I wanted to highlight another piece that I wrote for PURE Ministries about how respite ministry looks a lot like “kingdom come.” I hope you enjoy it.
After 3-hour night of respite ministry, I realize I hadn’t really known what to expect. That night, I had seen amazing relationships being forged between typical people and those we cherish as PURE. I had personally witnessed a schedule and format that was complete genius as it allowed everyone to focus on their strengths and abilities rather than their deficits. Meeting and speaking with servants of this incredible ministry had left my fingers itching to write. But we were instructed to assemble in a large group meeting room for some kind of benedictory activity, so I slowly navigated toward a seat in the back of the room.
The last thing I expected, knowing how much energy this night had cost me personally, was a worship service. I don’t think I had ever considered what it would be like to worship with so many PURE people. Because my son’s primary anxiety trigger is auditory input, worship is very difficult for us. Noah simply cannot handle all the sensory information in the form of music, voices, clapping hands and moving bodies. His typical posture is to sit, shoulders hunched-over in a protective posture, with his hands over his ears.
This has perhaps been one of my greatest sorrows as the mother of my PURE child. Worship through music has been a life-long love of mine. I learned not only to sing harmony in church at my grandmother’s side, but also to sight-read music. As a matter of fact, the first book I probably every “read” was a hymnal. As I grew I joined choirs and, eventually, became a children’s choir director and worship leader. Not being able to share my love of worship with Noah has been difficult. I suppose it is natural to want to take that which brings me so close to God and impart it to my son. But for Noah, it is anything but “natural.” It is painful.
As we took our seats in the meeting room, I double-checked Noah’s noise reducing headphones to insure that they would help him endure a time of worship. I was comforted to see other PURE people entering the room taking similar precautions. So I settled us in as Miss Lorie began a few preliminary announcements. Then the completely unexpected happened.
After calling into the audience for the worship leader, she handed the microphone over to a young PURE man who was about 14 years of age. It was clear that he had done this before, for everyone began clapping in preparation for a song that I would never forget.
Read the rest of the story by following this link: Soon and Very Soon
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