Prelude

For he grew up before him like a young plant,

and like a root out of dry ground;

       he had no form or majesty that we should look at him,

and no beauty that we should desire him.

   He was despised and rejected by men,

a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;

       and as one from whom men hide their faces

he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

   Surely he has borne our griefs

and carried our sorrows;

       yet we esteemed him stricken,

smitten by God, and afflicted.

   But he was pierced for our transgressions;

he was crushed for our iniquities;

       upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,

and with his wounds we are healed.

  - Isaiah 53:2-5

I look at my thirty-three-year-old face in the mirror. People say I look young—and I am. But I see the weight of years etched into every line. The way my slanted eyes—without the double eyelids I had desired for as long as I can remember—now carry the realization and acceptance of a life marked by shame, guilt, manipulation, discrimination, and violence.

I look at a photo of myself as a young boy—round face, the same monolid eyes staring back at me. I’m wearing a tuxedo that doesn’t quite fit my rotund frame. Behind me stands my brother, a preteen with an awkward peach fuzz mustache, his lips pursed the way they do around braces. My dad is behind me, my mom beside me.

To our right are a pair of cousins—the bride and groom—dressed in traditional áo dài. They’re beaming; a happy couple on their wedding day.

But me? I’m serious. My face is sullen.

And as I look at that photo, a part of me hates that boy. A part of me hates myself.

Perhaps in reading my story you will understand a little more of why I feel this way. And, perhaps, you will be able to understand a little more of my reality.

Isaiah spoke of Jesus, God incarnate, and wrote:

“He had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him.”

I look back at my reflection. I see no form or majesty that should be looked upon, no beauty that anyone should desire. And yet in that same face—those eyes I’ve hated for almost thirty-four years—I begin to see something else.

Even the Son of God—the one through whom and for whom the world was made—could have had a face like mine. A face the Bible says has “no beauty.”

I look at my three daughters, laughing and carefree. I see in their faces a reflection of me—but, mercifully, without the burden of my childhood. They are beautiful, radiant, full of life. They have double eyelids—something I used to ache for.

But that’s not what makes them beautiful.

What makes them beautiful is that they are my children.

And they are human beings made in the image of God.

Does that mean, then, that in some way, that little boy was also beautiful? I don’t know yet. But I’m beginning to.

That kid in the photo—the me of years ago—had borne grief, carried sorrow, been stricken, smitten, afflicted. He was pierced by words, crushed by blows, chastised by his parents, despised by the world. He carried the wounds of an abused Vietnamese kid growing up in a country that both accepted him and kept him at arm’s length.

I am certainly not Jesus.

But this story is about me. And it is also a story about Jesus.

Because all stories—including every wound, every silence, every unloved face like mine—find their meaning in Christ alone.

This is the story of a life formed in abuse, shaped by violence, and ultimately redeemed by the Savior.

This is my story.

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Prologue: Genesis through Exodus