The Lord Is My Rock

By Lin Qinqin

After I graduated from a normal university, I worked at a training school as a teaching assistant. My work was mainly to contact schools and provide foreign teachers for them, and to assist the foreign teachers in preparing lessons. Within a couple of years, because of my outstanding work, I became the head of the training department, and was in charge of a team composed of over a dozen foreign teachers and six teaching assistants. Not only did I develop the market, train foreign teachers, and keep track of their teaching quality by myself, but I was also very strict with the teaching assistants and didn’t allow them to make a mistake.

For the sake of better helping the teachers improve their professional knowledge, I led them to study market information from dawn to dusk, and participated in and planned every market development project and every teaching and research activity. Moreover, no matter how late it was, I would convene a meeting to immediately sum up our experiences. Finally, my days of hard work paid off: After a period of time, we signed lots of orders, and the schools and parents were all very satisfied with our teaching results, and then I rose from department head to project manager and the members of my team doubled. Thus, I led our whole team to work harder day and night.

However, not long afterward, many of the teachers quit their jobs one after another, and many of the schools canceled contracts with us. In particular, an international school that we had been keeping in touch with was slow in signing with us. So, I had to hurry to find new clients and at the same time recruit new teachers. I felt exhausted mentally and physically, and lost my initial contentment and happiness. I felt frustrated and thought: “I have been dedicating myself to my work, but why are my efforts rewarded with this outcome? Not only is my performance not improved, but I encounter so many difficulties.”

After I returned home, I sobbed to my mother about this, feeling helpless. Looking at me, my mother said sincerely, “Man’s end is God’s beginning. You are a Christian. Why don’t you rely on God and entrust your difficulties to Him? This situation that has befallen you must surely hold the kindness of God, and there are lessons you need to learn. You should pray to God more….”

My mother’s words reminded me that I am a Christian. I have been attending meetings since I was in college. Many times when I encountered difficulties, I called on God and He led me through them. However, when I became ever more familiar with business, and when I was successful in work and feeling happy, I put God to the back of my mind. I relied on myself more and more, and thus I looked upon the Lord and relied on Him less and less. Even when faced with these difficulties, I didn’t remember to pray to the Lord and rely on Him. I racked my brains to improve my performance and preserve my reputation. As a result, the more I did things by relying on my abilities, the more I felt pained and directionless. Only then did I understand that God used these difficulties to warn me: I should no longer rely on my mental capacity to plan and do everything. I should let go of my own will, hand over the management of everything to God, truly rely on Him, and have faith that He has a suitable plan. Just as it says in the Bible, “I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13). “Come to me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke on you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and you shall find rest to your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:28-30).

From then on, when I encountered some difficulties in my work, I would pray strenuously to the Lord and rely on His leading to solve them. Moreover, I no longer made harsh demands on my subordinates: They didn’t need to work overtime day and night but just do all they could. Gradually, my mind became clear. I resolved problems with system and my efficiency was improved greatly, and I had better professional relationships within the team. Thank God for His blessings: A month later, we landed the big contract that we had been long expecting. While the whole office was a scene of jubilation, my heart was gratified and at peace because I clearly knew that all of this was because of God’s leading. I felt sweet beyond compare in my heart.

After I got back home, I knelt down by my bed and offered my sincerest praise to God. I truly experienced that nothing is difficult for God; relying on God and looking up to God, we will surely have a path that we can take!