“Well, yes, among other things. And the prophet Hosea obeys the Lord’s request,” Pastor Shin said in his sonorous voice. This was a story he had preached on before.
“The Lord continues to be committed to us even when we sin. He continues to love us. In some ways, the nature of his love for us resembles an enduring marriage, or how a father or mother may love a misbegotten child. Hosea was being called to be like God when he had to love a person who would have been difficult to love. We are difficult to love when we sin; a sin is always a transgression against the Lord.” Shin looked carefully at Isak’s face to see if he had reached him.
Isak nodded gravely. “Do you think it’s important for us to feel what God feels?”
“Yes, of course. If you love anyone, you cannot help but share his suffering. If we love our Lord, not just admire him or fear him or want things from him, we must recognize his feelings; he must be in anguish over our sins. We must understand this anguish. The Lord suffers with us. He suffers like us. It is a consolation to know this. To know that we are not in fact alone in our suffering.”
“Sir, the boardinghouse widow and her daughter saved my life. I reached their doorstep with tuberculosis, and they cared for me for three months.”
Pastor Shin nodded with recognition.
“That is a wonderful thing they did. A noble and kind work.”
“Sir, the daughter is pregnant, and she has been abandoned by the father of the child. She is unmarried and the child will not have a name.”
Shin looked concerned.
“I think I should ask her to marry me, and if she says yes, I will take her to Japan as my wife. If she says yes, I would ask you to marry us before we go. I would be honored if—”
Pastor Shin covered his own mouth with his right hand. Christians did such things—sacrificed possessions and their own lives even—but such choices had to be made for good reason and soberly. St. Paul and St. John had said, “Test everything.”
“Have you written to your parents about this?”
“No. But I think they would understand. I’ve refused to marry before, and they had not expected me to do so. Perhaps they will be pleased.”
“Why have you refused to marry before?”
“I’ve been an invalid since I was born. I have been improving the past few years, but I got sick again on the journey here. No one in my family expected me to live past twenty-five. I am twenty-six now.” Isak smiled. “If I’d married and had children, I would have made a woman a young widow and perhaps left orphans behind me.”
“Yes, I see.”
“I should have been dead by now, but I am alive, sir.”
“I’m very glad of it. Praise God.” Shin smiled at the young man, not knowing how to protect him from his wish to make such a grand sacrifice. More than anything, he was incredulous. If it hadn’t been for the warm letters from his friends in Pyongyang attesting to Isak’s intelligence and competence, Shin would have thought that Isak was a religious lunatic.
“What does the young woman think of this idea?”
“I don’t know. I have yet to speak with her. The widow told me about her daughter only yesterday. And last night before my evening prayers, it occurred to me that this is what I can do for them: Give the woman and child my name. What is my name to me? It’s only a matter of grace that I was born a male who could enter my descendants in a family registry. If the young woman was abandoned by a scoundrel, it’s hardly her fault, and certainly, even if the man is not a bad person, the unborn child is innocent. Why should he suffer so? He would be ostracized.”
Shin was unable to disagree.
“If the Lord allows me to live, I shall try to be a good husband to Sunja and a good father to this child.”
“Sunja?”
“Yes. She’s the boardinghouse keeper’s daughter.”
“Your faith is good, son, and your intentions are right, but—”
“Every child should be wanted; the women and men in the Bible prayed patiently for children. To be barren was to be an outcast, isn’t that right? If I do not marry and have children, I would be a kind of barren man.” Isak had never articulated this thought before, and this surge of wanting a wife and family felt strange and good to him.