When I last saw Zach Wilbur, he sat across the dinning room table at Greenwood Hills Summit Week. His carved face in its usual stoic posture, he confided how he had never cried in his life. “Crying is just what happens when we experience overwhelming emotion” he said. I suppose now is a first for him.
Awe? Joy? Peace? What was that first emotion that struck him like a wave, like the whelming tide that pulled him under as though to drown his eyes and throat? What was it that drove him to his knees – his face bent toward the ground – and caused him to shake and tremble until the Lord bent down and touched his shoulder and bade him, “Arise, good and faithful servant! Enter into the joy your Lord!”
A little after lunchtime on October 30, I sat in my room thinking of a problem to post for my Calculus class to help other students review for an upcoming test. The question I decided upon was to prove Euler’s Formula, a famous equation in mathematics. As I neared the end of solving the problem myself, I admit I became overly giddy as I finally came to understand the connection between “e to the i” and rotations. My mind suddenly went to Zach Wilbur, who had tried, the last time we met, to explain that very topic to me as he was showing me his work on solving the famed Reiman Hypothesis.
I then recalled how I had missed him in my last year as a Junior Counselor at Greenwood Hills. Despite his experience his first year, it was he who kept my mind from melting on my monotonous first JSIT hike. At one point, he had me recite to him strings of numbers which he would then repeat back perfectly using the various memory techniques he had learned for solving the Rubik’s Cube. Another time, groggy and tired, he wrote a song in Polish which translates roughly to, “I need food, and I need water. I need lots and lots of sleep.” Evidently, he had learned Polish in order to watch some Rubik’s Cube tutorials. I was born in Poland where my parents were missionaries, so I tried to recall those ancient Polish words I had learned many lifetimes ago.
Whenever we would pass the high, bare face of a rocky cliff, Zach would plea with the JSIT leader to let us climb the rocks rather than have us walk miles and miles along this flat, straight, gravel path. He had told me earlier how he liked to climb. I shared his urge to climb, though it never grew to more than an itch in me.
My fondest memory of Zach Wilbur was one Sunday morning at January Jubilee when he, I, and some others joined together before church to talk about the Lord, share what we’ve been learning in the Bible, and sing hymns with one another. I think Zach shared something from the book of Job. It was a wonderful time of fellowship and focusing on the Lord.
I wish I had told Zach how much he inspired me, in mathematics, in memory, in climbing, in the Lord. In many ways, he was the person I hoped to become. I fear that he thought his year as a JIST was wasted. I fear he never knew how much I appreciated his company or how much I had wished he was there the second year. No matter. He knows now. I wonder how God chose to show him how orchestrated his whole life really was. How every moment had its purpose and fit brilliantly into God’s plan. How no moment was in vain, no moment was useless, no moment was a mistake.
Well, lest I make that same mistake twice… I’m thankful to have gotten to know you, Daniel, and some of your family. I’ve always admired your sense of humor and your devotion to the Boy’s Camp memory verses. Though you always struggled with the memory verses, you never gave up on them. Instead, you sacrificed so many free times just to memorize God’s word. You’re a great friend to have, and I’m glad I got to know you and your brother.
With love,
Elliot
