The Bible in the Hospital: A Reference Guide for the Minister in the Hospital Setting

By Rev. Doug Allen

The minister in the hospital setting can build relationships with patients faster than any other member of the health care team. Patients who have only a brief time with the minister may feel like he is a long-time friend to them. In some case they may view him as a life-long friend. I call this fast bonding the temporal life long relationship.
The reason behind this is that the patient sees the minister in the hospital as a link in the life long chain of ministers they have known and loved. Use this advantage without taking advantage of the patient.
This book is written to minister to those who minister to others. It is more of a ready reference than a book to be read cover-to-cover in a sitting. Take advantage of what you need for the moment. The rest of the book will have use at a latter time.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Apr 16, 2008
• ISBN: 9781462823567

Rev. Doug Allen

Pastor Doug Allen has, in addition the pastoral ministry, served for thirteen years as a Hospital Chaplain and over ten years as a Police Chaplain. He is a member of the International Critical Incident Stress Foundation and the International Conference of Police Chaplains. He is a strong advocate for the presence of the Bible in health care facilities and for training for all ministers in the proper application of the Bible as a part of patient care

Book preview

THE BIBLE IN

THE HOSPITAL

A REFERENCE GUIDE

FOR THE

MINISTER

IN THE HOSPITAL SETTING

REV. DOUG ALLEN

Copyright © 2008 by Rev. Doug Allen.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Scripture used in this book are taken from the following:

Those marked:

AV        The Authorized Version of 1769

NIVUS New International Version United States

Zondervan Publishing House

5300 Patterson Avenue, SE

Grand Rapids, MI 49530

NAS      New American Standard Bible

Copyright 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977

by The Lockman Foundation

La Habra, CA

Used by permission

This book was printed in the United States of America.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

[e-mail]

45481

CONTENTS

Forward

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Quick Reference Key

To Susan,

my loving wife and

faithful partner in the ministry

I dedicate this book.

Forward

This book was birthed out of a sincere desire to help those who love our Lord enough to want to help others at times of great need in life. Perhaps no other commonly reoccurring situations are more devastating than that of sickness, injury and death. To observe people as they and they loved ones experience these times and events is heart touching. But to move into the situation with the motive of helping is Christ-like.

For over three decades of ministering as a pastor and a chaplain, I have watched as men and women of God have given of their lives to rush into such scenarios that most would want to run away from. Those who have the calling and hand of God on their life to serve and minister in such a way are indeed on the front line of the battle.

Many times I have observed as those same called ones have struggled to find the appropriate passage from God’s Word to bring comfort, hope and encouragement to the patient and patient family. For that reason, for a desire to minister to those who are ministering, God laid on my heart the thought of this book.

There are some basic observations that I have made over the thirty plus years of ministry in the hospital and nursing home setting. Consider these carefully as you evaluate your calling and response to that call.

First, being a minister in the health care setting is not about the minister. It is about the patient. This is true in any ministry. Pastors do not preach to make themselves look spiritual. They preach because the Holy Spirit has given them a message for their flock.

If the minister leaves the patient room feeling good about the visit because he received a nice compliment, the visit was a failure. On the other hand, if the minister leaves the patient feeling more comfortable and more at peace than he first found them, the visit went well.

Second, there is no room in the hospital visit for the debate over the inerrancy of the Bible. No matter what your beliefs are on the issue or which side you take on the debate the patient visit is not the time to promote or defend your views. As God’s representative in that room, you must be bigger than the issues of common debate. You are representing supernatural power and infinite wisdom. Stay with primary purpose of your visit.

The hospital minister must believe that the Bible is the Word of God if he expects to be God’s vessel for healing. The debate is detrimental to the patient because:

o   Debating Biblical issues is, for the laity, unnerving at beast. It is upsetting and shakes or shatters one of the patient’s most valuable healing tools—their belief system.

o   If the minister doubts the patients favorite translation the patient will perceive that as his doubting the Bible, period. His words of comfort and assurance will be as hollow as a base drum.

o   The Bible is the minister’s only source of eternal authority. Every patient that the minister meets will need that authority in order to become over comers. Without that authority there can be no abundant life. If the minister is anxious to debate translation he will lose the time he could have been ministering.

Bringing the Bible with the minister is bringing the Lord. John 1:14 reads, And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.

Third, the key word that describes a good minister in the hospital setting is effective. The criterion by which the minister’s visit is assessed is the kind of effect that the visit had on the patient and the degree of that effectiveness. It makes no difference how Bible the minister knows nor how well acquainted he is with medical procedures if he leaves the patient with less peace than when he entered the room.

To be effective as a minister in the hospital, the chaplain must develop an extraordinary ability to listen. The patient may ask a question of the minister. The effective minister will listen for the question behind the question before he answers.

For example, a patient who has been ill for an extended period of time may say, I just do not understand why God hasn’t healed me. Why is God not hearing me? But if the minister answers immediately he may miss the real question of, What is so wrong with me that God won’t answer my prayer? That is a door to an all together different area.

Listening to this depth can be hard, especially to those of us who are pastors. Pastors have a need to preach. Our primary duty is to take a passage of Scripture, a spiritual truth, and explain its meaning and application to life. In the hospital setting we must do the same but only after accurately hearing the truth the patient is searching for.

Fourth, the effective minister in the hospital works more to guide the patient than he does by being confrontational with the patient.

This is a somewhat confusing principle of ministering. We have been taught for years that the way to deal with a problem is to meet it head on. Confront your past is the battle cry of the psychotherapist. And it is true that there must be a confrontation before a person can move on to total freedom. That confrontation, however, is not the goal of the minister. Our goal is not to just get people out of the hospital. Our goal is to get people closer to Jesus through the trials they are undergoing while they are in the hospital.

Many times though in the minister’s zeal to help the patient, the patient’s inability to recognize their own problem makes confrontation impossible. If the patient cannot identify the issue troubling them they cannot confront it.

The minister must remember that what the Holy Spirit is showing you about the person He sent you to minister to may be totally foreign to the patient himself. Again, this scenario will separate the effective minister from the one who is making visits to satisfy duty.

Fifth, we treat, Jesus heals. Over the door of the Church Mission Society sponsored hospital, the Kiwoka Hospital in Uganda, are these great words. It is there motto and a very good one.

The effective minister in the hospital will realize that the medical staff is serving God by fulfilling His call on their life. But the effective minister will also realize that he is serving the same God in the same manner. Sometimes the disease that medicine cannot reach can be reached by the minister who touches Jesus for the patient.

The effective minister is the one who can strike the balance of never interfering with the medical staff and never allowing the medical staff interfere with his work as a representative of God.

Sixth, HIPPA.

With the passing of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, the manner in which chaplains and pastors minister in the hospital has been changed. We can still minister as we once did but the confidentiality of all information concerning the patient in any manner is now absolute. Simply put, you may not share the information you gain about the patient with anyone except those health care professionals who are directly on a need-to-know basis for patient care or the operation of the health care system.

Pastors are conditioned to maintain the confidentiality of the confessional. Yet at times the pastor will leave the hospital, go to the church and disclose the deepest personal information under the guise of sharing a prayer request.

The more appropriate approach would be to say, with the patient’s permission, Brother Smith is in the hospital. Let us pray for his healing. That will probably cause some to ask what is wrong with Brother Smith. Again the appropriate response would be to say, I’m sorry, I am not at liberty to say.

Seventh, which translation of the Bible should I use? One of the debates in the community of faith that finds its way into the hospital in that of which Bible translation should be used. This issue surfaces every time the minister opens his Bible to read if he uses a modern translation.

I use approximately 18 different translations for study and message preparation. As a Pastor I normally use the NIVUS in the pulpit, closely relying on the NAS as well. It has been my experience that the members of the flock are more likely to study on their own when they have a translation they understand.

In the hospital setting however, I use the Authorized Version almost exclusively. There are several reasons for this.

1.   The AV is the translation that I grew up reading and memorizing from. Often while ministering I find myself quoting the Scripture instead of reading it. This makes for a better flow to the ministering efforts.

2.   Many of the passages that are appropriate for the hospital ministry settings are well known and easily recognizable when read from the AV. The 23rd Psalm may not be recognized by the patient if read from a modern translation. The failure to recognize it will diminish the comforting effect of the Passage.

3.   For many people, especially in the Bible Belt, the use of translations other than the AV is tantamount to blasphemy. While nothing could be further from the truth, arguing the point with a patient is not only futile but only serves to alienate the minister.

The effective minister will know the difference between the Bible as a book of instruction and the Bible as a book of comfort and peace. It is the latter that is most often needed in the hospital.

Chapter 1

Anger = A

Anger is an emotion that is commonly found in the hospital environment. No one is exempt from feelings of anger.

•   Patients become angry at the fact that they are ill, in pain and out of circulation. They may be at a loss of income which threatens their economic well-being maybe to the point of the loss of their home.

•   Family members of the patient may be angry at the fact that they have to suffer in silence for the benefit of the patient. Their life is disrupted as hospitalization is never convenient.

•   Staff members become angry due to job issues and conflicts with co-workers, patients and patient’s family members.

•   Add to this that all of the above groups often bring anger from outside sources into the hospital and the possibility of debilitating anger becomes a very real scenario.

•   Compounding all of this is the fact that many times the real focus of these types of anger is none other than God himself. Since God is all powerful He could have prevented this from happening.

Physicians are all too well familiar with the negative impact of anger on the body’s ability to heal.

Consistent, prolonged levels of anger give a person a five-times-greater chance of dying before age 50. Anger elevates blood pressure, increases threat of stroke, heart disease, cancer, depression, anxiety disorders; and, in general, depresses the immune system(angry people have lots of little aches and pains or get a lot of colds and bouts of flu or headaches or upset stomachs). To make bad matters worse, angry people tend to seek relief from the ill-moods caused by anger through other health-endangering habits, such as smoking and drinking; or through compulsive behavior such as work holism or perfectionism.[1]

The Bible has a great deal to say about anger. God’s way is love of people and anger toward evil. Even when the evil is clearly evident in the life of a person God allows for intense anger toward the evil but not at the price of not loving the offender. The Minister must never forget that the hospital is a place where the unspeakable is often spoken of. He must also never