Tragedy To Hope

With Easter upon us, I felt this would be an appropriate time to share this story. It was written back in 2014 and it will always be relevant. This particular blog entry didn't come from my head space; it came from an amazing woman named Jade Wang. We used to work together and while working there, her father was brutally murdered while trying to protect a woman and her daughter. He was a hero and I can only pray that I would have the courage to respond the same way he did. I can only imagine the pain and suffering the family that he left behind suffered through as they tried to make sense of this horrendous crime. For Jade to share this with the world is both amazing and humbling at the same time. Only through God's love, can someone achieve the insight she has learned through this process. Anytime I start to complain [or think negatively] about something in my life, I read Jade's letter as a reminder. A reminder to me of just how little my petty annoyances really are and just how big some issues can really be. It takes a person of strength and character to open yourself up like this, but we should all learn from people like Jade. She is an incredible individual and I am honored to call her a friend. I pray that as I have to deal with tragedy, I can handle it with the class, dignity, thoughtfulness and insight that Jade has. I know that Reverend William Huang is very proud of his family and his heroic tale should be told to people so they can know how a real hero acts, behaves and sacrifices himself for others. R.I.P. Mr. Huang and God bless the entire Huang family.

"Death must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one's head, and listen to silence. To have no yesterday and no tomorrow. To forget time, to be at peace." - Oscar Wilde

Tragedy To Hope : 8 years ago

By Jade Wang

Eight years ago today, my dad was killed while trying to protect a pregnant woman and her 15 year old daughter. I remember sitting in a small room at the Houston Police Department while the sergeant played back the surveillance tape that captured the events of that tragic night. Not everyone chose to watch the tape. I needed closure. Even at the cost of haunting myself with the images for the rest of my life, I needed to know the final seconds of my dad's life and the choices he did and didn't make. I watched the madman chase my dad around with a machete. I watched my dad circle the cars to stay close to the woman and girl. I watched as he tripped and the man with the machete caught up to him.

The following week continued to be unbearable: seeing his blood at the site, gathering his belongings which included a proudly printed email written to him from my brother and witnessing my brother’s reaction as he picked it up to re-read. It didn’t get better seeing my dad’s body pre-makeup at the funeral home reminding me of the brutality of his death, as my mom held his hand where a thumb was severed from trying to block the machete blow to his head. The next year continued just as painfully. The madman was caught, we faced the animal that murdered our beloved daddy, and sat through the trial to hear the witnesses’ gruesome accounts of the event.

Eight years ago, I was angry. It was too simple to be angry with the killer. So I was furious that my dad chose to protect another family instead of ours. I had 3 younger siblings, the youngest who had just turned 10. We all still needed his wisdom and advice. I wanted him to watch my family grow. I wanted my kids to have met their grandfather who was so good at moving thousands to tears and laughter with his powerful stage presence. I wanted my dad to see my achievements but also my failures so he could lift me up from them. I wanted him to be proud of how I developed as an adult but also continue to challenge me so that I could be even better. When I was 17, in a fit of teenage rage from an argument I had with him, I took all of my trophies and dumped it into several trash bins and lined them up obnoxiously on our street ready for pickup. I tied every accomplishment I made in sports and school directly to my dad, as he was the one who encouraged and drove me to achieve and the loudest to cheer. I was lost without my greatest teacher. Because he chose to be someone else’s greatest hero.?

I read 2 Corinthians 12:7-10 for years ("My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness....for when I am weak, then I am strong.”). But in my world, tears didn’t equal strength. I read Romans 5:3-4 constantly ("..but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope") but I didn’t want character or hope. I just wanted my dad to be here. Last month during a train ride in China, my brother handed me a Malcolm Gladwell book that hit on the theory of desirable difficulty. And it was through Gladwell’s modern-time stories of how people rose through suffering did I truly open my eyes to these verses that I so devotedly, but so unconvincingly read to myself. On the train, I pulled the Bible verses back up and cried. My dad’s greatest lesson was taught in his last act. I realized that not one day goes by without a flashback of the tragic event in some way, shape or form. His bravery, his selflessness, his choice to protect people he barely knew played in my head for 8 years daily and there is no other more impactful lesson than a daily one. He left this world too early, but I did not lose my greatest teacher after all. I am stronger because of this. And character? Well, I still have a ways to go to be half the person he was, but at least I can keep aiming at the bar he set, with hope that only God can provide.

I love and miss you, Daddy.

www.revwilliamhuang.com