Micha Boyett

Summary: A mother with a Down’s Syndrome child discovers in the Beatitudes a relationship with God based on God’s love rather than our accomplishments.

A message on Lazarus spoke personally to Micha Boyett. The speaker asked why for someone so greatly loved by Jesus, we never hear Lazarus speak. The speaker wondered if Lazarus couldn’t speak–and if that was why he was so greatly loved by Jesus. We do not know for sure, but this deeply touched Boyett as the mother of a Downs Syndrome child with autism and not able to do more than vocalize a few sounds. Living in fast-paced San Francisco where people are valued for productivity and achievement, it opened her eyes to a Jesus with a very different set of values for things not valued by society. Values that assured her of hope for her son.

In Blessed Are the Rest of Us, Micha Boyett explores the meaning of each statement in the Beatitudes, interweaving this with the story of Ace, her son. She begins with discussing the translation of makarioi, usually appearing as “blessed” in our Bibles but can also mean “happy,” “favored,” or even “flourishing.” What is stunning is that the people of whom Jesus speaks as makarioi or the “weak, the weary, and the worn out.”

For the weak, they are the caretakers of the dream of God. Imagine a Down’s parent seeing her struggling work with her child in that light. She writes of the grief of the news of the child she was carrying, the grief even her children felt at Ace’s agonizingly slow progress and the hope of a divine banquet and the foretastes in the joys of their family. She writes of meekness as the release of power and the strange wonder that only in the setting aside of our striving are we free to receive what we cannot earn because it has always been ours from the Beloved.

Boyett writes of the Beatitudes not only re-orienting what we value; they speak of the value intrinsic as the Beloved of God when we feel valueless. It moves us to forgive and seek justice, and show mercy. And it moves us to serve peace. Boyett in the chapter on peacemaking describes what, to her was a failure in such efforts, motivated out of concern she, her pastor and elder board had that the LGBTQ+ part of their church community experience greater peace. It all blew up two weeks before Boyett’s due date, This all culminated in a hard evening with their closest friends, part of the same church, who didn’t share her and the elders convictions. They say hard things, including the poor way this was implemented where it seemed a small group decided made decisions for a whole church. And then they show up when Boyett has to go on full bed rest. Boyett writes movingly of a hard, painful process of pursuing peace both with each other and for LGBTQ+ people in their congregation, and a friendship sustained by nothing other than the peace of Christ.

Along the way, Boyett writes both of the love and wonder she has for Ace, love that makes her a fierce advocate for him and others with disabilities, and how much harder it is for many persons of color. Whether you agree or not with all of Boyett’s ideas in this book, this is a profoundly prolife book in which Ace’s value, and that of others on the margins, is grounded in the counter-cultural values of the Beatitudes and a God who loves in our weakness, poverty, failures, and suffering. Ace is all of us–we just don’t know it–and through Boyett’s work, we can learn what it means to be among the makarioi.

____________________

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.… (altro)

I was expecting a different kind of book. Instead of a narrative describing spiritual growth that would provide me with insight and encouragement, this was a memoir written by a homesick, lonely young woman with doubts about her mental stability. In addition, much of the book focuses on the turmoil and tumult of new motherhood. Although she was prompted to write because of her longing for a deeper connection to God, she has a distorted impression of God including difficulty believing that God loves her or that her life has value.

Halfway through the book she begins to meet regularly with a spiritual therapist, when she feels “the darkness slink back in again. Finally I’m recognizing it, this black smoke settling into the creases of my mind. I don’t think I’m depressed, but I do think something’s wrong; something has been wrong for several months. All this time I’ve written it off as loneliness, homesickness. But I know there’s more. I know it has to do with prayer.”

I’m not qualified to analyze her, but I agree with her observation that something is wrong – and it’s more than an issue of prayer. I appreciate how she honestly shares her concerns regarding her sanity. Add to that are her feelings of discouragement, as she is home alone every day with a toddler, while pregnant with baby number two. Her vivid descriptions of morning sickness brought back my own memories. Similarly, I had my three children (three under five years old) while also living in San Francisco, so I could identify with some of her experiences of being far away from family, with a husband who was at work every day, dealing with the mundaneness of early motherhood.

I agreed with one of the author’s friend's advice, “I think you can torment yourself inside your own head or you can bring the thoughts into the light of day. Sometimes you get them out of you and into prayer, they look different. They look a lot more hopeful.”

I do hope with insightful friends, her therapist, and God’s grace, she finds the stability and confidence she was seeking while writing this book.

So in summary, this book is not an uplifting advice-filled devotional, but instead it’s a journal of one woman’s spiritual journey, as she struggles with mental stability, her desire to be a good mother and wife, and her quest for a deeper connection with God.… (altro)