well who have COVID-19 when you can’t visit them in the hospital or in their home?

Here are seven ways churches can help people with the coronavirus, even when you can’t physically be with them.

1. Make sure they feel connected

You may not be able to visit someone who has coronavirus, but you can stay connected through technology. Video conferencing tools make it easy to have virtual face-to-face conversations with those who are able. Faithlife Messages includes a free, powerful video chat feature you can use on a computer or mobile device. You can send the chat link to someone who is sick—even if they’re not part of your Faithlife group. 

If the sick person is not comfortable with technology, a good old-fashioned phone call to someone fighting coronavirus will make a world of difference and help them feel like they are not alone. Or create a schedule for church members to regularly check in on those with coronavirus—especially if the sick person lives alone. This will also keep you informed on how they’re doing and what they need.

And though you might not be able to do physical hospital visits, you can send texts or short videos letting the sick person know you care and are praying. 

2. Offer to help with daily tasks

Chances are if someone has been diagnosed with coronavirus (or is showing symptoms), they might be overwhelmed mentally and not even sure what they need. This is the time for your church to jump in and act—and an easy way to do this without coming in contact with the person is by helping with day-to-day tasks. Do they need a mail pickup? Do their garbage cans need to be pulled out? Does the lawn need to be mowed? Relieving someone with coronavirus of simple tasks will help them be able to focus on what’s most important: getting well.

3. Set up a benevolence fund

Many people will get paid leave from work if they catch COVID-19, but not everyone qualifies. If they’ve been laid off or furloughed, they’ll be concerned about their health—and paying the bills. 

That’s where your church comes in. Some people might not feel comfortable leaving their homes, but they’d be eager to help cover someone’s bills. Setting up a benevolence fund for people to give to is an easy way for people to help others instead of feeling sidelined. 

If your church uses Faithlife Giving, you can easily create a new fund to which people can give. You can accept (and report on) benevolence giving, medical and funeral expense relief, and more. Then, you can update the church throughout the week with newsletters, instant messaging, and more.

Help people with the coronavirus blog

4. Drop off groceries 

This may be the most obvious opportunity on the list, which means it’s easy to assume someone else is taking care of it. No doubt someone who is sick and quarantined may be low on necessities like food staples, laundry detergent, soap, toothpaste, and of course, toilet paper. Many grocery stores offer online ordering and delivery. Without leaving home, your church can help restock someone’s shelves.

5. Host prayer conference calls 

James 5:14–16 says: 

Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up.

Prayer is powerful, and just because you can’t lay hands on a person does not mean you can’t gather to pray. Your church leaders can pray for people by name in private, or you can schedule prayer conference calls open to the church. Before you open a prayer call to everyone, make sure you get permission to use a person’s name or status. Some people will feel uncomfortable sharing their health information, and it’s wisest to make sure you don’t run them over in the name of caring for them.

6. Create care packages to help pass time 

I know of someone who was diagnosed with coronavirus while vacationing in Australia. She’s now quarantined in a hotel with nothing to do but watch TV—and beyond bored. She posted a message on social media asking anyone who knew anyone near her hotel to find her a jigsaw puzzle or two. The next day, she had a pile of puzzles outside her hotel door, and she posted that it saved her sanity. 

Rally your church to pull together care packages with boredom-busters like puzzles, movies, games—even kids’ activities if there are little ones in the home. They can pull from what they have on their shelves, pile everything in a basket, and leave it on their porch with a note saying, “We are praying for you and hope this helps pass the time.”

7. Organize meal delivery

One excellent way to help people with coronavirus, especially if the sick person does not live alone, is to arrange for daily or weekly food delivery. Meal Train, Take Them a Meal, and CareCalendar are free websites that help you create customized online sign-ups to organize meals and other help for people during illness and recovery. 

Or take it to the next level and start a food delivery fund to which church members can to. Then, use the money to have food delivered from restaurants that can only offer take-out because of the coronavirus. You’ll bless not only the person who is sick but also the restaurant owners who have been deeply impacted by the pandemic.

***

Has your church tried any of these ideas? If so, let us know in the comments what’s working—or tell us about other ways you’re caring for the sick in your community!

Filed Under: Culture and Context Tagged With: caring for the sick, church community, coronavirus

Comments

  1. Ken Schaeffer says

    April 21, 2020 at 5:54 am

    While all these are good, I am saddened by the fact that so little emphasis was placed on ways for the church to help build up people spiritually during this time. For many, this is something that is truly missed and needed.

    Reply
    • Jim Julian says

      April 28, 2020 at 12:16 pm

      Thank you for saying this as I am a retired pastor and children’s worker and I have this same sense of not building up spiritual people during this time.

      Reply
    • Brigitte Hargett says

      June 1, 2020 at 9:16 am

      I am a Lay Minister at my church. As the pandemic because our reality., the spirit of fear attacked me. For a moment, the spirit of fear weighed me down. The Spirit of God said to me, what do I say about fear? I immediately went to the word of God and read all the scriptures I could find on fear. And in an instant, I was motivated, encouraged, and empowered by the scriptures I was reading. The Spirit of God said if you are feeling this way others are also. It was placed in my spirit “God and M.E.E. (an acronym from the words above). Through the words of the Holy Ghost, I put together a proposal to share with my Pastor. Sunday nights from 8:45 until 9:00 a topic is selected. I started with fear. Ten to fourteen scriptures on the topic are read. For the month of May, the topics were fear, faith, joy, and this past Sunday peace. It’s not a teaching or preaching, but motivation, encouragement, empowerment using what we have as believers the word of God. I receive many text messages and calls from the congregants saying that their spirits are lifted after listening to these Sunday evening sessions. We will continue on until December and other congregants will be able to select a topic to share with the people of God through the Scriptures. I pray that this is of use to you.

      Reply
      • Karen Engle says

        June 1, 2020 at 10:16 am

        Brigitte, thank you for taking the time to comment about what is working for your congregation. What a wonderful idea to keep everyone focused on truth!

        Karen from Faithlife

        Reply
  2. Jonathan Meintjes says

    April 30, 2020 at 3:20 am

    We live in a very small rural village in the mountains in South Africa. We put out a call to not only our church, who ran the campaign, but to all the local community to donate money, food and effort toward feeding people who lived close by who had lost their income during this time. In collaboration with a minister in that area as well as health and social workers we identified over 120 families that needed assistance. In a matter of four days the team put together food hampers to keep a family of five fed for a full month and distributed them to those people. We cannot provide them with jobs in this time of lock-down, but we can be the hands and feet of our compassionate and loving Jesus. The world has changed. Now more than ever, we need to reach out in love and care to those who have nothing and no hope. This was our small way of doing that.

    Reply
    • Karen Engle says

      April 30, 2020 at 10:38 am

      Jonathan, Thank you for sharing! Would we have your permission to use your story in printed/published Faithlife material?
      Karen

      Reply

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