Miki's Heart Piercing Story

Eric's reflections after hearing Miki's story. 

When Ellie was 25 days old she was left at the gate of the orphanage.  Julie and I have wondered for months about her family wanting to know why she was left there.  We have wanted to know about the journey that brought her to this point.  Julie has read blogs, books, and heard story after story about these orphans that are abandoned, abused, and sometimes left for dead.  Everything that I have heard to date has always been second hand through her until yesterday.

Yesterday morning Julie and I embarked on a day long tour of the Tongli water village escorted by a young woman that was in her early 30’s named Miki.  Miki did an amazing job being our tour guide as we journeyed through the waterways of Tongli.  Her English was great and she was able to open our eyes to a world that we had read about but never had come to life in the way that she was able to describe.  Miki described the life as the youngest of three girls and who’s father wanted nothing to do with her since she was not a boy.  He was so disappointed that his ‘last child’ had not been a boy that her father took her and (in Miki’s words)  “zipped me up in a plastic bag and dumped me in the river”.  You could see the pain in her eyes as she described her biological father’s disgust with her existence.  You could see the agony of wrestling with a father who wanted nothing more than to have a son that he would abandon his own flesh and blood and dump her as an infant of only a few days old into a river.  As if this wasn’t enough, Miki went on to tell us that when she was 2 or 3 years old her father gave her to another family.  This family was so poor they could barely take care of her.  Miki’s two older sisters begged their father to take her back and told their father that the family would just leave her out and that her entire body was covered with mosquito bites.  Her father finally broke down and took her back.  She continued to describe the beatings that they would receive until the point when her mother finally committed suicide.  Miki said that she felt so happy for her mother when she watched her die.  She was so happy that she wouldn’t have to endure another day with her father.  Are you kidding me?  How did this girl survive?  How did she turn into such an amazing woman?  She was dumped into a river as a newborn, given to another family as though she was a house warming gift, and she welcomed her mother’s suicide as a great relief from the pain of this world.  

Immediately my head goes to little Ellie.  What is her story?  Did someone find her in the river?  Why was she abandoned?  Did her mother do this to protect her?   We will probably never know Ellie’s story but we know Miki’s story and our heart aches for her.

By God’s grace Miki was found in the river and didn’t die.  Someone found Miki in the river and knew which family she came from and returned her to her parents.  Can you imagine the look on her father’s face when the townspeople showed up at the door with Miki in hand?   I can only imagine the rage he had and who he took it out on.

Ellie, I don’t know your story or what journey that you have been on but I do know that in God’s sovereignty He has prepared a path for you to join our family.  We are coming to get you girl!  Hang in there only 24 more hours.