is the class that most intrigued me in Biola’s MSLP curriculum, the one that most excited me when actually entering the program, and, as of the end of the first week, by far my favorite class.
This week’s reading alone just breathed new life into my very deadened and cynical soul. (Look up Basil the Great’s “The Long Rules,” Q.1-7. You’re welcome in advance.) And it wasn’t really anything crazier than the gospel truth (which to be fair, really is the craziest thing ever in the history of all crazy things), communicated with genuine, fervent wonder.
Then we did a 30-minute in-class writing prompt reflecting on the following questions:
- What do you know to be true and why?
- How do you see disabilities?
- How does God see disabilities?
- How can a Christian speech-language pathologist best serve people with disabilities?
And I am including it here not only as an experiment to see how/if my theology of disability changes throughout the next few months, but also as a reminder that the secret to staying Alive, the real cure to boredom or cynicism or even despair, is not anything so out of the ordinary. Its simplicity should not take me by surprise. Here is the secret: to hear, read, reflect on, and reiterate what we believe to be True.
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I know that humans have been created in the image of God, by God, for the purpose of enjoying and glorifying him forever. By being created in the image of God, I mean, among other things, that we have inherited His ability and desire to create order out of chaos, His capacity to use reason and language, and His inclination to love and show grace and mercy. We were created by God--we were not a coincidence at the end of a long line of coincidences, but each part of us--physical, mental, emotional, spiritual--was woven together with divine purpose and design. We were created for the purpose of enjoying him and glorifying him forever. Our desire for beauty, for fulfillment, for purpose and for meaning--they are all echoes of the desire in our hearts to know and be known, love and be loved, by the one who created us. Therefore, we are the most empowered, effective, content, and fulfilled (even in suffering) when we are living into this purpose which was written onto our souls.
I know this to be true because in my life (and in the testimonies of others), I have felt a hopeless discontent, exhaustion, despair, and meaninglessness in striving to live to other ends (e.g., material wealth, reputation, the love of humans). As I chase after the beauty, wholeness, and meaning which I crave with all my being, I struggle with my ugliness and brokenness (e.g., my failures and vices) which preclude my attaining even my misguided ideas of those things. If and when I do attain whatever I was chasing, it is never lasting, and never as pure in satisfaction as I'd imagined. Only in this truth have I found a truly satisfactory answer to both my inexplicable longing for perfection and my lack of ability to perceive or attain it: that God has created me, in his image, for the purpose of enjoying and glorifying him forever, and has sent his Son to die and rise again on my behalf so that my brokenness may be made whole and that I may be empowered to live into this original purpose, and eventually, with Him in perfection forever.
I view disabilities as one of the symptoms of a fallen world--not that specific individuals are disabled due to a singular sin they or their predecessors have committed, but that since humans sinned against God by denying their original design (i.e., instead of living into their purpose of enjoying and glorifying God, they disobeyed out of the desire to determine an order of their own and be their own gods), what once was a perfect world has become imperfect by a series of subsequent events of human sin, and as a result, what was originally designed as ordered has become disordered. However, while they may be singled out in society due to more salient differences in physical, mental, or emotional ability, people with disabilities are no more "disabled" in the spiritual sense than any other human; all are fallen people living in a fallen world, powerless to be reconciled to God without divine intervention. At the same time, people with disabilities are, just as any other human, created in the image of God, for the purpose of enjoying and glorifying Him forever. Having or not having disabilities does not make any person more or less human (i.e., a being made in the image of God).
I believe this is how God views disabilities--symptoms of a broken world, manifested in His created humans who are also broken but whom he seeks to wholly redeem. Therefore, he sees and knows people with disabilities. He laments their suffering because disability was not in his original, perfect design for humanity. He also loves them immensely and values them no less than any other human--in fact, as Jesus has demonstrated and preached, God has a heart for the outcast and downtrodden, the sick and suffering. He loves and knows them and wants to be loved and known by them in return.
With that in mind, Christian SLPs can best serve people with disabilities by treating them as whole human beings created with divine purpose and in a divine image, not seeing them as pitiable projects or lesser beings dependent on us for their livelihoods, but as brothers and sisters who despite their abilities (or seeming lack thereof) have the same God watching and loving them. Christian SLPs have the privilege of using their gifts, education, and training to bring disorder into as much order as is possible on this side of eternity. Christian SLPs can do this by treating and caring for people with disabilities with respect, humility, love, and excellence, with the end of maximizing their potential to communicate and swallow effectively and their prospects of experiencing a humanity closer to the one God originally designed.
