It seems as though after we lose a loved one we think of ourselves as damaged goods and no longer welcome in church. But, that is a big lie of Satan .

3 “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 4 How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye. Matthew 7:3-5

When I was younger I used to think of the church as a place where perfect people went to socialize and network professionally with others. My parents were invited one time to a friend's home where they thought they were going to have a fun time socializing and getting to know their fellow neighbors.

 Once they stepped in the door of their home they saw all of their neighbors sitting in a circle in the living room talking among themselves.  It wasn't long before a stranger they did not know shared with them the Amway get rich quick plan.  These friends attended the same church as our family.  They were, of course, upset that they were nothing more than dollar signs to this couple, and when the presentation ended they politely thanked them and left without making any commitment to the Amway plan. That was the last time my parents spoke with those neighbors.

What I'm saying is that people do not like being treated as projects so others can put another feather on their cap.  After my tragic loss in 2007, I began to see those sitting in the pews at church as imperfect people struggling with their own pain. Since the beginning of the pandemic, we have seen over 100,000 people commit suicide with another 100,000 dead from opioid overdoses. When you factor in the 900,000 Americans who lose their lives to Covid-19 you can understand the monumental amount of grief out there. 

The question most of us should ask ourselves is this: "What would Jesus do?"  I think the words below written by someone else express exactly what He would do with those he befriends.  

You got hammered at the bar on Saturday, but came to church on Sunday….
You can sit with me, you’re right where you need to be.

 
You’re a drug addict who came to church high this Sunday….
You can sit with me, you’re right where you need to be.

 
You’re divorced and the last church you attended condemned you for it….
You can sit me, you’re right where you need to be.

 
You’ve had an abortion and it’s slowly eating away at your heart, but you came to church on Sunday….
You can sit with me, you’re right where you need to be.

 
You’ve been unfaithful to your spouse but came to church on Sunday….
You can sit with me, you’re right where you need to be.

 
Here’s the thing, people don’t come to church on Sunday for you to sit in the pew and quietly judge them because you feel that you’re somehow better than them.

 People come to church because in their deepest, darkest, most painful moments, they heard about a man named Jesus that could save their soul and transform their life and they’d like to know him.

 
The man that just snorted cocaine off his kitchen table isn’t a bigger sinner than you who told your boss a lie on Monday so you could leave work early.

The drunk man laying on the bar isn’t a bigger sinner than you who occasionally has too much to drink at home in private.

 
The woman that just got caught cheating on her husband isn’t a bigger sinner than you who had sex with your now husband before you were married.

 
Stop judging others because their sin is different than yours.
Romans 3:23-24 says “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.”

 
There isn’t a person in this world too bad, too broken, too mean, or too damaged for Jesus to save.
Romans 10:13 says “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

This article regarding this amazing couple who love the Lord with all their hearts who died one day after each other was published in the Pioneer Press.

 By MARY DIVINE | mdivine@pioneerpress.com | Pioneer Press

PUBLISHED: January 10, 2022 at 6:51 p.m. | UPDATED: January 11, 2022 at 7:05 a.m.

Jim Underdahl died around noon on Christmas Eve.

His wife of almost 64 years, Mary, died two days later — of “a broken heart,” family members say.

The Forest Lake couple “did everything together,” son Paul Underdahl said. “They were inseparable. They worked side by side. They read their Bibles together every morning. They created a ministry together.”

Jim and Mary Underdahl were buried together on Friday – in the same casket – after a shared funeral at Access Church in North Branch. Jim Underdahl was 83; Mary Underdahl was 81.

It’s exactly how his parents would have wanted it, Paul Underdahl said.

Forest Lake residents Jim and Mary Underdahl.(Photo courtesy of Roberts Family Funeral Home)

Jim Underdahl was 17 and a student at Johnson High School in St. Paul when he met Mary Ames, then 15, of Columbia Heights, on a blind date. A mutual friend set them up.




“That was it,” Paul Underdahl said. “It was all done after that first date. There wasn’t a Jim without a Mary, and there wasn’t a Mary without a Jim.”




The couple were married on March 1, 1958, by a Justice of the Peace at the Ramsey County Courthouse in St. Paul. They renewed their vows in 1970 at First St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in St. Paul after Mary Underdahl lost her wedding ring while falling overboard from a rowboat on Mille Lacs.




They renewed them again at their 50th-wedding-anniversary celebration in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico; 60 family members flew there to celebrate with them. They had so much fun, they did it again at a 60th-wedding-anniversary party in Puerto Vallarta, Paul Underdahl said.

Jim Underdahl graduated from Johnson in 1956 and took business classes at the University of Minnesota for two years. Mary Underdahl graduated in 1958 from Columbia Heights High School. She worked at the Bungalow Restaurant in Columbia Heights and went to Ritter School of Cosmetology in St. Paul.

The couple purchased eight acres of land in Forest Lake in 1963. Jim Underdahl, who worked as a plant manager in the fiberglass industry, wanted a hobby farm, and Mary Underdahl wanted space to have her own in-home beauty shop, called “Mary’s Mini Salon.”

In 1982, the Underdahls purchased a fiberglass bath and shower company that was going out of business. They renamed it Royaline Industries and divided up the duties – Jim Underdahl was an expert negotiator, and Mary was a meticulous bookkeeper, Paul Underdahl said.

“My dad was a visionary; my mom was the organizer,” he said. “They complemented each other very well.”

The couple would often stop for an appetizer and a drink at Vanelli’s on the Green in Forest Lake on their way home from work, he said. “They enjoyed each other’s company,” he said. “They loved people.”

The Underdahls worked together until 2001, when they sold the business and retired to their house on Forest Lake’s Second Lake.

The house was a gathering place for the couple’s five children, 29 grandchildren and 29 great-grandchildren. The couple always hosted dinner on Christmas Eve, and the menu was always the same: prime rib cooked on the grill.

Paul Underdahl said he called his father around 11:20 a.m. on Christmas Eve to see what time he should be there to help start the grilling. They arranged for him to come about an hour later.

“My mom was upstairs writing in my dad’s Christmas card,” he said. “I arrived about 12:20, and I walked around the front of the house – that’s where the grills are – and I saw him lying on the ground.”

Jim Underdahl had died just a few minutes earlier of an apparent cardiac arrest.

“The last words my mom heard my dad say were ‘Mary, are the Communion cups ready?’” Jim Underdahl said. The couple served Communion, and Jim Underdahl shared a Biblical message prior to saying grace before dinner on Christmas Eve, he said.

At Mary Underdahl’s request, the family gathered at the house for dinner that evening. “She told my nieces, ‘Make sure you take a lot of pictures tonight,’” he said. “She knew. She absolutely knew.”

The next day, which was Christmas, Mary Underdahl shared a story about her husband. The couple had been reading their Bibles with their morning coffee the week before when Jim Underdahl stopped reading, looked up at his wife and said: “Mary, wouldn’t it be great if we both go together?”

The next morning, Mary Underdahl was in her bedroom when she collapsed. Her children heard her fall, ran up to the room and found her on the floor. “She was gone. No vitals. Nothing. Usually, you at least still have a pulse for a few minutes. She had no pulse whatsoever,” Paul Underdahl said. “She never came back. I think that one half of her had already died. I think it is a Christmas love story orchestrated by God.”

Both Mary and Jim Underdahl had recently seen their doctor, and neither was dealing with life-threatening health issues.

The Underdahls take great comfort in knowing their parents had an “unwavering faith,” Paul Underdahl said. “They lived it and they shared it.”

The couple hired people with disabilities and people who were homeless and often opened up their house to people who needed shelter, he said. “With their success, they blessed others and were both gifted with generosity,” he said.

Their favorite Bible verse was Matthew 7:7-8: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”

The Underdahls are survived by three sons, Greg, Terry and Paul; two daughters, Sue Haseltine and Dana Darling, and 29 grandchildren and 29 great-grandchildren.

Services have been held.

I have known for a while that Suicides among Physician's and nurses have sky rocketed. This article by the sister of the physician who died by suicide emplains why we must do more to help those struggleing with mental health.

 

Featured article from the Hennepin Healthcare Foundation: An "Imperfect storm": Pushing for Change in the Wake of a Physician's Suicide. Written by Dr. Michelle Chestovich, sister of Dr. Gretchen Butler.

For Dr. Gretchen Butler, a social gathering was never just a get-together. It was an opportunity for a theme. " She was the fun one," said her sister, Dr. Michelle Chestovich. "She always brought adventure. Most importantly, she was kind and generous to everyone."

Gretchen worked as a radiologist and beloved teacher at Hennepin Healthcare. She earned honors as chief resident, teaching assistant of the year, and radiology resident of the year.  She was a mentor, a friend, a wife, and a mother of three.

In March of 2021, Gretchen died unexpectantly by suicide.  Now her friends and family are using her story to continue her legacy of care, compassion, and kindness. Working with the Hennepin Healthcare Foundation, they are raising awareness of mental healthcare and funding programs for doctors.

To honor her legacy we need to talk about it," said Michelle. " We need to say this can happen to the most outstanding person with the most loving, supportive family. This is a disease."

Michelle describes the circumstances leading to her sister's death as an imperfect storm."  Gretchen had given birth to her youngest child 18 months before she died.  Gretchen never took a full maternity leave because she felt a responsibility to get back to work.  The stress of being a mom and being a doctor were adding up.  Then Covid hit.

" When the pandemic came we all kind of backed off as a family because we're in healthcare and we didn't want to make each other sick," said Michelle.

Family gatherings through the holidays were conducted via zoom. The pandemic isolation also spread to Gretchen's work, where the normal banter with her colleagues was replaced by the silence of social distance.  For someone who is universally described as empathetic, the trauma of seeing extremely sick COVID patients every day was particularly difficult to process.

Gretchen had been receiving treatment for anxiety at the urging of her family and they thought she was doing better.  Then, after a particularly difficult week, she called her sister saying she felt sick, tired, and exhausted. She told Michelle how much she was looking forward to a trip to Florida the following week when she would have a chance to finally relax. She never took the trip. Gretchen died three days later.

So she was looking ahead. And I don't think it was fake, " said Michelle. " As a family doctor, I treat depression and anxiety regularly.  People say they sometimes have thoughts of hurting themselves. And so many people say, ' I would never do it. I wouldn't do it because of my children.'  I used to believe them, I absolutely don't believe them anymore because this woman loved her children beyond anything.

Gretchen's family and friends decided right away to be open about her cause of death and to work for changes in healthcare to help others who need mental health support.  Michelle says she's pleased to see programs like RISE aimed at helping residents with mental health needs. She wants to make this kind of care more universal, especially for doctors in the years after residency when they are suddenly on their own, often starting families, and teaching and mentoring students.

"We're taught in medical school to stuff our emotions and not cry on the rounds.  And I sort of get why we maybe shouldn't be crying when we're taking care of patients.  But what about afterward?"  said Michelle.  "We just told a young woman that she has breast cancer and isn't going to survive. We just told a mother that her 22-year-old died in a motorcycle accident. We see and deal with trauma every day and no one teaches us how to deal with it"

Michelle says her sister was a perfect example of what we need more of in medicine. We want people who are both driven and empathetic. We want perfectionists who also care about helping colleagues learn and grow. Now, she says, we need to create a system that will support doctors like Gretchen.

"Hopefully, it will be an honor to her, because unfortunately, she's not here, and that hurts my heart tremendously," said Michelle. 

By telling Gretchen's story, Michelle hopes more doctors will have access to the help they need to weather the storms they face and make it to the other side.

If you are struggling with depression during this pandemic of isolation I urge you to tell someone. If you are struggling with a traumatic loss of someone you loved, I urge you to seek the support through Grief Share.  Griefshare.org