Last night I was wide-eyed, eyes glued to a novel called ‘Christy’, by Catherine Marshall, till almost one o’clock in the morning. The wonderfully-worded story brought tears to my eyes, particularly the last chapter. Soon, a real torrent of tears were gushing; the story allowing me to relive the past 20 months since my 17-year-old brother, Ian, passed away, and even the months before that of seeing his condition deteriorate.
Throughout the novel, many happenings within the community of mountain people in which the main character, Christy, was working, seemed to so outrightly oppose and defy the goodness of God. There she was trying to share God’s love with them, and yet at every turn there seemed to be tragedy; children dying, mothers dying, murders, epidemics, and the list continues. And not until the very end of the novel does Christy begin to see glimpses of God’s incredible and LOVING plan unfolding for her and the lives of the mountain people. God’s ways certainly are not our ways. However, I am learning that we CAN trust Him, though in the midst of tragedy it is so hard to see past the darkness and pit of pain that we find ourselves in.
Reading the story of Christy Huddleston reminded me so much of myself…At the age of 19 she was forced to ask huge life questions, the kind fundamental to her very existence as a human being, and to her faith. At the age of 19 she lost someone very dear to her, a woman by the name of Fairlight, whom she had come to love deeply. And at the age of 18, my family and I were told of Ian’s diagnosis, cancer; starting me onto the road of grief. Though he went on to fight it for almost two years, my heart was already having to face the idea of loss; how does one face it?! And the journey of recognizing that even the pain felt in watching him suffer through his treatments was a form of loss; the loss of innocence; the loss of how our lives had once been… Then at the age of 20, I watched as Ian returned to his heavenly home, throwing me into an even deeper pit of grief and fundamental life questions. Reading this novel, I have found a great soul-friend in Christy; someone who struggled through so many of the same issues, and amazingly all around the same age as myself. And even though she was 19 years old in 1912, and I in 2008, she was nevertheless at one point in time very much a real, living and breathing person too. This book has been a priceless gift to me, especially reading it now at this point in my life. Thank you, God.
Over the past few months since arriving back in Taiwan, two moments particularly stand out to me. One is of a little neighbor boy named Shen Jue. Shen Jue is now five years old, and his smiles and energy are contagious! Every Sunday he comes along to church with us, and one Sunday he stood facing me with a look of absolute bliss on his face; smile stretched out wide across his full little face with the corners of his eyes crinkling up in joy. And what struck me most was that it wasn’t just a smile flashed for a moment while laughing or doing something fun. He actually took a few moments to simply stand still, beam, and revel in LIFE. I shall never forget that moment. It was as though through him, God was giving me permission to live again on the inside; to laugh and be cheerful again, and for no other reason than that of simply being alive. Thank you, God, for Shen Jue!
Then there was just this past Monday. After an hour-long speech therapy session with a friend’s three-year-old son, I took him outside to play with his babysitter. But it so happened that his babysitter was at that moment also watching another little boy, named Adam, recently adopted by a Canadian family here in Kaohsiung. Anyways, I shall never forget Adam’s reaction to seeing me. As I approached the little playground area, he had been lying belly-down in a bed of pebbles within a low concrete wall serving to hem them all in. Upon my arrival, Adam was immediately up on his feet and in a rush to reach me, tripped over the low-lying wall and fell flat on his face in the grass! But that was not enough to deter him. In another instant he was back up on his feet and before I knew what was happening, had wrapped his little arms tightly around my legs, saying “Hellooooo!”. My heart just about burst then and there. Burst with what? It is certainly a difficult thing to know how to express, but it was a combination of love, and joy, and the way that he approached me. He didn’t hold back at all; simply made a beeline straight towards me! And the unconditional love that he offered. He hardly knew me, and yet gave freely all the same. Joy also; joy that I was wanted and welcomed there. So priceless.
Since around the age of 13, I have been discovering just how passionate I am about children. And the more time that I spend with them, the more I realize that instead of me being the one giving, it is more often than not the other way round! Children have yet to be caught up in the complexities of personal identity and the more guarded nature of relationships in this world. Instead, living in ways that I believe God had once envisioned for all of us to live! Loving one another unconditionally and without reservation, just as God loves us.
And as I think of Shen Jue and Adam, I also think of Ian. Even though Ian must have lived with an often very confusing sense of personal identity, there was usually such a peace about him (especially in the last two or three years of his life), made possible by a few fundamental things: he was who he was, and he accepted that. Despite all that had happened and was happening in his life, God was in the thick of it, and could be trusted. Instead of allowing hurt to embitter his heart, he chose to love others more than ever. Also, having love poured unconditionally into his life by both God and family formed an immovable sense of security and love, always there for him, come what may. Despite having had three different families over the span of his short life, and in his final family changing from Taiwanese to Canadian citizenship, not to mention learning a new language, and many other transitions, he nevertheless emanated a sense of calm and of peace. An inner peace I believe, that allowed him to then so freely reach out and love others around him.
Thinking about such peace for quite some time and having now been walking through the grieving process myself, it seems that above all else, at some point in his life, Ian finally chose to let go the reigns of life. He let go the reigns, and handed them off to his Heavenly Father. Whenever Ian would give me advice, he would say things so matter-of-fact-ly, that I was often silently amazed at his wisdom. What he’d say often seemed too simple, too black-and-white. But then in hindsight I see that so much of that came from his accepting that life is life. Many things are just the way they are, and he took them at face value. He was to me one of the most hopeful realists that I’ve ever known. He never watered down reality and how tough it could be. He knew all about life first-hand; growing up without a mother, then losing his father at the age of 8. Joining a 70-kids strong family at the Home of Onesiphorus in Taidung, Taiwan, then finally, at the age of 10, joining our family as my newly adopted brother and soon-to-be close and cherished friend. And despite such upheaval and loss in the span of just 10 short years of life, Ian still had hope; And managed to find the good, humorous, or bright aspects of often dark situations. Unlike optimists or idealists who often (be it intentional or not) end up ignoring or watering-down the reality of situations, he was able to face things squarely and realistically, while still finding the blessings or good in them; which really did exist, if you looked hard enough.
He was one of the first friends in my life that ever loved me simply because. And as he came to personally better know his Heavenly Father for himself, I saw that gentle and quiet confidence grow, and his unconditional love towards others grow as well. Once at youth group in Kaohsiung City, we were all playing some silly game in a park just outside of our leader’s home, and, noticing that a few kids were feeling left out, Ian momentarily left his role in the game in order to go over and talk to them, welcoming them into the game with the rest of us. That and several other instances are engrained in my mind.
Because of Ian’s love and care for those around him, I was able to be completely myself with him. And it meant the world to me. Over the last few years during the course of Ian’s sickness, God has miraculously at different points in time brought different friends into my life with whom I can also be completely myself, all being relationships built upon unconditional love. And it was actually during my trip to Singapore and Indonesia this past summer to visit friends, that hope began to be kindled in my heart.
Now, looking back, Ian was truly a life-changing source of hope and love for me, way back eight years ago. After losing Ian, it has seemed that tragedy is indeed on every side, and that life could never ever be good again. But then after almost twenty months of wrestling with God and with the grief process, I am beginning to see that there is yet hope. Last night as I finished reading ‘Christy’, a vivid image came to mind. I was in a simple, musty, dark backwoods cabin, and found myself peering through a keyhole, glimpsing the bright flickering of a single candle sitting upon a crude wood-hewn table in the next room. Though still in the darkness, I was finally experiencing a tangible piece of hope, the light. I had only to keep going forward, open whatever door lay ahead, and there would be the light; even brighter and more brilliant than the glimpse given through the keyhole!
My visit to Singapore and Indonesia in July, little Shen Jue, and Adam too, paired with unforgettable memories of Ian, are by God’s grace melding together and propelling me forward. Towards hope, towards, I pray, a life lived better than ever before. Because the depths of life-valleys visited since losing Ian have been deeper than ever journeyed into before, I know that the return to the mountain tops with also take longer…harder work and greater endurence than ever before. But get there we will; God and I. And if you too have been struggling, get there you will. You and God. Together.
At the very end of the novel, Christy is only a hair away from death by typhoid. She sees her dear friend, Fairlight, at complete peace and joy in heaven, and longs to go and join her. And yet from her remaining tenuous hold on earth she hears someone crying out to her, pleading her to return; return for the sake of love. And so Christy does choose to remain on earth. Despite its pain and tragedy and perversion, there is yet love, and with love, hope. In her vision of heaven, Christy sees children, filled-up to overflowing with joy from loving one another and being loved without condition or reservation, just as I personally experienced with little Adam. And so upon arriving back to her life on earth, Christy opened her eyes to see a man sitting nearby, his voice full of love for her. And as she put it, “The joy of the children was in his voice”. Yes indeed, the joy of the children. Let us strive to live with ‘the joy of the children’, just as Ian did.
