Chapter Five: Marks of Growth—Smiles, Playing the Piano, and His First Worship Service
Every child seems to have a way of his own of telling the world:
“I am here.”
Little Wheat's way was his smile.
During the first days after he came home from the hospital, he still slept most of the time.
After forty-two days in the NICU, he seemed to need time to adjust slowly to this new place without the sounds of machines and the footsteps of nurses.
This was his home.
Gradually, he began opening his eyes and looking at us.
Especially when he heard his mother's voice, he would become very quiet.
Then one morning, for the first time, we truly saw him smile.
He lay there looking upward. We did not know what he had suddenly noticed, but the corners of his mouth began to rise little by little.
Very gently.
But more and more clearly.
For a moment, the room really did seem a little brighter.
To someone who has never gone through a long season of waiting, a baby's smile may be just an ordinary moment of growth.
For us, it was not.
We had waited so long for this child.
So even one smile felt like a gift.
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His First Time at Church
After he was discharged from the hospital, we began taking him to church.
He was still very small when he attended Sunday worship for the first time.
Sitting in his mother's arms, he looked at the people around him and toward the pulpit, and he listened to hymns and prayers that, of course, he could not yet understand.
We certainly did not know how much an infant could understand.
But that was not the point.
What mattered was this:
From the beginning of his life, we wanted him to know that he belonged to a family that worshiped God and also to a community of faith that loved him.
On the second Sunday after he came home, we held a baby dedication for him.
That day, the brothers and sisters in Christ gathered around us.
We carried Little Wheat to the front.
His American “spiritual grandpa,” Pastor John, took him in his arms and prayed for this child together with the whole congregation.
Once again, we spoke the words that had already been in our hearts before he was born:
“This child belongs to God. May the Lord help us to love him and raise him faithfully, and to entrust his whole life into the Lord's hands.”
The dedication certificate bore the name:
John Earnest Zhang.
Looking back at that certificate now, it carries a weight that is hard to put into words.
But at the time, that day held only joy.
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Quiet Moments Between Father and Son
One evening, I lay on my stomach on a soft mat, looking at this little fellow who had only recently entered our lives.
He looked at me too.
Neither of us said anything.
A grown man,
and a child who could not yet speak.
Yet I felt as though we had just had a complete conversation between father and son.
Later, I wrote on Facebook:
“I will praise the LORD, for he has done wonderful things.”
By then, we had already been married for many years and had also gone through many years of waiting.
Little Wheat's arrival made me understand something for the first time in a very real way:
Some theology is not first understood in books.
Sometimes it suddenly becomes warm in the midst of life.
Before, I preached about “grace.”
Now grace had weight.
It could yawn in my arms
and fall asleep against my chest.
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One Hundred Days
When Little Wheat was one hundred days old, we took photographs to remember the occasion.
The letters “JOHN” hung on the wall.
I wrote:
“It's a miracle!”
I also thought of a sentence in Luke describing the childhood of Jesus:
“And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom: and the grace of God was upon him.” —Luke 2:40, KJV
This verse does not need to be understood here as though “Little Wheat was the direct fulfillment of this verse.”
For us, it was simply a parent's prayer:
May our child grow,
and may the grace of God be with him.
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He Loved the Piano
Little Wheat responded to music from an early age.
Perhaps it was because his mother often sang and often played the piano.
Once, we held him in front of an electronic keyboard.
He reached out his hand and pressed the keys.
Of course, there was no melody.
Just a few jumbled sounds.
But he laughed with delight, as though he had just completed a formal performance.
Later, the keyboard truly became one of the things he most liked to be near.
He would press the keys with his little hands,
lie there beside it,
and move his body as he listened to the sounds.
We often laughed and said:
“Little Wheat is playing the piano again.”
Thinking back now, those sounds are especially precious.
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A Little “Visitor”
When we went to visit brothers and sisters from church who were sick or elderly, sometimes we took him with us.
He was usually very quiet.
Some people held him,
some tried to make him smile,
and some simply looked at him quietly.
The child did not know that he was “ministering.”
He was simply there.
But sometimes, a child sitting quietly in a room can itself bring a little tenderness.
One older person held him and said:
“This child is very comforting.”
Over time, I came to understand words like these more and more.
Not because a child possesses some special power,
but because life itself can sometimes remind us:
Vulnerability is worthy of love,
and presence itself has meaning.
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His First Birthday
January 17, 2024.
Little Wheat turned one year old.
A “Happy Birthday!” banner hung in the house.
There were balloons,
a cake,
gifts,
and blessings from brothers and sisters in Christ.
Someone played the piano,
someone sang,
and someone brought a Little Wheat puzzle prepared especially for him.
He sat in front of the cake, his eyes bright.
Everyone gathered around him and smiled.
That day, no one imagined what would happen seven months later.
And I am very grateful that we did not know.
Because some days, when God gives them to us, are simply meant to be received and lived.
That day,
we did not rehearse grief.
We simply celebrated.
We celebrated that this child was one year old.
We celebrated his smile,
his eyes,
the sounds he made at the piano,
his quietness,
and we celebrated that over the past year we had truly become a family of three.
Looking back now, I do not want what happened later to swallow up all these earlier memories.
Little Wheat must not be remembered only as “the child who later became sick and passed away.”
Before the darkness came,
he had truly lived.
He had smiled,
been held,
gone to church,
touched piano keys,
celebrated a birthday,
and been loved by many people.
This was his life.
It was not defined only by the final thirteen days,
and still less was it defined only by death.
Before entering the next chapter, I want to let the story pause here.
Let it pause on the smile of a one-year-old child.
Because this too is something we must remember if we are to know Little Wheat:
He did not first become a story about loss. He was first our son—a child who truly lived and was deeply loved.