The first time I ever went to a church was the first time I came to the U.S., before that, I had only gone to Buddhist temples and I didn’t believe there was a God or anything that could control my life. The church is very different from the temples, where you just go in front of the statue and kowtow, people sing to worship God and almost everyone knows each other. It’s like a family reunion rather than worshiping a god that you don’t know anything about. Following my dad, who is good at making friends and connections, our whole family was baptized. We went to church every Sunday, singing songs, and as an 11-year-old, I went to Sunday school. 

Not long after we visited the U.S. our family decided that it would be nice to live in an environment like this, compared to the pollution in Shanghai. My family worked hard to gather all the information and resources we needed to apply for the student visa, and after a long term of waiting for half a year, we finally got it. Not long after we got our visa, the US embassy decided that there would no longer be a waiting and investigation period for our Visa to get passed. 

I went to a Lutheran school that was suggested by my dad’s friend and the pastor in our church, so I didn’t want to trust the adults. I started school and slowly progressed my English skills along with the understanding of the words of God. I was very bad at English compared to all my classmates and sometimes I don’t speak the whole day because I am not confident speaking my crappy English in front of my native speaker classmates; my grade was severely bad too but I didn’t worry about it because I was only in 5th grade. We had bible class every other day, and chapel every Wednesday. It was nice and sweet, and I learned not just the “boring” content of the bible but also the teachings behind the story. One that I can remember and still is influencing me is action and concerning-you reap what you sow. Slowly, I recognized that Christianity is not just a fictional story of a poor guy getting crucified on a cross, but also a true story of a great teacher and savior for 1/3 of the human population. 

The weirdest time of my life came the year before COVID-19 hit. Both of my parents had to go back to China because they didn’t have Student Visas like my brother, Tony,  and I did, they had traveling visas. We then had to live with my grandfather and my aunt which was kind of boring to me because my grandfather was the only person who knew how to drive so Tony and my main task was: go to school, go back home, write homework, play video games, eat, and sleep. If you look at this list, you might think that “go write homework” took the larger proportion of our boring afternoons, but it didn’t. Our life was literally “made” out of video games during that period. I forgot my dreams of going to an Ivy League school, I forgot that there are friends in school who would love to hang out with me, forgot about the messy closet that needs to be cleaned, but only remembered that my iPad and my phones are charged and ready to be used. The only “healthy” thing I can remember is when I go out with my aunt to see the local museums, theater, and national parks. You would imagine four lonely Chinese people walking along each other, but no. There was a pack of them, why was that? It’s because of the friends we meet at church. There were two brothers in that household, one was the same age as my brother, and the other one was a little older than me. Both families had similar conditions, so we started to become like one. For a while before my grandfather and my aunt came, we were living in their house, eating the same food, and drinking the same water, and we were like a real family. Even thinking about it now, I still cannot believe how my parents made such a wild decision to “drop” us in America and just hope that we will survive. Nobody ever doubted the family that was hosting us, nobody ever questioned: “Are they there, what if they decided to throw them out the house or something?” Of course not, because EVERYONE was watching. The pastor, friends, and other family from church, the teacher, classmates, and faculties in school, and the most important- God is watching. 

It’s pretty amazing how my life is marked by every time I move to a different house. The first part was before I came to the U.S., I had never thought about studying in a different country. I remember one time I even told my elementary friend who just got a green card, “I will never leave Shanghai before I graduate from high school,” but I did, just one year later. The first house in America marked the “lost” state of my life. I had bad grades in school, my parents weren’t around me, and I didn’t care about anything that was happening around me. Then I moved again. With my mother and her newborn baby back in the picture, there were a few more chores and laughter in the house. Until COVID hit. For many people, COVID-19 was a big disaster, but for me, it wasn’t so bad. My house was full of people, like, FULL of people. With 4 rooms in the house, we managed to pull off 9 people in the house, sometimes one or two more; It’s like we have a party every day. It wasn’t too good of a condition if we have to talk about my great dropping, but this wasn’t a big struggle because I was immediately recommitted to school when the world was slowly recovering from COVID-19. However, during COVID, my dad got in some trouble with his business and he might never be able to visit America again. I picked up praying again and this was the first time that I had thought about what God meant to me. I have been baptized this whole time since I started school in America, which was only because my dad urged our whole family that was there to be baptized, but I have never sat down and thought about it. As our family's biggest stronghold, my father was in “danger,” I had no other person that I could rely on except my mom, who was taking care of my 1-year-old brother. I’m not “crazy” about praying, but I did pray every time I remembered; an answer came to my head. God is another person that I can seek comfort from when our parents and siblings are also in trouble. God is a trustworthy friend I can talk to wherever I want, whenever I want, and I don’t have to be afraid that He’s going to spoil my secrets. He can be my other Father, my heavenly Father when my other one is in need. Just thinking that I was and never brings me so much comfort. At that time I thought, I don’t have to accept God as my GOD yet, but he is my friend. Later in the year, my father solved his problems and joined us in the U.S.

My life started flourishing after my most recent move. In school, I started to actively study with my friends on every test and quiz, except the pop ones, and I was able to get all A’s when 8th grade ended. I was committed to my school’s choir, band, and handbells, which was fun and encouraging for me to perform on stage with my friend. It was the happiest year of my life! Because we moved, our house was closer to our church, which started something brand new for me. Everything was so smooth and it felt like it was planned, although I didn’t see it until recently. As soon as our family was all settled in our new house, our church reopened from the closing because of COVID-19. At first, there were still only a few people, so Tony and I took the chance to join the worship team to sing. Not long after that, a worship pastor along with his wife who is also great at singing joined our church. We bought a new drum set and, a new bass, and the worship pastor just started teaching us stuff that would have cost us much more. All of these opened up many opportunities for me. 

It felt like God gave me power, which made me not afraid to talk to anyone in the church at all. Slowly, I was recognized by the adults in the church as a small leader among the youth because I always spoke up and talked a lot. Because I sing and play on stage, learned how to care for my teammates and communicate with them on stage without talking; I addressed these skills in class to open up a conversation when no one is speaking, and became a sort of leader. I joined the Jazz band with the bass skill I learned in church, I started a music club at school to gather up my friends and create music, and I learned to synthesize other’s feelings because of the observations I made in church. It’s pretty impressive how all these changes can happen to one regular person in 2 years. People used to say that I was too loud, I couldn’t control my emotions, and I was too much of a crackhead in front of people I knew. Now I’m just calmer in certain circumstances and more responsible for my actions. People who don’t believe in God might say: “It’s just because you grew up, like physically grew up and got more mature.” Yes, of course, but couldn’t God also be involved in these amazing transitions? From a Chinese girl who doesn’t ever speak in class, to a proud leader of a club; I can see too much otherwise if it wasn’t God's plan.