Think You’ve Been Canceled? Most of you can skip this post. It’s for believers who think disabilities have made them small in God’s plans. I didn’t want to write this, because I’d rather downplay my situation. But my prayer team spanked me. They said, in effect, “Rick, please SHUT UP about what you’d rather. Do your work. Tell the truth. Write the post.” OK. If you’ve seen the teaser for my second film, Christ Quake (christquake), you saw me hike the Dead Sea with poles. That’s because I’m in pain. Have degenerative arthritis of the spine. No biggy, except that it wakes me if I move in bed. I replaced my hip two months after filming the teaser. Unfortunately, that went wrong and triggered heterotopic ossification. HO turns living muscle into bone. Hurts enough to make me howl and flip like a fish. That wakes me too. To ice the cake, doctors think I have Complex Regional Pain Syndrome ll. Google it. The point is: I live in a world of hurt. Serious pain. Every day. So, why tell you? Because I want you to know what I know. You and I can be used by God EVERY BIT AS MUCH as people without disabilities, though perhaps differently. I don’t care what you cannot do. It’s not lip-flapping when I say HIS strength is magnified in YOUR weakness. There was something bad wrong with the Apostle Paul. He called it his “thorn in the flesh,” and God didn’t take it away. Yet, that disabled man wrote much of the New Testament. Whatever is wrong with you doesn’t cancel you either. God still expects much of you, and HE CAN ENABLE YOU TO DO IT. He has me. My first film, The Star of Bethlehem, has repeatedly been the top documentary worldwide. Number One on Amazon, over and over. It was made by this guy already in BIG TROUBLE physically, with a shattered calcareous (cup part of the heel joint) that eventually caused my hip to fail. Yes, I’m pretty busted up. Attempts at repair have not always gone well. The bottom line is that I may hurt nearly as much as you. But God is using me, and He expects me to get off my butt and make film two, no matter how I feel. And, I’m going to do it in His power. Like Paul, I believe that serious daily suffering makes me a better servant. It keeps me from becoming conceited. And it keeps my spirit soft and seeking Him. Let your disability do that for you. Whether you can’t wash without help because of missing limbs or can’t hold a cup because of Parkinson’s, don’t count yourself out in God’s kingdom. HE DOESN’T COUNT YOU OUT. We do that to ourselves. Pray with me? “Lord, we know there is purpose in some disability. That helps. Paul’s pain teaches—you use rough means to shape us. Help us learn. If our condition is to stay, help us recognize the guardrail for our thoughts, as did Paul. Thank you that you will finally change us and remove pain, even from our memories. This day, help us see past the teardrops on the window. Show us how we can serve you and others. Even if only with encouragement and prayer. We ask it in the name of the One who embraced suffering beyond ours. Amen.” Rick
Posted on: Thu, 14 Aug 2014 12:54:38 +0000