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The Grace of Staying in the Big City
Ellie
I returned to China from the United States at the end of September 2012. The last 10 years have flown by so quickly. I have a multitude of feelings.
During my 4 years of study in France and the US, I felt that life was happy and sweet. Perhaps my memory of it all is romanticized. Since I returned to China, I have experienced dramatic highs and lows, and I often miss my life overseas.
Over the last 10 years, I have done many things: worked at the consulate, and in the IT and art industries. I have lived in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen, the four largest cities in China. In terms of romance, love and marriage, I have basically not met any suitable or reliable men, so I am still single. In November last year, I decided to put my 4-year art business on hold and moved to the most cutting-edge first-tier city to start a new job. Leaving the art industry was difficult and I struggled with my identity for a while. I was very uncomfortable navigating between executives at my new company and often felt self-doubt. Then during the pandemic, I was suddenly laid off and fell back into a state of instability and confusion.
After more than two months of lockdown, I returned to my parents’ home. On the first day of our meeting, my parents summarized my past ten years in one word: failure. After hearing such a judgment, I was extremely distressed, on the brink of depression. My parents challenged my value and identity, I felt devalued by the social system, and crushed by my own pride and expectations. I fought against bitterness in my heart, but one setback after another made me, like David in the Bible, want to question God.
I felt like I needed to run away. So I spent a month in a beautiful little city. It seemed like a good option to retreat there and “lay flat”, enjoy nature, in a low-cost environment with a small group of literary friends. During that time, I didn’t regularly attend online church meetings. I seemed to be happier there.
I only returned to church when I went to the big city where I used to work. I needed to deal with my apartment and belongings. I had been missing the teaching of my pastor (ZS), and his teaching was as sharp as ever. He was preaching on the book of Ruth and the stark contrast between Ruth and Naomi began to touch me. Especially when the pastor said that Naomi went wherever there was food. She moved from Bethlehem to the land of Moab, where she lost everything. And then when she learned that there was food again in Bethlehem, she went back to Bethlehem. Naomi’s god was not the Lord, but grain. At this point a voice suddenly challenged me, “Ellie, you fled from the big city to a small town, as if your god was your career. Did you leave because there were no jobs in the city? But you still have such a great church in this city?” I realized that although I had been continually challenged internally by the holy spirit, I was still rebellious and hesitant to stay. I thought the city was too stressful and jobs too hard to find after the pandemic.
Yet little by little God changed my mind. The sermons on Ruth showed me that it wasn’t that circumstances were poor, it was me who was wrong. The one who needed salvation couldn’t save herself, and I should give up my self-reliance. Naomi was concerned with immediate solutions. She was using God to accomplish her own plans, while Ruth was concerned for Naomi, and in faith in God. Who am I going to choose to be?
With tears in my eyes I told God, “Lord, I can’t help myself, come and save me. Fill me with your love.” God released me and comforted me again and again to the point that I stopped hoping for circumstances to change to prove God’s presence. I could accept that a low point in my life may last for a long time. But I could also trust in God’s unquestionable grace, even if things don’t always work out the way I expect.
I have been a Christian for 12 years now, and finally realized that I need to have a regular “circumcision of the heart”, to be set apart from the world. Sometimes I did want God and the world at the same time, and I didn’t realize that God had set me apart from the world for the sake of my spiritual health and growth. When I put my focus on my own plans and what I wanted, I was already far away from God. I am very happy that I ended up staying in this city, a city I had wanted to live in for a long time.
Although the past year here has been very different than I expected, I’m happy for the reasons I stayed.
Although I am still unemployed, I have begun to serve more in the church. I am enrolled in the church’s spiritual training program and may be involved in church planting in the future.
I am so thankful for the Lord’s guidance and for God’s grace for me to stay in this city.
Ellie studied in France and the United States and received her undergraduate degree in France before she returned to China in 2012.