Silver and gold have I none,
but such as I have, give I thee.
In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth
rise
up and walk.
Walking and leaping and
praising god.
In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth
rise up and walk.
The other day, I heard my 5 year old niece singing these
lyrics of a children’s hymn. To boot,
she was singing them in Korean. It
seemed strange, yet adorable since she doesn’t speak Korean and if you asked
her what she was singing, she wouldn’t have a clue as to what the words
meant.
These words remind me of my grandfather and through him,
they mean sadness, then hope, then peace.
My grandfather passed away when I was very young. Of all my grandparents, he was the first one
to pass away. I think I was around
10. In the last few weeks before he
passed away, all my aunts gathered all of us cousins together to visit him in
the hospital. He was deteriorating
pretty quickly from a losing battle with brain cancer.
When we went to see him, he was unable to move and could
barely speak. But he was still alert
enough to know all the 10 grandchildren who had come to see him. Most of us shuffled in and were unsure of
what we should say or feel or how we should react. One
of my aunts suggested that someone sing a song…one of his favourites. So, our youngest cousin, Stella, who was
probably barely 6 years old, stood up in front of him and sang this song. In my mind, I can still hear her high pitched
voice, her little body standing on twig legs, singing these words in
Korean. My grandfather’s eyes were wet
with tears, but smiling. Not sure if it
was because this song rang true to his heart; maybe realizing that material
possessions were useless unless you were spiritually rich. Maybe he saw hope in the littlest of all his
children and grandchildren singing to comfort and love him.
Recently, someone I had known suddenly and unexpectedly
passed away from brain cancer. When
speaking with his mother about his death, while I imagine she was grieving, she
smiled at me with wet tears and said that there was a reason he passed on so
suddenly and God knew that he would suffer less this way.
I am cynical of religion and not sure what category of
Christian I would fall under, if at all.
But I believe there is a higher being and something greater than us in
this universe. It goes by many names, God
or Buddha or Allah or The Tree in my Backyard, but when faced with moments of
loss and grief, whether it is for the person dying in the hospital or for the people
who are left behind after their loved ones pass away, this belief in this greater power provides
hope and gives peace.
When I hear this song, I like to believe that my grandfather
is in his heaven “walking and leaping and praising his God”.
No comments:
Post a Comment