Source: www.ChinaAid.org
Date: February 3, 2021
Pastor Wang Yi and Shuya, his son.
(Photo: ChinaAid)
(Chengdu, Sichuan Province—Feb. 03, 2021) Two days prior to learning that Chinese Communist Party (CCP) authorities had sentenced him to serve 9 years in prison during a secret trial December 30, 2019 [one year after being arrested], Pastor Wang Yi wrote the following poem: Miss my Son
The peach blossom does not covet fruit
The East wind misunderstands
how I miss my son.
If the lamb did not replace Isaac
How could one compare
the biological with the Heavenly Father?
Pastor Wang wrote the poem, Miss my Son, based on the 90th poem in 100 Palace Poems by Wang Jian—a poet in the Tang Dynasty. The following original poem talks about the loss of freedom... about maids working in the palace who feel sympathetic to flowers and hate the wind. They resonate with the plant, and sigh at their own fates.
Look for the red petals
on the tree and at the bottom of the tree
Petals fall down here and there
it is natural that peach blossoms covet fruit
We were taught wrong to hate the wind blowing at 5 am
Like the maids Wang Jian depicts, Pastor Wang lost his freedom. In addition, however, he has not seen his son Shuya for more than a year and knows they will not see each other during the next eight. Although as the earthly father of Shuya, Pastor Wang misses his son, he knows that because he and Shuya have the same Heavenly Father, they share the hope they will be together forever in Heaven.
Imprisoned Pastor Wang Yi prays with his son Wang Shuya when younger.
(Photo: ChinaAid)
Shuya, only 12-years-old when the CCP imprisoned Pastor Wang Yi, will turn 21 by the time of his father's release.
After reading Pastor Wang Yi’s poem, Minister Cao Qing’en of Early Rain Covenant Church, said:
Pastor Wang misses his son, but he misses him in the bigger context of the gospel, "If the lamb had not replaced Isaac, how could one compare the biological father with the Heavenly? If "God’s lamb" (God’s son—Jesus Christ) had not come to substitute Abraham’s son—Isaac (my son—Wang Shuya), how could we understand? Our biological father’s love for us cannot compare to the Heavenly Father’s— no matter how deep this love may be.
One Christian responded to Pastor Wang Yi’s poem:
Reading Miss my Son
It is universal for humans to miss their children
He [Pastor Wang] can’t help weeping while missing his son
the corpse of the beloved son is abandoned outside the city
he feels the Heavenly Father henceforth....
Some, like Pastor Wang's wife Jiang Rong may think as she shared in a seminar “Christianity and Poetry” [in which Pastor Wang spoke], “Poetry is not my thing." Others, however, may think like one who questioned, I wonder how I could do it?
If there were poems in our worldly life, this Christian said, we would fly to the sky. Poems can be our faith. When we experienced hard times, Pastor Wang shared several poems and we felt better. Ms. Jiang Rong and Shuya, as well as he, Pastor Wang says, "are like a towel in God’s hand. I would want to be used and twisted by God."
Pastor Wang Yi delivering a sermon prior to his imprisonment.
(Photo: ChinaAid)
Before he obtained a Bible in prison last year, Pastor Wang could only access classic poetry. Now, as he incorporates God’s divinity into his poems, Miss my Son reflects and encourages faith. Prior to being imprisoned, Pastor Wang said that in his sermons as well as in his poetry, he has strived to change his scholarly-bureaucrat wording to humble everyday language so that he may more explicitly reveal God’s divinity and the Redeemer on the cross—Jesus Christ.
Yu Bing, ChinaAid Special Reporter
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The Lord is like a father to his children,
tender and compassionate
to those who fear him.
~ Psalm 103:13 (NLT)
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