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Writing this book has been one of the hardest things that I’ve ever
done. I started by asking a heart-wrenching question:
Where was God during the first few minutes of my life as I lay
suffocating on the delivery table? Even though I have made a lot
of progress, I still lack many of the answers to some of my most basic
questions about God and the way he works in the lives of those he
loves.
Having cerebral palsy doesn’t make me an expert
on the sovereignty of God. I haven’t resolved the issue of pain
and suffering in the world, nor have I come up with the definitive
answer to the question of why some people are born with disabilities
and others are not. I have asked these questions for years, and
most of the answers given to me by well-meaning Christian friends are
all but worthless. They remind me of a man I met a few years
back during a camping trip that I went on in the High Sierra
mountains of California.
Twenty-five of us had gathered to experience five
days of rock climbing and rappelling, an ambitious trip, especially
considering the fact that six of us were disabled and four of those,
including Paul, used wheelchairs. There is nothing like camping
out on the side of a mountain, sleeping under the stars, and freezing
at night to make a person appreciate some of the comforts of home.
Our food was dehydrated, the water had to be purified, and the
outhouse consisted of a bucket beneath a lawn chair with a toilet
seat duct-taped to it.
The first thing that I noticed about Paul,
besides the fact that he used a wheelchair, was his weight. I
would never poke fun of someone just because of body size, and that
certainly isn’t my intent here. However, it’s not every day
that you hear about someone who weighs close to 250 pounds, and who
uses a wheelchair, going rock climbing and rappelling. I assure
you that it was no easy task taking Paul on this trip. Six staff
members labored for two hours carrying Paul up the side of the
mountain, and that was just to get him from the road to where we made
camp. You can just imagine what it was like helping him rappel
down the side of a 90-foot cliff.
There are two more things about Paul that you
need to know in order to appreciate this story. First, Paul was
the camp jokester and loved to make people laugh. I pride
myself on my ability to tell a good joke, but even I took a back seat
to Paul’s quick wit. No one was safe from his dry humor, and he
took advantage of every chance that he had to make us laugh. The
second thing that you need to know about Paul is that he does not
believe in God, and he makes no bones about it. It’s not that
he’s antagonistic toward those who disagree with him. Just the
opposite. He got along great with everyone on the trip and even
welcomed opportunities to talk about questions of faith.
Most of our group were professing Christians, and
Paul knew exactly where each of us stood in terms of our belief in
God. In fact, he seemed to enjoy bantering good-naturedly with
the rest of us. He even smiled when I invited him to follow me
to the edge of the cliff so that I could ask him if he was ready to
become a Christian. He declined my request, saying that he would
not be believing in God at the top of the cliff and doubted very much
whether he would at the bottom, either, if and when I pushed him over
the edge. Just my luck—an atheist who isn’t afraid of heights.
Along about the fourth day of the trip, I asked
Paul about his belief or, in his case, his lack of belief in God.
His answer surprised me. I half expected Paul to blow off my
question with one of his usual one-liners. Instead of taking the
opportunity to give me another one of his wisecracks, he answered me
seriously. He told me that he could give a lot of reasons for
not believing in God, but everything hinged on one problem: He
could not understand why good people suffer. How could a loving
and all-powerful God sit back and let someone like himself deteriorate
from a disability? Paul had done nothing to cause his
disability. Yet he will spend the rest of his life using a
wheelchair.
What do you say to a guy who refuses to believe
in a God who allows people to be disabled for life? I certainly
didn’t have the answer. My mind raced through everything that I
had ever learned about the scriptures, apologetics, and the
sovereignty of God. I knew all of the theological arguments
about sin and free will. Yet none of those things seemed
appropriate, and after a few moments of silence, I finally told Paul
that sometimes life just stinks. Pretty brilliant, huh?
The guy who’s supposed to have all the answers, and my best comeback
was to say that life stinks.
I’m sure many Christians would say that I blew it
with Paul. After all, he left the door wide open for me to share
what God has done in my life, and to assure him that God could do the
same in his life, if given the chance. That was not what Paul
was looking for, though. He wasn’t asking for a thirty-second
explanation about the problem of good and evil. Nor was he
looking for pie-in-the-sky platitudes about a God who miraculously
shields us from pain. Such a God doesn’t exist in my own life,
and even if he did, I doubt whether Paul would have been interested in
such a plastic dime-store deity.
It’s too easy to give pat answers—as though there
is a magical hat filled with all the answers to all the questions that
Christians will ever be asked. Whenever people get in a tight
spot, all they have to do is reach into the hat and pull out the
latest in Christian jargon. I’m sure that you’ve already heard
all of the so-called answers before. I know I have—plenty of
times. I’ve even used some of them myself: “If only you
would trust God, things would get better.” “If only you had a
little more faith, things would change.” Or, how about my
all-time favorite, “If only you would just pray about it, everything
would work out”? Don’t get me wrong. I’m all for prayer,
I’m all for faith, and I’m all for trusting God. The question
is: What happens after you pray and pray and pray, and you
believe and believe and believe, and the problems that haunt you
refuse to go away?
I’ve wrestled with these questions for most of my
life, and for me everything comes down to the question of how I see
God. Our modern-day culture has prostituted our image of God.
When some people are asked to describe God, the first image that comes
to their minds is the character played by Charlton Heston in The
Ten Commandments. To these people, God is a little like
Moses, only bigger, more glamorous, and more powerful. He is the
great protector, the big grandfather in the sky—complete with a white
beard and long, flowing robe—who stands ready to parcel out one favor
after another to anyone he chooses.
Others see God as a deified vending machine who
stands ready to dispense anything and everything asked of him at a
moment’s notice. The only thing that’s required is to pray in a
specific order—and then presto! Out comes the desire of one’s
heart. Perhaps there’s even a cosmic drive-through window called
McGod’s, where one can order a hamburger, fries, and a miracle with
the works. Wouldn’t that be something to write home about? I
could get rid of my cerebral palsy and order a Big Mac, all with the
same prayer.
You’re right! I am poking fun at the
stereotypical images that society uses to portray the God of the
universe, and I am exaggerating, just a little, the way that many
people respond to those images. That’s precisely my point.
We’ve allowed both Hollywood and our own imaginations to warp our
perception of who God really is. Either we think of God as a
type of Superman who fights for truth and justice and answers our
prayers on a moment’s notice, or else we think of him as someone
wearing oversized combat boots and standing ready to stomp on the
first person who steps out of line.
I stumbled across an Iranian proverb a few years
ago: “If you see a blind man, kick him. Why should you be
kinder than God?” Now, before you recoil in shock, let me remind
you that although we aren’t quite as blatant with our theology, some
well-meaning Christians assume that if a person is suffering, God must
want it that way. I wish I had a nickel for every time someone
has told me that it is God’s will for people to suffer. I’ve
even had Christians go so far as to tell me how fortunate I am that
God made me disabled. They see the work that I’m involved in and
assume that God gave me cerebral palsy to better equip me for
ministering with other disabled people. I wonder whether they
also think that God gave disabilities to those other people just so
that I would have someone to minister to!
I do not believe that God causes suffering.
There was no sickness or disability in the Garden of Eden.
That came later, when Adam and Eve turned their backs on God and
decided to go their own way. That wasn’t God’s decision.
The reality is that we live in a fallen world, and suffering is one of
the results of living in that fallen world. To try to pin the
blame on God for the sufferings of the world is ultimately to blame
God for sin.
Does God use my disability? Absolutely!
I am extremely thankful for the way that God has chosen to use my
life. However, there is a difference between God’s using
my disability to minister to other disabled people and his causing
my disability specifically for that purpose. God does not have a
quota system in which he parcels out disabilities at will!
If God does not cause disabilities to occur, then
I am still left with the question, “Where was God when I was
struggling to take my first breath at birth?” Many people would
say that God was nowhere to be found, but I don’t believe that.
I believe he was there all along—with me through every struggling gasp
of air I tried to take. Knowing that he had planned life, my
life, to be good, healthy, and abundant, and knowing that humanity
destroyed that life with sin, I believe that God was in the delivery
room crying his eyes out, mourning the cerebral palsy that I would
have to contend with all of my life.
I believe that a day is coming when God will dry
every tear from the eyes of the faithful. As a man with cerebral
palsy, that belief gives me tremendous hope. I’ve heard friends
talk about how much they’re looking forward to walking on streets of
gold and living in a huge mansion. They paint heaven as a
glorified Disneyland, complete with swimming pools, Jacuzzis, and
eighteen-hole golf courses. I’m sure that heaven will be far
more beautiful than we can ever imagine, but none of that glitter
really appeals to me. What does appeal to me is knowing that
one day I will no longer be disabled. I won’t have cerebral
palsy in heaven, and those of my friends who are disabled here on
earth won’t have to use wheelchairs or other devices to assist
themselves. There will be no stopping us. We won’t be
stuck outside, waiting for some angel to install ramps to make heaven
accessible. We will be walking and running and jumping and shouting
“Hallelujah!” at the top of our voices, and everyone, and I do mean
everyone, will know that Jesus Christ is Lord! I yearn for the
day when I will stand face to face with Christ in a fully restored
body and hear him say, “Well done, good and faithful servant” (Matt.
25:23, RSV).
That day isn’t here yet, and no matter how much I
wish things were different, the fact is that today, right now, at this
point in time, I still have cerebral palsy. The good news is
that I am not alone. God has not abandoned me. My hope
comes from knowing that God will never leave me, no matter how
desperate my life becomes. That’s the one thing I can count on,
no matter what. God loves me and is with me. Somehow
that’s enough. That has to be enough, because ultimately that is
all there is, and to wish for anything more is to wish in vain.
I don’t want to imply that we have no need of
other people in our lives, or that we should feel like martyrs because
of the hardships we face in life. I do need to share my life
with people who are close to me. I have a wife, and I love her
very much. I have friends I can turn to when life gets tough.
However, friends move, loved ones die, and disasters happen.
Ultimately, the one thing, the only thing, that will never change is
God’s commitment to me. God will never leave me, and that is my
one and only hope.
Each of us has been at the end of his or her rope
with nothing left to hang onto except memories of better times and a
God who seems to be nowhere. The depression is overwhelming, the
loneliness is unbearable, and some of the advice from those who try
to help is all but worthless. I’m tired of hearing easy answers.
People have a Band-Aid mentality toward God. They believe that
by saying the right prayers and having enough faith, they will have a
life filled with complete joy, with no pain or suffering of any kind.
That is simply not true.
I believe that God does not offer easy answers to
the tough questions that we ask about all the pain and suffering in
the world. Instead, he offers us a relationship with Jesus
Christ. There is a difference between the two. We’ve
mistaken our relationship with Christ as a cure-all for pain and
expect our lives to be filled with complete joy once we accept him as
our savior. Yet, Jesus Christ did not die on the cross to take
away my pain in life, at least not on this side of heaven.
Christ died to take away my sins, and hallelujah, he’s done that!
He willingly faced the cross, died an agonizing and humiliating death,
and arose from the grave three days later. Christ died for my
sins, and I will be eternally grateful for his act of compassion on
my behalf. But to assume that the purpose of Christ’s death,
burial, and resurrection was to provide a life of comfort somehow
devoid of any and all types of pain and suffering is simply wrong.
Some may ask, “What good is a relationship with
Jesus Christ if I’m still left to suffer?” I believe that it
does a lot of good. Christ knows firsthand what it means to
suffer. Pain is not an abstract theory that he learned from
reading a textbook while basking in glory on the far side of heaven.
He experienced it while hanging on a cross. It is because of
that experience that he understands the hopelessness that comes when
suffering seems inevitable.
When all is said and done, that’s the Christ I
want—not someone removed from all the hurts of the world, but someone
who can identify with me and who knows what it’s like to go through
intense agony. It’s precisely because of that firsthand
knowledge of what it means to suffer that Christ refuses to offer me
easy answers. He offers me a relationship with himself instead.
And it’s in that relationship that Christ offers me hope as I walk
humbly with my God.
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