Hands Off!
Part 1
A friend emailed me this encouraging story of a man called Nick Vujicic who was born without limbs.
In the morning of 4 Dec 1982 in Melbourne (Australia), Nick was born. Horrors to horrors! The parents realised that their firstborn son was born without limbs.
That began a life faced with many challenges and obstacles. He faced doubts and discouragement from himself and from people around him.
Initially, his parents were absolutely devastated. His dad was a pastor and the whole church also mourned over his birth. The dad had great concern and fears of what kind of life he will be able to lead.
But their faith in God provided the parents strength, wisdom and courage to care for their child.
As Nick came to school going age, he faced his next test. The law in Australia did not allow him to enroll in main-stream school. God gave his mum the strength to fight for the law to be changed and did the one of many miracles in his life. He was the 1st disabled students to be allowed to study in main-stream schools.
Yet Nick encountered many uncomfortable times of feeling rejected, weird and bullied because of his physical differences. He struggled.
Yet with support of his parents, Nick started to develop attitudes and values to overcome these challenges times.
Deep down, Nick knew he may be outwardly different but inwardly he was as normal as anyone.
That began a life faced with many challenges and obstacles. He faced doubts and discouragement from himself and from people around him.
Initially, his parents were absolutely devastated. His dad was a pastor and the whole church also mourned over his birth. The dad had great concern and fears of what kind of life he will be able to lead.
But their faith in God provided the parents strength, wisdom and courage to care for their child.
As Nick came to school going age, he faced his next test. The law in Australia did not allow him to enroll in main-stream school. God gave his mum the strength to fight for the law to be changed and did the one of many miracles in his life. He was the 1st disabled students to be allowed to study in main-stream schools.
Yet Nick encountered many uncomfortable times of feeling rejected, weird and bullied because of his physical differences. He struggled.
Yet with support of his parents, Nick started to develop attitudes and values to overcome these challenges times.
Deep down, Nick knew he may be outwardly different but inwardly he was as normal as anyone.
With his parents’ encouragement, Nick start to attempt to make friends with some kids. Soon, the kids realized that he was just like them. God kept blessing him with new friends……. (to be continued)
Though we may not be outwardly crippled as Nick, inwardly we may be emotionally crippled. For example, there was a period of time in my life when I had low self-esteem and felt that I was never good enough. Guess I have an inner handicap =) This inner handicap affected my life outwardly. I was shy and quiet. I also had no confident in the things I was doing and chose to remain always in my comfort zone.
Hmm, you could say I was a frog in the well =) But thanks be to God, I met Him and He turned me into a prince charming (I am being thick skin here).
He made me see the handicap in me as my uniqueness and accept them as my strengths. For example, I realize that because I am quiet and shy, I am thoughtful and observant. I can also be sensitive to the needs of people.
Yet at the same time, I recongised that my strengths can be my weaknesses at times. Therefore, I need to step out of my comfort zone and overcome my handicap at times. Therefore, I am consciously making efforts to talk and share more. Though still have struggle at times, at least I am working towards breakthrough =)
Hopefully after reading this, the question you can answer is :
Do I see my inner handicaps?Have I accept them as my strengths
and yet learn to overcome them at times when they are our weaknesses?
0 comments:
Post a Comment