Anecdotes of Uncle When He Was Young（B）

Caring for Younger Brothers and Sisters and Deeply Beloved

Due to the parents’ old tradition of preference of boys to girls, the second daughter Fengjin Liu, with a gentle character, always endured grievance from her parents. When they distributed something to the children, they gave her less or even nothing. On such an occasion, Zhanxiang Liu, as the eldest brother beloved by the parents, would tell his parents that unless his younger sister had this, he would rather not want it. Then his parents had to compromise. This caused the youngest sister to be grateful toward her eldest brother and she always mentioned this even when she was old. Once Zhangxiang Liu saw the younger sister with bare feet in cold weather, mercy and love arose in his heart. So he washed her feet with warm water, and then took off his own socks and put them on her feet. His loving heart deeply moved the whole family.

The marriage between his first younger brother Ruilin Liu and his sister-in-law Yongcai Zhu was contributed to by Zhanxiang Liu. Yongcai Zhu had two brothers and four sisters and was a native of Shaoxing, immigrated to Jiaxing. Her family was a very prosperous large family in the countryside. The reason of the marriage between the two families was the common belief of Christians.

My mother Chunbao Liu was the first younger sister of Zhanxiang Liu. There was very deep feeling between the brother and the sister. In the sister’s mind, her brother was a great man and nearly a perfect man, so she respected him greatly. She said numerous times that her biggest wish in her life was to see her brother again. She would go to Taiwan to see him at all cost. As her son, I knew from my childhood that her brother’s word had the biggest influence on her. After my graduation from elementary school, my father hoped that I would quit attending middle school and go home to farm. However, my mother strongly disagreed, because her brother once told her that if the child studied well, she must try her best to let him study. So even when the situation of the family was very difficult and she could not even collect enough money for tuition and books, she would strive to ask the teacher to postpone the payment of the fee.

Being Powerful in Prayer

The wedding ceremony of my parents and that of my uncle (my father’s younger brother) and my aunt were held on the same day, and then the two couples lived together under one roof. My uncle was physically strong and his wife, a child bride, was capable of farming and cultivating silkworms. Whereas my mother, born in a carpenter’s home, was incapable of coping with farm work. Therefore, in others’ eyes the condition of my father’s family was worse than that of my uncle’s family. The displeasure and unhappiness caused by the living arrangement of my father’s family and my uncle’s family exceedingly depressed my mother that she felt bullied. Hence, my mother complained to her elder brother, Zhanxiang Liu concerning this very matter. After he prayed persistently, Zhangxiang Liu told his younger sister that my uncle’s family would have difficulties, yet my mother still needed to treat them kindly. After a short period of time, my uncle passed away due to acute disease, not long after that, his son died as well and my aunt remarried someone else. These things that had happened, completely exceeding our expectations, had fulfilled Zhanxiang Liu’s prophecy.

Once my paternal grandfather got very seriously kill, he himself felt it was difficult for him to recover, so he had already considered to prepare for his funeral. At that time my grandfather was an elder in the local church, and he asked his eldest son’s wife’s elder brother, Zhanxiang Liu to pray for him. After he prayed persistently, Zhanxiang Liu received one Bible verse: “Weeping may linger in the evening, but a ringing shout goes up in the morning” (Psa. 30:5). So he told us happily, “it does not matter. He (my grandfather) will certainly recover.” Sure enough, my grandfather was restored to health soon (My grandfather passed away without any illness at the age of eighty-eight).

My mother had not been able to get pregnant for several years after she got married. It was not until 1948 (the ninth year after she got married) that my mother conceived. At that time, it was already difficult to communicate between Mainland China and Taiwan. When my mother was pregnant for four to five months, Zhanxiang Liu received the information about my mother’s pregnancy, and then he wrote a letter to his younger sister that the child she would bear shall certainly be a boy, and he gave him a name called “Isaac.” At that time, ultrasound diagnosis was not available. However, his speaking was so definite, which was totally by faith and came from the revelation of the Holy Spirit through prayer.

His nephew, Isaac Xu

November 14, 2015