Has life dealt you a wound that doesn’t seem to heal?

It might have started with a battle of words. It could be a challenge you couldn’t master that holds you back. Or it might even be a physical limitation that pushes you down. Experience like that can lead to criticism from others or even from yourself. It doesn’t have to be that way.

Li Juhong dreamed of being a medical doctor as a young girl. But the prospects were slim. Her family was poor. They lived in a remote mountain village in China’s Chongqing province. Then tragedy struck. A truck hit Li Juhong. The accident crushed the bones in her legs. The local medical services had to amputate her legs to save her life.

If the odds were ever against a person, they were against her. In that culture what worth could a woman without legs have?

Yet, as the Scripture tells us: “for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart,” (1 Samuel 16:7, NKJV). Li Juhong determined not to let her injuries and limitations hold her back.

Within a few years she taught herself to walk using to two small wooden stools. In the 1990s she attended a medical school for the disabled. In 2000 she returned to her hometown of Wadian village and began making house calls to its 1,000 residents.

Yes, in a mountain village, this doctor without legs made house calls.

You see, God doesn’t always heal our disabilities to perfectly equip us to serve Him.

Oh, sometimes her husband carried her up steep mountain paths. He even quit his job to support her. She used a wheelchair wherever sidewalks and pavement were present. But she accomplished most of her travels by using two small stools to walk. And it worked. Over the last 16 years Dr. Li has treated more than 6,000 ailments among the people of her town and its surrounding villages.

You know, there are many services which cater to the disabled. But we shouldn’t get the wrong impression from this – that “the disabled” are always on the receiving end of service. Dr. Li Juhong overcame her own disability and limitations – not to simply “follow her dreams” in the American sense. She overcame her disability to keep herself useful and helpful to humanity.

Dr. Li refused to be a burden to society. She refused to merely occupy a place on a sidewalk and beg money from hard-working people. Then she committed to a decade of medical training. This equipped her to serve others and be a blessing to society. In the Process she overcame a huge disability in the process.

God can use our disabilities to open the hearts of those we reach out to.

The Bible is full of people who became instruments of peace and blessing to their fellow human beings, even in the midst of their their personal disabilities and weaknesses. Several examples include the four leprous outcasts (2 Kings 7:3-20), the lame but transformed Jacob (Genesis 32:31-33), the stammering Moses (Exodus 4:10), the frequently sick Timothy (1 Timothy 5:23), and the nearly blind apostle Paul (Galatians 4:13-15; 6:11; 2 Corinthians 12:7-10).

You see, God doesn’t always heal our disabilities to perfectly equip us to serve Him.

He often uses those disabilities in the process of our serving Him. God can use our disabilities to open the hearts of those we reach out to. This is certainly the case in the ministries of Joni Eareckson Tada, Dave Roever, Nick Vujicic, and many others. Their disabilities actually made them more effective in ministry.

But God also uses our disabilities and weaknesses to develop the person on the inside. Because this makes us more Christ-like and to forge and mold our character, will, and perseverance. Dr. Li’s service has included over 16 years of making house calls. She has worn out more than 24 of those wooden stools. What a fitting illustration of determination and perseverance. Like an anvil which wears out the hammers that beat upon it, so this determined soul has worn out the reminders of her disability.

PRAYER:

Dear heavenly Father, I do not pray for an easier life but to be a stronger person. I do not pray for challenges equal to my abilities but for ability equal to my challenges. And may I be transformed from weakness to strength and from selfishness to selflessness as I face life’s challenges in Your power. Amen.