Who Rules Over My Fate?

Who Rules Over My Fate?

Wu Ming

When I was nine years old, my father died of illness. Thereafter, my mother had to work outside the home to feed three of us siblings. As she was often bullied and oppressed by others, she usually vented her grievances on us after returning home. At that time, I felt I had an extremely unhappy childhood, for besides having a poor family and being deprived of my father’s love, I often had to suffer blame and corporal punishment from my mother. I did not want to live such a miserable life for one more day. After I started school, my teacher told me that “The fate of man is controlled by his own hands” and “Let us build a beautiful homeland by our own hands.” These words convinced me that my hard fate could be changed by my own hands. What’s more, at that time, the success stories about some famous people and great ones were often shown on TV. I admired them so much when I saw the scenes where they, crowned with laurel, wore a self-confident smile in the limelight and were warmly supported by the people. Because of the influence of this environment, I began to weave my wonderful fantasy. I thought that as long as I kept striving, one day I would definitely earn fame and riches, freeing myself from the misery. After graduation from polytechnic school, I began to do the wholesale business in general merchandise. I worked from dawn to night with all my might every day. A few years later, I became a boss admired by the people around me. However, I was not at all satisfied with what I had achieved, and I felt it was too far from my ideal—being a successful man admired and adored by all. In order to achieve my ideal, I devoted myself heart and soul to my business and kept looking for opportunities to achieve success and acquire fame.

Once, a good friend of mine told me that an enterprise that the local government invested in was going public, and if I underbought its shares before its public offering, I would profit greatly later on, for its share price would rise dozens of times after it publicly traded shares. That was a highly profitable business which would make me rich overnight. I was so excited at this good news, and I thought, “Little did I expect that I would have this opportunity to quickly achieve success and gain fame.” For safety’s sake, I went to visit one of my former classmates and ask him about this matter, for I thought he must know it, as he was the mayor’s future son-in-law. As expected, it was true. So I went everywhere to raise money, and bought some shares worth over 300,000 yuan with all the money I had. But never had I imagined that on the day when the enterprise’s shares began trading, the grievous news came that the Central Committee suddenly introduced the macro-control policy which stated that it was a serious violation of regulations that local governments developed and operated over-the-counter stock markets for their financial interests, and that it must be banned. The enterprise in which I bought shares belonged to that kind of market and must be disqualified from trading at once. The news was like a thunderclap to me. Realizing that my hard-earned money, the several hundred thousand yuan, was down the drain in an instant, I was limp and weak all over and plunged into immense affliction. I had never dreamed that the shares issued by a company with government shareholding would become as worthless as bubbles. Later, I happened to know that the local government’s investment in that enterprise’s stock was purely a fraud made by it and that enterprise, and that their purpose was actually to cheat the investors out of their money. At the news, I burned with anger and hatred and itched to expose this scandal of the local government. But in today’s society where officials shield one another, how could I, a common person, defeat the government? When I thought of this, I swallowed my anger without protest and continued to do my business. Two years later, I came out of the crisis at last. However, I forgot the pain after the wound had healed. When I had some money in hand, I began to seek business opportunities again, dreaming to become a successful man admired by all soon.

One day I met my cousin who was responsible for the operation of a state-owned enterprise. From my conversation with him, he knew that I had enough money, so he egged me on to invest. He said, “Our enterprise is cooperating with the Hong Kong government in a big project. There is no risk involved in it. The investors can receive dividends each quarter. It will bring returns on investment in the short term. Moreover, the operation of this project will last for decades. If you invest in it, you are sure to receive a continual good return!” His introduction touched my heart. In order to avoid the failure I had suffered last time, I asked him to take me to conduct an on-the-spot investigation. A few days later, he made a “careful” arrangement for me to go and investigate. After the investigation, I was sure about it. So I began to plough huge sums of money into the project. During over one year, I invested 800,000 yuan in it altogether, including 200,000 yuan, a sum of public money lent to me by the manager of a state-owned enterprise. When I gave the 200,000 yuan to my cousin, I told him that it was public money and must be returned to someone by the due date. Later, however, my cousin suddenly disappeared on the day that he had promised to give back the money. I hurried to the enterprise to carefully verify this matter, only to find that it was a trap he and the manager of the enterprise had set for their respective interests. At that moment, I completely collapsed. I, a man who had seldom shed tears from childhood in any hard or difficult situation, burst out weeping in spite of myself. I was only 29 that year. Because I was incapable of paying back the money I had borrowed after being tricked out of over 800,000 yuan by my cousin, I had to go to his house and asked his mother, my aunt, for help. I pleaded with her to lend part of her mortgage to me as the operating capital for the time being, but she refused ruthlessly, and she said that I was extorting money from her and even threatened to call the police. Seeing her so hard-hearted, I had no choice but to leave. Inflicted with such a heavy blow, I was in a trance. At the thought that my cousin, my close kin, even used my trust in him to snare me and my aunt was also so cold-blooded, I was filled with an unspeakable fear and felt that the noisy world was too alien and seemed very far away from me. The thought of committing suicide by jumping off the building became ever stronger within me. Just at this critical moment, my family called me up to comfort me…. Afterward, cared for and helped by my family, I gradually came out of the gloom. However, this disastrous defeat did not extinguish my determination to struggle to change my fate, but on the contrary, it spurred me on to a firmer resolution to fulfill my dream: I am determined to let those witnesses of my failure look at me with new eyes again.

So in the over ten years that followed, I pursued my dream like crazy. The moment I opened my eyes every morning, the only thought that occupied my mind was: Make money, pay the debts, and succeed! I, like duckweed, journeyed to and fro in the world constantly and endured many hardships. I carried on one trade after another, but all my attempts ended in bitter failure. All I saw, heard, and met was how people racked their brains to exploit and plot against one another and how they ruthlessly betrayed one another. The grief I experienced and the tears of blood I shed in those years tired me out, and I can hardly bear to recall them.

The long period of great pressure and irregular life ultimately caused great harm to my health. I often lay awake all night and was listless in the daytime, and I lost dozens of kilograms very quickly. My nasal mucus was with blood, and I felt burning pain in the left side of my chest every day. Later I discovered that there was a tumor in my left upper abdomen. I did not dare to go to the hospital for examination, because I had no courage at all to face the diagnosis. I was extremely afraid to leave the world which I loved and hated. At that time, I deeply experienced the feeling of fearing death. I, in agony, really couldn’t figure out these questions: I have gone all out to work for so many years in order to achieve success, to gain both fame and wealth, but why do I end up in such a plight? Can a man not change his fate?

Just when I was terrified and helpless, my mother preached the gospel of the kingdom of Almighty God to me. I read these words of Almighty God: “The fate of man is controlled by the hands of God. You are incapable of controlling yourself: Despite always rushing and busying about for himself, man remains incapable of controlling himself. If you could know your own prospects, if you could control your own fate, would you still be a creature?” (“Restoring the Normal Life of Man and Taking Him to a Wonderful Destination” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). From these words I understood that the fate of man is controlled by the hands of God and that man is only a creature and cannot at all control his own fate. I thought, “Throughout these many years, I have been bent on changing my miserable fate and becoming a successful man by my own efforts, but all my investments ended in failure. In the end, instead of arriving at my ideal life, I am afflicted with serious illness and almost live on the brink of death! Alas, to judge from this, man indeed cannot control his own fate.” Almighty God’s words, full of authority, convinced me, so I accepted His work of the last days.

Before long, I began to formally live the church life. In the Church of Almighty God, I noticed that all brothers and sisters practiced being an honest person according to the word of Almighty God. They were simple and open and without lies or deceit. They resolved all problems with the truth. Whichever brothers or sisters were experiencing difficulties, everyone would help and sustain them with love. In this environment that was full of love and the truth, my anxious heart gradually calmed down and I came to understand some truths, so my mental outlook became completely new. Unknowingly, my insomnia, which had troubled me for years, was gone, my health got ever better, and the tumor in my left upper abdomen became smaller day by day in a miraculous way. I deeply knew that all this was thanks to God’s salvation of me. Not only so, God also blessed my business greatly. One year later, the business of my company picked up gradually, and it came out of the crisis step by step. Besides, I bought a foreign-style house with a garden as I had wished. Although I received great grace from God and I also acknowledged that the fate of man is controlled by the hands of God, yet as the desire to make others see my great success and to be the best of the best always haunted me, I continued to struggle against my fate in spite of myself.

Later, the government began to strongly support the development of the nongovernmental finance sector. At that time, one of my former classmates visited me, and he urged me, “Now is the golden opportunity. If we set up a small loan company together and closely cooperate with the bank, I bet we will make a lot of money.” I thought, “I am too busy with my business. How can I possibly have the energy to set up another company?” But he thumbed his chest and promised me , “You can rest assured that I will take care of all the affairs of the company. You won’t need to bother with anything. We will run it with steady steps, and everything will be in our hands. All you need to do is to invest now and receive dividend later.” I was moved by his words, and I thought, “According to my knowledge of the finance sector and my ability to master it, I will be fully able to map out strategies to make the company thriving. By then, the people around me will see how powerful I am!” Driven by such a great ambition and desire, I again walked the old path of seeking to achieve success and acquire fame by my own ability.

After we ran the company for a year, the grievous news kept coming that many clients were unable to repay the loans. I was bogged into agony once again. I was aware that it was probably God’s work that came upon me, and I felt somewhat terrified in my heart. So I immediately knelt down and cried to God, “O Almighty God! Now our company suddenly faces so great a difficulty that I cannot bear it at all. This must be permitted by You, but I don’t understand Your will. Please lead and guide me to get out of such dire straits.” After the prayer, I came upon these words of God: “… there will always be some people who want to see for themselves what they are capable of; they want to change their fates with their own two hands, or to achieve happiness under their own power, to see whether they can overstep the bounds of God’s authority and rise above God’s sovereignty. The sadness of man is not that man seeks happy life, not that he pursues fame and fortune or struggles against his own fate through the fog, but that after he has seen the Creator’s existence, after he has learned the fact that the Creator has sovereignty over human fate, he still cannot mend his ways, cannot pull his feet out of the mire, but hardens his heart and persists in his errors. He would rather keep thrashing in the mud, vying obstinately against the Creator’s sovereignty, resisting it until the bitter end, without the slightest shred of contrition, and only when he lies broken and bleeding does he at last decide to give up and turn back. This is true human sorrow. So I say, those who choose to submit are wise, and those who choose to escape are pig-headed” (“God Himself, the Unique III” in Continuation of The Word Appears in the Flesh). Each line of God’s words struck my heart. I thought, “Before I believed in God, I had borne hardships and stood hard work and struggled for nearly half of my life in order to become a successful man and change my fate. But I ended up with heavy debts and illnesses. Thanks to God’s mercy, I became a believer in God and saw that the fate of man is indeed controlled by the hands of God. However, I didn’t have a true belief in or obedience to the authority by which God controls and rules over everything. I professed that ‘Human fate is ordained by Heaven,’ but I still walked in the old path of believing that ‘Man’s fate is controlled by his own hands.’ The path I have walked in my belief in God is the wrong one. I haven’t pursued the truth and life according to God’s will but have continued to stubbornly struggle against my fate, living in a state of disobedience and resistance to God. It was not until the company was in dire straits that I came before God to reflect on myself. Now I see that all that God has done is to save me and lead me to walk on the right path of life.”

Then, I read another passage of God’s word: “In fact, no matter how lofty man’s ideals are, no matter how realistic man’s desires are or how proper they may be, all that man wants to achieve, all that man seeks for is inextricably linked with two words. These two words are vitally important to the life of every person, and these are things Satan intends to instill in man. Which two words are these? One is ‘fame’ and one is ‘gain’: They are fame and gain. Satan uses a very subtle kind of way, a way very much in concert with people’s notions; it is not any kind of radical way. In the midst of unawareness, people come to accept Satan’s way of living, its rules of living, establishing life goals and their direction in life, and in doing so they also unknowingly come to have ideals in life. No matter how high-sounding these ideals in life seem, they are just a pretext that is inextricably linked to fame and gain. Any great or famous person, all people in fact, anything they follow in life relates only to these two words: ‘fame’ and ‘gain.’ Is this not so? (Yes.) People think that once they have fame and gain, they can then capitalize on them to enjoy high status and great wealth, and to enjoy life. Once they have fame and gain, they can then capitalize on them in their pleasure-seeking and unscrupulous enjoyment of the flesh. People willingly, albeit unknowingly, take their bodies, minds, all that they have, their futures and their destinies and hand them all over to Satan in order to attain the fame and gain they desire. People do this without ever a moment’s hesitation, ever ignorant of the need to recover it all. Can people still have any control over themselves once they go over to the side of Satan in this way and become loyal to it? Certainly not. They are completely and utterly controlled by Satan. They are also completely and utterly unable to free themselves from the quagmire they have sunk down into. … So Satan uses fame and gain to control man’s thoughts until all they can think of is fame and gain. They struggle for fame and gain, suffer hardships for fame and gain, endure humiliation for fame and gain, sacrifice everything they have for fame and gain, and they will make any judgment or decision to both maintain and obtain fame and gain. In this way, Satan binds man with invisible shackles. These shackles are borne on people’s bodies, and they have not the strength nor courage to throw them off. So people trudge ever onward in great difficulty, unknowingly bearing these shackles. For the sake of this fame and gain, mankind becomes estranged from God and betrays Him” (“God Himself, the Unique VI” in Continuation of The Word Appears in the Flesh).

These words of God made me understand this: The reason why I wanted to pursue greater wealth when I led a life comparatively rich in material comforts was that I was driven by “fame” and “gain.” The fame and gain are things from Satan. During the course of my learning knowledge in my childhood, in me were instilled the erroneous thoughts that “Man’s fate is controlled by his own hands” and “Let us build a beautiful homeland by our own hands.” So I established a wrong life goal when I was young. I have struggled for my ideal for decades. When I achieved a fair amount of success and won the admiration of many people, I was not contented with it. In order to win the admiration and adoration of more people, I frantically looked for opportunities to be the best of the best, dreaming that one day I would be in the limelight and attract the attention of all. But my investments brought financial ruin to me, which made me fall to the lowest point in my life. When I longed to receive help from my relatives and friends, they ruthlessly deserted me. The cruel reality broke my heart, and meanwhile compelled me to have a stronger and more determined desire to fulfill my wish in my future life. Yet the repeated struggles left me broken and bleeding, and exhausted in both body and mind. After I believed in God, thanks to God’s grace, my business became brisk, but I was greedy of gain. In order to further fulfill my ideal and win greater admiration of the world, I set up another company together with my former classmate. But I still ended up with bitter failure…. Did I not do all these in order to achieve success and win the admiration of others? Was I not pursuing my own fame and gain in doing so? For decades, I have regarded fame and gain as the only objective to strive toward in my life, and unknowingly I have sunk down into the quagmire of fame and gain step by step. I have been bound by the shackles of fame and gain and completely taken captive by Satan, so that I have resisted and betrayed God in all my words and deeds. Fame and gain are indeed traps Satan uses to entice man to become estranged from God and betray God.

At that moment, I felt very remorseful, and I couldn’t help but fall prostrate before God and prayed, “OAlmighty God! I thank You for working on me this way today. Through Your words I came to realize that for so many years I have been actually driven by the erroneous thoughts of Satan and pursued fame and gain for others to think highly of, esteem, and look up to me. Your purpose in creating men was for them to live in harmony on earth, submit to the guidance of Your words, and live out the real likeness of man, to be equal without the distinction of high and low, but I have always pursued to stand high among people. O God! I am too arrogant. I have been corrupted so deeply by Satan that I am devoid of the conscience and sense of a normal man. O God! Now I only want to truly repent before You, and I don’t want to pursue to be the best of the best anymore. I only want to be a small creature and submit to Your sovereignty….” After the prayer, these words of God occurred to me: “… Those who seek to know God are able to set aside their desires, are willing to submit to God’s sovereignty and God’s arrangements; they try to be the kind of people who are submissive to God’s authority and satisfy God’s desire. Such people live in light, live in the midst of God’s blessings; they will surely be commended by God” (“God Himself, the Unique III” in Continuation of The Word Appears in the Flesh). God’s words allowed me to understand that a man who is willing to seek to know God can give up the interests of his flesh, set aside his intentions and desires, accept God’s sovereignty, willingly submit to all of God’s arrangements, pursue to perform the duty of a created being properly, and live to satisfy God and bear witness to God. Only such a man is one after God’s heart and commended by God! After understanding God’s will, I began to conduct myself and do things in a down-to-earth manner, deal with my debts soberly, and face up to the crisis calmly. While doing so, I, under the guidance of God’s words, also made up my mind that I would never again walk my former way—raise fund to establish a new company in order to be exceedingly wealthy and illustrious.

Over a year later, because my company did not receive enough payments and faced many difficulties, I was overburdened. A good friend of mine, one of my former classmates, visited me, and he said, “You have so many debts now, and I feel worried for you. Now I have a way to make money. Be sure to seize this opportunity! One of my friends has a big sum of idle money in hand, and he is on good terms with some banks. As long as you agree to cooperate with us, we will go to the banks to grease the wheel. Within a few years, you will be able to pay off all your debts, and then you can gather in the profits of the two companies. When you have more money in your hand, you can also better expand your enterprise. …” I was somewhat swayed by his words, and thought, “My company is about to face bankruptcy for failing to repay the loans. If I cooperate with them, won’t I be able to come out of the crisis and again lead a life admired by others? If I miss this opportunity, my company may go bankrupt in the end for failing to repay the loans. In that case, won’t I have to live a poor life again?” But I then called to mind my past experience of struggling against myfate time and again and ending up with total failure every time because of not believing in God’s sovereignty. So I had to carefully consider before making a decision whether to cooperate with them or not. He added, “Do think it over these days. Success or failure hinges on the decision made in a moment. Be sure to seize this good opportunity!” These words reminded me. “Right! Success or failure hinges on the decision made in a moment. Wasn’t the reason I met with so many failures before because I didn’t believe in God’s sovereignty and chose to struggle against my fate? Isn’t the very reason why I am heavily in debt that I didn’t have God in my heart and did things according to my own will?” So I immediately came before God and prayed, “O Almighty God! There was Your good purpose in allowing my former classmate to visit me today. Faced with his persuasion, I was in a quandary about what to choose. O God, please guide me so that I can learn lessons in such an environment.” After the prayer, I felt somewhat peaceful in my heart. Then a passage of God’s word occurred to me: “If some of you are still dissatisfied with things as they stand, believing that you have some special skill or ability, and still thinking you can get lucky and change your present circumstances or else escape them; if you attempt to change your own fate by means of human effort, and thereby stand out from others and win fame and fortune; then I say to you, you are making things hard for yourself, you are only asking for trouble, you are digging your own grave! One day, sooner or later, you will discover that you made the wrong choice, that your efforts were wasted. Your ambition, your desire to struggle against fate, and your own egregious conduct, will lead you down a road of no return, and for this you will pay a bitter price” (“God Himself, the Unique III” in Continuation of The Word Appears in the Flesh). God’s words made me suddenly see the light: My success or failure in career is not determined by my own ability, but by God’s ordination. Even if I try to draw on someone’s influence to resolve the crisis of my company and achieve success and win fame and fortune, my efforts will be wasted. For if one cannot submit to God’s sovereignty and ordination, whatever he does will not be commended by God. At that moment, I felt thatGod’s love and salvation for me were so real. When I was in a tight corner and faced with temptation, God reminded me promptly through a man around me, and when I prayed to God and asked Him to guide me, He guided me through His words so that I could understand His will and turn back in time. God is truly omnipotent, and He rules over and knows everything!

Afterward, I read these words of God: “As someone who is normal, and who pursues the love of God, entry into the kingdom to become one of the people of God is your true future, and a life that is of the utmost value and significance. No one is more blessed than you—and why do I say this? Because those who do not believe in God live for the flesh, and they live for Satan, but today you live for God, and live to carry out the will of God. That is why I say your lives are of the utmost significance. Only this group of people, who have been selected by God, are able to live out a life of the utmost significance: No one else on earth is able to live out a life of such value and meaning” (“Know the Newest Work of God and Follow the Footsteps of God” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). Having read these words, I felt extremely excited, as I finally came to understand this: A real man is a man who loves God, and a man such as this does not live for fame and fortune but lives for God. Thanks to God’s predestination and selection, I have come before God today. So I should no longer live to pursue fame and fortune according to the desires for material things, but should live to perform the duty of a creature. I should allow God to be the Lord of my life and arrange my life, should only desire to submit to God’s orchestration, and should pursue to love and satisfy God and become a man who truly worships God. This is a life of the utmost value and significance!

The next day, I resolutely picked up the phone and told my former classmate, “Thank you for your kindness! Though I am in great difficulty, I don’t want to take my old path again. I believe that all this shall pass.” When I had easily forgone all those things by relying on God, I saw God’s wonderful deed. Two months later, I must pay a debt of 500,000 yuan. After I brought this difficulty before God and prayed for it, my wife called me up and said, “One of our relatives learned about our present difficulty, and he insists on transferring 900,000 yuan into our account, for he received a large sum of money as the compensation for the demolition of his house. …” At the news, my eyes brimmed with tears. I truly felt God’s care and mercy for me at that moment. Later, several of my friends and former classmates came to ask me to cooperate with them. I refused all of them under the guidance of God’s words. When I satisfied God, I felt incomparably peaceful and secure. Also, I saw more of God’s wonderful deeds when I forwent all that by relying on God’s words. I truly experienced that God’s word is the truth, the way, and the life and is the lamp to light up man’s path in life!

In the past, although I was ignorant of God’s sovereignty all along, God never left me, and He protected me by my side all the time, so that I could come back to Him safely and know His almightiness and wisdom. In order to awake me, a man afflicted by fame and gain, God allowed me to encounter those people, events, and things; His purpose was for me, an obstinately rebellious son, to realize the truth and no longer be afflicted by Satan. If it had not been for God’s love and salvation for me, I wouldn’t have seen through my arrogant nature today. As I, who used to seek to be exceptional and above others, have experienced some of God’s work, my former wrong outlook on life has been corrected, and I have truly understood that when a man is alive, he should submit to God’s sovereignty and arrangements and pursue the truth so that he can live out a meaningful life. In the remaining days, I will allow God to rule over every day of my life, and submit to whatever environment God arranges for me, and I will take His words as the principles of my actions, and be a man who fears God and shuns evil!