It might seem ironical that a book written by a man born without arms and legs should call itself Limitless. But limitless is not an attribute that Nick is claiming for himself. When he uses the word, Limitless, he is referring to the power and love of God.
Nick’s faith is uncommonly strong. To understand the faith that he has described in the 50 devotionals set out in the book, you have to understand Nick’s life and the difficulties he has faced. You have to learn of his struggles with ordinary life, his feelings of inadequacy and his depression and desire to end it all. It is these difficulties that help you appreciate the turnaround that happened in his life when he allowed God to work in it.
Today his life is a powerful testimony to how God can take the most inadequate things and fill them with His grace. Filled with God’s power, Nick now describes himself as enabled, rather than disabled. More than that, he sees himself as “God-is-abled.”
Each devotional begins with a verse from the Bible, mostly from the Psalms, then moves on to a personal devotional drawn from his own experience, and ends with an affirmation of positivity, a resolution not to let negativity get in the way. To look forward with cheer and hope and to counter the challenges that life throws up. The third section is where he talks directly to the reader.
Nick reminds us to have hope, to do something fun and ridiculous to encourage our youthful spirits, and to remember to laugh at ourselves. He tells us of how he once rode the baggage carousel at the airport. Just because. To the horrified, shocked and amused looks of his fellow-passengers. It is a reminder not to take life too seriously.
The book draws heavily on material drawn from two of his other books, Life without limits and Unstoppable. Through the devotionals, he tells us of the time when he wished he were dead. He was just 10 years old then and he agonised over the fact that he would never ever be able to feed himself or cross the road unattended or play sports like other boys. When he grew to be a teenager, another ‘would never’ was added to that long list. He would never be able to have a wife and children.
It’s hard not to be moved by Nick’s experience. I know how often I have felt completely miserable and dejected when things didn’t go the way I wished they would. As I read through Nick’s Limitless, I realize just how better off I was and how much I had to be grateful for. And yet Nick finds time to acknowledge the pain of others, hardships and abuse that he has fortunately never had to battle with. And he repeatedly thanks his parents, brother and sister, and assorted aunts, uncles and cousins who’ve treated him with love, respect and affection.
It takes Nick, a man who has gone through more than the regular share of disappointments and heartaches to tell us that we are special. That we are “God’s creation designed according to His plan.”
Despite missing “a few bits and pieces,” as his mother put it, he does not wallow in self-pity and warns us against the inadequacies that people like us who come with all body parts intact like to cherish.
Through it all, Nick admits that he has had a ridiculously good life, and reminds us that we can have one too if we only remember to surrender our lives to God and allow Him to be the hands and legs we don’t have.
It requires an incredible amount of mental strength! What an amazing person!
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