It was 8:30 a.m. on a weekday morning, I was brushing my teeth and my wife was combing her hair when the call came in. It was one of those calls that you never want to receive. A friend of ours called to let us know that her sister and brother-in-law had just given birth to their first child, the baby was in Sick Kids Hospital and was not
going to live. We made the 1 hour trip to sit with the family as they grieved the inevitable. It was not long after we left that afternoon that the baby passed on.
Death is always hard even if the person has lived to a “good old age” and the passing is expected. However, when the death is of an infant the impact is greatly increased because it doesn’t seem fair that this person never had a chance to live their life.
Ministering to a family during the death of an infant is extremely difficult and the issue of a child’s stand before God is guaranteed to come up. As a minister how do you deal with this important question? Here are a couple of articles that help bring this quandary into perspective.
The blog the Cripplegate addressed this issue this past summer with two posts called “What Happens To Infants Who Die?” Here is their article from the Old Testament perspective and here is the New Testament perspective.
Canadian blogger, Tim Callies takes into consideration various religious traditions in his article. “What Happens To Child Who Die?”
The death of child a journey none of us want to take but it is taken almost every day. I hope these articles equip you to minister well if a family in need calls on you in their time of crisis.
“The true character of ministry is a servant’s heart.” Harold Warner
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