Caring for the Ones Who Once Carried You
Daily Scripture
Genesis 47:7-12
Joseph brought his father Jacob and gave him an audience with Pharaoh. Jacob blessed Pharaoh, and Pharaoh said to Jacob, “How old are you?” Jacob said to Pharaoh, “I’ve been a traveler for 130 years. My years have been few and difficult. They don’t come close to the years my ancestors lived during their travels.” Jacob blessed Pharaoh and left Pharaoh’s presence. Joseph settled his father and brothers and gave them property in the land of Egypt, in the best location in the land of Rameses, just as Pharaoh had ordered. Joseph provided food for his father, his brothers, and his father’s entire household, in proportion to the number of children.
Daily Reflection & Prayer
By now, Joseph’s entire family has resettled together in Egypt, reunited after decades of separation and grief. Joseph rose to become the second most powerful man in the country, using that position to store grain and save Egypt, and eventually his own family, from famine. Now his elderly father Jacob has arrived, and Joseph brings him before Pharaoh himself.
Jacob once fed and clothed and provided for a household of twelve sons. Now Joseph does the providing. The roles have fully reversed. He arranges land, secures food, and makes sure his aging father has everything he needs in a country that isn’t even home. Jacob stands in front of the most powerful man in the world and describes his own life as “few and difficult,” an old man’s honest accounting of a life that held more grief than he expected. And it’s his son, the one he grieved as dead for over twenty years, who is now the one making sure he’s cared for.
Joseph settles the family, provides the food, makes the calls, all while running an entire nation’s food supply during a famine. Wesleyan tradition calls this kind of care a work of mercy, one of the means through which God’s grace moves in both directions, into the person giving it and into the person receiving it. Will Willimon, who has written about what it means to grow old within the church, put words to what Jacob is living out here. Needing someone else’s care, he writes, is “part of the price we pay for loving and being loved.”* Anyone who has watched a parent grow older while still managing their own household, their own job, their own kids, knows this particular stretch. It’s not just physically demanding. It’s disorienting to become the strong one for the person who used to be your strength, while everything else in your life still needs just as much from you as before.
- Think of a need in an aging parent’s or loved one’s life that you can see coming but haven’t addressed yet, because they haven’t brought it up themselves. What’s one conversation about the future you’ve been putting off, and have you asked God for the courage to start it?
- Joseph is caring for his aging father while still governing an entire nation. Where in your life right now are you being pulled between more than one generation’s needs at once, whether that’s parents, kids, work, or all of it together? Where do you need to trust God enough to ask for help instead of assuming it all has to fall on you?
Prayer
Lord, you see what it costs to care for the ones who once cared for me. When I feel stretched between generations, between responsibilities that all seem to demand everything, give me your strength for today rather than worry about tomorrow. Help me hear the hard and honest things people I love say about their own lives without rushing to fix them. And when I need help managing what I’ve been given, give me the humility to ask for it. Amen.
GPS Insights
Melanie Hill
Melanie Hill is the Director of Operations and Community Life at Resurrection West. Whether she’s streamlining operations, celebrating 26 years of marriage to her husband, Britton, or cheering on their four amazing kids (including a proud Navy mom!), When she’s off the clock, you'll usually find her with a great book in hand or tracking down the best plate of nachos in town.
Youth is wasted on the young, they say—mostly because we’re too busy mourning the loss of our own bedrooms to realize we’re standing right in the middle of a legacy.
I grew up in a family with four kids in a house with four bedrooms. That meant someone always had to share. As a kid stuck right in the middle, I always drew the short straw and bunked with my sister. But then, when I was in eighth grade, we moved to a house that finally had a room for everyone.
I was so excited to finally get my own room! It was perfect. For about three weeks.
Then my grandfather passed away, and my parents sat me down to explain that Grandma was going to be moving in with us—and she needed my room.
It was such a mixed bag of emotions for a middle school kid. On one hand, I really loved my grandma. On the other, those three weeks had been absolute paradise. I was sure I was going to be sad forever.
My grandmother lived with us for the next five years. She taught me new card games, watched sappy movies with me, and helped me memorize the book of James for church camp. During those years, I finally got my driver’s license and promptly drove her all over town.
My grandmother loved to go dancing. Every free Friday night, she roped me into getting dressed up and driving her to the community center for singles night. I was her official geriatric wingman. Older gentlemen loved getting to teach me how to box step, and I loved introducing them to my grandma. It wasn’t long after that she found someone special, got married, and moved out.
I got my room back just in time for my senior year. This time, though, I wasn’t quite as excited as I had been before. I missed her. Even though she was just across town, it wasn’t the same. She had become such a pivotal part of my teenage years, and I wouldn’t have traded that time for anything—not even my own room.
These days, I find myself smack in the middle of the parenting sandwich: parenting my own teens while caring for my aging parents. Having had the amazing experience of living with my grandmother during my youth has deeply shaped how I parent today. It inspired me to intentionally foster those same rich connections between my own parents and my kids.
I love watching my son call his grandfathers, who served in the Army, to talk shop whenever he has new orders or hits a milestone in the Navy. Or listening to my oldest daughter, an artist like my mom, chat away about new creative techniques and mediums.
There is truly nothing more precious than having the honor of bridging the gap between the generations for the people you love most.
So, here’s to the roommates who change our lives, the memories built in the cramped seasons, and the beautiful chaos of the middle.
© 2026 Resurrection: A United Methodist Church. All Rights Reserved.
Scripture quotations are taken from The Common English Bible ©2011. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
References
* Will Willimon, Aging: Growing Old in Church (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2020).
