The Girl In The Picture Finds Forgiveness And Faith
Do you know what happened to the little naked girl running for her life in the iconic Pulitzer prize winning photo* from the Vietnam War? Dr. Peter Saunders does. He had the privilege of meeting her recently, and recounts her story:
8 June 1972, a plane bombed the village of Trang Bang, near Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City) in South Vietnam after the South Vietnamese pilot mistook a group of civilians leaving the temple for enemy troops.
The bombs contained napalm, a highly flammable fuel, which killed and badly burned the people on the ground.
The iconic black-and-white image taken of children fleeing the scene won the Pulitzer Prize and was chosen as the World Press Photo of the Year in 1972.
It communicated the horrors of the Vietnam War in a way words never could, helping to end one of the most divisive wars in American history and later becoming a symbol of the cruelty of all wars for children and civilian victims.
In the centre of the photo was a nine year old girl, who ran naked down the highway after stripping off her burning clothes.
Kim Phuc Phan Thi was with her family at the pagoda attending a religious celebration when the plane struck and lost several relatives in the attack. The children running with her were her own brothers and sisters. …
Kim remained hospitalized for 14 months, and underwent 17 surgical procedures, until she recovered from the burns.
Grateful for the care she had received she later decided to study medicine but struggled to come to terms with her deep physical and psychological scars.
‘My heart was exactly like a black coffee cup,’ she said. ‘I wished I died in that attack with my cousin. I wish I died at that time so I won’t suffer like that anymore … it was so hard for me to carry all that burden with that hatred, with that anger and bitterness.’
But it was as a second year medical student in Saigon that she discovered a New Testament in the university library, committed her life to following Jesus Christ, and realised that God had a plan for her life.
Kim later defected and now lives in Canada. Her biography, THE GIRL IN THE PICTURE, written by Denise Chong was published in 1999.
*Click the link to source above to view the original photo.
"Forgiveness made me free from hatred," Kim told Saunders. "I still have many scars on my body and severe pain most days but my heart is cleansed. Napalm is very powerful, but faith, forgiveness, and love are much more powerful."
If that little girl in the picture cold find the power to overcome the scars left by napalm, then what prevents you from forgiving those who have harmed you?
"Hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all offenses" (Proverbs 10:12).
Trading Places
Tim Keller writes:
"In a real world of relationships, it is impossible to love people with a problem or a need without in some sense sharing or even changing places with them. All real life-changing love involves some form of this kind of exchange . . . Imagine you come into contact with a man who is innocent, but who is being hunted down by secret agents or by the government or by some other powerful group. He reaches out to you for help. If you don't help him, he will probably die, but if you ally with him, you—who were perfectly safe and secure—will be in mortal danger. This is the stuff that movie plots are made of. Again, it's him or you. He will experience increased safety and security through your involvement, but only because you are willing to enter into his insecurity and vulnerability."
Keller adds,
“All life-changing love toward people with serious needs is a substitutional sacrifice. If you become personally involved with them, in some way, their weaknesses flow toward you as your strengths flow toward them ….How can God be a God of love if he does not become personally involved in suffering the same violence, oppression, grief, weakness, and pain that we experience? The answer to that question is twofold: First, God can't. Second, only one major religion even claims that God does.”
"But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed" (Isaiah 53:5).
Of Sea Otters and God's Safe Keeping
Weighing between 40 and 100 pounds, the sea otter is the world's smallest (and maybe most adorable) species of marine mammal, while at the same time being the heaviest member of the weasel family.
Sea otters have voracious appetites and relish eating abalone, clams, and other marine species. With their high metabolism, they consume about 25 percent of their weight in food every day.
While there were once around a million sea otters in the North Pacific, aggressive fur-trade hunting in the early 1900s decimated their numbers to just over a thousand worldwide.
Today, after laws were passed to protect them, it is estimated that there are about 106,000 sea otters. However, they are still categorized as endangered.
What made the pelts of sea otters so valuable that these creatures were nearly hunted to extinction? Unlike other marine mammals, sea otters don't have a layer of blubber to keep them warm. Instead, they have the densest fur in the animal kingdom, ranging from 250,000 to a million hairs per square inch. By comparison, the average human head contains 100,000 hair follicles.
Whether you're as bald as a baby or you have 250,000 hairs per square inch of scalp, God is lovingly concerned with every detail of your life and that every hair of your head is numbered. Jesus said, "Are not two sparrows sold for a copper coin? And not one of them falls to the ground apart from your Father's will. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered" (Matthew 10:29-30, NIV).
In Psalm 139:14 David said, "I praise You becuase I am fearfully and wonderfully made"