Over the past two years, quite a few newcomers have joined our church. Since many of these new friends have only recently come to know me, I am often asked, “Pastor, how did you become a Christian?” As our church prepares this 30th anniversary special publication, I am writing down the story of how I came to faith as a single response to that question.
Looking back, I can sum up the fact that I came to faith in one sentence: it is all God’s grace. I firmly believe that God chose me before the creation of the world. I could even say that, when I knew absolutely nothing about God, He had already used His gracious hand to bring me personally to New Zealand.
To explain that, I need to begin with why I came to New Zealand. From the world’s point of view, the first thirty-two years of my life in China went very smoothly. Many people who knew me wondered why I wanted to migrate, because I seemed like one of the people least likely to need a new start overseas. Growing up in China, everything around me taught me to work hard and keep climbing upward. On my first day at school, perhaps because I was tall, the teacher appointed me class monitor. I was class monitor in primary school, in secondary school, at university, and even during postgraduate study. After entering the workforce, I was promoted three levels within four years. In other words, I was moving upward quickly.
Yet along the way I saw and experienced things in society that made me begin to question the meaning of life. Is life really about constantly trying to climb higher? What position must a person reach before life can be considered successful? And what happens after reaching the position one has pursued? These questions became even stronger when I saw what life looked like for my senior supervisor after retirement. I said to myself, “Is this all there is to life?”
Gradually, I began to wonder whether there might be another way to live. In that situation, at the age of thirty-two, I pressed the pause button on my life. My wife and I decided to migrate, and in November 1994, together with our four-year-old son, we moved to Auckland. When I first arrived, I had no clear goal for how life here should unfold. I could only take one step at a time.
Everything began to change when I found my first job in New Zealand. In a new country, whatever kind of new life I hoped for, I still needed to find work, earn an income and support my family. By February 1995, three months after arriving in Auckland, I still had no job. We had used some of the money we brought with us to buy a car, and every week we still had rent and food to pay for. Our savings were running low, and I was beginning to feel the pressure. At that time, someone invited us to a home gathering on a Friday evening in February. When we arrived at Brother Li’s home, we discovered that it was a Christian small-group meeting.
It was the very first gathering of that Chinese small group. There were three Taiwanese Christian families, including two retired colonels from the Republic of China military. Ours was the only non-Christian family from mainland China. I remember thinking suspiciously, “Could these people be Kuomintang agents?” Of course, I later realised that if they were “agents,” they were people with a special mission from Jesus—sent to persuade me to believe in the Lord.
At the end of the gathering, Brother Li asked whether we had any needs that the group could pray for. I said, “I need a job.” He replied, “We will pray for your work.” I responded, “If prayer can help me find a job, I will believe in your God.” A few weeks later, I started work.
My professional field was industrial automation. In a country whose economy was heavily based on agriculture and livestock, finding a job that matched my specialist background was far from easy. Yet I not only found work in automation; I was hired without an interview, started work that very day, and received a good salary.
How did it happen? Not long after that prayer, I received a phone call from a company to which I had previously sent my CV. I assumed I was being invited for another interview. When I arrived, the receptionist took me directly to the office of the chief operating officer, a middle-aged Kiwi. He said, “I have read your CV. When can you start?” I replied, “Today.” He said, “Good. Go to Human Resources and complete the employment paperwork.”
I nearly jumped up and shouted, “I finally have a job!” Yet at that moment I did not connect what had happened with prayer or with God at all. After becoming a Christian and looking back, however, I can see very clearly that God used this job as a miracle. He brought before Himself a man who had always depended on his own effort to achieve life’s goals, yet who could no longer find a goal worth pursuing.
When I returned home, I was delighted and phoned Brother Li: “I found a job!” He then asked me a question I will never forget: “Do you remember what you said when we prayed for you that night?” I did not dare say that I had forgotten, so I answered, “Yes, I remember.” He said, “Good. Wait at home. I am coming over to lead you in a prayer of commitment.” And that is what happened. I prayed to receive Christ and became a Christian. From that point on, my life became completely different.
In John 15:16, the Lord says to His disciples: “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you.” This verse seems to have been spoken both to Brother Li and to me. As someone who has received the grace of the Lord’s choosing, the purpose of my life is now very clear: to accept the Lord’s commission and go and bear fruit for Him.