A brother offended is more unyielding than a strong city,
and quarreling is like the bars of a castle (Proverbs 18:19).

The language around disability is constantly changing. Even using the word ‘disability’ can be controversial.

Recently, I was talking to one of the volunteer disability coordinators at our church about the wording we should use on an announcement for a new initiative. We could use one of two words. One has been commonly used for a while, and the other is emerging. We both knew that either choice meant somebody could be annoyed, and possibly offended.

Concerned About One Little Word

It was just one little word and we were very concerned. You may wonder why — why w…

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Rarely does disability elicit an indifferent response:

• Joni Eareckson Tada wanted to kill herself.¹
• I entirely rejected God as good, kind, merciful and purposeful.
• Even families who fully embrace God as sovereign over all things must now deal with a new reality that raises hard questions.

And this can be a helpful thing for a local church. God has strong feelings about being lukewarm:

I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth (Revelation 3:15-16).

Church leaders: you should want families like mine in your churches. God is often ple…

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We say, “useless!”  God replies, “on the contrary — indispensable!”

Our churches are filled with people who don’t realize how the culture has made a negative impact on their perception of disability.

For those of us with loved ones who live with severe cognitive impairment, it can be frightening to live in an American culture that so highly values ease, transitory wealth, health, and beauty.

Some people (generally not those who go to church) will even say out loud what many people are thinking: that person is so limited by disability he or she isn’t really a person; I would rather be dead then live like that; they are useless.

God provides a clear response:

On the contrary, the pa…

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People often gave glory to God when Jesus healed their disabilities:

When Jesus healed many: And they glorified the God of Israel (Matthew 15:31).

When Jesus healed a blind man: And all the people, when they say it, gave praise to God (Luke 18:42).

It was right for them to do so! God himself was performing miracles in their presence.

But, like us, they sometimes confused things — giving greater glory for gifts they could see rather than the gifts that are eternal.

The Paralytic Man in Mark 2

We see it in the story of the healing of the paralytic in Mark 2:1-12. . .

Four men bring a paralyzed man to where Jesus was staying, vandalize another person’s property, and lower him down…

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During a recent interview, Pastor John pointed out that most people recoil at the thought of God’s sovereignty over things like making babies who are born blind, or ordaining deadly diseases. He asked me why the healing accounts that demonstrate God’s sovereignty over disability are such good news to me.

I’ve thought quite a bit since he asked that question, and I believe my first response to him was incomplete. So, here’s my second attempt at an answer.

Why God's Sovereignty Over Disability Is Good News to Me

First, God did a miracle by enlightening the eyes of my heart to see my need for Jesus and to know the hope to which he has called me (Ephesians 1:18). If that doesn’t happen, th…

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Pastors, Here's a Scenario

You're a pastor and ‘the call’ comes. One of your families has welcomed a child into the world – and that child is significantly disabled. They are crushed.

What do you do?

You haven’t experienced this thing in your family and maybe you don’t even know this family well (or at all).

More than 15 years ago, Pastor John wrote a note to my family. With our permission, he turned that into an article for the church, Words of Hope for a Baby Born Blind. I recommend the ministry of writing a letter to anyone in that situation, but I recommend it particularly for pastors.

Here are some reasons:

• It came right away. For routine births, the emails and tweets and ca…

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For most of my life I sailed right through the healing passages in the Bible. They were all great stories, but with little actual impact on my life or my conception about God:

• The healing of the paralytic who was lowered through the roof (Mark 2) – sure glad he had those friends.
• The cleansing of Namaan’s leprosy (2 Kings 5) – how nice for him that God took that leprosy away.
• The giving of sight to the man born blind (John 9) – bet that man was happy Jesus came around!

Then I was given my own little man born blind (along with a whole list of other things) and John 9 was no longer a nice story about Jesus helping a poor, blind beggar. This exact issue was in my own home and frighteningly re…

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In last week's sermon on John 9:1-23, John Piper makes this bold statement:

Jesus says that the purpose of the blindness is to put the work of God on display. This means that for our suffering to have ultimate meaning, God must be supremely valuable to us. More valuable than health and life. 

But what if the intense suffering is happening to your child? Can God really be more valuable to a parent than a healthy child? Can there possibly be purpose to disability?

Greg and Kim Lucas answer that question for us with a resounding yes! And their deep love for Jesus has given them an ever-increasing capacity to love their son with multiple disabilities.

(Watch on Vimeo)

For more on …

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What was your last cab ride like? 

A dear friend of Desiring God recently wrote to us about an experience in a London taxi that blessed him—and made more than a few of us here laugh out loud in delight!

Indeed
by Rick Segal

Wednesday night I was on my own in London. Such a void in the schedule gives me the chance to taxi in from Chelsea Harbor to Central London to Foyles, my favorite bookstore in all the world.

The distinctive, boxy, black London taxi is a masterpiece of western civilization. In no other city can one navigate urban traffic in a cleaner, more spacious, more professionally operated vessel at a more reasonable price. Unlike the usually filthy, dinged-up yellow cabs of Ma…

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Greg Lucas is a dear friend who has contributed a gift to the Church in his new book Wrestling with an Angel: A Story of Love, Disability, and the Lesson of Grace.

Here's my endorsement of the book:

It is a rare book that makes much of God and our dependency on Him while also celebrating His goodness through hard things. Using his own example of parenting a child with significant disabilities, Greg demonstrates what relying on a sovereign God through extreme difficulty and suffering looks like. This book is a gift to the church, and particularly to men who need an example of masculine, Biblical leadership in the face of complex, confusing, and overwhelming circumstances. If you have eve…

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