“I would rather be in this chair knowing Jesus than to stand on my feet without Him.”
Those were the words spoken by international disabilities advocate Joni Eareckson Tada, minutes before she addressed a conference audience on the topic of suffering and the sanctity of life.
She knows what it is to be in a dark place where life doesn’t feel worth living.
And she knows what it is to be healed—but not in the way the world deems most important.
Since the early 1970s, Joni has shared her story a dozen times from the stage at Billy Graham Crusades around the world.
On Sept. 8, she will share this message of healing from her personal journey as a quadriplegic at a different Crusade venue—the Billy Graham Library.
She will then sign copies of her books, including her newest release, Beside Bethesda: 31 Days Toward Deeper Healing.
Beside Bethesda is a story of Joni’s journey with God during the season of her life when she was first injured as a result of a diving accident. At the age of 17 she unknowingly dove into some shallow water in the Chesapeake Bay, and became a quadriplegic.
“During those early days in the hospital, I imagined myself in John chapter five by the Pool of Bethesda along with the disabled and diseased people looking to be healed,” she said.
“I would beg God to heal me as he did the man who lay on a straw mat, paralyzed for 38 years: ‘God, please heal me like you healed him.’”
Yet, two years later when she was released from the hospital, she didn’t get the physical healing that consumed her thoughts and her prayers.
“I suffered a deep disappointment with God,” she remembered.
“But this book, Beside Bethesda, is how I found a deeper healing from John chapter five. This book is really based on my personal journey of (spiritual) healing that God brought me through. It is because of this healing that I got to a point to where I can earnestly say, ‘I would rather be in this chair knowing Jesus than to stand on my feet without Him.’
“And it was through this journey of healing that I made the rich, wonderful discovery that there are more important things than walking.”
This event at the Billy Graham Library (4330 Westmont Drive, Charlotte, NC 28217) will begin at 1:30 p.m.
Books will be available for purchase in Ruth’s Attic bookstore at the Library, or guests can bring their own. There will be a limit of two signed items per person.
