Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada and welcome to Joni and Friends.
Okay, here’s a name for you. Do you recognize this: Jill Kinmont Boothe? Is that a name that rings a bell? Jill, if you'll recall, was the skier who broke her neck back in the 1950s while racing in the Olympic trials (they made two movies about her life: the first was called The Other Side of the Mountain and then they did a sequel). Shortly after my own accident back in 1967 in which I broke my neck, someone gave me Jill's book. I remember reading it by turning the pages with a mouth stick that I held between my teeth. Just learning about her story so inspired me! It was so helpful to know that there was someone out there, another quadriplegic, who was blazing a trail. Jill was one of the first wheelchair students on the UCLA campus; she graduated from UCLA and eventually won an appeal to secure her teacher's credentials. Back then, the Board of Education didn’t award credentials to a quadriplegic in a wheelchair.
After I read her book in the hospital, I wrote her a letter (much like, I guess, the sorts of letters newly injured people write to me). To make a long story short, Jill and I became friends after I moved to Los Angeles. I showed her the van I used to drive by myself. Yep, I am one quadriplegic who used to drive a big Ford Eco-line, can you believe it? I let Jill take the wheel—actually, my van didn't have a wheel; it had a big joystick that came up out of the gearbox, but that's another story. Anyway, when Jill discovered that she could drive, too, she ended up purchasing her own van. People would often confuse me with her, and when they did, I would smile, and say, "I'm sorry, you've got the wrong quadriplegic; I'm the other quad."
Over the years, I spoke to her about my faith in Christ, although it was pretty much one-sided; to be honest, she really wasn't that much interested. As a result, she was often in my prayers. The last time I saw Jill was in the fall of 2010: we spent the afternoon together at her home in Bishop, up in central California, and I was amazed at her health! I couldn't believe how well she was doing for being a quadriplegic in her early 70s. She was the longest living quad I had ever met. Well, that afternoon, we had a great time talking about art (she painted amazing landscapes, holding her brushes in an 'arm splint' Velcro-ed around her hand).
That was back in 2010. But a few months ago while I was on a trip, I received the news that she passed away in a Reno, Nevada hospital at the age of 75. When I got that news on the road, it left me a little breathless. Yes, because she was a fellow quadriplegic, but mainly because I have no assurance that at the end, she 'made her peace with God.' And so I have wrestled with conflicting thoughts: was I upfront enough about the Gospel with her? Did I press the point urgently enough when we last talked? To be honest I'm not sure. And so, Jill's death has helped me make a commitment to be more bold for Christ. It's become a real point of prayer. Even the apostle Paul asked his friends in Ephesians 6:20; he asked them to earnestly pray that he might declare the Gospel fearlessly—in other words, he wanted to be bold, but he knew he needed prayer for that.
People all around us are perishing so join me today, would you? Actually, join the apostle Paul and, as it says in Ephesians chapter 6, pray that God might help us all as Christians be more fearless, be more bold and courageous when it comes to sharing the good news of Jesus.
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