THE CHURCH & DISABILITY

'...the foundation of ministry to those with disabilities begins through faithful preaching - reestablishing an authentic Christian worldview based on weakness and grace. This must then be modeled by leaders who embrace their weakness as an example to others. Finally we need a corporate community that grasps a vision wherein this ministry can find root and grow - first through availability and hearts open to experience transforming grace in a way that is entirely new to many, then through growing "expertise," that is the application and working out of grace based on the mercy and grace we have received and experienced from God in Christ.'

Michael S Beates, Disability & The Gospel, p.131.

THE GOSPEL

'The gospel allows us the liberating freedom to admit what the world doesn't want to hear: we are utterly unable, but our God is supremely able.'

Michael S Beates, Disability & The Gospel, p.80.

THE CHURCH & SUFFERING

'...just as the culture works hard to bury the reality of our sin and mortality, so too often does the church. While we confess our belief in salvation by grace alone, we all get properly dressed and work quite hard to appear clean, healthy, and whole (too often for all the wrong reasons). True spirituality does not project an image of superiority or power or "togetherness." Rather, true spirituality is quite ordinary and transparent in its shortcomings and weaknesses. The Lord Jesus, in his humanity was quite ordinary and even weak. Like all of us, he was ordinarily weak as an infant in the manger and extraordinarily weak and vulnerable on the cross.'

Michael S Beates, Disability & The Gospel, p.79.

FAITH

'...the opposite of faith is not doubt but self reliance.'

Michael S Beates, Disability & The Gospel, p. 71.

SUFFERING

'...the most fertile quadrant in the north-west part of the land of the Bible - the Jezreel valley and surrounding territory - was the location of the worst apostasy, unfaithfulness, and rejection of God anywhere in the land. Where conditions were most ripe and most hospitable, people tended to forget God, to wander from God, even to outright reject him. But correspondingly, the opposite quadrant - the most arid, dry, hostile, and forsaken part of the land - is where God met people in the quiet desolation of their souls.

This is a strong metaphor for us. When the circumstances of life are comfortable, we are more likely to drift from God. We are in danger of believing that we can be self-sufficient, and faith in God can become merely an intellectual exercise. But when we find ourselves in the desolation of loneliness and pain, doubt and desertion, deprivation and despair, there God meets us - even when we can't hear his voice. This is the way God works.'

Michael S Beates, Disability & The Gospel, p.51.

SUFFERING

'Do you bear the mark of wounds from God's sovereign hand? You and I can take heart because this means we are in his hand. And he promises that no one (and Romans 8 expands on this) can take us out of his hand. His grasp on those he loves is firm, immoveable, eternal, and unshakeable. And at the end of the day, no matter how hard the day may prove to be, that is a good thing!'

Michael S Beates, Disability & The Gospel, p.33.

SUFFERING

'...God intentionally brings woundedness to those he loves. And in fact, those God uses the most he breaks, in some manner, for his sovereign purposes. Think about your life. Perhaps there is a physical scar or dehabilitating condition you carry. Or maybe the scar or weakness is much more subtle and unseen by the human eye, but no less profound in its effect on your life. God used Jacob to show us that he uses such people not despite their weakness but rather because of and through these very weaknesses.'

Michael S Beates, Disability & The Gospel: How God uses our brokeness to display his grace, p.28.