I felt like a Stranger All Alone in Church

I could almost see the glory.  The front two rows of the church, filled with wheelchair and mobility impaired people.  It was glorious.

My favorite spot in the church is to sit/wheel into the back.  Why?  It is symbolic?  Blacks where always asked to occupy the back rows.  Also, the people whom tend to occupy the back rows are the homeless and the poor, because, they do not want everybody to see them.  They want to be comfortable in church, and, if they sit in the front, then they will get the nasty looks and the whispers. 

Yes.  I felt alone.  I felt alone because again, I was the only wheelchair in the church. 

I miss and yearn.  I miss and yearn New York, and the disabled ministries that used to come the Belsky House to worship with all the “cripples”.  It was glorious beyond belief.  To hear people whom could hardly talk worship and sing to God.  Glory beyond comparison.

And now, March 2016, I am faced with the same scenario, being alone in church.  Wow.  The dread. 

Church has become, many of them, a place for the young people only.  You do not see the elders much in the church.  Grandma coming in to lead a worship and praise song.  Services begin at 8 PM in many church, but you do not see the opening at 7 PM and people coming in and immediately getting on their knees to pray and thank God.  It is the new style of church, and, I hate it.  Where is the popcorn?  Those people whom used to pop up and give their testimony during praise and worship.  It is gone “Deary”.  

Jesus and his ministry, he went out to get the disabled.  He went out and healed the sick and raised the dead.  Just read the scriptures, it is there.  Really.  But, very few churches have church vans, less handicapped wheelchair vans, to “Bring them” and “call them” to worship the almighty. 

I say this in dedication in part to Esther Flores.  The missionary whom came back for a few month, from Peten Guatamala, and shared with me what I term is “Missionary Post Traumatic Stress”.  Abroad, the people whom have nothing appreciate all you give them and worship God thereby.  She saw the orphans and children in need, and said, “I want to adopt all of them”.  She said, “You do not understand Ray, they are locked up and outcast of society”.  There, for sure, if you are disabled you are “warehoused” and considered nothing.  The same dedication is to Jennifer Frye, whom’s son sees the same thing, and want to stay abroad in Honduras.  He did not want to come back.  He saw the same needy children.  I am wondering when the churches in the US are going to see the same needy people, the disabled, in all their glory.  This is why I pray; This is why I hurt.