Praying with Lior

Praying with Lior, is an awesome film about the Bar Mitzvah and life ministry of a young man with Down Syndrome. His full inclusion at a Jewish day school, the importance of his community, and his charisma are powerful examples to me of God's kingdom come, God's will being done on earth.

Lior's honest candor and sense of humor warm my heart and draw me to a God in whose image He is surely made. As his Dad says, "he's not stupid; retarded, but not stupid. There's a difference." Ilana Trachtman interviews Lior here, fielding questions about the production and their first meeting.

What a thoughful disability awareness curriculum this study guide of questions and verses from the Old Testament would be for teens coming of age in either the Old or New Testament tradition. Lior has an undeniable spiritual gift of wisdom. What strikes me anew, as it did during Reid's preparation for baptism, is how marvelous it is that the Bible is at once complex and simple. Reid, through the purity of his testimony song and Lior, through his innate preaching distill it to the fundamentals.

As much as I wrote about Reid's baptism, I do not think I ever posted the resulting video. To our immense gratitude, one of the pastors at the beach that day said, "the whole congregation must see this." He arranged for the professional recording of Reid in our family room so this slideshow was shown on New Member Sunday. The ironic twist for me was that after many years of whining and complaining for programs at church that would serve Reid, now as he comes of age, he is in fact, ministering to the church body. God turned upside down and inside out, what I thought I wanted or we deserved. A kind of ministry was born in which he was serving rather than being served.





And he stood and blessed all the assembly of Israel with a loud voice, saying... 1 Kings 8:54-56


The law of the LORD is perfect, restoring the soul; The testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple. Psalm 19:6-8




...but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, 1 Corinthians 1:26-28