One of my fears is that we are losing the ability as a society to help someone who experiences a disability or is suffering in some way, because we are afraid of doing or saying the wrong thing.

In today’s world, people with disabilities are largely ‘othered’, and there’s movement of self-advocacy afoot among them. There’s no telling what can happen when people unite across differences.

What if I told you that the Christian church has been silencing a prophetic presence in our midst?

Having journaled for years, recently I went to a digital platform for my journal, so I’ve begun to transcribe my old, hand-written journals into the new platform. It’s a painstakingly slow project, and the strange world of COVID-19 has prompted its resumption.

Then it finally dawned on me. The tree is a metaphor for life. It is weighed down by its branches but yet keeps growing taller and taller towards the sky.

Jesus instructed his disciples to “pack light” for their mission (Matthew 10:9-10). When it comes to the mission of supporting people who experience disabilities, there are a few transferable principles from this passage of scripture that we can apply.