The following eight entries were all originally posted on my Xanga site from the end of April, when I returned to the Bay Area for a lengthy home visit, to present (June, 2007). There were more entries on the Xanga site, while these few were the most representative of my encounters and thoughts of my current trip. I repost them here in preparation to move my blogging activities to Blogger.com.
(Originally posted on Xanga on Wednesday, June 20, 2007)
This is probably the first time that I use a person's name as an entry's title, not to mention it's a girl's name! Yes, if you know me and care about me, you really want to pay attention. I think I fell in love with this young woman. ;-)
Have you ever read Catherine Marshall's novel Christy or watched the TV series based on the book? Yes, that's the Christy I am talking about. :-)) More than the inspiring young lady who is the leading character, I truly fell in love with the story. I am currently going through the DVD set for the TV series that was aired in 1994, and one big reason that I was so captured was that somewhat I could relate to the story. That sounds a bit odd, because the story was about a 19-year-old girl pursuing a career in teaching at a remote and poor region in the Great Smoky Mountains of Tennessee. While it's true that I've been to remote and poor places - and teaching English on some of those trips, no less - I can honestly tell you that teaching is not exactly a career that I am pursuing. But if you ever want to grasp what it is like to do missions work, or more precisely, to reach out to people with pride and hardened hearts - not by preaching to them, but by building relationships through meeting their real needs and speaking their heart language - while overcoming your own weaknesses in a harsh environment, you want to read the story of Christy (and, of course, other characters in the story).
I just reached the half point of the DVD set. In the episode that I just finished, Christy's father, while visiting her, suffered a stroke. There was a great need for Christy to return home with her parents in order to take care of her father, but the place needed her, as the people were facing a very difficult winter coming up. Christy was torn. Eventually, as the story went, her father got much better and there was no immediate need for Christy to leave the place. For those of you who know me and care about me, now you see another reason why I am drawn to the story.
But I know a few people who would be drawn to the story too. In fact, the story of Christy may be more dear to them than to me. I personally know a few sisters who are now in a faraway place, working also with "mountain people." They too left their family and friends, they too have had many obstacles to overcome, and most of all, they too have experienced time and again the grace of G*d. They are the real life Christies.
This is what I am going to do. As a matter of fact, in more than a month's time, I will have an opportunity to visit them. When I finish watching this DVD set, I will wrap it up, and I will take it to that faraway place as a present. (Yes, they do have DVD players and computers over there. It is, after all, almost 100 years after Christy's time.)
(Originally posted on Xanga on Friday, June 08, 2007)
A week ago I drove down to central California to see some big, tall trees. On Sunday I drove back to the Bay Area. On Highway 99 I used quite a bit of cruise control, something that I had not done in over 10 years! There was a reason for that; the last time I used cruise control, I had a near-death experience.
I don't remember exactly which year it was, but I was still driving my first car, an old Toyota Celica. One morning I was to travel to southern California, and before sunrise, I was already on Highway 5. There was no other vehicle in sight, and I put on cruise control. Enjoying the ride, soon I was looking down to search for something to drink. When I looked up, the car was already steered to the right, almost off the road. Scared, I quickly turned the wheel toward the left, but I forgot that the car was still on cruise control, thus the speed didn't reduce for a bit! To my huge surprise and fright, the car spun sharply to the left. At that split of second, I realized that the car was out of control. I still tried my best to steer the wheel, to no avail. Perhaps the car zigzagged a couple of times on this side of the highway - it happened so fast that I couldn't grasp every moment - and it finally spun all the way to the other side of the highway! I was probably lucky on two accounts: 1) There wasn't a center divide at that section of the highway, or my car would certainly crash hard into it. 2) There wasn't any car on either side of the highway that could have hit my car. The car, amazingly, skipped all the way to the other side of the road, facing opposite of my original direction, and it skipped off the road and stopped, as if I just pulled over the car. There was no real damage to the car, except dirt got in all the tires and wheels. There was no damage to my body either, except a small cut on my middle finger. I eventually got some help, and 3-4 hours later, I was driving the same car for southern California again!
Obviously that was a scary moment. I pointed at using cruise control as the root cause of my accident. There is an old Chinese saying, "Once bitten by a snake, for ten years being afraid of a rope." This past weekend I finally used cruise control again - I guess ten years were up! :-)
On Sunday morning, while I was driving back on cruise control, I fell into a deeper thought: What does it mean to put on cruise control in one's life? Okay, it was Sunday morning. I was sure to miss the service at my ch*rch. You wouldn't blame me for being spiritual for a moment or two, would you? :-) I was thinking along the line of giving up the control in our lives to G*d. But the more I thought about it, I got more questions than answers.
First of all, using cruise control means to give up the control on speed. Is that easy to do? Somehow I sense that if we give up the control on speed to G*d, He would almost definitely move slower than we do. We want things fast, and we want things now. How much can we wait on Him? The next thought is on direction. This won't happen to driving a car; when we put on cruise control, we still get to hold the steering wheel. In real life, can we also give up that control to G*d? No, G*d, that's not where I want to go! That's not the direction I like! I imagine how quickly we'd take back the steering wheel.
(Originally posted on Xanga on Monday, June 04, 2007)
This past weekend I went to Sequoia National Park at the end of a short business trip. Giant Sequoia is the largest plant on earth. The photos I am sharing here - and my photographing skills - don't do justice to showing how big the trees really are. You just have to be there to truly experience them!
(I have another presentation of these pictures on Facebook. What, you are not on Facebook yet? :-)
Left: The "yardstick" on the ground is to demonstrate how tall The Sentinel is. My friend and I are shooting pictures for each other at the two ends. The Sentinel is said to be average in size among the giants in the park. Right: Interestingly, the seeds of the Giant Sequoia are not giant at all. In this picture, 91,000 seeds weigh merely one pound.
Left: The General Sherman, the biggest tree on the planet. It's not the tallest or the widest, but its overall volume ranks #1 in the world. A 6-foot-tall man looking up at the tree would be equivalent to a mouse looking up at a 6-foot-tall man. Right: The cross section of a Giant Sequoia. The oldest among them have lived over 2,500 or even 3,000 years. The General Sherman, for example, is estimated at 2,200 years old.
Left: The Sentinel, 257 feet (78.5 meters) tall. Right:The General Sherman, the largest tree in the world. If the Sherman Tree's trunk could be filled with water it could supply all of the water needed by an average household for 3.5 years.
Left: The General Sherman. At 275 feet (84 meters), it is not the tallest, but with 52,500 cubic feet (volume of trunk) and 1,385 tons (weight of trunk), it is the largest tree on the planet. By comparison, a Blue Whale, the largest animal, may be measured up to 110 feet in length and 200 tons in weight. Right: The Three Sisters. The better known "Three Sisters" are in Kings Canyon, which is not far from Sequoia. So these are the "Three Little Sisters."
(Originally posted on Xanga on Thursday, May 31, 2007)
I haven't blogged on running for quite some time (three years, to be exact), and that's because I haven't been running. Living in Shenzhen gives me a convenient excuse that the air is quite polluted, which is true, but an excuse is an excuse. Today I want to talk about running again because I just finished reading a biography of Eric Liddell, the Olympic champion of more than 80 years ago who was portrayed in the movie Chariots of Fire. A few months ago in Hong Kong, while chatting with a group of friends, I mentioned that watching Eric Liddell in that movie was an inspiration for my own running. They giggled and asked, "So, did you also feel His pleasure when you ran?" I answered positively, "Yes, I did."
People who've seen that movie know that Eric Liddell was a runner. While there are hints here and there in the movie, people may not think much about his connection with China. The fact is, he spent many more years serving in China than running for an Olympic medal. His greatest race was not in 1924 when he won an Olympic gold medal in world record time, but his whole life was a race that he ran well - with joy in Him.
What struck me the most, after reading this volume of biography, was that Eric Liddell never seemed to force himself into anything. Whether he was running for the Olympics or serving in China, he never appeared to be particularly driven. G*d made him fast, so he ran. When the race schedule conflicted with his faith, he simply said "I am not running" and he didn't run. With another opportunity (race), he ran and won the gold medal. After the hero's reception and celebrations in his Scotland hometown, he simply walked away from the spotlight and went to China. In China, again, it was not that he wanted to go somewhere or do something in particular; like most other people, there were places or ministries that he felt more comfortable with. But when there was a need, he would go despite the discomfort - and he would give his all. Even his sharing of the Good News was utterly simple in style. He never tried to preach to anyone, but to use his own life as an example to talk about His love, and he always did it with a smile.
Yet, you cannot say that his life was aimless. In his own words, it was "complete surrender." That was his secret. His life was full of purpose because he had a close relationship with the purposeful Creator.
During that gathering in Hong Kong a few months ago, we had the pleasure to hear the story of Hudson Taylor and his family serving in China through the generations. In fact, some of Hudson Taylor's great grandchildren ended up in the same Japanese internment camp with Eric Liddell toward the end of WWII (where Eric eventually died of illness). They got acquainted with Eric and saw him as a father figure. I was thrilled to hear this piece of history. For these two families to somehow have such a connection, it was awesome to me.
It's interesting that an Englishman (Hudson Taylor) and a Scot (Eric Liddell) have inspired me to go back to China more than any of my own countrymen. (That's true even in the sense that I am a U.S. citizen. :-) Even more than my own birthplace or my own cultural background. Perhaps that's enough a hint or reminder that there is a deeper cause of this yearning.
People often remember this quote from Hudson Taylor, although it was only half of what he said, "If I had a thousand pounds, China should have it. If I had a thousand lives, China should have them." He went on to say, "No! Not China, but Chr*st. Can we do too much for Him? Can we do enough for such a precious Savior?"
