Disability Evangelism To Adults With Disabilities: So How Is The Church Doing?

Greetings & Blessings Faithful Followers of Mission Access!  I only have two Life Questions:  1.  What are you doing?  2.  And why are you doing it?  So today I ask this question re:  Disability Evangelism to Adults with Disabilities.  How are we as the Church doing?

One of my favorite verses in the Bible is Proverbs 25:2:  “It is the glory of God to conceal a matter; to seek our a matter is the glory of kings.”  I think God really digs it when he hides a tasty morsel of wisdom and then find it when we earnestly seek it.

So I imagine he was delighted when I came across a blog entry on Church 4 Every Child entitled “Adults with disabilities and church attendance…What does the data say?”

Well in a word:  lousy.

The 2010 Survey of Americans with Disabilities done by The Kessler Foundation and the National Organization on Disability commissioned by Harris Interactive looked at the impact of the ADA (The Americans with Disabilities Act) 20 years later.  The study looked at a wide range of areas including “the relationship between the presence of a disability and attendance of religious services.”

Here are two facts I find fascinating:  1.  “Adults with disabilities are significantly less likely than their peers without disabilities to attend religious services (50% v. 57% respectively), and 2.  They are also significantly more likely to have NEVER attended a religious service compared to non-religious controls.”

What a shame!  Although not at all surprising.  When I was Church Relations Coordinator for Joni & Friends/DFW, I scoured the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex for evidence of Disability Evangelism and sadly outside of a few large and well-funded programs at several of the 50 area megachurches with more than 5000 members I concur with the research survey that little has changed in 20 years post ADA.

OK so we know that the What, and the Why are sorely lacking, but perhaps we are not asking the right question.  Why don’t we ask about How we are doing Disability Evangelism, and how we can do it better in the future?

All I know is this:  right after the Lord led me away from my job with Joni & Friends he immediately led me right to the front door of a church in Dallas that has been ministering to people and families affected by disability for more than 55 years!  Verily Bartimaeus Baptist Temple (www.BBTemple.org) must know something to teach ALL of us about now just What and Why but more importantly the How of Disability Evangelism that truly helps bring people and families affected by disability into a Relationship with Jesus Christ.

Isn’t that what we are commanded to do?

In His Accessible Grace,

Linda