So You Want A Disability Ministry? Read The Room

We lay out a clear path to start disability ministry that honors dignity, protects volunteers, and builds a culture of belonging. From prayer and assessment to policies and a small, sustainable launch, we show how churches can move from good intent to faithful action.

• prayer-led vision and congregational assessment
• accessibility as physical, spiritual, and social
• start small to avoid burnout and build trust
• recruit champions with lived and professional expertise
• listen to families to shape priorities and supports
• write simple, safety-first policies and procedures
• pilot a buddy model, iterate, and expand thoughtfully
• keep learning and celebrate shared gifts

If you want to dive deeper on your own, you can check out the Indispensable-People blog or my books on Amazon called The Indispensable Kid or Gospel Accessibility and the Indispensable People

Transcript

The Big Question: Where To Start

Pray And Assess Your Congregation

Accessibility Beyond The Ramp

Start Small, Avoid Burnout

Recruit Champions And Listen To Families

Policies, Safety, And Sustainable Launch

Keep Going: Resources And Next Steps

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hey, hey, my name is Tracy Coral, and welcome to Indispensable People. I'm a pastor, a teacher, a missionary, a mom, a wife, and I believe that every person should have access to the gospel so that they can know Christ, grow in him, and serve him with the gifts that he has given. Over 65 million Americans have a disability. That's 15 to 20% of every community. And over 85% of those individuals do not attend church. 90% of pastors believe that they are a disability-friendly church, but only 20% of parents and families agree. Let's dive deep into hard topics, big questions, perceptions, stereotypes, and so much more. Hey, hey, welcome to Indispensable People. Today we're talking about some top questions that are asked when concerning disability ministry. And so if you go on your Chat GPT or whatever search engine or whatever you look at, and you type in what are the top questions about disability ministry, the number one thing that comes up is how do we start a disability ministry? Which tells me a couple things, right? So that means the need exists, there's a concern for it, the there's a reason that the person is asking this question. Whether it's, you know what, in their professional life, they see this, they they see schools and other things doing something for people with disabilities. Why isn't the church? Or it's a kiddo showed up on a Sunday morning and now they need support and the church is going, well, what do we do? How do we do this? But here's here's the honest to goodness, like easy way to look at this in the start. Okay. You already see the need, and for whatever reason. Hopefully it's because you said there's value in every single person. Each person is made in the image of God, which is is found in Genesis 127. There are you see in scripture where it's talks about the plans and the purposes that God has and that it is for his glory and all of those, those types of foundational pieces that go, we need to do this, right? Also, because we know that every person has fallen short and is in need of a savior. And so let's we're gonna fast forward past the reason part. Okay. So you're at the let's do something part. And sometimes what happens is people jump in uh before they're ready and or before they have an understanding. Or you know what, they just want to do it because it's the right thing to do and you'll just figure it out as you go. And some of that is actually some of that is going to be somewhat true. However, I do recommend following, contacting, or finding ways to have people come in and work specifically with you. That is one of the things that I do as a missionary, and I get to train and equip the church, and I get to help people who, for whatever reason, are looking to start disability ministry within their church. So once you get to that part, your real first step is to pray. You want to pray about what God has spoken into your heart and the need that exists, and then you want to assess. So you're gonna start praying for guidance and surveying your congregation in the sense of identifying people in your church. And I say survey as kind of a loose term. Survey means like you're kind of gauging the needs that exist within your church, but you can also do a survey with your church, and that can also give you an opportunity to identify interest and need. So that's that's your base, right? You're gonna pray and you're going to start assessing where the church is, what it has. I even have an assessment. I always say that accessibility is much more than just physical. Yes, they have to be able to get into your building to participate in the church as the bot as the building, right? But also when they want to participate in the body of Christ, they need to have spiritual accessibility and social accessibility as well. And so you want to really assess where that is at. But then the next piece and part is whatever you do, don't do everything all at once. Right. If you go, okay, we're gonna minister to teens, kids, and adults, we're going to start this program, that program, we're gonna do Bible study support group, we're gonna do respite nights, we're gonna do all these kinds of things. Doing them all at once will only lead to volunteer burnout, uh, a lot of mistakes, which mistakes will happen, but an abundance of them all at one time. So it's just a safety and a protection to start small and to build up with what you have in your in your space. You can't do all the things all at one time, just like you can't be everything to everyone all the time. The next thing you're gonna want to do is you're gonna identify some champions in the church. Those that you can gather as a team that might be interested to be volunteers. You might want to include parents of kiddos with disabilities, teachers, anyone, therapists, people who work or might have already served people with disabilities in their professional lives outside of the church. Those people are going to be a great resource to you, whether or not they become your long-term volunteers, or it's because they will just support you with information and guidance and direction. Sometimes it's a hard ask to do to ask someone who does it in their professional life to also do to be a big piece of it in the church simply because it's, you know, it's a lot. And but however, those people who are called to it in their professional lives are likely called to it in the church. And so utilizing those individuals will be a great benefit to you. Also, you want to listen to families, you want to ask questions and really get their thought processes, their ideas, their views of the church. And when I say families, I'm taking into consideration families that are impacted by disability. And this is because you want to build and grow, and those are your people that you're gonna be serving within that ministry. So you definitely want to understand, especially if you are not an individual that is that has a disability or that is caring for someone with a disability. You don't have the same perspective and you can't just simply because you've never lived that life. However, you can build an understanding which will then inform the way that you choose to minister within the church. I would say to even go beyond this as you start to build that team where you can, you know, start a Bible study together and really grow that deep foundational understanding and then involve your families as a part of that so that they can help inform your entire team. Those are gonna be incredibly beneficial. The steps outside of that, those are your basic starters, right? You wanna pray, ask God for guidance, you wanna assess your situation, you wanna remember to start small and then to build that team. And while you're doing that, include those individuals who are impacted by disability. But I would say above and beyond that, you are going to want to start creating a policies and procedures manual. And the great thing is most churches already have one for children, for youth, those kinds of things where you can build off of and include extra things like bathroom policies for changing teens and adults or medication policies, which I always recommend you don't pass meds. If there is a need for a med, a parent or caregiver can handle that while they're there. Unless it's an emergency med like an EpiPen or something like that. That's a different story, but would require training and understanding. Once you build that policies and procedures manual and you have a basic understanding in a team, you really can start launching whatever small piece of disability ministry you have chosen to take on, whether that's a buddy ministry or um something like that. But those are your basics and all of those exist so that every person can know, grow, and serve him with the gifts that he has given. I can't claim to have all the answers. I can't claim to know all the things, but here's what we are gonna do. We're gonna keep this conversation going. We're gonna make the accessible gospel available to individuals with disabilities in our churches and in our communities so that every person has the opportunity to know Christ, to grow in him, and to serve him with the gifts that he has given. If you want to dive deeper on your own, you can check out the Indispensable People blog or my books on Amazon called The Indispensable Kid or Gospel Accessibility and the Indispensable People.