Christian Living

Based on II Sam. 9:1‑13

      Joni Eareckson Tada  is probably the most famous handicapped person in the Christian world.  She tells of a girl she knows named Betty who cannot speak, cannot walk, and cannot feed or dress herself.  She has no control over her bowels or bladder, and needs constant care.  She often wakes in the night with screams for help.  At first you might jump to the conclusion that this is another hell on earth story.  But in fact, nobody even feels bad for Betty, and the reason is that she is an 8 month old baby.  This is Joni's clever way of getting us to realize that at one point we were all severely mentally and physically handicapped.  We have all been so handicapped that we would die in a short time without loving care.  Every mother and father are in the business of helping the handicapped, for all normal babies are just as handicapped as those who are not normal.  Everyone of us is alive today because of the helpers of the handicapped. 

      We do grow out of many of our early handicaps and become somewhat independent, but we are never totally free of handicaps.  Most people cannot do all that they dream and wish they could.  There are so many limitations of time, talent, and treasure.  Mrs. Sarah Ophelia Calley Connors set out to be actress on Broadway.  It did not work out and she had to choose second best.  She became a comedian whom we all know as Minnie Pearl.  She had this philosophy about it:  "Success is not always getting what you originally thought you wanted.  To me, successful people are the ones who leveled with themselves.  They were able to realize that in a lot of cases, second best is every bit as good as first choice.  We must realize that many times our plan is not God's plan."

      One of the most famous handicapped people in Minnesota history illustrates this.  Michael J. Dowling was 14 years old when he sat on a soap box in the back of a wagon with two men up front.  They left Canby, Minnesota and were out on the prairie when a blizzard stuck.  The wagon hit plowed ground and he was jolted off the back.  He yelled at the top of his voice, but the men did not hear him.  He tried to follow the wagon, but the snow soon obliterated the tracks.  He stumbled blindly and finally found a straw pile, and he dug his way in.  He survived until the morning, and then found his way to a farm house where the doctor was called.  He had to have both his legs amputated 6 inches below the knees.  His left arm was taken off below the elbow, and all his fingers and part of his thumb on the right hand. 

      You would think that meaningful life would be over for this poor young victim of a tragic accident, but not so.  He got artificial limbs, went to Carlton College, became a teacher, then became a principal, and then a banker, then a newspaper man, and finally a politician.  He was once mentioned as a candidate for governor of Minnesota.  He was sent as a member of a Commission to the Philippines where he had to help get the attention of the Sultan to impress him with the importance of education.  The Sultan was bored by the Americans and had a hard time staying awake until Michael took off his left leg and threw it on the floor.  Then he removed both feet and tossed them down before the astonished ruler.  He was captivated and gave full attention to what they had to say.

     Dowling turned his handicap into an asset, and he proved that second best can be ever bit as good, if not better, than first choice.  The handicapped are often just like everyone else.  They just need help to figure out how to use their handicap in an effective way.  Our text is a whole chapter about a handicapped son of Jonathan.  It was bad enough that he was lame, but to add to his burden he had one of the most unpronounceable names in the Bible.  Don't look for it in your little book of 300 names for your new baby because the name Mephibosheth just never caught on, and never became popular, even though it is a biblical name.

      The handicapped compel the mind to ask why?  Why should anyone have to be deprived of the mental or physical abilities that are considered normal for the human race?  In the case of Mephibosheth the Bible tells us clearly.  He was handicapped by an accident.  We read of it in II Sam. 4:4.  When he was 5 years old the news came that his father and his grandfather, who was Saul, had been killed in battle.  His nurse grabbed him and ran.  In her haste she dropped him and he became a cripple.  He was the victim of a human mistake.  A person who loved him and cared for him was trying to save his life, but in her panic to do good she did harm, and he ended up handicapped for life.

      It happens every day as the handicapped population grows due to the accidents of life.  Even those born handicapped have their defects due to accidents.  The things that are suppose to happen in developing a child do not happen, and so the child is born with defects.  These accidents are the result of a fallen world where nothing is free from Murphy's Law.  Nothing is perfect the way God made it, and the result is something can go wrong with anything, and that includes the way babies are made.

      We know that a mother can take drugs and produce an abnormal baby because of it. Handicapped children are born by the thousands due to chemical accidents.  No mother deliberately does it, but she does not know the consequences of her behavior, and so she takes drugs that interfere with the process that produces a normal child.  In other cases there is no external cause, but an internal defect in the mother or father that causes the child to be handicapped. 

      The point is, neither God nor man is in the business of producing handicapped children.  They are not the result of anyone's will, but they are the product of a monkey wrench in the works.  Anyone who thinks all accidents are the will of God have rejected the fall of man and the resulting fall of nature.  If all accidents are God's will then we must conclude that God is still saying what He did after creating this wondrous world.   He said that it is very good, and if all accidents are His will then all is still very good.  No one can honestly believe that the world is still very good and so the wiser way to think is to recognize that all is not good, and the world is full of things that are not ideal and not a part of God's will.  In a perfect world a nurse would not drop a little child and injure it for life, but such a world does not exist for us as humans, at least not yet. 

      The number one answer for the question, why are persons handicapped, is that they are the result of accidents.  It may be before birth, during birth, or after birth, for there are no end to the things that can go wrong in a fallen world.  They happen to God's people just as they do to the world.  There is not now, nor has there ever been, a group of God's people who did not have handicapped children.  Every problem in the book happens to God's people, and even to those whom He chose to be His priestly people.  It was sad indeed for the descendents of Aaron to have a child with any defect, for the law demanded that all who approached the altar in the temple be free of all abnormalities.  Not only was the sacrifice to be as perfect as possible, but so was the sacrificer.  Any handicap meant a child could never be a priest even though that was his destiny by being a descendent of Aaron.

     To even suggest that God deliberately made children born in the priestly line handicapped is to make God very cruel, for he forbid them to ever function in their family tasks.  Listen to this clear passage where the handicapped are severely restricted.  They are not rejected as people, but they are free to eat the most holy food and be one with the family of God, but they are not allowed to ever offer the sacrifice as a priest.

       Lev. 21:16‑23 says, "The Lord said to Moses, "I say to Aaron:  For the generations to come none of your descendants who have a defect may come near to offer the food of his God.  No man who has any defect may come near:  No man who is blind or lame, disfigured or deformed; no man with a crippled foot or hand, or who is hunchbacked or dwarfed, or who has any eye defect, or who has any festering or running sores or damaged testicles.  No descendent of Aaron the priest who has defect is to come near to present the offerings made to the Lord by fire.  He has a defect; he must  not come near to offer the food of his God.  He may eat the most holy food of his God as well as the holy food; yet because of his defect, he must not go near the curtain or approach the altar, and so desecrate my sanctuary.  I am the Lord, who makes them holy."

     God did not will these children to be born with these defects.  They happened to the priestly families for the same reason they happen to anyone else, and that is the accidents that we have mentioned due to defects in the genes and environmental problems.  Joni Eareckson Toda said that there are 516 million people in our world with disabilities.  She is one due to a diving accident, and she has plenty of company.  She tells of the many paraplegics in Bangladesh who are young men who have injured their spinal cord by falling out of palm trees while cutting coconuts.  All over the world she finds the victims of this fallen world, and she starts ministries for them.

       She ended a conference in Manila with these words:  "No other ministry better demonstrates Christ's heart of compassion than ministries to people with disabilities.  Those who are helpless, no matter what their handicap, see themselves in the Man of Sorrows because He became one of them.  Jesus' message was clear.  We are without help or hope as long as we are without Him.  But He was also clear that His good news was, in some way, especially for those who suffer the helplessness and hopelessness that physical infirmity can often bring." 

      God in His sovereignty uses accidents and handicaps to change lives for good, but it does not mean that He wills everything, for then He would be the author of evil.  What it does mean is that He can use everything, and even bring good out of evil.  This is what He is ever doing in the realm of accidents and the resulting handicaps.  It is part of the fallen world, but where people choose to seek His guidance there can be blessings for time and eternity that come out of the burden of being handicapped. 

       Sir Walter Scott and Byron were both lame, but Byron loathed it and brooded over it. He was a bitter man because of being handicapped.  Scott, on the other hand, never complained of his disability.  He accepted it and coped with it.  It is no wonder that Byron wrote to him once and said, "Ah Scott, I would give all my fame to have your happiness."  A bitter spirit is worse than any mental or physical handicap.  Most all handicapped people face this temptation to become bitter, but those who overcome it discover they can be as happy as anyone else if they maintain a positive attitude.  Joni went through the pits and wanted to take her own life because she was so bitter, but by the grace of God she came out of that pit and has brought happiness to multitudes. 

      The great battle of most handicapped people is the battle with a low self‑image and a sense of inferiority.  Most non‑handicapped people struggle with this as well, and so why should they not do so when their problem is often so conspicuous?  Mephibosheth had this battle.  We see it in verse 8 where he says to David, "What is your servant, that you should notice a dead dog like me?"  Talk about a low self‑image.  He was on the bottom and felt as worthless as a dead dog, and not just a lame dog, a sick dog, or a mere mangy mongrel. 

       This is a common problem of the handicap, but one that is very serious.  If this low self‑image is allowed to persist it leads to a loss of all their potential because they just give up.  Mephibosheth had two bad feet and that eliminated him from a lot of normal activity, but he still had two good hands and arms and a good mind.  He had great potential beyond any living dog let alone a dead dog.  We have no idea of what he did with what he had, but we know of people with similar handicaps who have built careers in business, music, art, and even sports.  Many famous people have been handicapped.  Milton was blind; Beethoven was deaf, and Helen Keller was blind and deaf, just to name a few. 

       At the age of 19 Stan Musial was playing center field for the Daytona Beach Islanders.  He caught a fly ball at his feet and took a somersault.  It damaged his body so that it almost ended his career in baseball.   His dream was to be a pitcher, but the pain in this shoulders made that impossible.  Branch Rickey of the Cardinals recognized in him a great hitter, and so he took him on.  As a handicapped player Musial went on to lead the national league in batting 7 times.  He could not pitch, but he could still hit, and he became famous for it.  He illustrates that a handicap does not necessarily limited a person in all areas of life. 

       Sometimes a handicapped does not even limit a person in areas that it should if they have enough determination.  Peter Gray tried to hop a train when he was 6 years old.  I know the danger for I was that age when I use to do it, and I know it is easy for your leg to slip as you jump for the ladder.  Pete did slip and lost his right arm.  He had to learn all over to use his left arm for everything.  He loved baseball and refused to quite just because of a missing arm.  He got so good that he worked his way up to the professionals.  In 1944 he was the best player in the Southern Association.  A one arm player in the major leagues is rare, for most two arm players never make it.  Here is an example of how handicapped people can even be superior to those who have no such handicap.  He had the choice to be bitter and be a quitter, but he chose instead to be determined to be excellent in spite of his handicap. 

       Life has more handicaps than we usually think.  All of us are handicapped in some way just because all people have limitations.  Youth feel bad because they can't do what adults do.  They have to wait to drive and it drives them crazy.  On the other hand being older has its limitations too.  Older people can no longer enjoy all the new slides in the modern park.  The older you get the more you are limited, and to be middle aged can be just as bad.  You are too old to get the free kids meal and too young to get the senior citizen's discount.  It is a handicap just to be the age you are whatever that age is. 

       Some people get bitter about being young or old, or in between.  You can be bitter about any of life's limitations and become a spiritual handicapped person.  But on the other hand, you can be spiritually mature if you learn to accept any and all limitations and use them to the glory of God.  Booker T. Washington use to say all the time the phrase, "The advantages of disadvantages."  They can stimulate, motivate, and cause people to rise above them and develop a spirit that is truly beautiful and pleasing to God.  This is success on the highest level.  Joni and many others have come to the point where they can identify with the words of Helen Keller: "I thank God for my handicaps, for through them I have found myself, my work, and my God."

     Harold Russell had his hands blown off by a blast of TNT.  Lying in a hospital, he didn't care much whether he lived or died.  He had a visitor who had lost his own hands in World War I.  He told him to look up the word handicap in the dictionary.  He did so and read this definition:  "Any disadvantage or hindrance making success in an undertaking more difficult."  This made him realize that a handicap just meant he had to work harder for success.  He went on to become a writer and a lecturer, and he developed abilities he never dreamed he had.  He wrote, "My weakness‑my handlessness‑ my sense of inferiority‑has turned out to be my greatest strength....this seeming disaster as brought me a priceless wealth of the spirit that I am sure I could never have possessed otherwise.  I have enjoyed a life that has been full and rich and rewarding, a life that has had a meaning and depth it never had before...It is not what you have lost, but what you have left that counts." 

      None of us are all that God intended people to be, and so all of us are in some way handicapped, and none of us are whole and complete.  Even though Jesus was the perfect man, even He was handicapped in the sense that He gave up equality with the Father and took on enormous limitations to become a man.  As the Son of Man He was greatly limited.  He became a handicapped person and suffered even greater handicaps for our salvation and our perfection.  He did so in order that we might have an eternal life free  from all the handicaps of a fallen world. 

       Meanwhile, we have to live in this fallen world and cope with its limitations.  David was kind to the handicapped son of Jonathan, but he was often cruel to himself by not over coming his handicaps.  He had poor control over his own sex drive and over his children.  These were handicaps that lead to great suffering and sorrow for him and his whole family.  Life is a battle with handicaps, which are all of the weaknesses and limitations that make us less than ideal. 

      When you are kind to any person you are being kind to the handicapped, for that is the state of all people.  Show me a person who is in no way damaged or defective and I will show you an illusion.  All people are handicapped, but some are more conspicuous than others, and so they have more conspicuous needs to be met.  But all people have the same need to be encouraged to overcome their handicaps.  Nobody needs to accept a less than excellent life. Disabilities need not stifle us from making the best of a bad situation.

     Ted Engstrom in his book The Pursuit of Excellence p. 81‑2 writes, "Cripple him and you have Sir Walter Scott. Lock him in a prison cell, and you have a John Bunyan. Bury him in the snows of Valley Forge, and you have a George Washington. Raise him in abject poverty and y;ou have an Abraham Lincoln. Strike him down with infantile paralysis, and he becomes Franklin Roosevelt. Burn him so severely that the doctors say he'll never walk again, and you have a Glenn Cunningham‑who set the world's one‑mile record in 1934. Deafen him and you have a Ludwig van Beethoven. Have him or her born black in a society filled with racial discrimination, and you have a Booker T. Washington, a Marian Anderson, A George Washington Carver....call him a slow learner, "retarded," and write him off as uneducable, and you have an Albert Einstein."

     If you want to see lists of famous people all through history who have overcome handicaps go to-http://members.aol.com/disablenet/Leaders/Leaders.html

One of the most famous musicians in our world today who has played his violin all over the world to cheering crowds had polio in his early life. He has to play on crutches, but he brings thrills to Kings and Queen, Presidents, Leaders of all nations, and to the masses. His name is  Itzhak Perlman. The point of all this is not that every handicapped person can become famous, for that is not even true of the non‑handicapped. The point is that a handicap does not mean that the person who has it is any less of a person, but that they have the capacity to be all they can be too, and sometimes that is a great deal more than those who have no such handicap. That is why they need to be encouraged, like everyone else, to seek to discover their gifts; develop them, and dedicate them to the cause of Christ.

       The seven letters of Christ to His churches in Rev. 2 and 3 make it clear that Christians are handicapped people who have many defects, and Jesus encourages each to see that they also have virtues and assets to overcome those handicaps.  Helping the handicapped is what those seven letters are all about, and that is what the Christian life is all about.  The greatest handicap of all is to be a person made in the image of God with an eternal soul, and yet be so lame you cannot walk in the light of God's will.  It is awful to be so dead in sin that you are like a dead dog as far as your value to the kingdom of God.  The Gospel is the good news that Jesus died for just such dead dogs. He rose again that they might live too and be raised to run with the Hound of Heaven in helping the other handicapped find their legs so they too can walk in newness of life.  We are all like Mephibosheth, for we are all handicapped, but we are also all called in Christ to be like David and be helpers of the handicapped.