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Helping Parents of Special Needs Children

Truth in Love 179

Parenting a special needs child brings great joys and great hardships.

Nov 5, 2018

Dale Johnson: Today on the podcast, we have with us Pastor Steve Viars, the pastor of Faith Church in Lafayette, Indiana. Historically, I’ve been so thrilled about his church and his involvement with the biblical counseling movement as an exemplary church for utilizing biblical counseling ministry and proper biblical soul care. An interesting fact: Pastor Steve led one of my very first formal trainings in NANC back in 2003 or 2004. The on the road training was led by you and Randy Patten. What an exciting thing that we get to sit down and talk about this very important subject! Welcome to the podcast.

Steve Viars: Thank you very much, Dale. It really is a privilege to be able to speak into this important topic.

Dale Johnson: You know, it is an important topic that many of us may not think about on a daily basis, and you’re in a situation where you think about this on a daily basis. What are some of the challenges in your family’s life that some of us who don’t have a special needs child should understand?

Steve Viars: Well, God’s given my wife Kris and me three children. We were able to have our first daughter naturally: Bethany who’s now married and has two children up in St. Paul, Minnesota. Then our second daughter, after we were not able to conceive another child, is adopted. Her name is Karis, the Greek word for grace; she and her husband and our third grandson live with us in Lafayette and in the same town and attend our church. Then, God allowed us to adopt a special needs son, our son Andrew.

Andrew is blind; he had a number of other abnormalities in the development of his early life, and so something happened with some sort of anomaly while his birth mother was carrying him. Though he’s 25 years old now, he functions like he’s about 8 or 10 years old. We adopted him at birth and have had the opportunity to serve as his mom and dad joyfully for the last 25 years. It totally changes your life and I’m not going to sugarcoat this. I would not want to offend any of the parents who might be listening to this podcast who are going through a situation where their child has special needs. It affects every day, and the answer to your question almost depends case-by-case on the kind of person that we’re talking about.

For us, our son cannot be left alone. He is in my wife’s care or another caregiver or myself always. It changes every aspect of the daily decisions that you’re making. For her, typically where a pastor’s wife might be, that’s not going to be the case. She cares for my son, which frees me up to take care of our church family. I even said to her early on, “Would you prefer that I step away from pastoral ministry in order to provide more consistent care for our son?” and she did not want me to do that, but it does affect each and every day.

I would say, my wife would say, and I think many parents of children with special needs would say that it’s also a source of great delight. Almost always, when I walk in the house, one of the first noises that I hear is laughter, and it’s my son and my wife cutting up about something. He is a great joy to be with. We were at a family wedding and he had everybody in stitches. There’s just something about the joy oftentimes that men, women, boys, and girls with special needs have that brings that to the fore as well. The point I’m making is yes, there are challenges, but it’s not all bad. There are all sorts of blessings that God brings along with the opportunity.

Dale Johnson: When we think about the ministry of local churches, there are tons of people in our churches who want to help families who have special needs children. I remember serving at a local church, I had several families who wanted to reach out to other families in our church body who had special needs children. Even in that desire to care, they were always concerned about, “Well, what can I do and what can I not do to help this family? I don’t want to be a burden on them. I want to be helpful. I can see that things are difficult at times. I want to be compassionate and help them to be involved in the church.” What are some things that other families can do to help families who have this distinct and valuable ministry of having special needs children?

Steve Viars: Well, I’ll tell you about a couple of conversations that I’ve had within the last two weeks. A good friend of mine invited us to his home. He and his wife sat down with me and my wife Kris and our son Andrew and said, “We’re getting to a place in our life where we’ve got some bandwidth. Our kids are grown, and they live in other places, so our grandkids aren’t close.” He said, “I’d like to spend time with Drew one night a week. Would that be possible where we could have a meal together? Either one that I cooked at home or that we went out to a restaurant together. Then we could do a short Bible study together, and then we could just hang out bowling or play games on the Wii. Tell me, are there things that we could do?”

My son loved that idea. He’s 25 years old and having friends is a great thing. It’s helpful for my wife and me. It was very sensitive the way he did it. He said, “Steve, I know on Monday nights you’re serving in the church’s community-based counseling center. Would that relieve pressure from your wife’s schedule if I took Drew (or “Bear”) on Monday nights?” It was a delightful thing and we are going to do that. We have some traveling going on right now, but as soon as our schedule is free, we’re going to do that. What a compassionate thing for that man to say. I had another fellow at the church ask a very similar question, but I think the key is to ask and to ask sincerely, and then follow through on what you’re told.

Dale Johnson: With the follow-up, we have great intentions, but often times we may not follow through. I think that’s a critical piece of the puzzle to demonstrate that we’re willing to reach out and to have an honest conversation about what would be most helpful for those particular families in need. Mentioning the church and thinking about the church, this is not bound simply to the church. There are many people in our communities that have special needs children and are trying to live life maybe without Christ and trying to manage and minister to their special needs children. What are some of the ways that we can think through the process of the church reaching out into the community to minister to these families?

Steve Viars: I think that in most communities there’s going to be a group or perhaps a series of groups of parents who have banded together formally or informally in order to support one another. For example, my son plays on a softball team for individuals with special needs. There’s a whole group of parents and loved ones who are involved in that. Oftentimes, through the public schools with teachers who serve students with special needs, there are support groups, again either formally or informally. For the church to speak into that and to say to those groups, “How can we serve you?” It doesn’t have to be overtly gospel-centered; it can be simply giving a cup of cold water in Jesus’ name and then wait for some of those additional gospel opportunities to come if that’s the plan of the Lord.

For example, we have a couple of gymnasiums at our campuses, and there’s a group that serves children with special needs from Purdue University, but they constantly need a place to hold that program. For us to be able to say, “We’re delighted for you to use our gym. We’ll provide all of the backup support, any snacks that you need, and any way that we can serve you, but we just want to have a safe, welcoming environment,” along with having comfortable seating for the parents and a way for us to interact with them.

Recently, the softball team wanted to do an end-of-season cook-out. We got a bunch of our young couples together and they fixed a huge meal. We can’t do everything, but I come from a Baptist tradition and we know how to eat. To have a marvelous meal for the kids and their families, and to celebrate their accomplishments, we did everything we could to make that a special event for their team. It doesn’t always have to be that we’re running the program or we’re starting the program. A lot of times, it’s coming alongside existing programs and asking how can we, as a church of Jesus Christ, resource and strengthen what they’re already doing?

Dale Johnson: That’s critical, because most of the time communities think negatively about our churches, and what you’ve just done is you’ve described how we flip the mantra of who the local church is to, “We’re here for you and the community. We’re here to serve your needs in the name of the Lord Jesus.” There is one final thing that I’d like for us to close with as we bring this discussion into the counseling room and as we’re ministering to a father and a mother who diligently give of themselves to their special needs child and the challenges that they face. What are some of the things in the counseling room that a biblical counselor can help a mom and a dad with as they’re working through some of the struggles that they would experience in this type of difficult ministry?

Steve Viars: This is an area where the sufficient Word of God becomes so alive. Starting with our identity in Christ, if I truly believe that I’m united with Jesus Christ, then as a father I’m not facing this challenge alone. I have the power of Christ at my disposal in order to help me provide everything my son is going to need. My wife has the exact same resources. We’re not parenting this child alone, and that gives us incredible hope and it gives us incredible joy, even when it’s hard.

Then, you think about the sufficiency of God’s grace. You think about the great passage in 2 Corinthians 12 about Paul’s thorn in the flesh and he asked for it to be removed. We’re not masochists. We’re not asking for trouble. Paul asked for that to be removed, but it’s fascinating the way God answered that prayer. He said, “I have something better than the removal of the thorn. I have the opportunity for you to learn about the sufficient grace of God.” My wife and I would say that we’re so thankful that our sovereign God has entrusted us with a son with special needs because we’ve learned more about the power of Jesus Christ, and we’ve learned more about the sufficient grace of God than we ever would have otherwise.

It’s a delight and that’s what I would say to any potential parent who’s worrying. Because that’s always the question someone asks, “Do you want a boy? Do you want a girl?” The response is always, “Well, it doesn’t matter as long as that child is healthy.” What an incredible affront to a parent with a special needs child, but I think that reveals a fear in many of our hearts that we’re going to be in a situation where God’s grace is not sufficient. For a follower of Jesus Christ, that situation does not exist and we can move forward in our parenting responsibilities with great hope believing God will give us all we need.

Dale Johnson: Well, I’m so thankful for you sharing from your personal experience the wisdom the Lord has taught you from the angle of being a parent, but also for your vision of being a pastor and how you can minister in these very important areas. Thank you so much for being with us today.

Steve Viars: Thank you. It’s a great privilege.