people stories: jonathan sim

in yesterday’s edition of the seattle times [saturday, april 14], there’s a front page picture of kelly sim and her two children and an article entitled, ‘legacies of love and learning.’  the article is about this family and jonathan sim – father, husband and follower of jesus.  at a very young age of 33, he suffered a massive stroke and passed away in july 2005.  i can’t say that i was very good friends with jonathan; i’ve always enjoyed his company and respected his work.  i first met him in 1998 [somewhere in the east coast]; he was then a college student and i was a 2nd year seminarian at princeton theological seminary.  he was a helluva basketball player.  i couldn’t admit it then but he was a better player and that pretty much ate at me.  but anyway, we had a long conversation one night about his larger calling in life and the possibility of pastoral ministry. 

as it turned out, his calling involved his wife, his children, and his substantive work with world vision.  after having a meal with him once every year, i was shocked to hear the difficult news of his stroke and soon thereafter, his passing.  they say that you can learn alot about a person at one’s funeral and that was certainly the case with jonathan.  so many people – young and old came to extend their respects and love to jonathan and his family. 

from the article:

In the small, isolated village of Twachiyanda, Zambia — 9,700 miles from Seattle — the building supplies have been delivered, and work to build the town’s first school is scheduled to be finished in August. It will house 430 children in the elementary grades, many of them orphaned because their parents have died of AIDS.

The school will be named the Johnathan Sim Legacy School, honoring the staffer for World Vision, the Christian relief agency based in Federal Way that sends help to more than 100 countries. Some $110,000 was raised in donations in Sim’s memory to build the school and buy school supplies.

Sim recorded the video only eight months after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. The world seemed to have become a much more dangerous place for Americans, and Sim was about to go on a five-week trip to Bangkok, Thailand.

He had traveled in other Asian countries, as well as Africa, often going to the world’s hot spots. As he sought donations for World Vision, Sim was learning firsthand why that help was needed. [read the full article]

this is not meant to sound morbid or insensitive but as i shared in an earlier post, “we’re all going to die – hopefully later than sooner.  so, let’s make a difference.  we’ve got one life.” 

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Filed under: asian-american, seattle