A Son’s Journey with Rock House
A Life Shaped by Words, Family, Faith, and Calling
My journey with The Rock House Publishers / 海天書樓 began long before I understood what publishing meant. I was ten years old when my parents, Prof. Timothy Yu and Mrs. Helen Wang Yu, began this ministry from our rented bungalow at 15 Diamond Road, Diamond Hill, Kowloon. It was a simple home, without the comforts many families hoped for at the time, but it was filled with faith, imagination, and calling. Around us were trees, vegetable fields, a nearby winery, and a flowing stream. To me, it was home. Looking back, I now see that it was also the spiritual birthplace of a publishing mission that would shape my life.
Where Calendars Were Born
The first Rock House Monthly Calendar 海天月曆 and Rock House Desktop Calendar 海天日曆 were born in that humble setting. As a boy, I helped with practical production work: moulding metal bases for the desktop calendar, fitting plastic spirals onto the wall calendar, and learning that every small detail mattered. Those early tasks taught me something I have never forgotten: Christian publishing is not only about printing words on paper. It is about serving God’s people with care, excellence, and faithfulness, day after day, year after year. My father was then working full-time with the U.S. Information Service, editing the magazine 今日世界. My mother taught accounting at New Asia College while also caring for our family. Rock House Publishers began as their part-time ministry, but it was a serious and quiet step of faith.
The Typewriter That Opened a World
One object in our home left a lasting mark on me: my mother’s Underwood typewriter, with its black-and-red ribbon. I still remember watching the keys strike the page and seeing words appear line by line. One day, I opened the drawer of the typewriter table and found the manual. For most people, it would have been only an instruction booklet. For me, it became a gateway into the world of words, communication, and publishing. By Grade 4, I was already typing my school notes instead of handwriting them, using the two-colour ribbon to highlight important points. Classmates borrowed my notes to study before exams, and I discovered the joy of sharing knowledge with others. Later, as my typing speed improved, I became my father’s secretary, first typing his dictated letters, then drafting correspondence, and eventually helping with communication with overseas publishers, pastors, and ministry partners. I did not enter publishing through a formal appointment. I entered it through family life, daily practice, and growing affection.
I learn to type using my Mom's Underwood typewriter.
Learning the Tools of Communication
God continued to prepare me through education and experience. After studying at Diocesan Boys’ School, I entered the Communication program at Hong Kong Baptist University, where I worked with English and Chinese typesetting and helped produce The Young Reporter. I learned to use tools such as the IBM Selectric Composer and the Morisawa Chinese phototypesetting system. Later, I studied communication at Stanford University, continuing the path of words, media, and visual presentation. At Rock House, I also learned by doing. We worked with printing, layout, photography, film, photopaper, and book cover production. I trained staff on the Morisawa Chinese phototypesetting machine and explored how design, typography, and publishing technology could serve Christian communication. My mother, with her creativity and practical wisdom, opened a small Christian gift shop connected with the Rock House office. Her gift for administration, accounting, property, and creative service became part of the ministry’s foundation. From her, I learned that ministry is carried not only through words, but also through stewardship, beauty, order, and daily faithfulness.
IBM Selectric Composer and Morisawa Chinese photo typesetting.
From Printing Tools to Digital Tools
My love for technology grew naturally from those early publishing years. I learned desktop publishing software, invested in Chinese font systems, studied paper types, observed professional printing, and followed the development of computers from early personal systems to modern cloud-based tools. To me, these were never merely machines or software. They were instruments that could be offered to God for a higher purpose. The tools kept changing: metal type, phototypesetting, desktop publishing, digital layout, cloud storage, e-books, audio, video, and now AI-assisted writing and translation. But the purpose remained the same: to use every available tool faithfully for Gospel-centred communication.
My digital desktop publishing starts with Aldus PageMaker
A New Chapter in Canada
In 1988, I immigrated to Canada and began a new professional path in landscape architecture. I studied, worked in private practice, and later served with the City of Hamilton, designing parks and public spaces. Yet even while my professional life moved in another direction, Rock House remained part of my calling. I continued to contribute to 海天日曆 and 海天月曆, writing columns, selecting images, preparing devotional content, and supporting the publishing work from afar. Then came an unexpected turning point. After a demanding season of work, I suffered a serious physical setback that affected the use of my right arm and hand. As I was considering retirement, my wife Betty encouraged me to step back. Around the same time, my mother called from Hong Kong and asked, “Are you still working?” When I said yes, she replied, “If you do not retire, the younger generation will not have the opportunity to move up. Retire.” That became the final confirmation I needed. In October 2016, I retired from my municipal career and entered a new chapter of service. The project management, communication, budgeting, and design skills I had developed over many years became tools for serving Rock House Publishers in a fuller way. I had once shaped landscapes for people to walk through. Now, I was planting seeds of truth to guide souls home.
Mom said: Are you still working? Time to retire!
Returning to the Rock House Mission
After returning more fully to the Rock House ministry, I continued writing for the calendars, working on translation and publishing projects, and exploring new ways to extend Chinese Christian content to wider audiences. I also helped move Rock House from paper-based records toward digital management. Through the UNITY digital management and operating system, Excel-based inventory and customer tools, and cloud storage, we began strengthening the practical systems behind the publishing work. These may seem like ordinary administrative tools, but to me they are part of faithful stewardship. In recent years, I have also worked with AI-assisted writing, translation, image development, and publishing workflows. I see these tools not as replacements for human calling, but as servants of the mission when used with discernment, care, and Christian conviction.
Carrying the Legacy Forward
Today, alongside my brother John, I help carry forward the 65-year legacy of Rock House Publishers. We are not chasing size for its own sake. We are seeking impact, faithfulness, and eternal value. We measure success not only by how many books are printed, but by how many hearts are touched, how many readers are encouraged, and how many lives are drawn closer to Christ. From the Chinese Study Bible to devotional calendars, from Christian books to digital publishing, from Traditional and Simplified Chinese resources to audio, video, and AI-assisted tools, Rock House continues to serve with the same calling: to make God’s grace known through faithful words. The tools are changing. The calling remains. The Rock remains.
The Thread of a Lifetime
What began with a black-and-red ribbon on my mother’s typewriter became a thread running through my life. From Diamond Hill to Canada, from metal type to AI, from catching guppies by the stream to catching glimpses of God’s grace through words, I now see that the Lord was preparing me all along. My life with Rock House has been a journey of family, faith, publishing, technology, and stewardship. It is also a journey of gratitude: gratitude for my parents’ vision, for my mother’s hidden faithfulness, for my father’s calling, for my brother’s partnership, and for the privilege of serving a ministry built on Christ the Rock. “Now it is required that those who have been given a trust must prove faithful.” -- 1 Corinthians 4:2 “The Lord is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge.” -- Psalm 18:2 From this Rock we began. Upon this Rock we continue.
“With the sea as ink and the sky as parchment, we lift our brush to paint the grace of God.”
海熊墨汁天為紙，共揮彩筆繪神恩。
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