The church and people with disabilities

During my training sessions, the participants always work on a story set for their particular context. These story sets are always a personal highlight for me, as I am often very richly rewarded and discover many new treasures in God's Word. A story set consists of 4-10 stories, which are either told one after the other or build on each other visit after visit. What does this look like in practice? Physiotherapists working somewhere in Asia took part in a training course. Disabled children or adults are considered a disgrace and are often hidden away. As a result, they do not receive the support they actually need. These physiotherapists travel to the villages and visit the families. Depending on the disability, they perform exercises or treatments and teach the parents how to repeat them. Afterwards, they sit together for a cup of tea or usually for a meal. During each visit, they tell one of the stories from the following set:

Creation of the world Gen 1-2 Possible conclusion: All people are created in the image of God, including people with disabilities.

The first disobedience against God Genesis 3:1-24 Focus: Through the disobedience of man, suffering also came into the world.

David and Mephibosheth 2 Samuel 9:1-13 Focus: King David has given all the land back to a severely disabled man and Mefi-Bosheth is a daily guest at the royal table.

Jesus heals a man born blind John 9:1-9 Possible conclusion: "The purpose of disability is not punishment for individual sins, but the glory of God."

Seeing the weak Luke 14:1.7-14 Focus: Jesus sees the suffering of the weak.

The story of the prodigal sons Luke 15:11-32 All are welcome with God, even people who are supposed to be a disgrace or shame.

The African Acts 8:26-39 Focus: The eunuch was castrated and becomes a follower of Jesus.

My personal favorite story from this set is David and Mephibosheth 2 Samuel 9:1-13

After David became king, he thought of his deceased friend Jonathan, the son of the former king Saul. David began to find out if any of Saul's family were still alive. He was determined to keep the promise he had made to Jonathan to do him good. One of his servants remembered that one of Jonathan's sons, Mephibosheth, was still alive. When he was a child, his nurse had accidentally dropped him while fleeing, and since then he had been paralyzed in both feet and could no longer walk. King David had him brought to him from a town some distance away. When Mephibosheth arrived at the royal court, he bowed before King David. David reassured him: "You needn't be afraid. Your father was my best friend, and I want to do you good. I will give you back all the fields that belonged to your grandfather Saul. You will eat at my table every day as my guest. Mefibosheth bowed again and asked: "What have I done to deserve this? I am worth as little as a dead dog." Then King David publicly declared, "I give all the possessions of King Saul to his grandson Mephibosheth.” King David treated Mephibosheth very well, even though he could have killed him. And so Mephibosheth ate with King David every day. This is a true story from the Holy Scriptures. Possible lid: What I like about this story is that King David treated a disabled person like a royal child.

Think about the effect this story has on parents who have only ever heard it: Disabled children are a disgrace and shame.

In future blog posts, I will also present a story set from time to time. You can find all the material in my handbook "Stories and Oral Bibles" under https://www.fivefingerfood.org/en_us/download/. As my handbook continues to grow, I can only give the current page page 171, but this will change. Otherwise look in the table of contents under "The church and people with disabilities". The photo is from https://www.freebibleimages.org, a free super resource for Bible photos or drawings.