Church Inclusion Archives

February 10, 2015
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Las Cinco Etapas en Nicaragua

Tags : Disability Matters Jeff Davidson Paul Blas Tesoros de Dios The 5 Stages The 5 Stages: Changing Attitudes

Category : Christian Views on Disability , Church Inclusion , Disability Attitudes , Disability Ministry

Churches have many objections to doing disability ministry, including:

We don’t have enough volunteers.
We don’t have the money.
We don’t have people with disabilities here.
Wouldn’t they be happier in their own churches?

And that’s just to name a few. You can find some other great “myths about disability ministry” in this post by Jeff Davidson over at Disability Matters.

You would think that resources would not be a problem for most American churches. Yet the objection still arises every time a new opportunity or challenge comes up.

Even more, though, we would expect this objection in a less prosperous country. Say, in Nicaragua, where the average wage-earner lives on an income of about $150 a month (WorldBank data). What resources might they have available in their churches? Would they even consider making the effort to include people with disabilities?

These challenges didn’t stop Tesoros de Dios from sending out Paul Blas, who just a few years ago translated The 5 Stages into Spanish and set about meeting with churches near Managua and challenging them to become 5 Stages churches. There is so much more to tell, and fortunately, we have Paul to tell us himself.

Outreach Video 2015 from Elim Christian Services on Vimeo.

Isn’t that amazing? Paul not only challenged these churches, but despite the resource challenges they faced, they committed to becoming the church homes of people who have disabilities. They have been convinced that they are called by God to have a co-laboring attitude toward people who have disabilities. What about you? What about your church?

Check out our resources and see how you can help your church become a welcoming place of inclusion, just by changing attitudes.

January 27, 2015
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What the Heidelberg Catechism is Missing

Tags : Heidelberg Catechism The 5 Stages The 5 Stages: Changing Attitudes

Category : Christian Views on Disability , Church Inclusion , Disability Attitudes , Disability Ministry , Disability Theology

In 1563, two young men were charged with creating a question and answer synopsis of the Christian faith and its practice. The resulting Heidelberg Catechism has been used as a reliable companion to the Scriptures for over 450 years.

The catechism aims to draw the believer’s attention to the crucial elements and questions of the faith, and to answer those questions directly from Scripture. These questions range from the practice of the sacraments to observance of the Law to basic theology.

Why Do Good Works?

One of the age-old questions for Christians is why we should do good, if indeed Christ has already done all the good that’s needed to satisfy our Creator. In the 86^th set of questions and answer that make up the Catechism, the authors ask, “Since we have been delivered from our misery by grace alone through Christ, without any merit of our own, why must we yet do good works?”

The answer is given with reference to specific Bible passages:

“Because Christ, having redeemed us by his blood, also renews us by his Holy Spirit to be his image, so that with our whole life we may show ourselves thankful to God for his benefits, and he may be praised by us. Further, that we ourselves may be assured of our faith by its fruits, and that by our godly walk of life we may win our neighbors for Christ.”

So the reasons we should do good work are found in:

Romans 6:13–Because we are thankful.
I Corinthians 6:19-20–So that God might be praised because of what we do.
Matthew 7:17-18–So that we might be assured of our faith.
Matthew 5:14-16–So that others might be drawn closer to Him.

That Answer’s Not Enough

All of these are very good, and Biblically-based, reasons for doing good works. But they never quite fully answered the question.

I do think we do good works because we’re grateful for all our Lord has done for us, so that others will praise Him and be drawn to Him, and because these works are a sign of our faith. But all these reasons miss what Paul writes in Ephesians 2:

“For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which have been prepared in advance for us to do.”

So, this would add a fifth item to the 86^th answer in the catechism. We do good works because that’s what we were created to do.

Still Missing Something

Maybe this is missing from the Catechism, but there’s something else missing too. But it’s not because it was overlooked by the authors, but because we overlook it to this day.

In both 1563 and in 2015, the Heidelberg Catechism, its authors and its readers, are missing something. We are missing this very explicit call from the apostle to build God’s Kingdom, to do the work we were called and equipped to do.

But we’re missing something else too. We’re missing the opportunity we have to draw others to Christ by including them in that call.

We are all called to more than belief, to more than thankfulness, to more than being nice people. We are, every one of us–from different economic and social backgrounds different countries, different races and yes, different capabilities–called to do the good works that have been prepared in advance for us to do.

And by everyone, I mean people who we normally do not include in that call, people like Nick.

Nick is God’s Workmanship

Nick has cognitive delays and behaviors that warrant a specialized education to help him reach his potential. Yet, my friend Nick greets me boisterously every time he sees me. He smiles, yells “Mr. Vander Plaats!,” and gives me a high five or even a hug. Nick blesses me. Nick is following God’s call.

For Nick is God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God has prepared in advance for Nick to do.”

The Heidelberg is missing this, but the Bible isn’t. Are you missing this Biblical command, this imperative to following Christ? How are you helping Nick, and other people who live with disabilities to answer God’s call?

Dan Vander Plaats is the Director of Advancement at Elim Christian Services in Palos Heights, Illinois, a ministry that exists to equip people who live with disabilities to answer God’s call on their lives. He is also a member of the advisory committee for Disability Concerns for the Christian Reformed Church. In 2009, he developed “5 Stages: The Journey of Disability Attitudes” as a resource for Elim. The 5 Stages helps churches and individuals assess their attitudes toward people with disabilities. He is married to Denise (Hiemstra), and is father to Ben and Emma. They are members of Orland Park Christian Reformed Church in Illinois.

January 20, 2015
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An Opportunity Missed by Too Many Churches

Tags : Church Country Club Church Hospital Country Club Church Teaching Hospital The 5 Stages The 5 Stages: Changing Attitudes

Category : Christian Views on Disability , Church Inclusion , Disability Attitudes

Life with a Disability is Difficult and Lonely

Life always includes tragedy. And tragedy can be a time of loneliness and deep despair. But when you are part of a church, that tragedy can become an opportunity.

Tragedy and difficulty, whether temporary or long-term, is an opportunity for the church to truly be the church. Not every aspect of life with a disability involves such tragedy, or even difficulty, but it still provides the church with a unique opportunity to respond in a way that only a church really can.

So what keeps us so often from being that kind of church?

The church isn’t a country club. We’ve heard this before. We don’t pay dues (offerings) to pay for the club pro (the pastor) and the grounds crew and caddies (ministry staff) to make sure our tee-offs (services) are on time and everything is done efficiently.

A church whose members think of themselves as ‘belonging’ to a country club want a certain kind of clientele. They have their seat. They have their social clubs. They have their favorite preacher and worship-leader.

When tragedy befalls our country club-church, we respond with pity, with bitterness, and even an awkward social silence that says your kind of tragedy isn’t welcome here. This is particularly so for people who have disabilities. Disability is a constant difficulty, a reminder of sin and brokenness, and its presence in our church not only makes us uncomfortable, it mocks a self-righteous church life.

But it also Presents an Opportunity

It can be helpful to instead think of church as a hospital. Even better, perhaps, it’s a learning hospital. All of us need healing, but we also all need to learn how to heal others.

In tragedy and difficulty, the church-hospital to which we have been called becomes a place of healing, and, hopefully, a place where we learn how to heal.

Even–and perhaps, especially–for people who have disabilities, this kind of environment has profound potential. To see what God sees in the broken person, to call that person into His Kingdom, to equip that person to serve and worship Him with every fiber of their being. That is when the church truly becomes the church.

This all sounds fine in the abstract, but what, more precisely, does it mean?

Fortunately, God’s Word provides some very specific characteristics of the kind of hospital-church community we’re talking about:

I Corinthians 12: Christ’s church is not homogenous. It is not made up of one kind of people. It is made into one people from many. Those many come from different economic backgrounds, social classes, ethnicities, levels of ability and education, and genders.
Acts 4: That church shares everything, especially with those in need. In fact, the needy are not just an opportunity; they are a priority, for all time.
Luke 14: The hospital-church is one that includes everyone, so that God’s house might be full. Everyone, the lame, the blind, those who are weak in body, weak in spirit, hungering and thirsting–all are invited to His eternal banquet.
I Thessalonians 5: That church encourages one another, both those who have plenty and those who have nothing, into the work that God called them to do. Everyone is encouraged, not just those who have no troubles, but those who are in great need, are also encouraged to respond to God’s invitation.
Matthew 28: The disciples were told to baptize, but even before that, they were called to make disciples. The church is about the business of making disciples, and again, not just of the clear of mind and the strong of limb. Everyone is to become a disciple, a living ‘epistle.’
Ephesians 2: That church is full of people who do good works, not just because of what God did for us, or because it is an evidence of our faith, but moreso because that is precisely what God created us to do–to do the good works He has prepared in advance for everyone of us to do.

This is not the Kingdom of this World

The hospital-church is a place this world cannot understand. The kingdom of this world is where capability, difference, and wealth define the person. But in God’s kingdom we are defined, valued, encouraged, and equipped for one reason. We are all His. We all belong to Him. We are all called and equipped. We are all broken, and we are being and have been healed.

And in the process, we are simultaneously called not just to be healed, but to heal others. We are not just called to be disciples, but to make disciples. Not just to be encouraged but to encourage others.

This is the Kingdom of Heaven…and it is at Hand

This is something the church can do that no other entity has the call to do, nor the power or authority to do. And it is an opportunity that is starkly evident in the lives of people who live with disabilities. Don’t just seek our healing; equip us to heal others. Don’t just teach us about Jesus, equip us to teach others. Don’t just encourage us, come alongside us and together, we can encourage others, and continue to build His kingdom.

October 14, 2014
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Use a Little G.L.U.E. to Help Your Church

Tags : Barb Newman Christian Learning Center Network CLC Network G.L.U.E. Manual Jacki Sikkema The 5 Stages The 5 Stages: Changing Attitudes

Category : Advocacy , Church Inclusion , Disability Attitudes , Inclusion

I just don’t know HOW. This is the statement that I often hear when I speak with church leaders about including people who have disabilities. How do we move from pity to care, or from care to friendship? How do we move through the five stages of being ignorant of those with disabilities to becoming co-laborers in Christ with those who have disabilities? While the process of changing attitudes and the atmosphere at your church may seem daunting, CLC Network (Christian Learning Center) has a tool available to help you and your church in this process.

We offer a planning process called G.L.U.E, which stands for giving, loving, understanding, and encouraging. G.L.U.E. is a manual that comes alongside churches as they strive to be an inclusive community. CLC Network desires for you to do “ministry with” individuals who have disabilities, rather than “ministry to” individuals who have disabilities. We desire for churches and communities to see each person as a co-laborer in Christ.

Our G.L.U.E. Training Manual and DVD is a three hour long training session, broken up into four segments. This training will walk you through the biblical and theological thinking for viewing all people as an important part of the Body of Christ. It will focus in on appointing a special needs coordinator, getting to know the person(s) with a disability, sharing the vision of G.L.U.E. with your church, developing an inclusion action plan, and training a support team for the person(s) with a disability. If your church is able, we ask that you purchase the training materials on the CLC Network website.

We are aware, however, that some churches may not be able to afford these materials, and, because of this, we offer a grant that allows churches to purchase our G.LU.E. Training Manual and DVD for free. To apply for a G.L.U.E. grant, visit our website, www.clcnetwork.org/GLUEgrants. Here, you will fill out a short application form. Once your grant is approved, you will receive a DVD and training manual in the mail.

Because we are each different, G.L.U.E. is meant to be adaptable to each person’s differences, rather than a cookie-cutter program. It is a planning process that is flexible for each church, each community, and each individual. Whether you are in charge of ten churches or one, whether your faith community is big or small, you can make G.L.U.E. your very own.

And, it is a process. It’s a process that not only speaks to the individual, but it also speaks to everyone else as we work to become an example of God’s body—as we work towards God’s Kingdom as co-laborers in Christ.

Go here to get an overview of the G.L.U.E. Process: http://www.clcnetwork.org/church_services/glue_process.

Jacki Sikkema has a background in Special Education and currently serves in the Church Services Division at CLC Network, a ministry that, like Elim Christian Services, is devoted to equipping people who live with disabilities to answer God’s call on their lives.

The 5 Stages

Category Archives: Church Inclusion

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