Joel Vander Molen guided his wheelchair to the front of Peoria Christian Reformed Church in Pella, Iowa, and introduced himself to people sitting in the pews for the Sunday service on Sept. 6, 2020.
Receiving air through an implanted ventilator, he took short breaths as he spoke, telling worshipers — for whom he had come to preach — a little about himself.
“I...Joel Vander Molen guided his wheelchair to the front of Peoria Christian Reformed Church in Pella, Iowa, and introduced himself to people sitting in the pews for the Sunday service on Sept. 6, 2020.
Receiving air through an implanted ventilator, he took short breaths as he spoke, telling worshipers — for whom he had come to preach — a little about himself.
“I use my mouth to write, and I can type 30 words a minute,” said Vander Molen, who has quadriplegia as the result of a car accident that occurred when he was three years old.
“My wheelchair and I together weigh more than 500 pounds. I have muscle spasms, so if my arms and legs shake or move around while I’m preaching, don’t worry about it. It’s just part of me.”
Moving his eyes across people scattered in the sanctuary, Vander Molen mentioned that he had been working in web development for the past 20 years or so. But he has also branched out into ministry.
“In about 2004, I started speaking in a Christian grade school. I told them how to serve God with the different tools God has given us,” said Vander Molen. “In 2010, I began speaking to medical students at colleges about how to work with people who have difficult disabilities like I do.”
Then in 2017, after much prayer and encouragement from friends, Vander Molen went before his local classis, Classis Central Plains. And after being interviewed on the depth of his faith and commitment to Reformed doctrine, he received a license to preach in the CRC.
“Since then, I’ve been able to bring God’s Word to different congregations,” he said. Most of those congregations are in and around his hometown of Pella, although he and his family and his caregiver once made a 550-mile trip so that he could preach in a church where a friend pastors in Louisville, Ky.
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