I’m laughing in this picture but minutes later I was crying. The interviewer asked me how this place made me feel and I lost it.
The moment I walked in the gates, I had chills run up and down my arms despite the thermostat reading 90.
How do you convey after years of pondering, wrestling and schooling, you feel as if God is tapping you on the shoulder, alerting you with a gentle whisper, “This is it.”
This place, a place designed for those with disabilities and made for all, is how I believe the next life will be.
After the interview, we went to a puppet show. One mom fed her child through a tube, another child with a cognitive difference waved his hands with glee, and my child with Down syndrome tried to join the performance more than once. There were no disapproving eyes, only understanding, only love.
People often talk about heaven as being a place where we will be made whole. But if we believe in the incarnation, we are already complete.
I think the difference will be our hearts will no longer be swayed by darkness. We will see each other more clearly, love ourselves and one another more wholly.
Everyone will belong. Everyone will be welcome just as they are. We will see God’s handiwork as being intentionally diverse, and we will see it for the beauty it is instead of assuming it is a less than design.
My hope is that we won’t wait for death to start making this shift. My hope is that places like Morgan’s Wonderland will inspire all of us to tap into the wholeness of humanity. My hope is that once we leave its gates and others like it, we pursue more inclusive tables inside our homes and schools and churches and workplaces.
I always cry here because I see what the world could be and a snapshot of the heaven that awaits.
