Bob Fu's Story
Bob Fu
One of 80 Million Stories
1997. As the massive “Countdown Clock” on Tiananmen Square ticked backwards toward the July 1 takeover of Hong Kong by Communist China, Bob Fu and his pregnant wife, Heidi, knew their time was running out, too.
Newly released from prison, Bob Fu and his wife Heidi fled to Hong Kong as tourists, abandoned their group and applied repeatedly for visas to America. They knew that, if they were unable to get out in time, they would be arrested again. By God’s grace and the prayers of the saints, they arrived on U.S. soil just a few days before the British turned over Hong Kong to Beijing.
Born and raised in mainland China, Bob Fu studied at Liaocheng University in Shandong (1987-1991), and was a leader of the student democracy movement that ended in the Tiananmen Square massacre of June 4, 1989.
That year, Bob was led to Christ by an English professor and by 1992, he was pastoring a house church of 30 students. He later studied at the People's (Renmin) University in Beijing, where he met his wife Heidi, until 1993. Bob and Heidi later started a bible school in a shuttered factory. On May 9, 1996, secret police discovered the school, and Bob and Heidi were imprisoned.
Not long after their release two months later, Bob was fired from his job as an English teacher at the Beijing School for the Communist Party, and Heidi lost her acceptance to study for her master’s degree.
Also, Heidi was pregnant. Chinese law requires women to obtain approval from their work units. Without it, Heidi could receive no medical help and would be forced to abort her baby, even at full term.
So God opened a way for them to travel to Hong Kong as tourists at the end of 1996. With the help and prayers of many brothers and sisters throughout the word and the direct intervention of President Bill Clinton, the Fu family arrived as refugees in the United States . . . just three days before Hong Kong once again became part of Communist China.
In 2002, Bob Fu founded ChinaAid Association to draw international attention to China’s gross human rights violations against house church Christians. He has testified before many organizations, including the House International Relations Committee, U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, the Congressional-Executive Commission on China and the UN Commission on Human Rights.
Bob Fu is a PhD candidate of Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. Bob and Heidi have three children.