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A one year old boy, who could have a tracheotomy, be taken home from the hospital and live his life, may have his ventilator removed at the wishes of his mother and the HOSPITAL TRUST PAYING FOR HIS CARE, because his severe physical disability has been deemed 'intolerable suffering'. His father disagrees and is fighting for his son's life.
In honor of Reformation Day, the anniversary of when, in 1517 Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to the Wittenberg University’s Castle Church door, boldly declaring where the Church needed reform, I'm writing my own thoughts about the Church and some places where we still need reformation. Of course, this post will lead to inclusion of people with disabilities, because, well, that seems to be what I do.
There are two religions in this world. One is based on works, the other on grace. The religion based on works requires its disciples to work through law, rite, or service to make that disciple in right standing with the god of this religion. The God of the second religion, that based on grace, demands perfection unto His Law; however, when man failed and fails, this God has given mankind His own righteousness through His Son, the Second Person in the Trinity that calls Itself God, a righteousness contingent only on faith in this Holy Son and His atoning work on the Cross.
The disciples of this second God- of this One True God- the adopted sons and heirs, join together according to the Word of this God, as one Body, and we call ourselves the Church, with Christ as our Head. Like the followers of the first religion, the Church has a law, the Law of God, though our Law has been fulfilled by this Christ, and we members of the Body now walk by faith in our Savior, Christ Jesus', work and in the Spirit, Who is the Third Person of this Triune God. We perform rituals in our church gatherings as does the first religion, though our rituals, rituals of baptism and the communion of the saints, focus not on our attempts to gain righteousness but rather on the One Who obtained righteousness for us.
And, as do followers of the first religion, Christians, those of the Body, of the Church, we perform acts of service. As is the Law, Christians, attempt to love God and love our neighbors by serving our community and serve others.
However, unlike those following the first religion, Christians are not attempting to earn our place in our God’s Kingdom through this service, though serving God and serving others is part of God’s Kingdom. In fact, daily lawbreakers, we could never serve enough to enter that Kingdom.
Nor are we serving God through our own power or our own nature. We are serving God because we have a new nature, and a new Power- the Holy Spirit, given to us through the work of the Cross, upon our belief in Christ, this work, and the repentance of our sins. We are serving humanity- offering grace and mercy to one another- in response to how we were shown grace and mercy, in response to how we were invited into that Kingdom based solely on the death and resurrection of our King. We love because we have been loved.
Based upon this motivation for service and community within our own Body, we take seriously our Savior’s teachings on service and community. The fourteenth chapter of Luke’s gospel, verses 7 through 24, includes one such teaching. Through instruction and parable, Jesus shares His Father’s desire that, oh, may His house be full! He teaches us that His Father wants those at His table those who cannot repay His kindness- ‘the poor and the crippled and the blind and the lame' (vs 13) (as if people who are not poor or who do not have a disability could pay Him back). In fact, He says to compel them to come, revealing the earnestness of His heart toward the least in this world, those same ‘least’ who will become great in His Kingdom.
How does this teaching apply to Christ’s Church 2,000 years after its original exhortation? It applies the same way. There are still those who are ‘great’ in this world, and those who are poor or who have disabilities are still regarded as ‘the least’. Sadly the world’s view of who is great and who is the least is often paralleled in the Church.
Thankfully, the Spirit of God is working in the same way that He has for 2,000 years. He still convicts the Church, both the individual member and the entire of Body, of sin, and He is convicting me of my exclusionary practices of the ‘least of these’ in my church’s gatherings.
So, what do inclusionary practices of the ‘least of these’ look like? Inclusionary practices begin by being reminded of how all inclusion to the Body begins. It begins with the Cross and how Christ, forgiving us of our sin, reconciles us with God, making us His child and a member of Christ’s Body. We must be reminded that God never needed our able bodies or cognitive awareness or our large bank accounts to forgive us our sin, to give us faith, and to make us one with Him and His community. In that regard, we become aware that we are no different than our poor and/or disabled brother and sister.
When we become aware of the absolute equality with ‘the least’, community- koinonia- the Greek word used 20 times in Scripture for 'fellowship, sharing in common, communion'- makes sense! We are equally created in the image of God, we are equal in our human depravity, and we are equal in that any grace anyone has received has been from God. We are one Body.
Therefore, as one Body, if one member suffers, we all suffer. When one rejoices, we all do. When one holds a banquet, all are invited.
Whether through formal programming, or just meeting an individual or family where he or they are suffering or struggling, any church can do ‘disability ministry’. The call is for all, for all of the Body, to invite, to compel, ‘the poor and the crippled and the blind and the lame’ into the Kingdom of God and sharing a meal- that is, offering them repentance and the forgiveness of sin through Jesus' name, and truly becoming one Body- for the grace of God is for them, too!- in loving response to how the Father first invited us. This is how we reveal the religion of grace to the world.
"'Rational' Suicide Advocates Push Assisted Suicide in Mental Health Journals"- A podcast edition of bioethicist Wesley J. Smith's 'What It Means to be Human'
John Shelby Spong is not my liberator.
This is God's justice. I sinned homosexually. Jesus suffered and died for that sin, removing the wrath of God from me.
'Quality of life'. Brothers and sisters, can we think about that phrase for a moment? Can we think about what we are saying when we are using it? Can we, as Christians, really use that phrase?
A recent study says that ninety-two percent of women who discover they are carrying a child with Down syndrome opt to abort the pregnancy.
Early in Scripture we read a seemingly disheartening command of God. None of the offspring of Aaron, the priests of Israel, who had a disability could go through the veil and approach God’s altar, ‘lest he profane God’s sanctuaries’. (Leviticus 21:23) In addition, for sacrifice, God only accepted ‘perfect’ animals, those without blemish or illness. Yet, even men in ‘perfect’ bodies sacrificing ‘perfect’ animals were not perfect enough to purify us once for all time- as was the perfect sacrifice made by Jesus Christ (Hebrews 7:26-28).
The animals sacrificed were a foreshadow and type of this perfect sacrifice to come. The sacrificed animals and the men entering into God’s holiest place on Earth had to be as perfect as they could be to mimic the Christ. However, neither were really perfect.
All priests had to offer sacrifices for themselves before offering sacrifices for the people, for these priests sinned. Because of this sin, their bodies wouldn’t remain perfect forever. They would with age begin to wither, fail, and die. Had they not been sacrificed the bodies of these perfect animals, also, would also have grown old and died because sin was in the world.
God considered, for the Old Testament system of sacrifice, disability ‘profane’. God always considers sin profane. Could disability be profane because it is a result of sin in the world?
Yet, God doesn’t shun the person with the disability. He still refers to Himself as their God, as the God Who sanctifies them. (Leviticus 21:21, 23) In His same grace and mercy, God doesn’t shun His sin-drenched people.
God is a God of both justice and love. God hates sin. Sin must be atoned for. However, God loves His people, and for His Holy namesake, forgives His people for their sin, sending His own Son as atonement. For we His people cannot atone for ourselves.
We are not saved by our own righteousness. Our righteousness is like filthy rags. The only righteousness we have to offer God is that which was imputed to us by Christ at His sacrifice. The only sacrifices we have to offer God are a broken spirit and a contrite heart. God draws near to the humble. God knows we are weak, that we are only dust. He takes pity on the weak, and, while He demands us to do so, also, as Job found out, caring for the weak- the blind and the lame- did not even make him righteous ‘enough’. (Job 29:15)
There is hardly a greater a symbol of weakness than disability or illness, and these people to whom God seems most drawn. While they were forbidden to enter the holy of holies, God comes to them. To people like Paul who know that because God’s grace is made perfect in our weakness, when we are weak they are strong. The only strength that is to be relied upon is God’s, as the only righteousness that is to be counted is Christ’s. It is God Who opens the eyes of the blind and the deaf, makes the lame man leap, and the tongue of the mute sin for joy (Isaiah 35:5-6), and in His justice, Jesus came to open the eyes of the Spiritually blind. (John 9:39)
Interestingly, God calls people to weakness- before He calls us to stand and to run. He calls us to repentance, to a time of contriteness and humility at salvation, making us His. When we are God’s we rely on God’s strength, and, therefore, must die to our own.
In our weaknesses, God glorifies Himself. It was because of a bodily ailment that Paul first preached the Gospel to the Galatians. (Galatians 4:13) God is just as glorified by leaving Paul with his ‘thorn’ in 2 Corinthians 12, as when Jesus gives glory to Him through the healing of a man born blind in John 9.
God receives glory in His compassion for the suffering and the hurting. Jesus, for instance, Who only did the work that He saw His Father doing first, (John 5:19) ministered to and healed people with disabilities, illnesses, and sin. He was filled with compassion for the widow whose only son had passed away. After raising the son from the dead, He returned him to His mother. This most compassionate act caused the people to cry, “God has visited His people!” (Luke 7:11-18)
In the resurrection of Christ, those of us called by God unto salvation, having had our spiritual eyes opened, have hope of an end to suffering. Our physical weaknesses will have an ending. We will not always be disabled, old, and emotionally vulnerable. Most excitedly, in our new bodies we will no longer battle with sin. One day, we will be perfect (1 Corinthians 15).
However, even in our perfect bodies in our perfect Home, human beings, once being imperfect, children of wrath and enemies of God, we will always remain dependent on Christ and His perfect sacrifice. Upon Christ, who embraced weakness by putting human flesh and dying our death (Philippians 2:5-11) , to bring us to God (1 Peter 3:18), to give us eternal life (John 3:16), which is knowing God (John 17:3), forever in perfect harmony with our Creator.
As both a Christian and a caregiver for the elderly and those with disabilities, I'm struck with this Biblical view point- sin obstructs our decision making process. In our fallen state, we often make choices, including medical choices, for the wrong reasons- often for motives that appeal to the flesh or mere human reasoning. While patients should remain a crucial part of the decision making process regarding their medical treatment and doctors should have the freedom to discern the best care for his/her patient, both patients and doctors would be wise to remember that human reasoning does not always lead us to the right choices. Bioethics is attempting to set standards for the conduct of medicine and healthcare in an age of new knowledge and changing science. However, bioethicists are setting these standards from a fallen state of mind. Truth is subjective to them, as are ethics, dependent on such things as a person’s worldview, religion, and philosophy. “There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.” (Proverbs 14:12, 16:25) If this proverb has ever been relevant, it is so with bioethics. When we, as Christians, set standards for how we care for the sick and needy, we must remember that truth is not relative. The truth- the Biblical truth- about who God is and who man is plays a critical role in regard to medical decisions that affect the lives of the weak and the needy. All of those we care for in the hospital bed, teach life skills to in the group home, or 'produce' in the laboratory are deserving of dignity and respect for the sole reason that "In the image of God, made He man." (Genesis 9:6) So, while scientists can manipulate genes and clone embryos, we can never engineer the image of God out of a human being. This truth alone could set the tone for any medical ethic. However, likewise, in our attempts to manipulate genes and clone embryos to eradicate diseases and eliminate disabilities, we can never create a person who will not inherit the struggle with sin. As much as we are created in the image of God, we are also sons of Adam; therefore, there will never be a perfect person. Our only hope remains, as it always has, in Christ and Him crucified. In His work on the cross- the great exchange, the righteous for the unrighteous, the suffering for our sins so He could save us from them and bring us to God. This is incredible mercy and incredible love. Despite the uniqueness of each created person, in these two things- our common created image and our common depravity- man can be considered virtually identical to one another. Our worth could not be contingent upon any work or ability. To say that a person is too weak or does not contribute enough is laughable compared to the greatness and splendor and perfection that is in God! All men fall short of that Glory. We are all too weak and no one ‘contributes’ enough! For all of us, our worth is dependent only on who we are through the work of Christ at the cross. With new life in Christ through the cross, we are given new nature and the told to renew our minds. In both this new nature and in our renewed minds, we view suffering, ethics, and caring for the weak and the vulnerable differently. We now consider those weaker than we are, and we realize that it is a sin to not show them the same grace and mercy we were given, even if one is so weak that he or she is not even cognitively aware of it. Suffering is horrible. It is no light thing. We are better off dead and at peace with our Maker than alive on this dead earth! But in our renewed minds, we know, also, that we cannot take suffering into our own hands, as those in bioethics seem to do. We can never consider breaking God’s commandment to not murder, for instance, through abortion and euthanasia because we deem someone to be suffering too much. We cooperate with nature and conform to the way God created it. For when we attempt to manipulate nature (think of the undignified 'Ashley Treatment') and destroy that which we judge undesirable- destroy whom we judge undesirable because of the sufferings they are given- we question God’s goodness and wisdom leaving us rebuked as Job was- “Where was man when God laid the foundation of the earth?” As we painfully watch those around us suffer, doing all we can to ease their suffering, we are to suffer with those suffering. We are not to cooperate with the hopelessness that suffering brings by manipulating the death one suffering or who we assume will suffer after birth. Instead we offer them and their loved ones the hope of Christ found in His Gospel, that those who call upon His name will be saved from their sin soaked hearts, from the wrath of God, and from hell. And that those who call upon His name will be saved to new life in Christ, to a perfect and holy body in eternity, and the unimaginable joy of eternity in the presence of the Creator. Because of the unity we have with Christ (because of the great love and mercy shown to us at the cross), we, in humility, count others more significant than ourselves. We look not only to our own interests, but also to the interests of others. We have this mind among ourselves, which is ours in Christ Jesus Who, though He was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. (Philippians 2:1-8) And so we humble ourselves to one another, using our freedom to serve one another in love (Galatians 5:13), taking tender care of the weak (1 Thessalonians 5:14), seeking justice and encouraging the oppressed (Isaiah 1:17), and becoming disabled to the disabled (1 Corinthians 9:22) in order to share the Gospel to all people, in hopes that all people will be saved from, among other things, their fallen states of minds, having their minds aligned with Christ and His purposes for all things- including suffering and caring for those suffering.
From the blog post of Tony Jones.
If you are one who thinks that homosexual sex is sinful, can you please explain to me WHY a gay or lesbian person who is in a long-term, monogamous relationship would not be able to wholeheartedly follow Christ?
My only stipulation is this: You may not quote one of the six verses in scripture that mentions homosexuality. Instead, you must use theological and/or philosophical arguments to attempt to convince me that when you have genital contact with someone of your own gender, it somehow inhibits your relationship with Christ.
But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although, the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it- the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who had faith in Jesus. (Romans 3:21-26)
