Imagine yourself walking into the library. You are looking for a specific book, just like you have done countless times before. And just like before, you walk up to the computers to search the card catalog. You type in the name of the book and hit enter, but there are no results. So, you check the spelling, and you find your problem. You entered gibberish instead of the title. You type it again, and the same thing happens. What’s going on, you ask yourself. Then, you look down at the keyboard, and the keys are in all the wrong places. So you sit there, staring at the keyboard, picking out the letters one by one.
That feeling is just a small taste of my life as an autistic. Each and every person has their own keyboard they go from; you could call it a standard, and we all know the standard keyboard is QWERTY. Just about every person in the world understands this innately, and they can type along with everyone else no problem. But, there are people whose keyboards were put together differently – people who are autistic, who suffer from depression, whose brains are wired a different way for whatever reason – people with different keyboards, trying to live in a QWERTY church. People who have no place.
Here is the problem. People like me, people with different keyboards, still go to church. And we start doing churchy things. But it doesn’t take long for someone with a QWERTY keyboard to come over and correct us. “No, you’re doing it wrong. Press the q!” And we start looking for the q, but the person gets exasperated. “No, the letter in the top left of the keyboard, just under the one!” But the problem is, that’s not q. We push it anyway just to make others happy, but in reality, this act cuts us away from the Spirit of God. And so we are left, “doing church” as we are told, but not truly experiencing the power of God.
There is hope, though; hope for all of us who are placeless in the church, for all of us using a different keyboard for whatever reason. The Gospels have story after story of people like me, people who did not have a place in normal society, let alone the church. One such story involves a woman who had been bleeding for 12 years.
Because of her bleeding, she couldn’t have children, and that by itself would have made her life miserable. But her bleeding also made her unclean, and anyone or anything that touched her also became unclean. She had gone through all the doctors and all her money, and had nothing left. She was isolated and placeless; there was no room for her in the church.
But, she heard about a man, Jesus. How he was healing and casting out demons. Maybe she heard about Jesus casting out Legion from the Gerasene Demoniac, and that man was given back something we frequently overlook. Yes, he was healed and put back in his right mind. But, he was also able, no commanded, to go back to society, in this case the Decapolis. There was a place for him, and Jesus restored him to it. So maybe, just maybe, Jesus could restore this woman to her place in society.
Hearing that Jesus was there, she joined the crowd, pushing through them in order to get just behind Jesus. Just imagine how many people she made unclean in that crowd! She was desperate. I’m sure she was convinced that if she just had contact, no matter how minimal, with God the Son, she would find her place once again. And then … she touched him his garment. And he healed her. Her bleeding was ended. And, perhaps more important, she could belong again.
There are people just like this woman in our church buildings every Sunday. People bleeding, looking for the balm of Gilead, but they can’t seem to find it. Instead of the healing touch of Jesus, they find the abrasion of misunderstanding. So they go away, with their wounds bleeding worse than before.
If we could only just touch the hem of Jesus’ garments, we could be healed and regain our place, just like this woman did. She reached out, touched his garments, and was healed immediately. Just that fleeting encounter with Christ was enough for her.
I have often wondered just how this could happen. I know that all things are possible with God, but this just seems out there. It reminds me of the handkerchiefs and aprons of Paul healing the sick in Acts 19. How does that even work?
Enter the Holy Spirit. I have to admit that I don’t know much about the Spirit or how it works. But there is one thing I do know: the Spirit brings us into contact with God, and that contact brings healing. After all, power left Jesus, and I don’t think it was because of his clothes. Rather, I attribute this healing to the Spirit. And that is the true power of the Spirit. The Spirit makes a place for us, and restores us to that place. The Spirit doesn’t care what society thinks or what keyboard you are using. No matter who you are, there is a place, and the Spirit makes that place for us.
But there is another side to this story. Yes, the Spirit makes a place for us, but how often do we deny that place to others? Think about it. There were difficulties that the woman had to overcome, shoving her way through the crowd. Imagine what would have happened if the crowd of Jesus-followers saw her, really saw her, and cleared her way to Jesus? What would have happened if they helped make a place for her?
Ultimately, we don’t know. But, we can find out. What would happen if we made a place for others, especially others who are using a different keyboard than us? I don’t know, but I know we would be embodying the Spirit of God. When we bring others into an encounter with Christ, only good can come of it.
Please, embody the Spirit of God and his power today, and make a place for everyone.