spiritual development disorder

It has been a long time since my last post. We have been researching and waiting and last week we got our answer: Our son has autism. It has been a sad journey to this place of reality that our child has a real problem, and one that could be with him his entire life. We have so many questions--Will he ever talk? Will we ever be able to communicate with him on any kind of deep level? Will he ever understand God or spiritual things?

Through it all, I wish I could say that I've been holding steadfast to my faith and trusting God at every turn. I'm sorry to say that my response has been less than faithful. It is so easy to trust God with other people's problems, or even my own problems....but when it comes to my child, it is so much harder for some reason. I want him to have a life, and to be successful and accepted by his peers. It causes me much heartache to know that he is so different and will most likely endure much hardship in his future. It is more painful to watch than to endure yourself sometimes.

That being said, I have been reading so much about autism and the disorder that it is in communication and social settings. It frustrates me so much that Lewis can't understand when I'm trying to do something good for him (take him to the park etc.) and because initially he has to wait or we have to get in the car, he throws a fit and protests, unable to be quiet and listen to me explain what is going on. Sometimes I even shout "I'm trying to make you happy!"

Today I realized that I'm the same way with God. I was preparing for a Bible study the ladies in my church are doing about grace. One scripture reference was Philippians 3:8 where Paul has been bragging about his staunch righteous in keeping the law. He writes starting in vs. 7--

"But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish that I may gain Christ....."

Basically Paul is saying that we can try to have a righteousness on our own from our good works which will always fall short......OR we can set all of that aside and come to Christ through faith in his good work done on the cross and gain HIS righteousness.....merely by admitting we can't do it on our own and that we NEED him.

Now that is profound. But what struck me was that little part about the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ. Somewhere in my despair I forgot that Christ is a person. He is a relational being who gave up all so that we could know him. I've been shaking my fists in the air asking "why?" which is understandable, but I've been thinking about God like some passive monarch sitting in heaven saying, "Oh look, Shelley's been impatient. Let's give her a real challenge and let her build some character." And I'm embarrassed that I have given in to such lies.

So while Lewis has a social and communicative development disorder, I have a disorder of my own, and one that needs fast attention because I'm going to need him desperately in the coming years. Thank God that He is a gracious and forgiving HEALER. I know he can heal Lewis and I'm certain he can heal me. Will he heal Lewis? I don't know. I have to live with the reality that Lewis may never call me 'mama' or be able to pay his own bills. But either way, Jesus is a person who wants to walk with me through this and give me the strength to get through each day. And more than likely he has a plan that is going to make me better in the end.

It's hard to lay it down and believe that someone else has more at stake here. It's hard to believe Jesus loves Lewis more than me, but I know it's true. And there's nowhere else to go. Only Christ can bring healing, spiritually or otherwise.

Obviously there will be much more on this to come......but this is a start.