Image-bearers encountering Christ
/But the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one man,
how much more did God's grace and the gift that came by the grace
of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many!
Romans 5:15 (NIV)
Grace and salvation overflows to the many, which includes those whose lives are touched by disability. In many books on special needs ministry, I see the focus on the truth that we were all created in the image of God. And that certainly is true, but it's incomplete.
That last remark might sound extreme, but let me explain. A friend of mine drew my attention to this news article last week, the story of the bar mitzvah of a boy with multiple disabilities. From a disability advocacy perspective, it's encouraging, and it provides a model of a faith tradition welcoming those with special needs in another country.
The primary reason for Jewish children with special needs to be included in religious ceremonies, as stated in the article, was that they are made in the image of God, like each of us. And that is certainly true. But it is also true that they are each sinners in need of the Savior.
It may seem like I'm being picky here. After all, the passages Jews use to support the "image of God" reasoning includes some of the same verses we use, given that we share some scriptures. But as I've reviewed books about Christianity and disability, I have been surprised to see that many of those books stress only that these individuals are made in the image of God. Sin and salvation? Only mentioned in passing, if at all.
It would be wrong if I added the words "except people with disabilities" to verses about being made in the image of God. Likewise, it's wrong if we tack the same dismissive clause to the end of verses like Romans 3:23-24:
For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
and are justified by his grace as a gift,
through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus
Have you ever heard someone say, "Oh, I love working with kids with special needs. They're just so cute, especially the ones with Down syndrome!" The problem with comments like those is that they can dismiss the truth that each of those kids is a kid first. The child has a disability; the disability does not have him. And I can vouch from experience that the five children with Down syndrome at our church are certainly precious ... but they are also mischievous and occasionally disobedient, just like any other children at our church.
Sometimes the true statement about people with special needs being made in the image of God is said in the same tone as "aren't they so cute?" It's almost said as if they have an exalted status, as if the image of God that they project is somehow more complete or less marred by sin than their non-disabled peers. My concern is that an overemphasis on "the image of God" could be motivating us to settle for accessibility without progressing to inclusion.
Yes, we need to ensure that individuals with special needs can enter churches and Sunday school classes. To be transparent about our past failures at my church, though, we used to do that well...but we didn't really aim to teach the kids with disabilities once they arrived. If someone walked by a class, they might have assumed we practiced real inclusion because kids with special needs were included in our typical classes. We included them in classes because it was easier than making a separate class and because, after all, they were created by God too; we just didn't try to figure out how to teach them in a meaningful way.
Did we think it was too hard? Yes, in part. Did we care more about appearing to be inclusive rather than actually being inclusive? Maybe a little of that. Did we feel like our aim was to make sure parents could go to church? A little of that too. Did we fall short because we weren't convinced that they needed to know Christ and be discipled as much as any other child? Yes, I think that was a big part of it although no one would have admitted that.
I began coordinating Access Ministry with my husband within a month of teaching a vacation Bible school class that included a little boy with Down syndrome. Over the course of the week, we kept him safe. I don't think we did a whole lot more than that, though, and his cognitive abilities were high enough for him to have learned a lot more than he did, even without significant modifications being made.
My point here isn't that we should stop talking about people with disabilities as being made in the image of God, just like you or me. My point is that we shouldn't stop there. As it says in the verse I began with, grace and salvation overflow to the many through Christ. The sin that has stained the image of God in each of us can only be made clean by Christ.
I would love for everyone to see people with disabilities as creations of our great God. And I would love for salvation and grace to overflow to every person - with or without special needs. I don't just want to recognize those I love as image bearers; I want them to be image bearers who encounter the God whose image they bear.