Jun
22
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Filed under Biblical Womanhood | 52home 7:28 a.m. Love Worn
As a pastor’s wife, I’ve often had a front row seat to observe people walk through trying circumstances. It invigorates my soul and builds my faith to see God’s grace at work in their lives.
Yet to be completely honest, I’ve also wrestled with questions, fears, and doubts as I’ve watched godly people experience severe trials such as a child being born with a disability. Why did God allow this to happen? Why hasn’t God healed their child? What is God’s plan and purpose in this suffering?
As in every arena of life, we must resolve our questions and fight our doubts and fears through Holy Scripture. To help us discover what God’s Word has to say regarding people with disabilities, we want to encourage you to read an article by Peter Avery: “Then shall the lame man leap like a deer: God and the disabled.”
Himself the father of a disabled daughter, Mr. Avery notes that, “Families never plan to have a disabled child. We live in a society that strives for and idolizes perfection, with people paying exorbitant amounts of money to have reconstructions done on their bodies.” But, he also observes that one in five of his native Australians have a disability.
So, he continues, “The question I want to ask is, ‘How do people with bodies that are less than perfect fit into God’s world?’ What is the big picture of how God views his creation? How does he view people with disabilities? How should we view them? How do people with disabilities fit into his plan?” In this honest, thorough, and hope-filled survey, Mr. Avery outlines what Scripture has to say in answer to these questions.
Even if you do not have a family member who has a disability, no doubt you know someone who does. This article will arm you with a biblical viewpoint and equip you to more effectively care for the disabled and their loved ones.
(Thanks to our friends at The Briefing for allowing us to make this article available to our readers free of charge.)
—from the archives
A few weeks ago, John Piper preached a powerful sermon on the suffering of children with disabilities: “Why Was This Child Born Blind?”:
The issue may be autism or Down syndrome or FASD or spina bifida or blindness or any number of rare and unpronounceable conditions—each has its own peculiar sorrows, its own peculiar way of turning decades into what you never dreamed or planned they would be. Married life isn’t what you thought it would be. Everything is irrevocably changed, and life will never be the same again. And you were not asked.
What would I do as a pastor if I had to face these things—these children, these parents—with a Bible that said nothing about it? What if all I could do is think up ideas on my own about suffering and disability? What if all I had was human opinions? I thank God that this is not our condition. The Bible is permeated with suffering and sorrow. This is one of the things that make it so believable. It is filled with things that God has said and done to shed light on these sufferings and sorrows.
You can listen to the entire sermon online or read the transcript.
The Desiring God blog followed this with sermon with several amazing testimonies of grace. First, John Piper’s three-part interview with John Knight, followed by the story of Greg and Kim Lucas and their son:
“When you say there is no difference between men and women, you hurt, more than anyone, women,” laments Kevin DeYoung in his recent message at the NEXT Conference, “Who Am I? Humanity in the Eyes of the World and the Christian.”
Kevin spent fifteen minutes of his hour-long talk contrasting God’s view of gender with the cultural view that there is no difference between men and women, and the accompanying dangers of such faulty thinking. “I hope you see how patently unbiblical this is” he said. “God made them, in the beginning, male and female. And we see already in Genesis, before The Fall, that there were distinct yet complementary roles for men and women.”
The entire message is packed full of biblical insight, clear cultural analysis, and humor. We highly recommend you listen and learn.
(And for all of you moms with young kids, don’t despair for want of an hour. Break it into seven ten-minute segments and you’ll be finished by the end of the week!)
Steve and I have been great friends with Gary and his wife Dawn for several years now. Recently, they watched their four young grandkids for a week which inspired Gary to compose the following top ten list:
1. The soap dispenser has more water in it than soap.
2. When you go into the pantry in the morning, the cereal boxes are all opened and there are crumbs on the floor.
3. Your house looks like the Caterpillar Room in Toy Story 3
4. You begin to believe that their mom really does allow them to watch Star Wars every day.
5. You’ve broken up more fights than the United Nations.
6. You don’t panic when your grandson announces that he just finished off the chocolate milk from the Red Robin glass that has been sitting in a hot car for over 24 hours.
7. Nobody can find the TV remote, the DVD remote, or half the Wii remotes.
8. You wonder why you ask who did it, because you know everone’s answer will obviously be, “Not me”.
9. They have more loop-holes in your instructions than a legal firm could find.
10. When someone asks them, “Who is looking forward to seeing Mommy and Daddy tomorrow?”, your hand is the first one in the air.
Happy Father’s Day to all of the fathers and grandfathers—especially to CJ, Brian, Steve and Mike!
the girltalkers
Rachel Jankovic—a wife and mother of five little ones—has a must-read post for mothers at the Desiring God blog today:
If you are a Christian woman who loves the Lord, the gospel is important to you. It is easy to become discouraged, thinking that the work you are doing does not matter much. If you were really doing something for Christ you would be out there, somewhere else, doing it. Even if you have a great perspective on your role in the kingdom, it is easy to lose sight of it in the mismatched socks, in the morning sickness, in the dirty dishes. It is easy to confuse intrigue with value, and begin viewing yourself as the least valuable part of the Church.
There are a number of ways in which mothers need to study their own roles, and begin to see them, not as boring and inconsequential, but as home, the headwaters of missions.
My fellow moms, we need to read and re-read articles like this every week to help us keep the gospel in view. Read the whole thing here.
