Fearing God, Not Man
"Christ was the first to suffer," Pastor Li De Xian said. "We just follow Him. There are many thorns but we are just injured a little on our feet. This suffering is very little."
Pastor Li speaks about suffering from experience. The man who said "I will preach until I die" has stuck to his word. Despite continued pressure from the Public Security Bureau, Pastor Li refuses to miss a service unless he is in prison or change his message of salvation through Jesus Christ. During the period from October 2000 to May 2001, he was arrested 15 times for preaching in his unregistered house church in Guangzhou. He has been arrested so many times during the past two years that he has lost count. During one recent detention, jailers tied his arms and legs to a bedpost for three days. When they finally released him from this torture, he was forced to work on an assembly line in the prison factory putting bulbs into strings of Christmas lights to send to America. He and the others had a quota of between four and five thousand bulbs a day. "They suffered this inhumane treatment simply because they failed to meet their daily production quotas in the Chinese labor camp." Li has seen imprisoned Christians tortured so badly that their buttocks bled through their clothing. He spent fifteen days in prison on this particular occasion.
Yet rather than this experience teaching him to be afraid, it has taught him to be prepared. He travels at all times with a small black duffel bag that he keeps packed with a blanket and a change of clothes - the things he will need for prison whenever he is arrested next. "Arrests will come at any time, but we are not afraid, as we have prepared ourselves, and we have not done any crimes." Whenever possible he will spend his time in prison reading the Bible, something he manages to smuggle in with amazing regularity.
His wife, Zhao Xia, strongly supports him in this and refuses to worry. "God will take care of him," she says, "so there's no need to worry."
In 2000, PSB officials also confiscated Li's church and welded the doors shut. In early November 2000 in the city of Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, they reportedly blew up and demolished at least 450 churches, temples and shrines. Government officials said religious leaders had built the churches and temples illegally.
"Don't feel sorry for us," Zhao Xia says of their lifestyle. "At least we are constantly reminded that we are in a spiritual war. We know for whom we are fighting. We know who the enemy is. And we are fighting. Perhaps we should pray for you Christians outside of China. In your leisure, in your affluence, in your freedom, sometimes you no longer realize that you are in spiritual warfare."
(taken from 'Jesus Freaks: Book of Martyrs')
I am comfortable too often. I remember spiritual warfare on occasions in my freedom. I believe that I will see a day when Christians are persecuted by our country because of extreme dedication to their faith. I believe that the lines are being drawn in the sand between the dedicated and the non dedicated; the sheep and the goats are being divided as we live our lives today. This man, Zhao, sees all to well our complacency in America. There are many things that go unnoticed in our comfort. 50 million babies since 1974. That's just one.
I need to open my eyes! I am comfortable, and it is not comfort from The Comforter!
-David
Pastor Li speaks about suffering from experience. The man who said "I will preach until I die" has stuck to his word. Despite continued pressure from the Public Security Bureau, Pastor Li refuses to miss a service unless he is in prison or change his message of salvation through Jesus Christ. During the period from October 2000 to May 2001, he was arrested 15 times for preaching in his unregistered house church in Guangzhou. He has been arrested so many times during the past two years that he has lost count. During one recent detention, jailers tied his arms and legs to a bedpost for three days. When they finally released him from this torture, he was forced to work on an assembly line in the prison factory putting bulbs into strings of Christmas lights to send to America. He and the others had a quota of between four and five thousand bulbs a day. "They suffered this inhumane treatment simply because they failed to meet their daily production quotas in the Chinese labor camp." Li has seen imprisoned Christians tortured so badly that their buttocks bled through their clothing. He spent fifteen days in prison on this particular occasion.
Yet rather than this experience teaching him to be afraid, it has taught him to be prepared. He travels at all times with a small black duffel bag that he keeps packed with a blanket and a change of clothes - the things he will need for prison whenever he is arrested next. "Arrests will come at any time, but we are not afraid, as we have prepared ourselves, and we have not done any crimes." Whenever possible he will spend his time in prison reading the Bible, something he manages to smuggle in with amazing regularity.
His wife, Zhao Xia, strongly supports him in this and refuses to worry. "God will take care of him," she says, "so there's no need to worry."
In 2000, PSB officials also confiscated Li's church and welded the doors shut. In early November 2000 in the city of Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, they reportedly blew up and demolished at least 450 churches, temples and shrines. Government officials said religious leaders had built the churches and temples illegally.
"Don't feel sorry for us," Zhao Xia says of their lifestyle. "At least we are constantly reminded that we are in a spiritual war. We know for whom we are fighting. We know who the enemy is. And we are fighting. Perhaps we should pray for you Christians outside of China. In your leisure, in your affluence, in your freedom, sometimes you no longer realize that you are in spiritual warfare."
(taken from 'Jesus Freaks: Book of Martyrs')
I am comfortable too often. I remember spiritual warfare on occasions in my freedom. I believe that I will see a day when Christians are persecuted by our country because of extreme dedication to their faith. I believe that the lines are being drawn in the sand between the dedicated and the non dedicated; the sheep and the goats are being divided as we live our lives today. This man, Zhao, sees all to well our complacency in America. There are many things that go unnoticed in our comfort. 50 million babies since 1974. That's just one.
I need to open my eyes! I am comfortable, and it is not comfort from The Comforter!
-David
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