Did Jesus Have a Disability?

People with disabilities have not always felt valuable. This includes the context of the church. Are disabilities just a reminder of all that is not right in the world?

But what if Jesus had a disability? I'm not suggesting that he had autism or was lame. But consider this passage:

 In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:

Who, being in very nature God,
    did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
rather, he made himself nothing
    by taking the very nature of a servant,
    being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
    he humbled himself
    by becoming obedient to death—
        even death on a cross!
Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
    and gave him the name that is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
    in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
    to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:5-11)

Many people see the cross as the greatest sacrifice that Jesus experienced. But what about the incarnation? God the Son became a human being!

One of the first heresies was not doubts about Jesus' divinity but about his humanity. Some could not believe that Jesus really became human and that he must have only seemed to be human.

But the incarnation teaches that Jesus really became human. He emptied himself. If taking on humanity with all of its limitations is not a disability, what is?

People with disabilities should not feel out of place in churches. They should feel right at home because the foundation of Christianity is about the worship of the disabled God.

Jesus' Resurrection and Disabilities

Easter Sunday is the most important day for Christians. It is the day that we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus.

Does this have anything to say about disabilities?

When we think of the afterlife, we think about becoming perfect according to popular understandings of normal. All the things that we think make us stand out will be removed and we will have the bodies we always wanted.

What will the afterlife really be like? The only hint that we have is Jesus. The resurrection body of Jesus is the type of body we will have at our resurrection. Yes, it will be a better body. It will be a body that will be built for eternity. Jesus was also able to do things that his other body could not do. He walked through walls and even seemed to travel differently.

But there was something else interesting about his body. He still had his scars. The holes in his hands, feet and side would not seem to be ideal by normal standards. None of us would choose them. And yet there they are in his resurrection body. While a resurrection body is, what I tell my Bible college students, "an upgraded body," for Jesus it was a body that was in continuity with his "weak" body.

What does this means for those who have disabilities?

It is possible that some aspect of what we consider disabilities may be represented in our resurrection bodies. The difference is that it would no longer be a disability any more than Jesus was still being bound to the cross.

I am not necessarily saying that those in wheelchairs will be unable to walk in the resurrection or the blind be unable to see. But it is very possible that those parts of their life will be represented in some way in the resurrection.

Easter Sunday is a day of hope for all Christians. The possibilities that it opens up are limitless.

Image by pixaby