Mentally handicapped

[Chris.Steele]

Hello,

I just had a discussion with a work mate where he described an institution he once worked in as a contracter. Apparently he left the site without finishing the work brcause of the disturbing things he saw there.

He described what he said was "puddle of a person" which is people that are so physically and mentally defected that they are basically just bodies.

He went on to describe a person propped up in a wheelchair with no arms and legs just wailing and screaming and to reduce the noise a worker just pushed the wheelchair into the toilet/bathroom/wetroom and shut the door and walked away.

Another person he described was an older lady thats body was mangled and deformed walking around like "the walking dead" flashing her private parts from her robe.

These people are very much just functioning bodies with very little else behind the eyes.

It's very disturbing and these people are very much been that way since birth. Severe birth defects. My colleague isn't religious but he went on to say "if there is a God why does he let that stuff happen"

I can't say anything about it to him other than listen, i do know that sickness and illness and defects is caused by sin, and that most likely these peoples souls have already departed to be with God, and i know that peoples suffering is all for a reason.

but i can't help but think why is these people being kept alive, in intense agony and pain?
How can i preach the gospel and defend our Lord when stories and personal experiences like that are spoken to me?
Have you any advice for me on any readings i can increase my knowledge on these topics?

I too, am disturbed by what he told me.

 

[timf]

There are two sources for discomfort in the world, those things that (because of our selfish, sinful nature) we inflict on ourselves and others. There are also environmental hardships because of the curse God placed on creation. There can also be genetic variations requiring some people to be cared for by their families. As families have diminished in both depth and breadth, many of these poor souls are institutionalized.

Many people blame God for a world filled with suffering. However, God created the world perfect. It was our sin that messed things up. The hardships God imposed were for our benefit. God even offers us a way out this mess we have created through faith in Christ. There is much much more evil in the world that what your friend described.

 

[ViaCrucis]

Hello,

I just had a discussion with a work mate where he described an institution he once worked in as a contracter. Apparently he left the site without finishing the work brcause of the disturbing things he saw there.

He described what he said was "puddle of a person" which is people that are so physically and mentally defected that they are basically just bodies.

He went on to describe a person propped up in a wheelchair with no arms and legs just wailing and screaming and to reduce the noise a worker just pushed the wheelchair into the toilet/bathroom/wetroom and shut the door and walked away.

Another person he described was an older lady thats body was mangled and deformed walking around like "the walking dead" flashing her private parts from her robe.

These people are very much just functioning bodies with very little else behind the eyes.

It's very disturbing and these people are very much been that way since birth. Severe birth defects. My colleague isn't religious but he went on to say "if there is a God why does he let that stuff happen"

I can't say anything about it to him other than listen, i do know that sickness and illness and defects is caused by sin, and that most likely these peoples souls have already departed to be with God, and i know that peoples suffering is all for a reason.

but i can't help but think why is these people being kept alive, in intense agony and pain?
How can i preach the gospel and defend our Lord when stories and personal experiences like that are spoken to me?
Have you any advice for me on any readings i can increase my knowledge on these topics?

I too, am disturbed by what he told me.

My first thought was why are these vulnerable people not being treated better when they clearly need better care than they are receiving.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Chris.Steele]

My first thought was why are these vulnerable people not being treated better when they clearly need better care than they are receiving.

-CryptoLutheran

Absolutely. I agree. Also they are lost in the governmental care system here in the UK. Any governmental institutions in the UK are a terrible place to be, so for me it's no wonder they are treated so awfully.

 

[Chris.Steele]

There are two sources for discomfort in the world, those things that (because of our selfish, sinful nature) we inflict on ourselves and others. There are also environmental hardships because of the curse God placed on creation. There can also be genetic variations requiring some people to be cared for by their families. As families have diminished in both depth and breadth, many of these poor souls are institutionalized.

Many people blame God for a world filled with suffering. However, God created the world perfect. It was our sin that messed things up. The hardships God imposed were for our benefit. God even offers us a way out this mess we have created through faith in Christ. There is much much more evil in the world that what your friend described.

Yes, thank you. I agree. How would i try to tell people that? People that have no faith. I've tried to tell people our sin is the cause of this all but they don't accept it.

 

[ViaCrucis]

Absolutely. I agree. Also they are lost in the governmental care system here in the UK. Any governmental institutions in the UK are a terrible place to be, so for me it's no wonder they are treated so awfully.

There is a story that I've heard from some of my Jewish friends and neighbors; I don't know the source, but that's not the point. It's a parable of sorts. So the story goes (I'm paraphrasing from memory, so I'll be getting the details wrong here) there was a rabbi who saw great suffering around him, he would see people hungry in the streets, poor and destitute and in deep need. And he would pray that God bring them relief from their sufferings, praying that God would send people to help alleviate the suffering. Finally the rabbi reached the end of his days, and then stood before God. The rabbi asked God why God didn't help the hungry, the poor, and those suffering, why didn't God send anyone to them? God's response to the rabbi was, "I did, I sent them you."

The lesson which the story intends to convey is that the work of Tikkun Olam, or repairing the world, is something which each individual is invited to partake in. It's not about waiting around for God to fix everything; the work of repair and healing is something God has vested in human beings to participate in.

While this involves a specifically Jewish view; it is strikingly biblical, and Christians should be able to recognize these things even from our own New Testament, to the words and teachings of Jesus, and the Apostles.

Christians are told that we live in a fallen world, broken and beaten down by sin and the entire narrative of the Bible is God putting creation back to rights--that ultimately happens in Jesus, and eventually we behold the renewal of all things in the end. But between here and there, between now and then, between the now and not yet the people of God are called to a participation in the work of God, to the ministry of reconciliation. The kingdom of God is now and not yet; and in that tension God's people, as citizens of heaven, are tasked with what we might describe as taking the macrocosm of the kingdom and bearing it in the microcosm of our communities, in our relationships, in our day-to-day mundane realities of life. We don't usher in the kingdom by making the world "Christian", but rather we bear the kingdom of God and God's royal power and authority in the Messiah by the little things, in the forgiving of those who hurt us, in turning the other cheek, in loving our enemy, in breaking bread with those across the aisle. And the Church is, itself, meant to be a microcosm of the kingdom here on earth, which is why here "there is neither Jew nor Greek, male nor female, slave nor free" etc; if in the end all nations and tribes and tongues are gathered around the Throne in a great throng and mixed multitude, then here and now the Church is a desegregated community of mixed people who, literally, partake of God's Peace by coming together at a Table, and bearing a shared identity in Christ having become a new kind of person through baptism and the power of Christ's death and resurrection. And so here the hungry are to be fed, the thirsty given drink, we are a people to be conscious of and active in the pursuits of inter-personal and community justice. Since our citizenship is from heaven, we bear that citizenship in our vocation as residents of this world, inhabitants of our communities and neighborhoods and fellow-sharers of God's earth and creation, to bring justice, limited as it may be, here and now. Our vocation as citizens of our countries, states, communities (any and all temporal jurisdictions) means operating toward the good of our neighbors, especially the most vulnerable.

And this is how Christ is Lord now, in and through His Church; it does not accomplish the grand renewal of all creation that will be; but it points forward to it, it anticipates it, it says "This is what it will be" and we bring pieces and fragments of that future world back into the present. As though we are planting little flags of the kingdom of God here and now.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[timf]

Yes, thank you. I agree. How would i try to tell people that? People that have no faith. I've tried to tell people our sin is the cause of this all but they don't accept it.

1Co_1:18 For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.

Joh 18:37b Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice.

I have found few to be "of the truth". Satan has done a pretty good job of making sin, God, and even himself laughable. Public education does a pretty good job of making people take in whatever they are told as truth and crippling critical thinking. There are still some that seek, ask, and evaluate in a search for truth.Often those who have had brutal encounters with reality are more open to truth. It has been said there are more people interested in Jesus in prison and hospitals than in country clubs.