This was the largest coffin I had ever seen. It was 2m long, 1m wide and 1m deep. It was oblong in shape, with no shape at all to it, in the conventional sense of a coffin, and in this coffin lay the mortal remains of someone who had become a friend:Chris, who weighed over 40 stone.
Our first meeting with Chris was via Social Services, who had phoned and said that he and his wife, Lana, were living in bad conditions with two children and if we did not take them in, they were going to take the children away. So we met this huge man with his wife. To say he was aggressive, I think, was mild. Not violent, but threatening. There is a difference. He didn't like the fact that his life was being interfered with by the Local Authority. In fact, anybody who came at him from an authoritative angle, he was against.
We had a two-bedroom house at the end of a cul-de-sac that we were able to put Chris, his two kids and his wife into. But we soon discovered that Chris had children by a previous marriage and these were lads in their late teens/early twenties. We had complaints from the neighbours that they were whizzing up and down the street, coming down the cul-de-sac one way and then reversing back up just at the same speed. They were bringing with them goods that evidently were not bona fide.
So we went and talked to Chris and he agreed that he did not want his lads visiting like this, and what should he do. We told him we would write a letter to pin on the wall saying that, if his boys continue to visit, we would have to terminate his tenancy. We wrote the letter, which he pinned on this wall, and it began to cure the problem, but the damage was done. The neighbours did not want them there, and so within 6 months we moved them to a five-bedroom detached house which we had recently bought. Lana's grandfather came and visited and stayed to help with the family. Lana also became pregnant again and a little girl was born.
We soon discovered with Chris that his weight was due not to over-eating, but to a medical condition. This affected the whole of his health. Going up and down stairs was a problem. Not only did he break the stairs so that we had to reinforce them, but also it hindered his breathing and his heart. So we applied for a grant to put a downstairs bathroom and toilet in for him and a large shower where he could shower himself down.
The grant was approved, but we were told we would have to wait for the money to come through. So we waited and waited and waited.
Sixteen months after the grant had been approved, Chris had a stroke and died. That's the reason I was viewing his coffin.
Perhaps if the system had worked properly and the grant had been made straight away and the new facility had been put in when it should have been, this lady would have still have a husband and the three children would still have a father.
Lana's grandfather has now joined the Church, has come to Christ and been baptised. I remember some three months before Chris died, I had talked to him, and he said "I know you care, cocker", and on that day I half hugged him, that was all my arms could encompass. I hope that Chris found grace and favour in the sight of the Lord.
I have learned a lesson from this. As a Church of Christ, it is the body of Christ who are given responsibility. If this should ever happen again, then I believe we need to fund that bathroom and toilet, because nationally and locally often our services fail and we failed this man. A lesson learned and we move on.
Read some of their stories as recounted by Pastor Pete Cunningham, director of Green Pastures.