Disability and the Gospel, by Michael Beates

Michael Beates, teacher, theologian, board member of Joni Eareckson Tada's ministry Joni and Friends, and the father of a child with a disability has given a gift to disabled individuals and their families.  His book Disability and the Gospel is a great resource for biblical, historical, and theological reflection on a Christian perspective on disability.

Some of what I liked about disability and the gospel:

A survey of disability in the Old and New Testaments.  The most important point: Jesus spent a lot of time hanging out with disabled people.

A survey of theological views on disability.  Some of these were not very complimentary.  Insightful, nevertheless.

A discussion of the meaning of "the image of God."  This was the most thought-provoking part of the book, for me.  I've always though of the image of God not as a physical image but ability to reason.  So what if an individual is born with a disability, or becomes disabled, and loses capacity for reason?  What about the severely mentally handicapped?  I have no doubt that they share the imago dei, but what is the image dei in the context of disability?  Interesting and challenging.

Most important of all is Beates's clarion call to the church to include individuals with disabilities in church life.  Martin Luther King, Jr., famously said that 11 o'clock Sunday morning is the most segregated hour of the week.  He applied that sentiment to race; it can be applied even more strongly to disability.  For the most part, Beates writes, churches are not welcoming to individuals with disabilities.  From simple matters like parking and ramps, to more challenging matters like noise and grooming, many don't know how to assist and respond to fellow worshippers with disabilities.

I hope churches are making more progress than what Beates reports.  In my experience, many churches are making strides.  Some in small but significant ways, like in my small church, where disabled children have a buddy to help out during Sunday school. Other larger churches in the area have dedicated classes for children with special needs, and host respite programs, where parents can drop off their disabled children for a night out.

However, these are focussed on children.  Adults with disabilities are embraced less readily.  Beates wants the church to understand that disabled Christians are no less gifted by God, are part of the body, and have much to offer the body as a whole.  Church leaders will be challenged by Disability and the Gospel to seek out disabled Christians in the church and community and help them exercise their spiritual gifts.  (I love to see my non-verbal daughter wheel herself up to the front of the church and lay hands on people, praying silently for them!)

Beates writes out of his personal experiences with his daughter.  His scriptural and theological treatment is accessible (pun intended!) to the layperson.  I was encouraged and challenged to foster spiritual involvement and ministry with my daughter and other disabled individuals in my church and community.

Mama's Right Here, by Susan Kerner, illustrated by Estelle Corke

Just in time for Mother's Day, here's a storybook for kids whose mother is no longer around.  Mama's Right Here, by Susan Kerner, illustrated by Estelle Corke, assures children that even though their mother might not still be with them, she cares for them, is proud of them, and is watching them.

We never hear what happened to their mothers, but that's not the point.  Having lost their mothers, these children are encouraged and reassured by their fathers, grandparents, and others.  We need that kind of support when we lose a loved one, especially Mom.  Corke's watercolor illustrations are evocative and dreamlike, giving the perfect setting for Kerner's text.

I am thankful I still have my mother, but Mama's Right Here is a reminder of how much she loves me and to cherish the time we do have together.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!

By the People, by Charles Murray

Is it just me, or is Charles Murray getting angrier and more frustrated as he gets older?  Murray's new book, By the People: Rebuilding Liberty Without Permission reveals Murray at the end of his rope.  This stuff he's been writing about for decades--limiting government, declining societal norms, the welfare class, racial divides--is coming to a head.  In By the People, he addresses the out-of-control federal bureaucratic state, offering solutions but with reservations about success.

The U.S. federal government has grown beyond anything the founders would ever recognize.  "Under Republicans and Democrats alike, the federal government went from nearly invisible in the daily life of ordinary Americans in the 1950s to an omnipresent backdrop today."  He paints a bleak picture of the administrative state, and finds that "solutions are beyond the reach of the electoral process and legislative process."

In the first several chapters, Murray describes how we got here, a nation of rules, whose rule makers are unaccountable and who frequently impose "arbitrary or capricious" rulings.  He compares our system of rules to a Third World kleptocracy, where lobbyists have pay the bribes and legislators shake down donors.  It leads to effectual lawlessness and inevitable corruption.

Given the corruption of the legislative process, what does that leave?  The judicial process, of course.  The most substantial section of By the People has Murray calling for civil disobedience, in which people refuse to follow certain types of regulations.  He primarily has in mind businesses whose operation is constrained by those "arbitrary and capricious" rules.  In order to protect these righteous scofflaws Murray proposes legal defense funds, similar to the Institute for Justice (only on a larger scale) and industry-specific trade associations.  When a company or work site is targeted by OSHA or other government agency, they will have a means to defend themselves.  Given the number of work sites across the country and the limitations of the regulatory agencies, Murray foresees an eventual concession to a "no harm, no foul," hands-off regulatory atmosphere.  He sees these concessions as potentially changing overall attitudes toward the regulatory state.  "Once it becomes normal for liberals as well as conservatives to react to stupid regulations with 'This is ridiculous,' the way will have been opened for larger changes."

Murray can be simultaneously bleak and wildly optimistic.  On the one hand, "The federal government was created with one overriding duty: to allow us to live freely as we see fit. . . . It has betrayed that duty." Yet, he writes, over the next two centuries, "America will do a better job of leaving people free to live their lives as they see fit. . . . There will be too much money and too many technological resources to make today's leviathan government necessary."  In the meantime, I really like his proposal for the Madison Fund, the legal defense fund he outlines.  If he can get the funding and recruit some good lawyers for it, I think it can have the impact he describes.  If he gets busy on this, maybe he will have a role in reining in the bureaucratic state and relieve some of his frustration!  More power to ya, Dr. Murray!


Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!

Some Churches, by Tasha Cotter

A Visit to the Modern Art Museum

I stopped by the museum to see a display of modern art.
I have no doubt that the paintings conveyed some meaning to the artist.
Pretty colors, interesting patterns, sometimes familiar shapes emerged.
Vaguely pleasing, slightly boring, only rarely conveying meaning to me.

What constitutes art?  What makes a poem a poem?
Words, put together, lovely phrases, nonsense.
Pretty words, interesting sentences, sometimes meaning emerges.
Meaning?  Sometimes.  Theme?  Must there be a theme?

Some Churches will appeal to some readers.
Poems without meter, rhyme, structure.
Pronouns without antecedents.
Stories without settings.  Settings without stories.

An abstract painting.  A room full of abstract paintings.
Spend enough time in the gallery, perhaps they will speak to you.
Something catches your eye.  You may have missed it before.
Spend enough time in Some Churches, perhaps these poems will speak as well.


Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!

Restoring All Things, by John Stonestreet and Warren Cole Smith

When I picked up Restoring All Things: God's Audacious Plan to Save the World Through Everyday People, I knew it would be full of culturally relevant, theologically sound, well-referenced, insightful analysis.  Warren Cole Smith, publisher of World magazine, and John Stonestreet, who carries on Chuck Colson's tradition on the BreakPoint commentaries, both have organizational pedigrees that point to evangelical Christian thinking engaged with culture.

Smith and Stonestreet met expectations and more.  On one level, Restoring All Things covers a wide variety of cultural hot buttons--race, criminal justice, sexuality and marriage, poverty and wealth, etc.--from a conservative Evangelical position.  Anyone familiar with World and BreakPoint will have a good idea what to expect on each of these issues.  They provide reasonable discussion and explanations of their position, as well as helpful addition reading and action steps.

What sets Restoring All Things apart is the stories that constitute the bulk of each chapter.  They write, "the ideas that shape a culture are rarely advanced by argument.  Rather they are advanced by the stories that shape our imaginations."  Their hope is that as we read stories of the work ordinary people are doing, "not only will we be inspired to embrace the redemptive responsibility the church has in the world, we will be inspired to join in."

For example, it's one thing to read an argument in defense of marriage, yet another to read about someone who was faithfully married for 73 years, yet retained a romantic adoration of his wife.  It's one thing to read that "The best way to eliminate poverty is by creating jobs," yet another to read about a nation-wide network of faith-based job training programs.  It's one thing to read about sex trafficking and pornography, yet another to read stories of women who have been assisted in getting out of the sex trade.

Stonestreet and Smith are writing "to inspire everyday Christians to 'run toward the plague when everyone else is running away,'" and in hopes that "the church today [will] have the strategic wisdom to be fire-bearers in ways that are restorative and life-giving, and not merely reactionary."  Restoring All Things is inspirational and practical.  Of course one Christian can't be passionate about every issue covered herein, but every Christian can be informed, and can find work where their "deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet."


Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!

Boogers and Farts Forever, by B. Couban

Everyone farts.  Everyone has boogers.  So, really, everyone ought to learn a little about where they come from.  B. Couban is here to help!  Boogers and Farts Forever may not win a Newberry Award or Caldecott Medal, but with simple, silly pictures and funny, yet a little bit informative, text, Couban gives the how and why of boogers and farts.

As Couban writes, "Boogers and farting are part of life's pleasures.  Always enjoy these natural treasures!"  You might not agree with these assessments, but kids will get a kick out of the book.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!

Never Say No, by Mark and Jan Foreman

When a young dad asked pastor Mark Foreman for "one nugget of parenting advice," he didn't expect this answer: "Never say no."  In Never Say No: Raising Big-Picture Kids, Mark and Jan Foreman write about their experiences as parents of two boys.  Not insignificantly, their boys Jon and Tim are the core of the successful band Switchfoot.  Given their commercial success, their musical impact, and their active ministry, the Foremans must have done something right.

"Never say no" sounds like the flippant answer of a permissive or over-indulgent parent.  But that's not at all what the Foremans convey.  They "hope to move beyond reactionary noes to proactive yeses.  Behavior often takes care of itself when we focus on having a healthy relationship."  Mark had a epiphany when he sensed God saying to him, "I enjoy you."  That realization shaped his relationship with God and with his children.  Enjoying children in play, communication, and shared experiences lays a foundation of relationship and character shaping.

As parents, our modeling behavior and reactions to our children's behavior communicate much more to our children than any spoken messages or verbal instruction and correction.  The Foremans write that children are watching; the easiest way to influence our children to live a particular lifestyle is to live that lifestyle ourselves.

The Foremans also talk about creating an environment that fosters creative thinking, independence, and interaction with culture.  With very little exposure to TV during their formative years, and lots of unstructured play, the Foreman boys explored their world.  The Foremans did not want their boys to succumb to "naturedeficit disorder," the indoor lifestyle that can lead to "increased depression, anxiety, and attention problems," not to mention obesity.

I don't remember the Foremans mentioning home schooling.  In fact, they write very little about school at all.  But much of their attitude and specific guidance reminds me of books I've read about home schooling and unschooling.  They emphasize reading books from the classics to modern literature, keeping up with and discussing current events, traveling with an aim toward learning about history, architecture, and life in other cultures, frequenting museums and cultural events, listening to and playing a variety of music, all of which fit in a homeschooling model (and are easier to do when a family isn't shackled by the rigors of a school schedule).

The Foremans' bottom line is enjoy your kids, give them an environment in which they can learn and grow, and model for them the character and values you want to see in them.  Be prepared to look for opportunities to say yes, and you will find yourself saying no less and less.  The Foremans have encouraged and inspired me as a parent.  Hopefully my kids won't be hearing "No!" from me (at least not very much!).


Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!