What to Do When Someone You Know Dies

This is a redo of a post I wrote eight years ago. I’ve added items and changed some others because I’ve thought a bit more about this subject over the years.

Yesterday I had to buy a sympathy card because someone I know has died. I didn’t know him well and I don’t know his widow at all, but he helped us out when we needed it, so I am sending a card. I’ve set aside some time this afternoon to compose a note to go with it. 

Since I’ve been on the receiving end of sympathy cards and other kind gestures a few times, I know how important these things are. Sometimes people wonder what they should do, and even if they should do anything at all, thinking it really doesn’t matter a whole lot; but, believe me, it does.

If you hear the news of a death and you wonder for even a second if you should do something, the answer is yes. It doesn’t matter that you didn’t know the deceased well. If you have even a small connection, your thoughtfulness will be appreciated. It’s the kindnesses shown, even by those they hardly know, that get the family through the difficult first days after a death. Until you’ve experienced it, you have no idea how much these little things help. 

Here are ten suggestions for things you can do what to do when someone you know dies. 

1. Send a card or letter. Just a signed card is fine, but a card with a short personal note is better. Write down what you admired about the deceased or how they encouraged you. If you didn’t know the person well, you can always write something like one note I received that said something like this: “I didn’t know him well, but when I saw him, he was always smiling and friendly.” Chances are, the family will go through those cards again and again for a few weeks, and the visiting relatives will want to see them, too. People who have never been interested in cards, even their own birthday cards, will be comforted by sympathy cards and notes. 
   
   Keep the family’s religious beliefs in mind when you pick out a card. I don’t mean you have to go against your own beliefs, just that you should try to chose a card that won’t be offensive to them. (And for goodness sake, don’t choose one of the silly ones that say, “Our prayers go out to you.” What good is that?)
   
   
2. Send flowers. Yes, they may get too many, but not necessarily. In some circles there is a reluctance to spend money on something as impractical as flowers, but the family will need some for the funeral or memorial service. If nobody sends flowers, they may end up having to purchase them. If you are worried there will be too many bouquets, send one carefully chosen flower or a small spray. The family can always give extra bouquets as thank you gifts to people who do big favours for them.
   
   
3. Give food. It doesn’t have to be a whole meal, or even a main course. Bake buns or a loaf of bread or a batch of cookies. Take over a frozen pizza or a bowl of fresh fruit. Make a pot of soup or chili. If you have no time for cooking, buy a deli meat and cheese tray. Chances are, they will have visitors to feed, and your contribution, whatever it is, will help. You can also put your food offering in a disposable freezer container and suggest that they freeze it for later if they need to. 
   
   
4. Give to a good cause in the deceased person’s name and let the family know of your gift. If they died of a particular disease, you can  give to a charitable organization that helps people with that disease. If they had a particular cause they cared about, give to that cause in their name. If there is a memorial fund, you can donate there. If the family is Christian, you can place Bibles in their name through the Gideons. Gideon Bible donations work particularly well if you can only give a small amount. You can just write on your card to the family that you donated 2 (or however many) Bibles in the deceased’s name. 
   
   
5. Visit. Or at least call to see if you can make a brief visit. A short visit will let them know that you aren’t scared to be around them and that you won’t be avoiding them because of their grief. (And you shouldn’t be scared to be around them. Most likely they won’t break down during the few minutes you’re there.) Be yourself and don’t worry about choking up or crying a little. 
   
   
6. Tell them your memories of their loved one. Stories are good, but doesn’t have to be a story. It might be just a remembrance of what they liked to put on their hot dogs, or how they used to walk to school in the winter without a hat or mittens. They will be hungry for details at this time, so whatever you’ve got, they’ll want to hear it, even if they’ve heard it all before. 
   
   
7. Offer to do something specific for them. Think about what chores they need done and ask if you can do one or two of them. Perhaps you could take the children to the Dairy Queen or walk the dog. They’ll need groceries; can they give you a list of items to pick up? 
   
   
8. Go to the funeral or memorial service. You don’t have to stay around after the service, and you don’t have to go through a receiving line, although it’s better if you do. You can just attend and sign the guest book so they know you were there. Once again, you shouldn’t worry that you were not close enough to the deceased or to the family to be there. Just attend the service and know that it will be appreciated. If you are worried that you won’t know anyone, you can ask a friend to go with you for moral support.
   
   
9. Invite the family or spouse of the deceased over for coffee or out for a walk a couple of weeks after the death. It may be hard for them to go out in public, yet they may be tired of being cooped up at home. You will be helping them make the transition back to regular life. 
   
   
10. Pray for them. Pray that they will be comforted; pray that God will give them joy in sorrow and strength to carry on. Pray that they will see God’s hand in their circumstances. Pray that he will give them everything they need. And be sure tell them that you are praying for them and, better yet, what you are praying for them. Knowing you are praying will bring comfort.

The most important thing to remember is that exactly what you do isn’t as important as that you do something to acknowledge the death. If you’ve procrastinated until you’re afraid it’s too late, take heart; it’s not. A month later or half a year later, your gesture will still be appreciated. Who knows, it might even be more appreciated, because by then the dust has settled and reality has set in.

Theological Term of the Week

mortification
The believer’s lifelong fight against sin with the goal of victory over it; the Christian’s active putting to death of self and sin.

• From scripture: 
  

  For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

  Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. (Colossians 3:3-10 ESV)

• From the Second Helvetic Confession:

  Chapter XIV

  Of Repentance and the Conversion of Man

  … We also disapprove of those who think that by their own satisfactions they make amends for sins committed. For we teach that Christ alone by his death or passion is the satisfaction, propitiation or expiation of all sins (Isa., ch.53; I Cor. 1:30). Yet as we have already said, we do not cease to urge the mortification of the flesh. We add, however, that this mortification is not to be proudly obtruded upon God as a satisfaction for sins, but is to be performed humble, in keeping with the nature of the children of God, as a new obedience out of gratitude for the deliverance and full satisfaction obtained by the death and satisfaction of the Son of God.

• From Eighteen Words by J. I. Packer:

This is our aim; so to drain the life out of sin that it never moves again. We are not promised that we shall reach our goal in this life, but we are commanded to advance towards it by assaulting those inclinations and habits in which sin’s presence is recognized. We are not merely to resist its attacks. We are to take the initiative against it. We must seek, in Owen’s phrase, ‘not a mere disappointment of sin, that it be not  brought forth … but a victory over it, and pursuit of it to a complete conquest’; not merely the counteraction, but the eradication of it. Killing, so far as we can compass that, is the end in view.

• From A Discourse of Mortification by Stephen Charnock:

Let us labour to mortify sin. If we will not be the death of sin, sin will be the death of our souls. Though the allurements of sin may be pleasant, the propositions seemingly fair, yet the end of all is death, Rom. v. 21. Death was threatened by God and executed upon Adam; death must be executed upon our sins, in order to the restoration of the eternal life of our souls. Love to everlasting life should provoke us, fear of everlasting death should excite us to this, the two most solemn and fundamental passions that put us upon action. ‘Why will you die?’ was God’s expostulation, Ezek. xxxiii. 11; Why should thou, O my soul, for a short vanishing pleasure, venture an eternal death? should be our expostulation with ourselves. This would be a curing our disease, bringing our soul into that order in part which was broken by the fall; by this the power of that tyrant that first headed and maintained the faction against God would be removed, and the soul recover that liberty and life it lost by disobeying of God. This would conduce to our peace. We have then a sprouting assurance when we are most victorious over our lusts: after every victory, God gives us a taste of the hidden manna, Rev. ii. 17. Unmortified lusts do only raise storms and tempests in the soul; less pains are required to the mortification of them than to the satisfaction of them. Sin is a hard taskmaster; there must be a pleasure in destroying so cruel an inmate. Gratitude engages us; God’s holiness and justice bruised Christ for us, and shall not we kill sin for him? An infinite love parted with a dear Son, and shall not our shallow finite love part with destroying lusts? We cannot love our sins so much as God loved his Son: he loved him infinitely. If God parted with him for us, shall not we part with our sins for him? He would have us kill it because it hurts us; the very command discovers affection as well as sovereignty, and minds us of it as our privilege as well as our duty. And to engage us to it, he hath sent as great a person to help us as to redeem us, viz, his Spirit; he sent one to merit it, and the other to assist us in it and work it in us, who is to bring back the creature to God by conquering that in it which hath so long detained it captive.

Learn more:

1. Sinclair Ferguson: The Practice of Mortification
2. Greg Herrick: “Of the Mortification of Sin in Believers” - An Outline, Exposition and Summary
3. A. W. Pink: The Doctrine of Mortification
4. Christopher Love: The Mortification of Sin
5. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Mortification of Sin (mp3)

Related terms:

• repentance
• sanctification

Filed under Salvation.

Do you have a term you’d like to see featured here as a Theological Term of the Week? If you email it to me, I’ll seriously consider using it, giving you credit for the suggestion and linking back to your blog when I do.

Clicking on the Theological Term graphic at the top of this post will take you to a list of all the previous theological terms in alphabetical order.

Round the Sphere Again: Understanding Scripture

Bible Study
Kim Shay continues her Training in Righteousness series with a post explaining the clarity, necessity, and sufficiency of Scripture (The Upward Call).

Word Use
From Doug Moo, a graphic explaining the various ways Paul uses “law” in his writings (Between Two Worlds).

Scholar Pastor
I’ve been making my way through these excellent—and down-to-earth—sermons on Romans by Tom Schriener, who’s written a well-respected commentary on the book.