Читать книгу Dancing on a Razor - Kevin John White - Страница 9

Prologue: First Contact

I remember now how all of this began. For so long, it was as though I’d been dreaming a terrible nightmare, and I’ve only now just awakened. A lifetime has passed, and I had almost forgotten what happened that night so many years ago.

I was only a child then, perhaps 10 years old, but certainly no more than that. Yet as I wandered back through my heart and quietly walked through my memories, I found it there, still as wondrously beautiful as the day it first appeared and still shining just as brightly.

That night I had slipped silently from my bed and crept very quietly to my window. We always kept it open at that time of year. The sounds and scents of the night seemed somehow mysteriously transformed into an intoxicating mixture of subtle fragrances, a heady concoction exhilarating to my young imagination. I loved to sit secretly by the window, my gateway to other worlds, and breathe deep the fragrant breeze as I let the warm summer night fill and awaken all my senses.

I remember, too, gazing wistfully up at the stars and as I searched them, feeling … alone somehow. Not lonely really, just sort of quietly alone. As I sat there, searching, scenting, listening, the night breeze brought a curious sound to my sharp young ears. It was the sound of people laughing.

I was an unusually inquisitive child (much to my parents’ exasperation), and so intrigued, I focused intently, eager to hear more of this mystery.

It was a group of people. They were all talking and laughing together, having fun, like a gathering of good friends. They sounded so happy to me—like they were glad to be together.

It was the sound of friends telling funny stories or sharing secrets known only to them.

I hadn’t many friends—any friends at all really, not even a best friend. Our family had travelled far too much for that. Besides my brothers and sister, I don’t think I’d ever even had a real friend before.

I’m not sure why, perhaps that night the evening air had mixed with I know not what, but as I listened to those distant voices, something happened to me. That night something broke wide open inside me.

It was as if somewhere in my heart, a great yawning chasm had been torn open, and from within it poured out a deep and terrible longing—a powerful yearning for what I heard in that far-off laughter. I longed for the friendship and companionship of people who recognized me, who knew me, who knew my name, and with whom I had a place, even if they were people I could only hope to know.

I longed for friends that I could laugh and play with, and right then, at that very moment, I knew for the first time in my life how very apart I was, how separate and how lonely I’d actually been, and how very much I wanted to belong.

It all came in a rush—painful, hurting me—and that night, deep in my heart, a fierce determination was born, a determination born of desperate loneliness and longing. I listened even closer, straining, using every sense I had to determine from whence this laughter had come. It seemed closer than I thought at first, yet still distant—a trick of the wind perhaps?

I was very bold as 10-year-olds go, so it was nothing for me to decide I was going to find these voices—that I would find them, and I would very boldly say “Hello” to them, and I would play my guitar for them and sing to them, and they would all like me, and we would all be friends. We would laugh and talk and play together as friends do. All this I determined to do that same night, for I was 10 now, and I was very brave.

As I pulled myself away from the window I quickly formulated a daring plan of escape. I must be silent as an owl feather, for my brother lay fast asleep in his bed, and should I wake him he would tell me I mustn’t go outside or I would be in terrible trouble again.

I was often in trouble for going out when I shouldn’t, as I had a tendency of not coming back. There were many times I had to be fetched home again (sometimes by helicopter). I meant no harm by it. It just turned out that the places I needed to go were often quite far away, and there always seemed so much to do when I got there.

By the time I finished dressing, I had become a “Green Beret,” “Special Forces,” “Black Ops,” “Military Commando,” and so executed my plan with the greatest precision. Just as in the tales I had read (which were many), I quietly knotted together my sheets, blankets, and pillowcases (in that exact order) and tied my makeshift rope to the radiator (whom I was terribly fond of, for even unprovoked, he would suddenly hiss at me quite fearfully and very unexpectedly and could spit and growl wonderfully like some terrible ill-tempered beast). Then, with the other end tied around my guitar and already out the window, I slipped over the sill, through the window, and, silent as the shadows, was down the side of the house to crouch in the soft wet grass below.

I quickly untied my guitar and, pausing only long enough to sling it across my back, was swiftly out of the backyard, across the alley, through the neighbour’s yard, and onto the moonlit road beyond.

It was glorious! I was mesmerized by the size of the night and, stepping into the middle of the street, felt that familiar thrill of freedom rush and tingle through me. With my heart pounding lightly, I paused and, feeling the night wrap itself around me, remembered once more the wildness in my soul. I was almost feral again, scenting the cool of silver dewfall, sensing the mood of the world that night, listening hard into the dark—and then, suddenly satisfied, l became nothing more than a whisper among the shadowy protection of the great spreading oak trees lining the sides of the road.

I had heard them when I paused—the laughter and the voices. They were still carried to my ears on the cool night breeze, beckoning me forward.

With my guitar tight on my back, I slipped quietly up the street, always in the shadows, my bare feet making no sound on the still warm asphalt. I had now become a “Great Warrior,” trained since childhood always to move with grace, speed, and great stealth, as do all creatures of the wild, and truly, that night, I had become a wild thing indeed.

As I moved quietly, unseen by all but the moon, my brother the wind would often bring news of them to me, so I knew to walk with my face towards him, always intent on my goal. It did not occur to me that I might not find them. I simply focused and did, always. That was the way of things for me. I would find them no matter what.

After a time, however, it seemed that among so many streets and houses the wind became confused and began to falter. I could no longer hear clearly the laughter of those voices. Often, I had to pause much longer to wait for snatches of sound, of conversation, and then chase after them. I would cut to another street, and then another, and then back again, climbing over fences and through yards. I would often have to backtrack two or three times and, with a rising fear chasing hard after my heart, head up still yet another street, venturing farther and farther, and hearing less and less.

Up and down I walked, desperately searching, but no matter which road I took or how hard I listened, I could never seem to draw any closer to those now fading voices, until after a time I could hear them no longer, and I found myself alone on the empty road with only the streetlamps for company.

I had to stop then. I couldn’t listen—it hurt to listen—anymore. I wanted to call out, to cry to them, but I knew they couldn’t hear me any more than I could hear them. I was alone, and all that I had felt before came crashing in like some great black wave. My heart ached. It ached so much for the companionship of I know not what or whom. Inside me was only a dark and frightening hole, empty where there should have been a great bonfire with cheery friends, and laughter, and sparks twirling and dancing, spiralling upward to greet the stars, who would look down upon them so tolerant and kindly, flattered by their brave ambition. There would be laughter and friends and just … somebody.

I walked again, very slowly, my guitar keeping time, thumping my back as if to console me. All of my 10-year-old boldness and bravery had vanished, just as those voices in the wind had vanished. Just like a part of me had vanished, and my heart was cast down inside me. I was alone. Again.

I really don’t know exactly how to describe what happened to me as I walked slowly back home that night, but I must try, for what happened changed my life, changed everything … forever.

As I walked, it was as though I heard a voice gently yet very powerfully speak my name and say, “Kevin, I want to talk with you.” I was startled by its clarity and impact, and I clearly remember faltering to a halt and listening, questioning … “What?” almost shocked, but in so low a voice I could scarcely hear it myself.

For a long moment there was nothing. The whole world seemed silent. I was just about to start walking on when I heard it speak again, very clearly, still gentle, but somehow even more powerfully than before.

“Kevin, I want to talk with you!”

For another long moment I could hear nothing. Cautiously I whispered, “Who are you?” but deep down inside of me, I already knew. This time the answer came almost immediately.

“I am God, Kevin, and I want to talk with you.”

I didn’t know it then, but that voice was the one voice I would come to long for, had already yearned for, more than any other voice in the whole world, for my whole life and, I know now, beyond even life’s end.

I began to walk again, but this time, it appeared I wasn’t alone. Of course, then came the inevitable questions. I feel myself smiling now, almost with tears in my eyes, because so many of those questions I still ask to this very day, 45 years later. (Oh! And also, because talking to him is like talking to an answer, and a question, and a great big magnifying glass with a wonderful sense of humour all at once.)

“How do I know you’re really God?”

“Because I have just told you so.”

“Well, what I really mean is, how do I know that I’m not just talking to myself?”

“Do you really believe that, Kevin? Besides, I’m the one who started this conversation.”

Then came the kind of trying to trick him, and trying to think of something he couldn’t possibly know, or trying not to think about anything at all, then, thinking-about-something-totally-different-really-really-fast, and then thinking about something different entirely while asking him to tell me what I had been thinking about when I’d thought about something really fast while trying very hard not to think about what I had just thought—before. Which he quickly pointed out was just plain nonsense and really rather silly as he was God and already knew everything about me. I had to concede the point.

Stymied but still quite suspicious, I slowly began my long walk home as we continued our conversation. I also remember feeling a slowly growing acceptance of this odd new inevitability and somehow feeling as if I remembered this voice from before—from another time.

I’m so glad now that I was still young then. Glad I could still be a “Green Beret” and a “Wild Untameable Savage.” (And I was, too!) I’m grateful for all of those evenings after supper and a bath when as a child I sat with my brother and sister on the floor, my toes burning on the electric heater in my father’s study, as he read to us of Narnia and of Aslan—“The Great Lion,” “Son of the Emperor Over the Sea,” “The King of All High Kings.” I am so pleased now that the cynicism and sophistication of many years had not dulled my ears nor deadened my heart to wonder and mystery.

I found out that night there was another world, but unlike Narnia, this world was not a bedtime fairy tale. This unseen realm was very real and had just invaded my life, and I would never be the same again—I couldn’t be the same again—ever.

I remember asking many other questions and that we talked about them all. Other than one, I don’t remember specifics about particular questions, but I would suppose they were all in the nature of what any lonely ten-year-old would ask God in the middle of the night as he walked down the middle of the road on his way back home. I do remember he always answered me, though, and that many of his answers seemed to be questions I had to answer for myself. This vexed me somewhat, but he always answered nonetheless. We walked together that night, he and I, and slowly we began to speak as friends would speak, of many things, the voices in the distant wind long forgotten.

The one question I do remember asking was “Why? Why are you talking with me?” His answer, try as I may, was something I cannot quite recall.

However, before we got home that night so long ago, he did tell me one thing that I do remember. It was something I have kept in my heart always and will keep there till I am at his side forever.

He said that I could believe in him or not but that he would always talk with me—always—no matter what.

Not very long after, I noticed something. Something wonderful. In that dark and frighteningly empty hole so deep in my heart, there mysteriously appeared a wondrously beautiful sphere of purest crystal, and inside it burned a single flame of fire. No wick, no candle, just a light in that terrible darkness—a flame that nothing in this world or any other could ever possibly extinguish—the very life of God in me. I can see it clearly still to this very second, and I long for it to consume me utterly and completely—the very fire of God in my heart of hearts.

And our conversations? They have continued, unbroken, to this very day. He has kept his promise to talk with me always, no matter what. And we talk as friends would talk, and I still have so very many questions to ask, and he remains as vexing as ever, “The Great Answer and a Question and a Great Big Magnifying Glass with a Wonderful Sense of Humour All at Once,” only now … I’m not alone. Now I’m never alone.

1: The Set-Up

I suppose I should introduce myself. My name is Kevin John René White. Legally my name is John René, but both God and my mother call me Kevin. Now I’m pretty sure the two of them pack a whole lot more wallop than any government on earth (especially my mother—ask God … he’ll tell you), so that being said, I shall call myself Kevin.

What I’m going to tell you is rather odd, but that’s not surprising seeing as how I’m the one who’s doing the telling. What is surprising, however, is that I’m alive with enough brain activity to write anything at all!

That also being said, everything I’m going to write down here is the honest truth about some extremely unusual events. I know they’re true because they happened to me, which means I was there when they happened, so I should know better than anybody—right? Except for the parts where I wasn’t born yet … and I am a little sketchy on the parts where I was crawling around in diapers (don’t remember—very embarrassing time … rather messy actually).

Now before I really get going here I think perhaps I should mention something. I am not the only one in my family that’s a little bit … well, odd really. It just seems like I got a double portion of this weirdness, so it’s actually quite normal that I turned out the way I did (I mean, being a tad whacked and all).

The parts where I wasn’t born yet go like this:

During World War II my father served in the British navy as a dive bomber and a reconnaissance photographer aboard the HMS Trumpeter. In civilian terms that meant he and his pilot pal flew around the Atlantic Ocean picking fights and taking pictures of everything that had an enemy flag attached to it. At least everything they could find. My dad would hang out the tail end of a British fighter plane and say “smile” to all the guns and crew on the enemy vessels while his pilot pal made steep dives so Dad could drop his bombs and take good pictures of what type of guns they had. This intel was then sent to headquarters monitoring enemy activity in that area of the Atlantic. While Dad was occupied with that, his buddy was real busy trying not to get them blown right out of the sky.

What was even trickier was taking pictures over land. They’d have to dive straight into the antiaircraft guns and take pictures of them so the bomber crews would know what kind and how many guns they would be facing in any offensives they were planning. They got shot at a lot. Oh yeah, during those missions they were not armed, so they couldn’t even shoot back.

Now none of this really has any bearing on what I want to write about other than to say I think Dad secretly loved the adrenalin rush and was definitely a bit mad. That, and I’m really proud of him (which I never told him while he was alive). Oh—and most importantly—I definitely inherited from him on both counts!

After the war, he returned to England and became a surgeon, working mostly in an emergency room. I guess he must have read a few books or something. My dad was a pretty smart guy.

After a while, I think God told him that there were even better things than bodies to save, so he got it into that wonderful head of his that being a missionary and saving poor savage souls was just the thing for him. So, off he went and hooked up with an outfit called New Tribes Missions and for the second time in his life found himself in a war, this one even more important than the last. This was around when the miracles started. At least the ones I heard about. I’m sure there were plenty of others.

See, before my father went to New Tribes boot camp, God told him that was where he would meet his future wife. Well, when he got there, missionary school was a total bust. No single dream girl in sight. But because God says, and Dad’s Dad, he decided to stick it out and began teaching. Seems like he taught wherever he was, at least as I recall it. He did this for a while, but as the clock ticked on and time got short, there was still no sign of Mrs. Right. Or should I say—Mrs. White.

One day in camp he was kicking back on his bunk with a prayer chain magazine, and he stumbled across an article about a young Canadian girl who, while serving with New Tribes in the Pacific, had contracted tuberculosis of the spine. At that time this particular type of tuberculosis permanently crippled or killed everybody who got it.

Now, for some reason this pissed my father off something fierce, and as he recounted to me, after reading it, in a heartbeat he tumbled out of his bunk, was onto his knees, and started getting real pushy with God—like actually arguing and demanding that God heal this woman—and with fast quickness too!

Dad told me that as he’d been reading he became frustrated and angry at God. Dad felt that this was all wrong! He began pointing out in no uncertain terms that God needed to really re-examine himself on this particular issue, reconsider exactly what he was doing here, heal this girl up right quick, and get her back in the saddle again, pronto! As in right away! The funny thing about it all is that Dad didn’t even believe divine healing existed anymore. But for some reason that didn’t slow him up too much that day.

Now there is a point to all this, and I’m getting to it now. The facts are that miracles were running way wild in my family long before I ever showed up. You see, I come by the kind of things I am going to describe to you honestly. Premonitions, visions, and manifestations of God’s incredible love and holiness were shared by both me and my father. I didn’t ask for them. I didn’t go looking for them, and there are many times I wished I’d never experienced them. Also, I’m going to show you, very clearly, that none of this is my fault, that I never stood a chance, and that I was set up from the get-go. Here are two miracles right off the hop, and then I’ll get to the “Big Set-Up.”

What my father could not have known was that right around the time he was in this big kerfuffle with God, the young lady who was responsible for said row was already back in Canada and headed for a sanatorium. There she was to be put in a body cast, probably for several years. (That’s if she lasted that long.)

The thing was, she had stopped at a church in Halifax to speak to some young people about the mission field, and right in the middle of her speech God just stepped in and “Bingo!” she was completely healed! Just like that! No trace of any illness in her body at all. Her spine just went completely straight again, and there was not a single sign of tuberculosis in her body. Done! In her own words, it happened like this:

When I arrived at the church I was led up to the front towards a chair, but as I started toward it God said to me, “Where do you think you’re going? I want you to stand at the podium!” So I did. When I began speaking I was leaning heavily on it, bent over, as I could not stand upright. As I continued speaking, all of a sudden the young people of the church started clapping. I had absolutely no idea at all why. I continued to speak but later they started clapping again, only this time they were laughing as well. I thought perhaps I had said or done something foolish, but I kept on talking anyway. What I didn’t realize was that as I was speaking I had begun to stand up straight. By the time I finished speaking I was standing erect and completely straight. The young people had seen all of this and that’s why they had started clapping in the first place. They knew before I did that God had been healing me as I spoke.1

After having x-rays redone and freaking everybody out, she returned to boot camp for reassignment less than a month and a half later with a straight back and no trace of tuberculosis. At 90 years old, she still stands erect and without pain.

Healed in May, back in July, and I bet you have no clue who she runs into at boot camp! Yep! You got ’er!—a certain daring (but very lovesick) young naval intelligence officer. The fireworks were ballistic. (What is it about camps and romance? Sigh.)

Now according to my father, he was just standing around minding his own business one day when he was, and I quote, “struck suddenly by a vision of beauty” who just happened to wander by. (Minding his own business?) Well Dad, not being one to waste any time, does a bit of fancy footwork and a few hours later has his “glory” alone on a riverbank and is asking if she wants to marry him and have four children (not a good example, Dad!).

Now I just love my mother. She says she wouldn’t mind the babies, but she’s not too sure about the boy. Poor Dad. You can tell she’s a fisherman’s daughter though, eh? Brilliant technique!

As things turned out they had to decide quickly as they were both going to be headed to different parts of the world very soon, so they shook hands on it (or something) and decided that they were going to tie the knot. Ten days later they were married, and they stayed that way happily for 45 years without one single serious argument, until my father passed away at home in her arms. This was after they had both lived incredibly amazing lives together, travelling all over the world in God’s service. Together they raised five children, and in all of my life there was never once that I ever thought ill of my father—ever. He is the reason it is so easy for me to call my God “Father.” As for my mother, no words can describe the love I hold in my heart for her.

It’s funny though; they didn’t put the whole—Mom getting healed and Dad praying for her—thing together until some years later. It must have been special for them—you know, all romantic and stuff. That was miracle #1 by the way. Here comes miracle #2.

You’re probably wondering where and when I come into the picture, but you’ll just have to wait because my big brother came first, and he’s the one who saved all our lives while I was still inside my mother just itching to get out and cause some trouble. (That’s not the miracle part—believe me.) For the miracle part, we’ve got to time warp forward about five years.

Now just to set the stage, Mom and Dad had been doing their missionary job at a leper colony in Bolivia up until my father got re-posted to work with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, strengthening, encouraging, and organizing the Christian university students in Latin America. This of course means Mother got re-posted to work strengthening, encouraging, and organizing my six-year-old brother Scott and an unborn hell-raising Kevin onto an airplane and, of course, into a completely different country.

We catch up to my mother cruising at altitude over the Andes Mountains as Scott (who’s as nervous as an untended whisky bottle in a back alley) is whispering, “I really don’t like this plane, Mommy!” like he is just about to pull a 20 dollar bill out of an unsprung mousetrap, and he won’t stop whispering, “I really don’t like this plane, Mommy!” until poor pregnant Mommy makes him a promise that they will get off at the very next stop. They did.

This decision saved our lives. When that plane took off to get to its final destination, it had barely cleared the runway when something went terribly wrong, and it crashed into a huge ball of flame, killing everyone on board except a tiny baby they pulled out of the wreckage. (It was all kind of spooky really.) It was one of the biggest airplane disasters in South American history.2

These narrow scrapes with death were to become pretty regular occurrences in my future.

Oh yeah, this gets even stranger. You see, Scott wasn’t the only one who knew that plane was going to crash.

The following entry is from one my father’s books, The Cost of Commitment. I came across it while I was reacquainting myself with him through his writings by rereading all his books. (I’m still trying to find 20 or so I’m still missing.) I felt a need to get closer in my heart to him. I’d hurt him pretty bad while I was growing up. I miss him so much now—his wisdom and gentle ways. You know, he never once raised his voice or said a single cruel or unkind word to me in all my life. Not once. I just wish he could have been here to see me finally get free.

This was such an interesting find, and is so much like him:

A Paradox and a Premonition

Once I had a premonition that my wife and infant son would be killed in a flying accident. We were to travel separately from the U.S. to Bolivia, South America. She would fly via Brazil and Buenos Aires, then north to Bolivia. I was to visit Mexico, several Central American countries, Venezuela, Colombia, and other countries to strengthen Christian work among students, before joining my family in Bolivia.

The premonition came with sickening certainty just before we parted on the night of a wild snowstorm. I felt I was a cowardly fool as I drove away and saw Lorrie silhouetted in the yellow light of the doorway, surrounded by swirling snowflakes. Why didn’t I go back and tell her I would cancel the flights? Why didn’t I act on this foreboding?

I didn’t believe in premonitions—and had never even heard of “words of knowledge.” Lorrie would probably laugh. Besides I was late, I had to get to the place where I would spend the night before my early morning flight. No conversation was possible with the man who was driving me to my hotel. Fear, shame, guilt, and nausea all boiled inside me.

In bed I tossed in misery. Of course I prayed. By faith I was going to have it licked. Faith? In the presence of so powerful a premonition? My mouth was dry. My limbs shook. God was a million miles away. The hours crawled by, each one a year of fear. Why didn’t I get dressed, hire a car and go back to them?

“What’s the matter? Can’t you trust me?”

I was startled. Was God speaking?

“Yes, I’ll trust you—if you promise to give them back to me.”

Silence.

Then, “And if I don’t promise? If I don’t give them back to you, will you stop trusting me?”

“Oh, God, what are you saying?” My heart had stopped and I couldn’t breathe.

“Can you not entrust them to me in death as well as in life?”

Suddenly a physical warmth flowed through all my body. I think I wept a little. My words came tremblingly and weakly, “Yes, I place them in your hands. I know you will take care of them in life or in death.”

And my trembling subsided. Peace—better by far than martinis on an empty stomach—flowed over and over me. And drowsily I drifted off to sleep.

Hate them? How could I ever hate them? Yet by faith I had said in effect, I will do your will whatever it costs to me or them, and I will trust you.

Their plane crashed. Everyone on board was killed. But my wife had also had a premonition and cut their journey short, getting off the plane the stop before the tragedy occurred.

I am grateful for the way it worked out. But I didn’t know beforehand that things would go as they did. And had it not worked out that way, I would have grieved (God knows how I would have grieved), but I would not have regretted my decision to trust and to go forward … This is what it means to follow Christ fully. This is the effect he wants to have on all our personal relationships—family members, spouses, friends—whatever they may be. The fear that may hold you back is a fear of unbelief. But defy your fear and go forward. For to follow Christ fully means to take steps along the perilous pathway of trust, roped to the safest Guide in the universe.3

Mom told me he got it all mixed up. (Ever hear a married couple tell the same story?)

It is interesting to me how that same event impacted two people so powerfully. You see, there is even more to this tale. Other factors were involved. It was actually impossible for us to have been killed aboard that plane. Here’s why:

Besides becoming a real pain in the ass real quick, I was also the answer to a whole lot of prayer—the prayers of my mother and father. (I guarantee you they got a little more careful about what they asked for after having me.)

I knew nothing of any of this until my father told me when I was in my late twenties. I was in Cook County Jail in Chicago for stealing a six-and-a-half-foot Burmese python named Monty. Needless to say, I was stoned and drunk. To put it very mildly, it was during a terribly dark time in my life, and I’ll leave it at that. There are some things better left alone.

This was the first time I’d heard of what I now call “The Set-Up.” Is that a fair name? You be the judge …

It was in a holding cell in jail for a visit with my father that I first heard of it. That he was even there was in itself a miracle. How he got in to see me was so typical of him. Believe me, he was an amazing man. (Contact visits were strictly prohibited.)

Well, after the pleasantries were done he gently took my arm and said, “Kevin, there is something that I can tell you now.” Then he told me a story that shed some light onto the insanity of my life.

He said that after my brother Scott was born they couldn’t seem to have another child for almost five years. They had prayed often about it, first for a son, then asking why my mother couldn’t conceive. There seemed to be no real answers.

Late one night while they were on leave in Paris, taking some much-needed time away from their work at the leper colony, my father went for a walk in a nearby park. He told me he was troubled about them not being able to conceive. At a bench deep in the park he got to his knees and began to pray.

He asked God for a son—a good son, a child he could raise up in the knowledge of God, one who would love him with all his heart, strong and full of the Holy Spirit, who would serve and honour God—a child who would bring glory to his name.

Right at that point God very powerfully interrupted him with a question.

“To my glory or to your glory? What about Adam and me?”

This was immediately followed by a rapid and equally powerful series of visions and emotions that included stone prison walls, shame, bitter struggle, great pain, and all the sin, disgrace, and terrible heartache that may follow. He said it shook him powerfully.

God spoke once again. “I am going to bring this child into the world. I am offering him to you. If you do not want him, if you do not accept him, I will give him to another.”

Here is how he put it in his own words. It’s something that, once again, I stumbled upon while reading one of his books, The Pathway of Holiness: A Guide for Sinners. It was in the chapter on pride and its pitfalls.

God taught me this lesson during the long delay between our firstborn and subsequent children. My wife and I were older, and in a hurry. Disturbed by the delay, I knelt one day in a park in Paris, when there were few people around. I asked God for another son with the caveat “if he will live to your glory.”

Quite distinctly the Holy Spirit said, “To my glory, or to yours?”

I was shaken a little. Then came “What about me and Adam?”

At first perplexed, I began to realize that at the time of creation God had known of all the wars, the cruelty, the diseases, the terrible tragedies that would follow the entry of satanic pride into human history. Yet he had still given Adam life. Was he asking me to do something similar?

I asked, “What d’you mean?”

Immediately into my mind came a picture of the walls of a prison not far from the home of my childhood. I felt sick.

“You mean he would go to jail?” The possibility of having a son who would go to jail frightened me. I could feel moisture penetrating my trouser knees. But I did not rise. I knew I was being offered a son who would go to jail. I also knew I could refuse that son. Perhaps someone else would have him. I have no idea how a sovereign God works this sort of thing. But there was no answer to my feeling of panic, only silence.

Finally, rather shaken, I said, “OK. I’ll have him!”

Two months later our second son was conceived. By that time, I had forgotten the prayer “conversation.” My dialogue with God did not lead to a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. I gradually forgot about it, and I recalled it only much later when the clear differences between Kevin and our other children became so obvious that they could no longer be ignored.

A nightmare began then. Did God cause my second son to sin? Obviously not. But he had known what would happen. And he had given me a choice.

Later came two prophecies, both from men with established reputations for accurate prophecy. A cloud of darkness rested on that particular son. At some date in the future it would be snatched from above his head, and he would change. In the meantime, Kevin never lost his longing for the things of God. In jail he would organize Bible studies. He would lay his hands on other prisoners, and these would occasionally fall to the ground, overwhelmed by the Spirit of God. How does one explain such things?4

For some strange reason, my father said yes. That he hadn’t the slightest idea what he was doing I have no doubt. If it were me, I would plead temporary insanity.

I’ve often puzzled on what he told me that day. In one sense, I was relieved that there was some sort of explanation for my insanity. Somehow, I had always known this was all part of a plan—that my life was being carefully guided and guarded for some reason, but I also was tempted at one point to become very angry—furious.

How dare you! Both of you! Who do you think you are?! Why did you even make me? So I could suffer hell over and over again? Here? And then when I’m dead too? WHY?! Why didn’t you just say “No”? I just so wished you’d have said “No! No! No!”

But he didn’t. He said, “Yes.” I understand now. You see, when my father said he trusted God, he really meant it. No matter what it cost. He may not have understood fully what his decision would mean. I think I do now.

Through that choice God revealed himself to both of us in a way that nothing else could have allowed him to. God revealed his incredible love and faithfulness to us both in ways neither of us could have experienced had we not gone through what we did, my father in his way and I in mine.

I would not trade the wonder of knowing him the way I do for anything. My father once told me that pain is the shovel God uses to dig us deep—that the hole would never be empty but would become a clear pool of life-giving water, overflowing from the springs of joy far beneath, clean and fresh, and full of the love of God. Those springs of joy bubble up now every single time I think on his great love and the wonders he has shown me, and I long to share what I’ve found with you.

Sometimes I think about it. God said, “I am going to bring this child into the world. If you do not want him, if you do not take him, I will give him to another.” (What’s he got? Contingency plans?)

What if Dad had said “No”? If God said it, somehow I’d still be here. Sometimes it’s cool to think what I’d be like if I wasn’t me but somebody else. Would I still be me?

I’d like to get into a scrap with him! What a blast! This world ain’t big enough for the two of us, pal! (Ha! I’d win either way!) But I digress …

Well, obviously Dad said yes, so “Bada-bing! Bada-boom!”—my mother was pregnant and my life began. (Yahoo!) (Gotta love Paris in the springtime, eh? Sigh … again.)

There you have it. “The Set-Up.”

So, back to the airplane—now you can see why we couldn’t die. I hadn’t been born yet! I was still alive inside, so I hadn’t pulled off any more trouble than a bad craving for tuna-fish ice cream and a mild case of heartburn. (By the way, I fully intend on having a very serious conversation with both God and my father about all this later on.)

Well, from here on in things get a whole lot noisier because now, I’ve got to get born! And man! I was hell on wheels right from the start. My mother told me that I hit the ground running and did not let up for one second. She said if I wasn’t in sight, I could always be found at a locked door trying to puzzle out how to get my way through it. She told me it seemed like I just had this fascination with going somewhere.

My mother told me that when I was still a toddler I figured out this one door and immediately made a beeline straight to the back of the yard, dug myself a tunnel under the fence, and escaped out to the road. Well, she flipped! (We lived in a small village in rural Argentina.) The whole house was in an uproar, because to them I’d vanished into thin air. (I’d purposely shut the door when I left, to buy myself more time.)

Long and short of it was they caught up to me some three long blocks away lying on my belly with my chin in my hands less than a foot from a busy trucking highway, just watching the traffic and trying to puzzle out how to get across that road too. The funny thing about all this is that I clearly remember formulating this plan of mine before executing it. And just before my great escape, I also remember looking down at my legs and thinking, I got this! I can walk now! (And if I get tired I can always crawl for a bit too.) “I” was going exploring, and that was that! This kind of behaviour stuck with me till, well … today really.

1 Lorrie White, interviewed by the author, November 2015.

2 “All 52 on Jet Die in Brazil Crash; Argentine Comet Dives to Earth Just After Taking Off—American Aboard All 52 on Argentine Jet Killed in Crash on Take-Off in Brazil” Associated Press, New York Times (November 24, 1961).

3 John White, The Cost of Commitment (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2006), 72–74, 79–80.

4 John White, The Pathway of Holiness: A Guide for Sinners (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1996), 38–39.