Bringing the Sunshine

Today I have another guest author.

Last week I posted this image on my Facebook page.  It is from a blog called  Bringing the Sunshine 
It was featured last week on the website IDSC for Life

I got a response from my step-sister.  Her daughter had written a speech on people with special needs.  Ahsby Morkunas' speech follows.

Have you ever walked into a store and seen a disabled or disfigured person?

What was your reaction when you saw him?

Were you uncomfortable and did you avert your eyes?

Did you look upon him in sympathy, thinking what a misfortune had befallen him?

Were you awkward and nervous around him?

Did you feel sorry for his parents?

Or did you pay no attention to him in an attempt to pretend you didn’t see?

I have a friend whose name is Ben. He is 15 and, like most boys his age, he gets loud and animated. He loves to play laser-tag and build with Lego’s. He laughs and welcomes a good joke. He adores his dog. He becomes engaged in his favorite books. The movies he most enjoys are noisy and action-packed. He is confident, outgoing, and excited to connect with any new person he meets.

However, while Ben is similar to other boys, he is also very different…

He has a protruding chest, slanting and sunken eyes, a flattened nose, tubes sticking out of his stomach, an awkward gait, hearing aids, a strong lisp, and a severe under-bite.

Down’s syndrome, cleft lip and pallet, and major heart problems are only a few of the innumerable challenges he has faced over the years.

The greatest mental age level he is ever anticipated to reach is nine.

Before the age of two Ben had undergone approximately twenty surgeries, two of which were open-heart. Today, his mother has lost count, though she is certain his surgeries are well over fifty.

When his mother was pregnant with him, a woman at church approached her and asked: “So, are you going to keep it?”

Local Universities knowing of his condition told his parents that is was their responsibility and civil duty to abort him and they “charitably” offered their services for free.

In public, people would see this child’s face and recoil as they murmured amongst themselves.

Despite all this, when his mother was asked what was wrong with him, she would simply smile and reply, “Nothing.”

Being diagnosed with “unusual” or “different” symptoms, such as those that Ben has, is a virtual death sentence to nine out of ten fetuses in America.

But do any of these unique qualities make him less valued by God?
Wrongfully, we frequently think that a person’s value is in his or her ability to “do”—to accomplish something; to contribute. But this is not so in God’s economy where a person’s value lies in their ability to love, and to be loved.

How did Christ treat the disabled?

Generally, when we see a disabled person, we unconsciously tend to do the opposite of what Jesus did. While we might be uncomfortable, critical, repulsed, saddened, and nervous, Christ did not respond in this way. He healed, loved, encouraged, and spoke with them as he did everyone.

Like us, disabled people are created in the image of God. We are called to love them. We should not shun them. Rather, we should treat them as we do everyone else: as human beings, for that is what they are. Moreover, there are many important things we can learn from them.

As Ben’s older brother states: [quote] “In reality, Ben’s disabilities are that which empower him. Persons with mental handicaps are not disadvantaged, but in many ways are stronger and happier than so-called ‘normal’ people.

The simplicity of the mentally handicapped allows them to be happier. They live in the moment, and do not anticipate the future, nor do they dwell on the failures of the past. My brother indiscriminately loves anyone who will give him the time of day. He does not care if you are talented, important, well dressed, or popular. Whether you are handsome or hunchbacked, nine or ninety. If you smile at him, he will smile back and give you a hug.” [end quote]

I cannot say for certain, but it often seems to me that Ben is not plagued by our arch-nemesis: pride.

These attributes, I would add, are a gift, and a great gift at that.

In John’s Gospel, Jesus saw a blind man and his disciples asked him: “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”

Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but that the works of God should be revealed in him.”

Likewise, it is through my friend Ben that God is glorified.

In today’s society we are taught that disabled people are a burden, that they are worthless, that they have nothing to offer; that they are somehow inhuman.

But are they really so unlike you and me?

Regarding the basic commonality of all humanity, Shylock in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice makes an eloquent plea for ‘understanding.’ Doesn’t the same sense carry over to another type of bias?

“Hath not a disabled person eyes? Hath not a disabled person hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions; fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer as a healthy person is? If you prick them, do they not bleed? If you tickle them, do they not laugh?”

And so, I would like to close with this challenge, both to you and to myself: The next time you encounter a handicapped person, remember the words that God spoke to his prophet, Samuel:

“Have no regard for his outward appearance, nor for the maturity of his stature…for man does not see as God sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord sees into the heart.”

Thank you. J