God Is Red - Liao Yiwu [31]
Li: If I had the surgery, it might have prolonged my life another five years. But what’s the point? It would be like waiting for death. Cancer is a blunt knife, poking me and slowly cutting me to pieces. The pain is unbearable; it was all I could do to endure it. I didn’t even have the strength to commit suicide.
Liao: What changed?
Li: There was a person, Brother Yang. He was born in Baoshan, Yunnan, and lived near here. He used to pass my store all the time. As we got to know each other, he would come in and chat with me, asking me about my life and business. One day, I told him about my cancer. He was very shocked. He sat down and heard my story. He was really worried about me. He said, “It will cost you lots of money to treat the cancer.” I told him that I didn’t have money. All I could do was wait for death to take me. He didn’t agree. He said, “Don’t give up too easily. Come to believe in God. God will offer a cure.”
I didn’t take him seriously. He visited me many times and would say things like: “Old Li, with your current condition, having faith in God is your only way out. The hospital can’t help you. Your relatives are helpless. The government can’t help you. For ordinary people like us, especially poor people like us, we have to have some spiritual support and have faith. You are on the verge of death, so why are you hesitating? Give yourself over to God.”
At that, tears welled up in my eyes. To tell you the truth, I was a pathetic living ghost but had been quite snobbish, worrying about being corrupted or getting bad luck from others. But God reached out to me again and again through Brother Yang. So I said loud and clear: “God, take me.”
Brother Yang said a prayer of deliverance for me on the spot. The hustle and bustle on the street remained the same. The sun continued to shine on the city. The tiles stayed on the roof, and the birds perched on them, chirping as they always do. Nature continued its way. I was the one who changed.
I followed Brother Yang, clutching both hands in front of my chest, tears streaming down like raindrops. I tell you, I wasn’t overcome with grief. I felt grateful. For the first time in my life, I didn’t think about myself or about human beings. I was thinking about God, who is above us, above all living things, above the highest mountain and above Erhai Lake. My parents gave birth to me, but God gave me life. I didn’t know that before. Cancer helped enlighten me, giving wings to my heart, which had been downtrodden in the mud, and made it fly and feel the bliss of heaven.
Liao: I’m touched by your poetic description. Tell me more about Brother Yang.
Li: He’s a minister from a local house church. He believes that going to church doesn’t necessarily make one a believer of Jesus. But as you know, the government doesn’t recognize the legal existence of house churches. During Easter in 2008, I was baptized at an old church here, which has over one hundred years of history. Many Christians in the region are like me. We do both, attending services at the church as well as at individual homes.
Liao: Since you were converted, has your health improved?
Li: The illness has probably worsened. It’s harder and harder for me to take food. I can feel the tumor stuck in here. For every meal, I have to rely on luck. I would have some water first and then take the food bit by bit. If I’m lucky, the passageway would open up a bit and some food could go down smoothly. Sometimes, water can’t even go down. When that happens, I have to go hungry. But I feel more relaxed and in high spirits. When I first started praying, I used to harbor selfish thoughts. I was hoping for a miracle, as if God owed me that. As a result, I was always distracted. I would think that God was probably helpless. God wouldn’t save me. In the past forty-some years, I had lived in misery, nothing but total misery. It wasn’t easy to change completely. My minister instructed me to pray for friends and relatives, and pray for those