Mark 9:30-37
“Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me.” ( Mark 9:37)
As we read in today's Gospel, the disciples are still in an acquaintance-like relationship with the Lord; the lack of intimacy being both a symptom and cause of their inability to accept a Messiah that must suffer, die, and descend in societal status in order to bring freedom and everlasting life. He invites them to better know Him by the featured verse today.
In my work with children with disabilities, there is an inherent element of seeing beyond the physical and a willingness to enter into a world foreign from our own. A world that can appear unsettling from conventional ideas of beauty and greatness. A world where there is often suffering, challenges, and lack of understanding from the community. Often parents grieve a reality they had envisioned for their child or what their life would be like. But I witness instead the daily choice of their openness to receiving the gift of the child that has been given them, modeling this teaching from Jesus. A child with disability is also the one whom the Father chooses to model as “receiving Him.” Are we willing to enter into the suffering and gift of another person, recognizing this is how God wills to reveal Himself?
I pray we may each confidently ask for and receive the daily grace to see with his eyes the face of God in our neighbors; in those who are suffering, in those who do not hold conventional beauty or greatness.The grace to embrace the vulnerability and weakness as so nakedly seen in our brothers and sisters with disability, and recognize this is Who God is; this is how He chooses to reveal his greatness. By choosing to embrace and receive these little ones among us, we receive God.
By Sarah Myers
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