“I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.” (Psalm 139:14)
Writing this as Neurodiversity Celebration Week draws to a close as I find it really hard to set priorities without a fixed deadline…
I’m Beth and I was diagnosed with dyspraxia when I was 22. Spilling Communion wine, walking into lamposts, and having an examiner stop my driving test and recommend I never get behind the wheel of a car again, are the visible signs that I am neurodiverse. The invisible signs: I have an ‘interesting’ filing system, I find budgeting money a challenge, and I am always running late unless I put an earlier starting time in my diary. If I am reliant on a map for getting somewhere, I might arrive sometime that day!
I spent so many years feeling my dyspraxia was a negative, a part of me I needed to hide, wanted to fix. Psalm 139 reminds us that we are created by God, with all our differences, to be a part of God’s amazing creation. We are not a mistake or an accident!
If I could drive a car, the lady on her way to court wouldn’t have asked for prayer, I wouldn’t have had all the life-giving pastoral conversations which can be had whilst being given a lift. Time-blindness keeps me present, in-the-moment with whoever I am with, and enables me to be flexible in emergencies. My ‘interesting’ filing system means I’m creative, see things from an alternative perspective, build networks and connections which others miss.
In our weaknesses are our God-given strengths.
In our weaknesses, we find the strengths of others who can do what we cannot, who will collaborate with us, so we support one another with our unique gifts and experiences. Together we are the Church, the body of Christ.
As Neurodiversity Celebration Week draws to a close, it is time to put into action the desire to challenge stereotypes, and transform how neurodivergent individuals are perceived, in our churches, so that each person, young and old, diagnosed or not, may know that they too are “fearfully and wonderfully made”, and can live life in all the glorious fullness that God intends for each of us.
Rev Beth Lewis is the Croydon Area Bishop’s Disability Advisor, with a focus on Neurodivergence. Beth can be contacted by clergy and lay ministers ministering with their own neurodiversities, and wanting their churches and services to be welcoming to neurodivergent individuals and their families.
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