Point of View

             My oldest son is about to turn 18.  His peers are busy with graduation and prom celebrations.  They are excited about their plans to go to college or university in the fall.  Those things are not part of Caleb’s world.  He hasn’t finished high school.  As a matter of fact, he hasn’t been to school this year since the first day way back in September.  Why?  Because he has Asperger’s and finds it very difficult to interact with people.  He doesn’t know why people act the way they do and he doesn’t know how to initiate or even respond to people.

            Over 13 years ago, we didn’t have any idea why he would get so upset over what seemed like trivial things.  He was frequently in trouble at school.  His story never matched the one from school personnel or other students.  Actually, his story never matched that of his younger brother either.  We had read an excellent parenting book that really encouraged parents to strongly deal with lying from a young age.  So, we disciplined Caleb for lying.

            I don’t know how long it took, but several years later we understood something:  Caleb wasn’t lying, rather his perspective was just very different from others’.  He saw the world through a mask of anxiety and paranoia.  If someone bumped into him in the hall at school, he understood that he was pushed.  He felt threatened and would push back.  His story was the truth – as he perceived it. 

            It was very difficult to place ourselves in his mind to try to understand things from his perspective. His hierarchy of rules was different from most people.  Rules were very important to him.  If he was told he was not allowed out of the classroom without permission, yet was about to explode with anxiety, he would stay and explode, rather than break the rule to leave the room to calm down in a safe place.

            He would try to “help” a student obey those rules that were so important to him, and would end up getting in trouble for pestering the other student.  He would try to make friends, and would get teased or bullied because he tried to makes friends based on his interests and understanding of reality.  When he reacted to the bullying, the other kids would lie and Caleb would get in trouble.  He actually didn’t know how to lie.  It is a “milestone” that most kids on the autism spectrum don’t reach until many many years after their peers have mastered it.

            Caleb also has trouble understanding anything from another person’s point of view.  Someone with autism thinks that everyone thinks the same way as they do – that there cannot be another way to think about something. There is no flexibility in their thinking. They often think that you have the exact same knowledge and understanding of things as they do.  Caleb’s brother Christopher, also on the autism spectrum, used to get very upset when I didn’t respond to something he expected me to know, even when there was no way that I would have known the information. If he knew the information, then I had to know the same information.

           

            So, where am I going with all this about Caleb?  I believe that all of us, like Caleb, have “distorted” perspectives of reality.  They just are not so obviously different. We often expect (or demand) that people have the same understanding of things that we do. God calls us to unity – but we are often so concerned with who is “right” and who is “wrong,” that we don’t care about what God wants.   Or, someone says something, and we hear and understand something completely different than what was intended and respond in anger or hurt, rather than making the effort to understand.

As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.  Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.  Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. (Eph 4:1-3)

            The apostle Paul urges us to live in unity with our fellow Christians. That takes humility, gentleness, and patience.  It takes love and it takes effort.  For my boys andothers on the autism spectrum, great care and effort is involved in teaching them the skills to be flexible and to realize that other people may think differently about such things.  They are being taught how to live in unity with others.  Most of us don't receive that kind of instruction, even though it is Biblical.  As a result, churches divide over the style of worship music, the method of sharing in the Lord’s supper, or because someone popular gets hurt by someone in leadership.  Unity is sacrificed for pride, self-righteousness, and unforgiveness. 

            Jesus prayed shortly before going to the Garden of Gethsemane to wait for his betrayal and crucifixion:

My prayer is not for them alone.  I also pray for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.  May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.  I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one.  I in them and you in me.  May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. (Jn 17:20-23)

What will show the world that God sent Jesus to love the world?  Our unity. 

            How are you doing at being unified with other believers.  Is your church divided into cliques or “camps.”  Do you harbor resentment against one of the leaders?  Do you think your way to worship God is “the right way,” and that any other way is wrong?  Do you demand that certain “rules” be observed that others do not see as wrong.  Do you simply leave a church when there are problems without making the effort to be united? Are you and your misperceptions and/or sin in the way of the answer to this prayer by our Lord and Saviour?

            I close with a repeat of the Apostle Paul’s appeal to the Church in Ephesus.

As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.  Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.  Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. (Eph 4:1-3)