Ya-Wen Cheng
Taiwanese Remnant
Remnant Mission Church in New York
Columbia University, School of Social Work
A Beautiful Breakup
During the RCA last year, I experienced the most heartbreaking breakup in my life. When I was still a nonbeliever, I received a phone call from my ex-boyfriend who was attending RCA as a Remnant. He made a resolution to end our four year relationship. It was a difficult ending for both of us. As a Remnant who had prayed for my salvation with tears for years, he finally lost his hope that God would save me. As a nonbeliever who believed that human love can conquer everything, I became completely devastated by the breakup.
I did not know who God was back then but I asked Him to take my life and show me His love for me. I did not know how to pray, so I prayed the Lord’s Prayer which had touched my heart before. I cried out to God, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will…and if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.” It was from that point on that God turned this heartbreaking breakup into the most blessing breakup that cut off more than 20 years of my relationship with sin, curses, death, hell and Satan.
I accepted Jesus Christ when I was reading The Gospel Letter alone. That was not the first time I read it, but that was the time that with all the hardships I was going through, God opened my spiritual eyes to understand every Word that was written. I could not stop my tears as I finally realized why John 10:11 says “He came to His own and His own did not receive Him.” I felt that I was a lost child who finally came back home when I accepted Jesus Christ. I made a conclusion that the love of Jesus Christ who died on the cross for my sin and sin of all is the solution to all human problems.
After realizing this, I began to ask God to show me His plan for me. At that point, I had finished my major in Nursing and Psychology and was beginning my graduate study in Social Work. The reason I had moved from one major to another was because I wanted to find the best suited profession that could truly solve the problems of people. So I entered the graduate school of social work, believing that social work is the best compared to nursing and psychology when it comes to helping people. I appreciated social work because it deals with not only the physical and psychological problems of individuals but also the environmental factors that cause those problems. Social work helps fixing different levels of environmental problems ranging from the micro issues such as bad parenting, to the macro issues such as flaws in social welfare policy that impact the individual’s life.
My conception about social work and all other “help” professions began to change after the Gospel entered my life. As I was receiving healing and growing spiritually from experiences in my church and the trainings I received in Korea this summer, God showed me His plan by first helping me to realize an important fact. Although all helping professions are helpful to people in some ways, they (including social work) are only helpful to fix symptoms of human problems and not the root cause of those problems. These symptoms being fixed are like bad fruits, which are consequential sins, that grow out from a tree with rotten roots ,which is original sin. These rotten roots represent the dead spirit as a result of disconnection from God. Therefore, it becomes less a concern whether a helping profession is fixing problems that are physical or psychological, individual or environmental, micro or macro because it can only fix symptoms and not the roots. In other words, even the best and most comprehensive practice in medication, caring, counseling, and social change can bring only temporary healing. The rotten roots must be renewed to bear new fruits as a dead spirit must reconnect with God to live again for the real healing to take place.
God gave me the greatest answer that I had been searching for years in my life. It is not the helping profession that can solve human problems but only the Gospel. This realization made me feel the greatest freedom, but at the same time I began struggling with my professional identity as a social worker. In my past internship, I struggled so much when I was allowed to provide social services but not to share Gospel to my clients who were immigrants from around the world and were suffering with all sorts of life difficult problems such as poverty, unemployment, domestic violence, an illegal immigrant status, and mental illness. I shouted to God “in the field of my specialty, show me the way to deliver the true answer to their problems and sufferings!”
God responded to my calling by giving me a vision. As time went by, I began to visualize a Gospel-based social service agency that delivers not only social services but also the true answer to save lives. This lead to a transition of my concentration within the field of social work from Clinical Practice to Social Enterprise Administration. God helped me realize that with the skills in management of social service organizations, I could either enforce the Gospel-based social practice in a faith-based agency or establish a Gospel-based social service agency in the future.
As I changed my concentration, I also began to feel my incompetence. I asked God, “How could I, a person who is totally inexperienced in finance, business, and management, make this happen.” God continued to answer me while I was receiving training in Korea. I shed tears when I learned how the vision of RUTC echoes in the vision that God gave me. I was filled with joy when I learned that the RUTC is going to include a social welfare department and raise a true social movement through the Gospel. Through my meetings with other Remnants who also shared the same vision about the RUTC, I also learned that I am not alone. God’s voice said to me that I am not going to do everything with my own strength but with everything that He had prepared long before He called me. Today, God sends me to one of the largest non-profit organizations in the United States to have an internship and receive training in administration. My lifelong prayer topic finally comes to light as I am growing in His love, power, and wisdom. I am praying to become a skillful administrator with the Gospel who can help build RUTC’s around the world to save souls.
There is no such thing like a beautiful breakup in this world but in God’s Kingdom and in God’s sovereignty there is. Although it appeared to be a breakup of my four-year relationship with a person, it was in fact a breakup of my relationship with Satan who had enslaved me for more than 20 years, and all members in my family line for generations. It was such a beautiful breakup that my true identity as a child of God was found; it was such a beautiful breakup that God broke my heart to receive the greatest love from Him; it was such a beautiful breakup that through years of searching for a true solution to human problems, I found Jesus Christ, the solution to all problems; it was such a beautiful breakup that my life was saved for the purpose of saving others’ souls; it was such a beautiful breakup that my study and knowledge which were once rubbish became the foundation of world mission; it was such a beautiful breakup that my bedroom became the Mark’s upper room where prayer and unity of Remnants is taking place; it was such a beautiful breakup that my best friend and roommate also became children of God after me; it was such a beautiful breakup that my Chinese friends joined my church, which answered my church’s prayer topic of multi-ethnic worship; it was such a beautiful breakup that my sister and brother begin to resist idol and ancestor worship; it was such a beautiful breakup that my ex-boyfriend’s greatest prayer topic about my salvation was answered and his relationship with God restored; it was such a beautiful breakup that I become a disciple and a witness of Jesus, the son of living God, the Savior of this world; it was such a beautiful breakup that God sent me to Korea this summer to testify of His Love in front of Korean Children in the first English Mission School; it was such a beautiful breakup that last year’s RCA became the platform for today’s RCA. Last year, my life as a nonbeliever confronted a dead end. This year, I stand in front of you to testify how my life was transformed through God’s master plan. I thank God that He did not let the cup pass from me, but God rather gave me a cup filled with truth, life and love.
