The godly beauty that flows from the life and dance of Okie West evokes hope for people everywhere.
“People don’t always understand, but my heart is to love the Lord and dance for Him — by grace I dance, right (understand)?” she said.
Raised in South Korea in a home where her mother was Buddhist and her father was a mediocre Christian, she was had no strong ties to religion.
“I went to temple twice a year with my mother and sometimes to church with friends, but I really did not have a religion,” West explained.
A bright spot at home in her childhood came from taking Korean traditional dance, but it was for the sake of enjoying the art.
“In my home my brother would play the guitar and we would gather around and sing, and I would dance. Little by little, the dance was becoming my life, and I became a Korean traditional dancer.”
Now a member of Lakeside Baptist Church in Birmingham Baptist Association, West enjoys sharing her gift of Christian dance with church groups, Baptists among them. Recently she presented her routine to senior adults at Westwood Baptist Church, Forestdale.
She pauses between dances to share testimony and Scripture that accompanies her dance.
“I’m dancing for the Lord. My dance is to express my love for God, I dance with all my soul, mind, heart and body,” she said.
Her moves are graceful and positively God-honoring as she moves to familiar hymns such as “Amazing Grace” and “In the Garden.”
She uses fans — like those traditionally used in the royal courts of Asia to bring great honor to kings — in her dances to the King, Jesus. She also uses a drum, which is widely used in the traditional dance culture of South Korea.
A flyer from Mountain Brook Baptist Church, where she has performed, reads, “She is a lovely lady of beauty and grace who interprets Bible passages through traditional Korean dance.”
The beauty of dance and life did not always exist for the South Korean native who has lived in the Birmingham area since the mid-1970s.
Her introduction to Birmingham was an abrupt one when her husband, the late Bill West, was suddenly brought to University (UAB) Hospital in 1976 after having surgery in South Korea while suffering from cancer.
He was a Christian, but West was not at that time. Doctors gave him eight months to live, and he died in 1977.
“My husband went to be with Jesus,” West said. “He told me he would wait for me in heaven, and that I should stay in this country.”
With weakened fingers, her husband scribbled little notes of Scripture to her while he was in the hospital. She treasures those and something he told her in his last days, “‘I’ll see you in heaven,’” she said.
Her only regret is that she was not a Christian then and could not pray for him or encourage him in the Lord.
Staying true to her promise of remaining in America would lead her on a path of more despair for nearly 15 years before she would know Jesus.
“I could see nothing beautiful in my life here,” she said.
Finally, through her literal and figurative tears, she wandered from one church to another trying to find out why God took her husband.
“After a year of going to different churches, the first one I went to where I didn’t cry was Vestavia Hills Baptist,” she said.
At some point in her story more heartache loomed after she married a non-Christian Jew, only to be divorced after seven years.
“I did not know in what direction to turn my life. I was very discouraged and felt worthless,” she said.
In 1992, after reading often in her house from a Korean-English Bible, she invited Jesus into her heart.
“He took somebody who was down to nothing, and He put in the something. My heart was empty and He put in grace,” she said.
In 1997 a church asked her to interpret the Bible using dance for the World Day of Prayer.
“When I turned on the music, God began to show me what I was to do, and a great joy filled my heart.
“When I turned on music, it was powerful — my heart was squeezed, and I couldn’t practice — I sat on the floor crying, and I didn’t know what it was.
“It was God’s Holy Spirit. I have been through so many trials in my life and He stood by until He saved my soul and gave the gift and joy,” she said.
“God always has the perfect plan that cannot fail, a better idea, a design that is bigger and more beautiful than anything you have ever dreamed of,” she said.
West said she will always be grateful for the encouragement she has received from Christians in Baptist churches and from Christians in other denominations as she grows in Christ and her ministry of dance.
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