Living Water: Jesus In New York

Bloggers’ Bible Study

The Book of John.  Chapter Five.

Donnette Sanz, a traffic agent in the Bronx borough of New York, was crossing a street when a van–which had no brakes–struck her so hard that she was flung into an oncoming bus.

A beautiful, black woman, she was only 33 years old.

And seven months pregnant.

But, immediately after Donnette got stuck under the bus, a crowd of about thirty strangers lifted the five-ton machine and got her out.

Unfortunately, Sanz died during surgery about two hours later.

But for the grace of God, her son lived.

Sean Michael Justin Sanz was born on the same day his mother died.

“It’s a sad thing and a beautiful thing.  We came together and there was strength other than what you see on this corner.  From where?” [Country Banks] asked, preacherlike, about the source of this surprising strength. “We all know where, but we don’t always speak of it”  (New York Daily News).

Five tons.  That’s 10,000 pounds.  With exactly thirty people, that comes out 333 pounds each.

And even if that group of strangers only lifted one end of the bus, that still comes out to 167 pounds per person.

But while some might say the miracle from God was lifting that five-ton bus, I think the greater miracle was the willingness of a group of strangers to aid a pregnant woman who desperately needed their help.

All too often humanity turns its back on the crises of the world.

For instance, since I started this site in November, Save Darfur has had only five clicks…but the genocide continues.  (And while you were waiting to watch The Olympics, the Chinese government was busy revoking the visa of 2006 gold medalist Joey Cheek, co-founder of Team Darfur and a contributor to Blog for Darfur.)

And Suicide Prevention & Awareness has had three clicks…but every 17 minutes there is another death by suicide.  And ONE, the campaign to make poverty history, has also had just three clicks…

…the apathy continues.

And that apathy bothers me more than the problems.  I have considered giving up.  I have considered not writing anymore.  I have even considered deleting my blog.

Yes, apathy can be paralyzing.  (So paralyzing this Essay is published quite late!)

But sometimes, when I feel like giving up, the solution is so simple it almost escapes me:

Would you like to get well?  Stand up, pick up your mat, and walk! 

In John Chapter Five, Jesus spoke those words to a man who had been paralyzed for 38 years.  No one had ever helped him.  The people who had made it into the pool and had been healed never came back to him and said, “I know that you are paralyzed, but I will stay with you so that I can help you into the pool the next time an angel of The Lord stirs the waters.”  Everybody just got up and left.

And yet, Jesus only tells the man to “walk;” He never tells him where to go.  As always, God leaves the most important decisions to us.  We can accept the cross we alone must bear or we can waste an entire lifetime wishing things were different for us.

I have been living a disability for decades; I got my first pair of hearing aids when I was just 23 years old (though I certainly should have had them before then).  I have gone through three pairs of hearing aids, each more powerful than the last.  But, as I consider the first question Jesus asks the man who had been paralyzed for thirty-eight years–”Would you like to get well?”–I wonder what my response would have been if He had asked that of me.

Would I like to get well?

Once upon a time, my answer would have been, “Of course!  It isn’t fair that I have to live like this!”

But people often make the mistake of trying to separate their identity from their disablity.  In the physical sense, my hand is as much me as my brain.  My feet are as much me as my heart and lungs and liver.  And my hearing loss has become such an integral part of my physical me that I would not dare give it up.  Because these things are not simply part of physical identity, they have become my spiritual identity.

Earlier today, I was discussing this post with a friend who said:

I don’t see your hearing loss as a disability; I see it as an enhancement.  You wouldn’t be you if you could hear.

She is right.  Because my hearing loss has taught me to look beyond appearances, into the hearts.  And I have learned compassion for people with disabilities; they are the best friends I have ever had.  And from that, I have learned compassion for those who suffer spiritually–from the alcoholic to the widower, and for my beautiful sisters in Christ who have recently lost their fathers.

Yes, there are times I want to give up.  There are times I don’t know how I ever made it this far, having lost 25–or 26–people.  (I know their names; they are not numbers.)  But even when my faith is hanging by a thread, God knows…

…that is enough.

So I stand up, pick up my mat–even my cross–and walk.

And who knows?  Maybe one day I’ll move a mountain.

Or lift a bus.