2004 Year End Thoughts
2004 Year End Thoughts
Peter Y. Woo, 12/29/2004
Peter Y. Woo, 12/29/2004
Note: I obfuscated names for good reasons. Please excuse me.
Q. Did you write down specific goals before you went and then review them afterwards?
A. This would be the right way to run a church, or a business. Thankfully I am not an administrator. I just have a general objective, and that is to see the people in the great country, and then light a match to kindle fires of compassion and spiritual concern. Smaller tasks and projects I may plan, but God may not allow things to go as I always want. However, I have to be meticulously careful when handling other folks' donations. This is a Christian responsibility.
Q. So what are your goals this time?
A. First, I have a duty to meet the 8 new kids that my US friends are supporting financially. I also wanted to visit the counties where they are from. I have heard that those are some of the poorest places in the province. Secondly, I want to have better insight into spiritual and physical needs and how we outsiders can help.
Q. What moved your hearts this time?
A. We saw with our own eyes what poverty means. This family moved us to tears. The son, Genteel, is a gentle, somewhat melancholy boy we are supporting. The whole family are Christian, but I cannot talk much with the parents because they can speak in only their tribal language. The father, 38, has 3 kids, but they forced him to have vasectomy or something. The doctor cut at the wrong place, perhaps a vital nerve, and now both legs can hardly walk or even stand straight. Not a dime was paid as compensation. They only have less than a mu of land, about 1/8 acre, and that cannot grow enough food. So the wife has to work on cheap jobs, plus farming the land, plus taking care of the man. Yet she was a beeming, joyful lady. Who gave her that joy? We told her we believe the same way as she does. She was visibly happy after hearing that.
I asked permission from the school officials to pray for the man. Several of us formed a circle around him. I almost choked up on my words, begging the Lord for a miracle on this family.
Genteel is a bright boy, with a younger brother and sis. I'll put up his picture on my web pages soon.
That evening we decided to give this family a bit of mammon and a woolen sweater. So the next day we stopped by the village again to give it to the father.
The boy has good faith. He even ventured to bring some of the other 7 to a church. Adversity and tough circumstances sometimes breed a great personality.
Q. Tell us about the other 7 kids.
A. There are 3 boys and 5 girls, and of course I tried to know the other 2 boys. One, DazzlingJoy, has been visited by the Haystackers the last time when I was not there. His family is so poor they don't have shoes. This time he was smiling at my stories of teaching math at Biola. Both he and the 3rd boy, StrivePerfection, and another girl Silver Hammer, said their favorite subject is Math :) Wow. So I taught them a trick to tell the weekday of any date in 20th or 21st century. I told them how I rewarded my math students in Biola with a dime whenever they can point out a solid mistake on my math on the wallboard. I told them how I would creatively punish kids that forgot to bring their textbook to class.
StrivePerfection is a very bright boy, eager to learn. His home was not abjectly poor, but still poor. His own story on his application form told of miseries of his parents languishing in sickness and debts and overwork, just to make ends meet. He has a bright eyed sister in junior high school about more than a mile from their home, but to avoid another extra mile crossing a bridge, she would cross a small stream of icy water by wading it, twice a day. Her joyful mother worried more about finding lotions or vaseline to put on her legs to reduce her skin cracking than about her catching pneumonia. How she kept her pants dry during the day is a mystery. They heartily escorted us to our van, and I took some photos of their ardent faces, and you'll see them later.
The other girls all have individuality. One has the funny name NewPiano, so I called her by this English name, and everybody laughed. Silver Hammer is so named because I did not hear her Chinese name correctly at first. One other girl was weeping when finally we had to say goodbye after the school's performance to entertain a large group of donors from HK. Another girl, WaterFairy, we visited her home also. Loving parents. Her father built the house with his bare hands, and the walls and windows were nice and smooth. He hand crafted and built the doors, perfect as Danish furniture. We suggested him to become a carpenter, but he said he cannot get employment that way.
I still have not read through all their written stories, but it seems all have families that suffered much in poverty and sickness. We began to love them.
Q. How about the older kids you have been supporting the last 4 years?
A. We met BladeGleam, who is struggling to repeat his 12th grade, but that takes a lot of mammon, because renting a room at the state capital takes 250 yuan a month, food another 250, etc.
Another boy, GreatHero is now a very loving and mature boy, earning a few bucks, and now finishing his junior college and having been accepted by a prestigious place: Beijing Polytech Univ. branch college down south here. So he is very happy. He did not ask me for mammon, but get involved with activities at church and at the high school.
Another girl, Fragrance, is now a medical intern. She came from a poor poor village in a northernmost county, and she is a believer. This is the first time I see her, even when we have been supporting her through 2 years of medical school, for about $1700 US a year.
Another vivacious girl, LittleCharm Jiang, who said unabashedly people like her because she has a likeable face, again met me for the first time. We supported her for 2 years, now she is working at an advertising firm. I showed her our pictures with the poor kids in Guizhou with Dr Jeremiah and Drake, and she finally said, "I think I want to go to church." That conclusion is worth a million dimes.
Q. I begin to see why you have personal affection for these kids.
A. Yes, I do want all you folks to catch on and love them too. They are still very pure and simple after two years in college, going home during vacations only to help reap the grain.
Q. A sister asked you have you been interested in helping China all these years? What would you say?
A. The interest of reaching my countrymen with the Good News had been there from my high school days, as with most of you. But only since 1998 I began to think of helping poor students as a piece of the action. Sort of like Franklin Graham getting involved with Samaritan Purse charities.
Q. Yeah, tell us about how you discerned God's guidance in your life towards missions.
A. I was stirred with a romantic love for missions when my father read to us "Unto the Unknown Missionary" in an evening at summer camp under the stars. Later on at college I read the books of Isobel Kuhn who worked among the Lisu in YN. That was how I got interested in the tribal minorities of China. But I also read biographies of D.L.Moody, Hudson Taylor, Amy Carmichael, Rees Howells, and I have a deep interest in revivals, which would stir up the church, clean up immoralities, and win souls. The power of the Holy Spirit is evident in their lives. So after we came to California I got involved with sharing Jesus with college students, leading home Bible studies and teaching the Word in adult Sunday schools.
After 1985 and some serious trials in life, we decided that I am living on borrowed time, i.e., my remaining days are His, and He can make it short or long. So we started attending prayer meetings of OMF, getting impressed with how God blessed the lives of those going overseas abundantly, whether they are much younger than us or retired veteran Vineyard workers. I visited Guangzhou and a church there 1988, Guizhou as a tourist with my brother, 1994, and then we taught English and computer stuff for 3 weeks at Beijing 1997. We watched the jubilation and tears of Hong Kong reverting to China over the TV in Beijing, July 1st.
In 1998 we met a sister active in helping students in Guangdong, "accidentally", in a funeral service. She then got us to visit the High School about 4 hours by bus from HK, and the Principal took us in a ride to escort 2 students back to their homes in the villages of Bridge Arches and Back Rock. I shot a few shots of a poor family where the wife had to support the whole livelihood from her acre land, because the husband is limping on a bad leg due to bad treatment from the hospitals. When I returned to US and showed those video strips, folks were in tears, and so they began to support a few high school students. That was the start of my involvement in poverty aid thing. I was never a salesman, I don't ask people for money. I let the Spirit move people's hearts.
Q. Isn't that "Social Gospel", which meets people's physical needs and not sharing the gospel of saving souls?
A. I believe that compassion and love should be a natural thing with us who want to follow the Master. Compassion for human suffering, whether physical or spiritual, is one whole thing. Helping the poor in China is good for our souls, and also good for their souls. Bob Pierce, who started orphanages in Korea, and later on World Vision, preached with his heart and tears poured out. His famous prayer was, "Lord, break my heart with those things that broke your heart." I still have an unforgettable sermon on old magnetic tape he preached at the Church of the Open Door around 1968.
Q. So do you want all of us to get involved with missions?
A. Yes, but not all are called to go for long term service. As long as God give you health and financial means, go and visit, serve a little. Remember the heart of God is "bleeding" with compassion for those who are suffering and hungry. If we turn off our compassion, we are like the rich man ignoring Lazarus, or the lazy and wicked employee who hid his talent in the field. If we let our hearts be stirred, we will discover that brings revival and health to our spiritual walk, as well as new insights into our faith and theology. So please subscribe to missions magazines, get to know the tribes in China, challenge young people towards a career in linguistics. (3 women of SIL, unknown to the world, has achieved the "Olympic Gold Medal" of disciphering the language, plus translating the NT, to one tribe, then another, then another, in 30 years.)
Q. But I am worried about catching hepatitis B and other diseases.
A. If you go there, you will see the Lord blesses and protects those who live for Him, far more than you expect.
But after all, is it more pleasant to live our lives up there at His presence, than to languish down here? Look, 100000 lives can be wiped out in a day around the Indian Ocean on 12/26. Does it make you conclude that there is no God of Love, or does it make you look at life down here more dimly, and life up there more brightly? Jesus said, "I go there to prepare a place for you." Is He fooling you, or does He really know something that you don't know? This is a crucial question. It dictates your whole system of values of life.
Once you conclude that to live a life gloriously is better than just living it long, yet drab and dreary and dry and dull, you will commit yourself to live henceforth meaningfully. You can dare to live and eat just like the locals. Of course you take medical precautions, alcohol wipes, herbal medicine, stay off unclean foods, etc.
Q. A slightly mundane question: Do you have fun in life these days?
A. Very much so. Here in KM we go twice or thrice a week to swim in a 50 by 25 meters olympic pool that is 25 degrees Celsius while outside is 5 degrees or less. There is fun in meeting people that are wisely arranged by divine appointment. I can share playing piano with folks who like it, e.g., Prof. David Young the hymnwriter at Wangnichong Valley, HK. I had fun solving math problems from math journals or the Putnam competition this month, and publishing my results. There is also fun in shopping with Gloria, becauses prices are often 4 times cheaper than in HK. Yeah, too much fun.
Here are some typical stories, all true, that I shared with the students and school officials at the High School: They began to laugh and relax.
Story 1: At Biola, I teach a Calculus class with 20+ kids. One day I notice a girl Lisa pointed out a rather subtle mistake I made on the wallboard. I said, "You are quite good to see that. Hmmm", and I began to have a bright idea: I got a dime from my pocket and gave her. The effect was tremendous. From then on instead of dozing to sleep, 20 pairs of eyes are staring and 20 brains are pondering when would I make the next mistake. Sometimes they pointed at one, but I said, "I am not done with figuring the whole thing out yet, so it does not count. Another time after they pointed out a mistake, I grabbed a dime and about to give Lisa, but she generously said, "I was not the one, it was she . . ." and pointed to another girl. All through the semester, I invested only 20+ dimes, but in exchange I got great attention, and much better teacher-students relationship with them. On the last day, before the Final Exam, they sang, "For he's a jolly good fellow . . . "
Story 2: (half true) One day in the middle of the lecture I found John had not brought his textbook. "What! Back in my high school days in HK I would be punished to stand on my desk for the rest of the class. Well, Class, should I administer this punishment to him?" "Go on, go on, go on . . . " clapped the hands. Then I said, "Out of my abundance of mercy and grace, I shall give you a reprieve. You shall hereby peek at the book of the pretty girl sitting next to you (he began to smile), but at a price: you shall pay her whatsoever she may demand, such as 10 dollars an hour. We Chinese never let an opportunity to make money pass by." He began to frown again. But the girl said, "It will be for free. This is Biola." So we all broke into a good laugh, and the boy never forget his textbook again. Lesson learned: a humorous solution is better than a system of legalism meting out a certain dose of punishment. One girl began to coin up a phrase which she would blurt out at some inappropriate time: "You must be punished."
Story 3: (I did not share this) I was passing back the papers after a test. "I shall give you back these papers in descending order of grades." "NO, NO, NO", they yelled. "You will go to jail. Biola will be sued. This is America." I said, "Public humiliation is a good tool in the hands of a good teacher. You mean you Americans do not have the basic human freedom that I have if I am teaching in China or Japan or Brasil today?" So finally the compromise: I announced the names and grades of the first half of the class. Remaining papers were distributed among themselves.