Every holiday season I like to watch one of the many movie versions of Dickens "A. Christmas Carol ".
I seem to like them all. I like the book better, which goes without saying.
My two top favorite versions are the animated "Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol" and the 1951 British version starring Alistair Sim.
All movie adaptations from classic literature take certain liberties with the material and changes are made.
In all the versions certain aspects remain constant.
In all the many film and stage versions that I've seen over the years the one constant that seems to be fairly consistent is the line where the characters Bob Cratchit is relating to Mrs. Cratchit something Tiny Tim said to him while at church on Christmas Day:
“Somehow, he gets thoughtful, sitting by himself so much, and thinks the strangest things you ever heard. He told me, coming home, that he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas-day who made lame beggars walk and blind men see.”
I read the book when I was about twelve years old and that line held me, not understanding quite why, too young perhaps to fully grasp it, but years later, while in seminary I came across the same lines shortly after studying John 9:1-7 which is the account of Jesus meeting a man born blind. The text reads:
"As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?"
Jesus answered, "It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.
We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming, when no one can work.
As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world."
John 9:1-7 (ESV)
Thinking about Tim's statement to his father began to make me think about Disabilties, and my own disabilties in a way that I hadn't before.
I was, as many do, struggling with the purpose that my having disabilities served.
I had, as I still do, hope and assurance that God does restore people. But that's a promise for the consummation of all things. Not right now.
What is God expecting of us with disabilties in the here and now?
John 9 tells us. Tiny Tim tells us.
Our disabilities are here at God's discretion. His purposes are served.
When we see persons with disabilties, or anything that is normal for a fallen world, we should be reminded of Christ. The one who came to restore things back to the way things were intended before a bit of fruit was eaten.
The Disciples with Jesus took note of the man's physical blindness, ignoring their own spiritual blindness, cited the man's sin and missed the point.
People pitied Tiny Tim, some like Scrooge, had a more negative kind of pity towards such people, noting that they should be incarcerated, out of the way, or die and "decrease the surplus population."
Tim's response was as if to say "don't pity me, remember The One who makes us all whole again."
We live in a crazy world. Values, ideas, and world views are all conflicting with each other. This is the kind of night, perhaps, that Jesus was referring to.
We need to see past all that and set our eyes, our souls, and our hope one the one whose birth many of us just celebrated.
That's when life finally starts to make some kind of sense.
