When tragedy strikes, it’s time to live through the “whys” to get to the “why nots.” Our son had autism, and we asked why. But now he has influenced so many people, and we ask, in the power of God, why not? Maybe you lost everything you had financially, but God restored more than you had before. Why not? You made a mistake that brought you disgrace, but God turned it around and brought you a new destiny. Why not? Your marriage fell apart, but God brought it back to life when it seemed like there was no hope. Why not? Nothing is impossible for Him.
The hardest part is working through the whys—the grief over something that has gone wrong. Many times we focus on what has happened, never thinking about what God could do through these events. Many people get discouraged and stop trying before they reach the finish line. A key is to not hold on to things we can’t change. It’s a shame to sacrifice all the good things that could happen in our lives for the one thing we can’t change.
There is always a bigger plan. I know we don’t want to hear it when we are going through the hard times. I never liked hearing my parents say, “One day you will understand.” But almost all the time they were exactly right. You can’t know what you haven’t experienced. A doctor cannot bring healing to the patient without the knowledge, experience, and tools to help them. In the same way, we cannot help bring healing to others if we haven’t walked through the broken places with God. Our experience gives us the knowledge and tools to be healers for other people. Before Jesus’ crucifixion He did many great things, but it wasn’t until His blood was shed and His body was broken that He could save the world.
When people are brokenhearted and don’t understand what’s happening to them, God draws near to them. When people fail, He draws near to those who are broken and need to be fixed.
I could never have envisioned, during that time of brokenness when our lives shifted with the news of our son, that we would go in this direction, but nothing is a surprise to God. He had it planned all along. We may have thought it was all a coincidence, but I’ve heard it said that coincidence is God’s way of reminding us He’s always there. He was about to show us a new vision for our lives.
One day I was walking through our church, looking at the graphics on the walls of our children’s facilities. Suddenly I heard God speak to me, deep down in my spirit.
Craig, look at your children’s facility for typical children, He said. It looks like Disneyland with all the rooms, animation, graphics, and equipment. Now look at what you’re doing for special-needs children.
As I looked around, I saw that we were like other churches, most of which didn’t have anything for special needs. We had one room with some caring individuals as instructors, and about ten special-needs participants who ranged from kids to adults.
God then said, Look at what you are doing for typical kids, and look at what you are doing for special-needs kids. There’s no comparison.
Then He said something that I’ll never forget: Special-needs kids deserve the very best, just like every other child.
My eyes got big because I knew we weren’t doing our best for all children at our church. We were just doing our best for those who were easier to help.
It’s always easier to help the ones who are front and center. But for profound change, we must be willing to do the hard things to reach all people, especially those who are hard to see and reach. When you’re cleaning your house, for instance, you can clean the visible areas, but it doesn’t mean your house is clean. It’s not until you see and clean the hard-to-reach spaces that your house becomes truly spotless.
Shannon Dingle, a special-needs blogger for Key Ministry and a special-needs parent herself, wrote a post titled, “Don’t Tell Me Your Church’s Theology Is Sound If My Family Isn’t Welcome.” In it she reminds us:
If your church is hearing the word but not putting it into action, then the Bible says you’re fooling yourself. And if you say you love your city but you’re willing to say no to people with disabilities—even knowing that nearly 20 percent of Americans have a disability, half of whom report their disability as severe, according to the 2010 US Census—then you’re deceiving yourselves.
I’m not saying every church needs to put in place supports for every imaginable disability area. Our church, with a well-established special needs ministry, certainly doesn’t have that! I wouldn’t expect any new church to be fully equipped with how to support our family if we wanted to join. But I would expect, hope, wish, pray, that they would be willing to love us enough to try to learn.1
I concur with Shannon. You can’t say you’re a church that wants to reach hurting people if you’re only willing to help certain types of hurting families and not others. When the need is so big, with more than fifty million people with disabilities in America alone, something needs to change. I believe the church needs to reevaluate why they pick and choose whom they are comfortable helping.
If we think the church doesn’t discriminate based on race, gender, and ability, we’re kidding ourselves. We all carry the responsibility for the fact that we have missed the mark when it comes to whom we cater to and whom we leave out. We must move from the selective church to the inclusive church. God is near to all the brokenhearted, and maybe it’s time for the church to remember the ones God never forgets.
When I went into the one classroom our church had for special needs, tears filled my eyes. I heard God speak to me again: When you look into the eyes of a person who has special needs, you are looking at Me. It’s My reflection, because when you do it unto the least of these, you are doing it unto Me.
I had never thought of it that way—that it’s as if God were standing next to me, and I were serving Him through these children. Then God spoke one last thing: Favor will follow those who reach the least of these.
So many people are looking for favor from people rather than from God. Human nature says to pursue people of influence. That makes sense. There’s nothing wrong with learning and growing from time with influential people. I’ve had that privilege in my lifetime. It’s always an honor. The caveat is, if you become motivated by the favor of people more than the favor of God, you’re on a slippery slope that often ends in disappointment.
There will always be a price to pay for favor from man, but when you are a child of God, you are already in a place of favor. God will give you a road map to His divine favor and blessings. All you have to do is follow it.
When God said, Favor will follow those who reach the least of these, I was reminded of a passage in the Bible in Luke 14, when Jesus went to eat dinner at the home of the leader of the Pharisees. All the people there were watching him closely. When Jesus noticed that all who had come to the dinner were trying to sit in the seats of honor near the head of the table, He gave them this advice:
When you are invited to a wedding feast don’t sit in the seat of honor. . . . Instead, take the lowest place at the foot of the table. Then when your host sees you, he will come and say, “Friend, we have a better place for you!” . . . For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted. (vv. 8–11)
But as He continued, I saw where favor follows:
Then he turned to the host. “When you put on a luncheon or a banquet,” he said, “Don’t invite your friends, brothers, relatives, and rich neighbors. For they will invite you back, and that will be your only reward. Instead, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. Then at the resurrection of the righteous, God will reward you for inviting those who could not repay you.” (v. 12)
There’s nothing wrong with pursuing people of influence, but you may get back only what their influence can pay you. You cannot compare the influence and favor of man to that of God. God says if you want His favor, pursue the least of these. I believe if you want influence, you chase after what moves God, not what moves man.
I’ve seen people push through crowds, wait hours in line, or even pay money to get a picture with someone famous. On the surface, there is nothing wrong with that. But what if we got just as excited taking a picture with someone who was poor, disabled, unpopular, broken, a person of no reputation? You may not get the same response from your friends and family, but God would say, “Wow! How cool was that? I love them!” And He would not stop there; He repays far beyond what man can repay. The Bible says He owns the cattle on a thousand hills (Ps. 50:10). God might say, “How can I bless them? What can I do for My child who has pleased me so much by remembering those who need it the most?”
We had no idea how much of God’s favor and influence was with us. I didn’t know how to effectively develop a program for kids and families with special needs, and I hadn’t seen many examples in churches. But God began to show us how to create what would become our first Champions Club. We never would have thought of it without Him.
First we searched out key people to be a part of our task force to develop a special-needs ministry that wouldn’t just take care of the kids but would help them develop at different levels. For too long these children and their families had been an afterthought, and I wanted them to feel that in our ministry they were the only thought. We needed to give them the best, so I looked for top experts in the community to help us learn what the best would look like.
I wanted this team to cover four areas of expertise in special needs: research, educational, spiritual, and parenting from people who themselves were parents of special-needs children. God was leading us toward a holistic approach.
In 2007 I first came across three amazing doctors: Jair Soares, Katherine Loveland, and Deborah Pearson—all of whom were at the University of Texas Medical Center doing some ground-breaking research for special-needs children. I saw them on our local ABC station in Houston while they were recruiting potential families to participate in their research. We thought Connor might make a good candidate for their study, so we took him in and let them observe him. To be honest, I had two motives: to help my son and to ask if they would meet with me to discuss becoming a part of the task force. Fortunately, they took the meeting and let me share my heart about our program. They agreed to come onboard, and our task force was on the way to becoming a reality.
I then looked for an educator who would understand curriculum and development for the program, and we found Dr. Charles Meisgeier, founding chairman of the Department of Special Education at the University of Houston. He also agreed to be a part of our task force.
For our spiritual focus, we pulled together some of the top team members in our children’s and family ministry at Lakewood Church who had expertise in ministry and development. Then we brought in some of the most valuable resources you could ever have in this situation: the parents of special-needs children. They are the ones walking the journey day by day, giving their best to see their children become everything they were meant to be.
Once we had the team in place, we knew we could begin to develop the program, but the most important person was missing. I still needed someone to run the program.
I needed a giant of faith on whose shoulders these kids and families could stand. I also felt I needed someone with expertise in the field of special needs to lead the program— someone who had a passion and a heart for these children.
One person on my staff wasn’t an expert in this area but was a great administrator and leader. She had been working with our children’s ministry both as a volunteer and on staff for years, and she was outstanding. She had given up a high-paying job running the office of a law firm to come on staff, but for years she had also worked diligently as a volunteer, serving and loving children.
Whenever I talked to Norma Puga about our son or other children with special needs, tears would come to her eyes. God spoke to me and said, She’s the one. Don’t worry about her expertise, because her heart and excellence are second to none. These children and families need to be loved and accepted more than anything else. She will be My instrument to do that.
I knew I had heard from God, and I was hoping Norma had heard from God too. One day we sat down with her and told her what we were planning to do, asking if this was something she would be interested in. Without hesitation, while tears rolled down her cheeks, she said, “Yes.” I think I shouted, “Yes!” as well. We had our task force, we had our leader, and now we needed God to guide us toward what our program would become.
It took one year to develop what would ultimately be called the Champions Club. We were already using that name in the limited program we already had for special-needs children, and I loved it. No need to fix what wasn’t broken. During our developmental meetings, we discovered that we needed tools to keep the children engaged and to help the leaders teach. As I’ve said, we wanted to see these kids developed, not just babysat.
And we wanted a program that supported parents as well as kids. That meant that when the parents showed up, we would give them special attention and care and make them feel like the most important parents in the church. We also wanted to create support for the parents through respite events, small groups for special-needs families, and camps and events for the entire family. They were carrying a heavy load, but we knew if we could come alongside them, that load could be lifted, even if only for a couple of hours. We also wanted them to trust the excellence of our program so they would not worry and would feel free to go to church, possibly for the first time in years, hear an uplifting message, and participate in a community of faith.
We also wanted to make sure our program was comprehensive enough that no child would ever be turned away, no matter what their special need was, and no matter how severe it was. We wanted them to experience love and acceptance like they had never experienced it before. We wanted to make it our mission that, for at least two hours of the week, their child would get the best care, and they as parents could experience a service with no interruption so they could receive the encouragement and hope they needed to make the coming week their best week yet.
Being turned away or having to leave is something that is an all too common experience for a special-needs family. We had experienced that pain many times, especially when we tried to put our son in a local private school that was highly recommended for special-needs children. When Connor was seven years old, we applied and hoped. But when my wife met with the assistant principal, she heard, “I’m sorry, Mrs. Johnson, but we can’t accept your son Connor into the school. We only accept higher functioning students, and although Connor meets the academic requirements, he doesn’t quite meet the social side.”
Though dreadfully disappointed, my wife could ultimately accept that this was a school for a certain type of special need, although she didn’t think that was fair. What she couldn’t accept was the next part of their conversation.
“What should we do to help our son?” Sam asked. “And can you help us find another option?”
“I’m not sure, but he won’t be able to come here,” the assistant principal replied. “You’ll just have to find a school that will accept him.”
Now, my wife is one of the sweetest and kindest people you will ever meet, but Momma Bear was about to growl.
“If you’re going to call yourselves a special-needs school, then be a school for all the kids and their challenges, not just the easier cases,” she said. “And another thing—you should never say what you just said to me as a special-needs parent. When people walk away from your school, they should feel hope, not despair.”
Later, when Sam was telling me the story, she exclaimed, “Craig, we need to start a school of our own! We could create a school where no child or parent is turned away.”
I said, “Now hold on, honey, I know you’re upset, but with everything on my plate, I’m not sure if starting a school is on the menu.”
Then she said something I’ll never forget.
“You should never leave a place that says they bring hope, without hope.”
That statement kept ringing in my head. If you are a place that is supposed to bring hope, no one should ever walk away without a taste of it.
That very day God spoke to me and said, I want you to start Champions Clubs in churches in the north, south, east, and west. I also want you to start Champions Academy schools for special-needs children. Match up a Champions Club in a church with a Champions Academy school in the same area. If there is no room at the school, they can always go to the Champions Club in a church nearby until there is an opening. This way, no matter what, they will be able to go to one or both, but they will never be turned away without hope.
We made it our mission to never turn away a child and to always make sure the family left with hope.
In March 2008, the Champions Club became a reality at Lakewood Church. It was an unprecedented, specially designed developmental area for kids, youth, and adults with special needs, focused on ministering to them spiritually, intellectually, sensorily, and physically. We reached for spiritual growth through God’s Word, developing the intellect of each participant through the five senses, and engaging the child physically during active gross motor fun. We designed Champions Clubs to be adapted to any school or public facility environment, and would eventually be proud to see Champions Clubs in schools, churches, and facilities across America and around the world.
The weekend we announced the Champions Club, one month before the opening date, I shared with the congregation of Lakewood, knowing my words were reaching more than forty thousand people online and across the campuses of our church. “I know many of you special-needs families are not here today,” I said, “but you are shut in, watching online from your home. Many of you have felt rejected by society and rejected by churches. You feel forgotten. We have worked for almost a year to build a program and state-of-the-art rooms that will allow you to come to church for the first time, volunteer, and be a part of a community while your children are getting the best care and development. I know you’ve felt forgotten, but you’re not forgotten anymore.”
As I finished, the crowd in each service rose to their feet and roared for these children and families. I will never forget a mother of a severely autistic child saying, with tears in her eyes, “This is the greatest thing anyone has ever done for me and my child. You didn’t forget us, and you gave us your best. We’re not forgotten anymore.”
When we started, we had five volunteers, plus our director, Norma, and we had to recruit enough staff to cater to congregants in seven different services in Spanish and in English. We needed a miracle! That first weekend, we gave the congregation the opportunity to tour the Champions Club before it opened. If they had the heart to serve in this ministry, they could sign up, and we would train them.
That weekend a miracle happened, and we had 175 applications. More than half of them had experience in different areas of special needs. Remember what God told me? Favor will follow you when you reach the least of these. It did! We didn’t even know these qualified people were in our congregation.
After we opened the doors one month later, more than three hundred families came to Lakewood Church to experience the Champions Club during the following six months. God met all our needs and even went above and beyond. We learned in an amazing way that favor will follow when you reach the least of these, because God is truly near to the brokenhearted.