T008 - A Gift (2009 Summer College Hunting Trip)
My daughter Spring was 17 in summer, 2009. It was her junior high year (11th grade). This summer was a critical one since many important decisions have to be made. One of them was which college she was going to apply to. This also became our family's fervent prayers that we offered before the throne of Grace. Our criterion of selecting a college were a few and quite simple ones:
- This is the college that the Lord wanted Spring to go;
- The location of the college must have a Christian Fellowship so that Spring can participate and continue to grow in the Lord;
- The college should match Spring's qualifications and achievements;
- There should not be great financial burden either to Spring or family when she graduates from the college.
As result, we planned a two-week long college hunting trip for Spring. In the same time, we educated ourselves by attending college Expos, reading college brochures, and consulting with brothers and sisters in the Lord who already had their children in college. We also checked out colleges' websites and their rankings.
At that time, we lived in Jericho, New York (which is part of Long Island). Spring was one of outstanding students from Jericho High School (it ranked top fifteen in public high schools in U.S.). As we waited before the Lord, the Lord put five universities on our list to visit during our college hunting trip:
- Emory University in Atlanta, GA
- Rice University in Houston, TX
- Vandebelt University in Nashville, TN
- Wheaton College in Wheaton, IL
- CalegMellon University in Pittsburg, PA
We prayed to the Lord and desired that the Lord's perfect will be done in Spring's college selection during this college hunting trip!
Spring and I started our trip by driving from NYC and made our way to South. Our first stop was in Emporia, VA and visited our dear Brother and Sister in the Lord Frank and Betty Ann Lifsey on the way. We stayed overnight and had sweet fellowship with them.
Our second stop was in Atlanta, GA and visited Bro. Yongman Zhang who is my college alumni and who also introduced my sponsor to me when I first came to U.S. (Refer to T001 - Is A Man Really Worth Something?). But we haven't seen each other for 25 years since 1985! While we were with Bro. Zhang and his family, we visited Emory University and attended their college orientation program. At the end of the day, with turn of a series of events, we were quite clear that this was not the university the Lord wanted for Spring. So we moved on.
Florida Visit
Right during our college hunting trip, we learned that our sponsor was in a process of selling his house in Venice (FL) and moving to a nearby city (Sarosota). We just burdened to go to see our sponsor and tried to lent a hand to him. We spent a few busy days in Venice with our sponsor and helped him out with packing, sorting things out, and so on as best as we could. We also spent a Lord's Day visited Bro. and Sister Michael and Ann Zhang in Bora, FL. This was a kind of detour to our college hunting trip.
A Long Stretch
Our next main stop was Rice University, Houston, TX. This will be our first time visiting Houston. It took at least two days to drive from Bora, FL to Houston. As a result, we made a stop at Dothan, AL. We stayed overnight with Brother John Smith's daughter and son-in-law's house and had sweet fellwoship with them. I can vividly remember their cute little pet rabbit and their very nice gust room with wireless network password written for any possible guest.
A Special Encounter
We left Dothan, Alabama in the early morning and headed directly for Houston, TX. It was a really long stretch and it took about nine hours to reach Houston (via I-10). We passed through Louisaa also the first time. After many exhausting hours on the road, we finally came to Houston's surburb (Houston was in our view). A very special thing happenned: as I was driving (I was the only driver then) closer to Houston, instead of feeling tired and exhausted, a special renewed strength and refreshment came to my being. Even Spring who sit beside me felt the same. As a result, both of us were uplifted in body, soul, and spirit a lot. Intuitively in my spirit, I was alerted and was thinking: "Will there be something here the Lord has for Spring?" I pondered.
"Felt At Home"
Another interesting thing also happenned. As we continue to drive forward to the city of Houston, we just looked around through our car windows and tried to grasp a first impression of this 6th largest city in U.S. Suddenly a most intemate feeling came to my spirit: "I felt right at home!" Since I was a country boy when I grew up, I always enjoyed rural areas rather than big city living. But by the Lord's mercy and His sovereign arrangements, we lived in NYC environment for the last 10 years, espeicially for the last three years we lived in Jericho, NY. As a result, New York City has become our last spiritual home. We just got so used to it and did not even realize it! When I looked at the busy cross high ways and flyovers, I felt as if I came back to NYC again. I felt that I was coming home. What a strange feeling! It seemed that the Lord was pointing His finger to us: "See, here there is something that I wanted you to look at and pay serious attention to!" We were convinced that there was something really special here for us in our spirit.
After arrival, we were most welcomed to our dear brother Shailesh and sister Daisy Palmer's home. In fact, we knew many dear families of saints in Houston fellowship, especially those went to annual Christian Family Conference and Harvey Cedars Conference, and West Coast Christian Conference. We already have had close fellowship with those saints throughout the years. As planned, we attended their middle week prayer meeting. We found that they even had a youth prayer group, which could really fit Spring's spiritual needs. We also found that quite a few young brothers and sisters in Houston Christian Assembly who either graduated from Rice University or are currently attending Rice. We were much encouraged from our new onsite foundings. We spent a day to visit Rice and attended their college orientation programs. And all with very positive feedback. With these new impressions, we moved on to next college on our list.
A Birthday Gift Was Stolen!
With the good impresson the Lord has impressed upon us in Houston, we pressed forward for our next college on our list: Vanderbelt University. We did some research and was convinced that Vanderbelt University could be the one of good candidates for Spring. It was an old and also famed college in U.S. What plus, there is a wonderful fellowship in Memphis, TN, which was only three hours away and we have visited and knew many precious saints there. We were even considering to move to wherever Spring will go to college so that we could cut some cost and in the same time keep an eye on our daughter. But the Lord's ways were higher thatn our ways, His wisdom our wisdom, His thoughts our thoughts!
We arrived at Brother David Walters' home around 9:00 PM (Our family has visited Memphis several times and we stayed with this dear brother twice before). After settling down, as I was washing myself up in the bathroom, a clear impression from the Lord came to me: "I have my people here, but this is not something for you." But as we already came here, we still wanted to make a visit to Vanderbelt University the next day, just for the sake of comparison.
Next early morning, we drove three hours from Memphis to Vanderbelt University in Nashville to attend their perspective student's orientation program. After the orientation, we had a meal at a nearby Chinese Buffet. All the time, we were seeking the Lord for His guidance through the people we encounter, things we do. By the time we hit back to the road to Memphis, we were firmly convinced that this university was excluded from our list of consideration and it cannot be the Lord's will for Spring to apply or attend.
A Thief on Our Orientation Day
But a very strange thing happenned that day at Bro. Dave Walters' house (where we stayed). It happenned like this: On our way back to Bro. Dave's place, we received a phone call from him. On the phone, Bro. Dave said, "Bro. Li, I have some bad news for you!" I replied with alertness, "What bad news?" He replied, "While you were away visiting the school, a thief broke into my house and now my house is a mess! And I do not know what was stolen. I am afraid that some of your stuff might also have been stolen!" We were kind of shocked a little bit but I felt peaceful in my spirit. So I replied to Dave, "Ok, we will be back very soon to find out more details." As we arrived at his driveway, Dave was there waiting for us. I can tell that he was a bit upset about what had happenned. He opened the door for us and showed to us: "See, this drawer has been opened, this place was ransacked, oh, probably some of my mother's precious antiques were stolen! I just do not know."
As Dave was looking around, he suddenly cried out, "Oh, my laptop was gone!" Then he ran into one of the bedrooms where I was staying and luckily he found out that his brand new laptop was still there under a stack of papers (still visible). Then he said, "Well, the laptop stolen was only an old Dell laptop, almost a junk!" He was quite relieved and said, "This was so strange. This sort of thing has not happenned to me for the last ten years (he lived in the same house for about 15 years until then). Last time a thief also broke into my house, but he found nothing to steal and only took all my steaks away from my frige. That guy must be really hungry!" Dave by then was pretty much calmed down and was cracking some jokes.
Then he said to us, "go ahead and see if you have anything missing." Then I went to my room, I saw nothing wrong and my IBM Thinkpad laptop was still on the bed. I can see the Lord's merciful hand on my laptop. He preserved my valuable asset since I had some important websites that I have developed on this laptop. If stolen, it will be difficult to restore them. But when my daughter Spring went to her room, at first she did not see anything wrong. Then suddenly she realized that her own Dell laptop was also gone! It was a year old and also a precious gift from our sponsor for Spring's 16th birthday! Now the thief had it. Fortunately it did not have a lot of importnat information on it (only some Spring's homework which was recoverable). Again, we saw the Lord's merciful preservation.
That night, we had some fellowship with some of the local saints we knew in Memphis. We did not mention anything happened at Dave's house since it was so fresh and new. I was still meditating on the meaning and lesson on this, since nothing happen to God's children by chance but God makes everything work together for good for those He has chosen according to His purpose.
"It's A Good Thing!"