Wheelchair or Little Red Wagon?

When my son was a youngster he found himself in the hospital for some surgery on his knee. When it was time to come home the doctor told him to climb up into a waiting wheelchair which would take him down to our car. Ian was adamant (as only a small boy can be) that he was not going to get into the wheelchair. After a few minutes it was clear that there was some deep seated conviction that was keeping him from the wheelchair. Finally, the doctor (who was a good surgeon and a bit of a psychologist as well) asked Ian if it would be okay if he rode down to the car in a little red wagon. Well, the frowns were lost, and through the tears the smiles came out. He hopped in the wagon, and off we went.

After we arrived home I asked Ian why he was so upset about the wheelchair. He looked up at me with his big blue eyes and said, "Dad, there were a lot of children at the hospital who were in wheel chairs and none of them could walk. I knew that if I got in the wheel chair that I would become like them and I would never walk again." I still get a tear in my eye thinking about that moment, and the logic of a child that led to such a moment. There is humor, looking back some 15 years, but at the time it was no laughing matter.

Sadly, we all are prone to apply the same kind of logic to our life experiences. Our Triune God has a wheelchair, a medicine, a plan, or a path that is in our best interest. When we see what He has for us, we recoil in terror, thinking that it will in some way inhibit us, or hinder us, or permanently scar us to such a degree that we will be rendered less than who we want to be, or less than who others around us expect us to be.

In some form or fashion we reject his Holy Church, we reject the teachings of the Apostles and Church Fathers, we do not prepare and partake of His Divine Liturgy, we don't avail ourselves of the prayers of the saints, we don't fast and pray, we don't give as we are able to cover the needs of the Church or those less fortunate around us. And, as a result our sin remains, our spiritual health suffers. We don't trust God because we don't think He knows best. We fear (albeit with great conviction) what we don't understand, and we miss out on what He has in store for us.

The Orthodox Church is that hospital, that wheelchair, that doctor, that surgery that we all need. It is not for me to say who will reside forever in heaven, whether Orthodox, or Catholic, or Protestant. But, I would urge my non-Orthodox friends not to reject the Church because of faulty reasoning. Come to some services, check it out, read the consistent teaching of the last two thousand years, and sample the depths of Orthodoxy.

Thankfully, our God is a merciful God. When we reject His wheelchair, He usually has a little red wagon for us to climb in to. I pray that we would all heed His call.