Us
pastor’s corner
By Paul Hathcoat
THE DISTINCTIONS BET WEEN
W
hat is our natural reaction to the distinctions or differences in people around us? How do we proceed when we encounter someone who is wholly distinct and unique in a way that doesn’t compute? Have you or your loved one ever been the peculiar or offbeat vibe in the room that makes others react in a way that stings? Why is that? Let’s talk about why we should celebrate our differences instead of letting them divide us, from a pastor’s perspective. In 1 Corinthians chapter 12 verses 12-31, we get a clear picture of how the body of believers is supposed to work together. The metaphor that is used here is the human body. “But our bodies have many parts, and God has put each part just where he wants it. How strange a body would be if it had only one part!” Verse 21 tells us that “the eye can never say to the hand, ‘I don’t need you.’ The head can’t say to the feet, ‘I don’t need you.’” God’s message to us all here is that each one of us matters no more or no less than the others, without exception. So why, then, do so many of us either hide our distinctions or make others feel unloved because of their own?
I think many of us forget that we have value. I believe that many of us, and many of you out there in the disability world, forget that being different is a superpower. People who do not understand someone get scared and even insecure about themselves when confronted with an exceptionally unique person. I think that far too few of us really know who we are in God’s eyes and then, in turn, draw our self-worth from the world instead of our creator. It took me over 30 years to fully embrace who I was made to be, flaws and all. I realized that I had listened to people who didn’t know or understand me for a long time and allowed them make me feel insignificant and weirdly different with their words and condemnations. I let who God created me to be hide while what I thought the world wanted me to be struggled to fit in and feel
36 Special Needs Living • May 2022
whole. I wish for myself and for all of you readers out there that we all embraced and accepted those around us in a loving way that reunited the one-body approach that God created us all to be a part of. So how can we celebrate the distinctions in the people around us? Well, I recently had the chance to give this advice to a large group of high schoolers, and it rings true for this article’s approach as well. (All of my messages have a lens of the disability world in them, as you may pick up here. That is the ministry that God has called me to, and it shines through everything I am inspired to talk about.) 1. Admit when it is uncomfortable; intentionally seek out people different from you. 2. Intentionally ask others about their distinctions. I promise they won’t bite. 3. Choose to celebrate people’s distinctions instead of fear or measure them against your own. My hope here is to challenge you. I want you to be challenged to help make change in our world. I want us all to rest knowing that we may not understand everyone around us but that we all are one part of the enormous “body” that God is sewing together daily. And more than anything, I want us all to show up, distinctions blazing, full of worth and self-confidence, being our unprecedented selves, ready to fill the YOU-shaped hole in our world and celebrating each other’s distinctions while accepting our own. Amen!
Do you have a thought, idea, or information that you would like to see in this section in an upcoming issue? Email Paul Hathcoat – phathcoat@wrcc.org.
