Hi, I'm Joni Eareckson Tada and it's Autism Awareness Month...
And I’ve learned a lot about autism firsthand from my friend and coworker, Steve Bundy, who serves as our Managing Director of our Christian Institute on Disability. Steve and his wife Melissa are parents to two wonderful boys, Caleb and Jaron. And, yes, I underline that word wonderful, despite the fact that 11-year-old Caleb has multiple disabilities, including autism. You’ve never met a more delightful family; Steve and Melissa are fully committed to helping churches embrace children like theirs. And churches have responded… but it wasn’t always that way.
Steve often tells of the time how disability ministry got started in their own church years ago. It basically started as a result of a heartbreaking incident in Caleb’s Sunday school class. It seems the whole class had been rehearsing for a special children’s choir presentation for a Sunday morning service. Now, sure, Caleb wasn’t the best of singers, but neither were most of the other boys and girls in that class, either. On the Sunday morning when the children’s choir was scheduled to sing, Steve quietly slipped out of the worship service to check on Caleb. When he arrived at the classroom, it was empty… he must have gotten there too late and the children and their teacher were already on their way to the sanctuary. But then Steve took a closer look inside the classroom. Yes, all the boys and girls had left except for Caleb, who was being tended to by one of the high school kids. She explained that the teacher thought Caleb might act up in front of church or have a meltdown or something, so he was left behind.
It broke Steve’s heart. Obviously, the teacher really hadn’t included him; she hadn’t embraced Caleb as really a part of the class. He wasn’t considered “indispensable” as it says in the Bible about the weaker members of the body of Christ. Right then and there in that empty classroom, Steve decided that things were going to change at his church – and change they did. With praying and planning, training and teacher development and curriculum, a special needs department was born and now, this congregation is one of the leading churches in southern California when it comes to disability ministry. And Caleb helped lead the way.
That’s how it usually goes: It’s the families, the moms and dads, specifically the kids with disabilities who spearhead an outreach in a church to families affected by handicapping conditions. First Corinthians 12:22 reminds us that, yes, those who seem to be weaker really are indispensable, because it is through ministry to families like Caleb’s that a congregation learns firsthand how it can boast in its limitations, delight in infirmities, and pave the way for God's power to show up through weakness, and the best part? God gets the glory – because no child (especially children with disabilities) should be left behind, especially when it comes to the family of God.
With this being National Autism Awareness month, I encourage you to take a look at your own congregation. Many more children are being born with autism than ever before – one in every 150 births. And that statistic is skyrocketing, so churches really do need to be prepared. You can get started by visiting joniandfriends.org and downloading our Autism Inclusion Strategies, or you can make plans to attend our Disability Ministry Training Summit coming up in a little over a month. All the details are right there for you today at joniandfriends.org. And believe me, little Caleb would thank you. And so would his parents.
Used by permission of
JONI AND FRIENDS
P.O. Box 3333
Agoura Hills, CA 91376
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