Do You Want to Be Disableld?

    I’ve had a set-back in my running schedule. Pretty big one, actually, as I am currently having to use crutches just to walk around. From running eight miles one day, I am now hobbling around on crutches the next. It was a bit humbling when I stopped in at Sam’s Club and the host tried to get me to take the electric scooter/shopping cart. I refused because I knew that my lovely wife beside me would have a picture of it on Facebook the minute I got on.
    But it’s given me a new appreciation for those with disabilities. I’m so accustomed to good health and mobility that losing it is unnerving. I want to get back running again, but we have some in our church who just want to walk again.
    That’s why it blew me away when I read an article this week of a woman who dreams of becoming a paraplegic. Yes, you could say it’s her life’s goal. Chloe Jennings-White is an able bodied woman who longs to lose the use of her legs. She says that she’s dreamed of becoming a paraplegic since visiting a disabled relative when she was four years old.
    And she’s tried hard to make it happen. She purposely took up extreme sports in hopes of a debilitating accident. She once rode her bike off a ledge, looking for just such an impairment. She was injured, but not badly enough. When she realized that she could have hit her head and died, or broken her neck and lost the use of both legs and arms, she decided to pursue a more controlled means to disability––she sought the help of a surgeon to sever the nerves to her legs. She found one willing to perform the surgery, but doesn't have the $20K necessary for the operation.
    I know...crazy. And that she is. They even have a name for her “psychiatric disorder” describing this bizarre desire. I’m sure all of my friends who would love to be able to walk, wouldn’t mind having a conversation with her.
    But as awful as this sounds, I know a lot of Christians who appear to have a similar inclination. While having been given the freedom of Jesus’ gift of salvation, and called to a life of walking in the Spirit, they continually choose to confine themselves to a spiritual or religious wheelchair, living in and for an iniquitous life in this dark and debilitating world. When we should be climbing mountaintops, many are content to inch themselves up and down wheelchair ramps.
    God has so much more for you! You have been healed! You’ve been raised up! Enjoy God to the fullest and leap for joy for the life he has provided you. Walk in the Spirit! – Galatians 5:16