The Hardest Lesson

Relating to God and Autism

“…Instead, I have called you friend…” John 15:15

The fastest way to get blank stares in a Bible study full of people with autism, especially high-functioning (Level 1), is to try explaining this verse. Erin Burnett, a Christian author who also has autism, was the first person I know to point this out and try to explain why this lesson is so hard for people with autism. In some ways, I can relate, and after talking with a few people I know with autism, it’s easy to see why this is the hardest lesson.

Social-Emotional Intelligence

If there’s one thing present in almost every single person diagnosed with autism, it’s the struggle with social-emotional intelligence. If you’ve been around someone with autism for any length of time, you can see it. They may have all the knowledge in the world, but they can’t read the room. They don’t pick up on body language, inference, and other social cues. Most people with autism do not naturally know how to relate emotionally with others. This deals their ability to function in social circles a serious blow.

Friends

Again, if you think about most people you may know with autism, they probably have only one or two friends at the most. They may have many acquaintances and may be liked by large groups of people because they are charismatic, entertaining, and intelligent. That’s not the same as friendship.

Neurotypical thinkers spend time with friends, get to know them, and form an emotional bond with them. Many autistic thinkers enjoy spending time with their friends and learning facts about them, but they often need time quiet or alone to process and recover. More importantly, that third step is missing or deficient.

To Boldly Go…

One friend with autism described it like this. I enjoy spending time with friends and learning about them. It’s like in Star Trek where they’re exploring an unknown region they know little about, but I get to explore with someone who I’m pretty sure won’t get mad at me if I mess up or get lost. I thought that was an interesting analogy, but even without the Star Trek reference, that seems to be the general consensus. Spending time with trusted people is more about discovery and knowledge than emotional attachment. Friendship is related more to trust than the emotional experience of love.

 This doesn’t mean people with autism don’t form emotional attachments. It just looks a little different. Take a child with autism from his or her favorite person, and you may see grief, fear, and sadness at an unbelievable level.

If you have a friend with autism, chances are they want to know about you, want you to succeed, want to help, and miss you when you’re not around. These friends can often sympathize (but not empathize) with you. They may talk about their own experience they perceive as being similar, not because they’re narcissistic but because they’re autistic. They will often experience shock or grief if something happens to you.

(Narcissistic people have high social-emotional intelligence and tend to manipulate and focus on themselves because of self-importance. Autistic people focus on themselves and their own experiences because they are trying desperately to relate and understand a situation, and don’t recognize how it affects the other person.)

Where so many people with autism struggle is with more complex social skills like empathy, perceiving needs without being told, and dealing with change to accommodate the needs of their friends.

Jesus As a Friend

To many people with autism, that one verse is a stumbling block. Sure, they spend time learning about Jesus, reading their Bibles, and memorizing Scripture. They can tell you about Him, but there’s often little emotional connection.

 Autistic thinkers may mimic the emotional reactions of neurotypical thinkers because it’s “right” to feel sad about the crucifixion or happy about Christ’s birth and resurrection. Many autistic thinkers are trained from a young age to show the “appropriate emotion” based on what people around them are doing, and the mimic this to fit in, even when they have no idea what emotions they have (or should have).

Reciprocating emotions to the friends they see is energy and time-consuming enough. Now take that to the next level of trying to relate and reciprocate emotions with a God we can’t see. They see a friend laughing, smiling, crying, or worried. What kind of facial expression is God showing today?

And the Questions Go On

If it’s hard to trust the person across the table to accept me when I misread their expression, how can I trust God to accept me when I have no idea what He’s feeling?

Is just knowing the facts about Christ and accepting Him as my Savior enough, or am I supposed to be His friend back?

 If I mess up with the friend across the table, they may reject me. If I mess up being God’s friends, could He reject me too?

What does being God’s friend even look like on a daily basis?

How can God have emotions when so many emotions (anger, jealousy, hate) are based in sin, and God is sinless?

Do God’s emotions change?

How do I know if God is having a mood swing or a bad day? Does He have those?

When someone with autism stumbles upon John 15:15, these are some of the questions going through their heads. No wonder it’s like looking at a group of deer in the headlights.

Explaining the Unexplainable

I wish there was a simple way to explain what it means to be God’s friend.

There are Scriptures to answer some of these questions. No, God won’t reject you for missing social cues or failing to empathize with Him. God’s emotions don’t change, and He doesn’t have mood swings or bad days. (Malachi 3:6) The Bible is pretty clear that sin makes God sad and loving His people makes Him happy. (Zephaniah 3:17, Psalm 78:40, Psalm 5:4-5)

It’s important to remember that God made us in His image. (Genesis 1:27-28) He has emotions, but the difference is sin. His emotions don’t lead to actions of sin, His anger isn’t like ours, and His love isn’t like ours. Being born into sin, our emotions can’t be trusted and are not generally righteous. (James 1:15, Jeremiah 17:9) God wasn’t born into sin, so His emotions are righteous. (1 Peter 2:22, Hebrews 7:26, 2 Corinthians 5:21) Big difference.

The Source

At this point some autistic thinkers are throwing up their hands in defeat. They can’t figure out their friends’ emotions, and now they have to figure out a whole different set of emotions of a God they can’t see face to face. Others may be wondering if this is God’s way of making neurotypical thinkers experience the social blindness they feel every single day.

The good news is this: We don’t have to do the work to be God’s friend. He’s doing the work. He accepted us as friends before we were even born, so “misreading” God isn’t going to change that. He is the source of the friendship, not the reciprocator. People with autism can trust God to accept them and teach them throughout a lifetime of trying to figure out how to relate to people. If friendship is based more on trust than the emotions of love, the most important message is that they can trust God to be who He says He is and the stabilizing force in that friendship.

Erin Burnett  “With All Your Mind”

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