aintnoyellowbrickroad

Get rid of all bitterness, rage, and anger…Ephesians 4:31

Only the foolish would think his journey free from all bitterness, rage or anger. We are too human, too frail, too broken by what has transpired to suggest we can easily dispatch such powerful emotions.

Our child is less than whole. Our dreams for him and for our life are shattered. Our future stretches out with more uncertainty than we can imagine. The holes that have been punched in our plans, in our future, in the very fabric of our day-to-day lives make it easy for every kind of emotion to spill into us.

Our spirit, our heart, even our faith is put at risk, threatened by such as bitterness, rage, and anger.

But we must not let them win. They cannot be allowed to overtake us, to become the defining traits of our character. We must not permit them to squeeze us in such manner as to make of us an empty, to make us any less than we were before this child arrived.

Buried in the line from St. Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus is this abiding truth: You can be a in a storm. You don’t have to let the storm be in you. This is a truth that we as the parents of disabled children must hang onto, claim for ourselves and live out in the days and months ahead.

Make no mistake: Life with a disabled child is a storm. It’s a big, angry, dark storm filled with pelting rains and rolling thunder and frequent lightning strikes. The winds blow long and hard and threaten to peel away our hope, our peace, our faith. The rains threaten to erode the foundations of our lives.

We find it easy to lose our way in such darkness.

We find it possible to navigate such tough times by taking hold of the promises of God, by letting the very hand of the almighty take us and guide us and our child. When we do this, we keep the storm from welling up within us.

It’s not an easy or a carefree time. The road will never again come easy. The storm will come and go in its ferocity. So we must always do what we can to keep the bitterness, the rage, the anger far from us. They are emotions that have no place in our lives and they can not be permitted even the smallest of footholds within in our hearts or spirits or even our words.

When you find even a hint of them, dig them out by the root, cast them far, and see to it that you flee from those who would encourage you to make them a friend.

“…I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation…Philippians 4:12

 My son, with the help of the apostle Paul, has been teaching me about contentment. I shouldn’t be surprised. In his few years on this earth, my son has taught me much about life, faith, and spirit.

 I am a man with friends of every kind and every financial situation. I have a friend who is a millionaire and a friend who wonders how she will put food on the table for her four children. I am a man with friends of political power and those who are oppressed by it. I know friends who live deep abiding faiths and those who disdain all things Christian.

 They have taught me much. I have seen them make trophies of gadgets: cell phones, GPS systems, and more. I have seen them count themselves successful because of the address on their door or the location of a new vacation home. I have seen them smile broadly at the nameplate on their new car, the invitation to join the biggest country club, the plan to add more space to their large home. I have seen some grow bitter with envy or loss.

 But my son and St. Paul keep trying to drive home to me lessons about being content. The idea, they tell me, is not in any external thing.

Paul, you will recall, wrote to the church at Philippi that he had learned to be content in times of wealth and poverty. He had learned to be content with any circle of friends, with any new challenge, with meal, be it a feast or a few scattered morsels. And he wrote of his contentment — provided through his relationship with Jesus Christ — while held inside a Roman prison, chained to a Roman guard.

My son tells me a similar tale. He lacks, of course, the eloquence of Paul. He lacks, too, Paul’s Damascus Road experience and his deep understanding of scripture.

But Bryson is chained in a place few of us would want to be. He relies on a wheelchair to get around. He needs help dressing, in the bathroom, at the dinner table, and getting into bed. Cerebral Palsy keeps his muscles and his brain from working in concert and so each of his limbs work with varying degrees of efficiency. Mostly, they don’t do what he wants.

Still, my son has a spirit that soars.

On sunny spring afternoons, he pleads for time after school to be outside. He wants the chance to check on the neighbors. He wants to the chance to roll along up and down the sidewalk in front of our house. He wants to talk with the passersby: walkers, joggers, pet sitters. He wants to wave to the guys in trucks and find out the source of motorized noises or the bouncing basketball.

He stops people I have never seen before and greets them as if an old friend has just arrived. Often, I am surprised to learn he already knows their names.

He has asked me to stay in the background, so I have. Dutiful parent that I am, I have drawn some limits. No crossing the street without my help and knowledge. No going past the house on the corner. No driving up through the yards without talking about the slopes and the pitfalls of uneven terrain.

And, of course, I have seen those limits ignored. I have found him across the street and learned he got there himself. I have called out to be sure he’s nearby and seen him disappearing up the street, his chair just slipping over the crest of the hill. I have heard him calling out for help and found him stuck, the wheels of his chair sliding on the slick grass and preventing him from getting out of the yard into which he was not supposed to go.

In virtually all situations, I have heard him laugh, heard his voice rise with excitement in the sharing of a story, and heard him call out to the new neighbor running by. Forget the chair, the uncooperative muscles, and the things he cannot change. Like St. Paul, he seems content with a little bit of space, a little bit of sun, and the hope he finds in the chance to explore, to meet, and to know others.

He isn’t concerned with what he cannot do or what he does not have. He’s too busy making the most of what he’s got.

Therefore, strengthen your feeble arms and weak knees. Hebrews 12:12

A few days ago, as my family cruised along the interstate toward church, I happened to catch sight of my son, sitting just behind me, in his wheelchair, with his arm lifted skyward.

Gospel music – at his request – was playing on the radio and as he tried to sing along, he lifted his hand up, toward Heaven.

Tears filled my eyes behind my sunglasses. I could not help but be moved by the sight.

Inside the Baptist churches of my youth, few were the times I can remember anyone, young or old, lifting a hand toward heaven or cupping their hands before them, as if waiting to catch grace falling from above.

Swaying to the music just was not done, except for very special occasions. We wore our suit coats and our ties and our collars buttoned-down. Our sisters and our Moms wore their dresses and their blouses and their jackets buttoned up tight, as well. Most of the time, our hearts seemed to be that way, too: buttoned-up, tight, unmoved.

The songs we sang came right out of the hymnals; and only every so often did it seem as if the words we sang came from anywhere near our hearts. It was church and that was the way church and worship were done.

Bryson, thankfully, is growing up in a different kind of place. He has never worn a shirt and tie. He has never put on a suit. He wears mostly men’s exercise style warm-up pants, polo shirts or Henleys, and tennis shoes over his leg braces. He has rarely held a hymnal, in part, because of his uncooperative, permanently bent left arm and hand.

Music, however, is a source of great joy with him. He takes to music of all kinds, particularly country and gospel. Country usually carries the day. Gospel reigns on Sundays and at other times when – I can only assume — he hears a different call inside his head or his heart.

Some Sundays in church, he wants to sit where he can hear the music of worship and see the praise team and the band on the stage, leading our congregation through songs of praise, of hope, of worship. Inside the sanctuary, he has rolled his wheelchair out into the aisle and a little closer to the stage, to improve his view.

Often, at some point, he lifts a hand skyward. He seems to understand – better than many adults I know – we are meant to reach for Heaven.

No matter how distant or how far it may seem, no matter how estranged we may be from our God and our notion of hope, no matter what may be pressing down upon us day in, day out, Bryson seems to realize an arm lifted to Heaven is so much more than a hand sticking up in the air.

It is an expression of the music within his heart, the melody and the hope that make his spirit dance. It is an outward expression of his desire – to connect with a God and a Savior he only now – at 13 – is just beginning to understand. It is his way of saying, “Here, Lord. Here I am. I want in. I want you. I lift my hand – and this broken, bent, imperfect body of mine – to you. Take it. Take me, Lord; take me with all my hurts, all my flaws, all my imperfections, with all my hope.”

In our quiet moments alone, sometimes when he wakes and needs help in the still of night or when he seems to need a victory or reassurance or the reminder that he is a special kid, I whisper to him: “Bryson, you are my hero.”

The truth is, I call him hero because he refuses to let his challenges and his handicaps keep him from enjoying life. He refuses to let his wheelchair dim the light of his heart. He refuses to give up the fight for hope.

And because, every once in a while, when I happen to look up and take notice, I see him, arm raised above his head and his wheelchair, pointing me toward Heaven.