Christianity in China

Nestorian Christians first entered China in 635 AD along the Silk Route via northwest China. The church they established was largely among foreign groups, not the Chinese.

Thereafter Christian influence waxed and waned, often absent for centuries before fresh initiatives were taken. Matteo Ricci, a Jesuit priest, obtained permission to reside in China in 1583. Despite planting a church, he still did not make Christianity a Chinese religion.

Protestant missions were latecomers to China, travelling on the same boats that brought Western trade and imperialism. Missions established themselves along the east coast in the mid-18th century. James Hudson Taylor, founder of the China Inland Mission (now OMF) in 1865, saw the needs of the inland provinces and he and others moved away from the coast establishing churches and hospitals. Work among the minority peoples in west China, like the Lisu, also began.

By 1949 there were about 6,000 missionaries in China and there were some 20,000 Protestant churches with over 1 million members. Christianity was established, though not accepted as an indigenous faith.

During the next 30 years the Chinese church was isolated and forced underground as the missionaries left, church buildings were closed and pastors and congregations were imprisoned and persecuted. To the outside world it was difficult to imagine how the church would survive this oppression.

As China emerged after Mao’s death, evidence of a thriving church was revealed, sustained by God’s grace through the faithfulness of the Chinese Christians, the prayers of Christians abroad and radio broadcasts.

In 1979 Deng Xiaoping allowed churches to re-open under the control of the Three Self Patriotic Movement. The church then had about a million members.

The TSPM has seen a growth in membership across China through the last 20 years; official reports admit to over 10 million Christians in China. Over 20 million copies of the Bible have been printed in China.

Many Chinese Christians will not align themselves with the official church, seeing it as too much under the authority of a Communist government and serving the Party first and God second. These meet in house churches; some isolated, others part of well-organized groups numbering several hundreds of thousands.

Although figures vary, a realistic estimate for the total number of Protestant Christians in China would be 70 million.

The house-church movement is also at present under great pressure to register with government authorities. Reports over the last five years reveal that incidents of persecution are common. Pastors are imprisoned, materials are confiscated and meetings closed down.

The struggle to establish Christianity in China is by no means over. Support and prayer for the Church is as important as they ever were.

I love what God is up to in China.

GHT

How to Pray for China

PRAY:

For peaceful, stable and honest government as China reforms its economic and social structures.

For Christian professionals to offer their skills for work and witness among Chinese intellectuals, the business community, and in both urban and rural areas.

For good Bible based teaching in the churches.

For the training of godly pastors. These men and women are often poorly paid and sacrifice much to lead their churches. As China develops rapidly, young people see the attractiveness of secular work and lifestyle. Pray that more young people will respond to the needs of the church.

For an end to persecution of house churches who refuse to register with the TSPM, and for the witness of those in prison.

For Hong Kong Christians to have a sensitive and significant influence in churches in southern China.

For witness among Christian minority peoples. Some groups such as the Lisu have large numbers of Christians; most have no viable church or no known Christians.

Radio broadcasts into China provide a valuable means of training leaders and evangelizing non-believers.

Give thanks for the great growth of the church.

GHT

Back to Jerusalem

BACK TO JERUSALEM -- A GOD-ORDAINED MOVEMENT!

What is the Back to Jerusalem movement?

The name unfortunately leads a lot of people to believe that it's about evangelizing Jerusalem or Israel. That's not the case at all. When the Chinese say "Back to Jerusalem," they're talking first of all about a geographical advance of the gospel throughout history. The gospel started in Jerusalem and then spread in a generally westward direction into North Africa and Europe. Throughout history it has continued to spread westward around the globe, with China as its farthest advance. With a Chinese mindset, they see that to fulfill the Great Commission is to encircle the whole globe with the gospel, until it goes back even to where it began. Their aim is not Jerusalem or Israel, but all the countries and unreached people groups between China and Jerusalem. Along the old Silk Road, which once brought trade from the Middle East to China, you find approximately 5,200 unreached people groups and tribes.

How did it start?

The vision goes back to the late 1920s, when a group called the Jesus Family had formed in China. They lived like the church in Acts 2, sharing all their possessions in a common pool, and preaching the gospel as they walked from one village to another. They faced tremendous opposition. Often the "scum" of society would believe in Christ, so it would be the cripples, the blind, and the beggars. Whole villages would come out and throw rocks and rotten fruit and vegetables at them.

It was that group, or a derivative of that group, that first believed that God was telling them to walk on foot all the way back to Jerusalem, preaching the gospel and establishing churches in every town and ethnic group on the way. But they never got to see their vision come to fruition. A small group of Chinese missionaries got right to the border. But then the vision died for a long time. It went into the ground from the early '50s to the late '80s.

When did it reemerge?

One of the great catalysts was a man named Simon Zhao. He was one of the leaders of the Back to Jerusalem movement in the late '40s and early '50s, and was arrested along with all the other leaders when the Communists took over that part of China. He was given a 40-year prison sentence. It's a very touching story. His wife was pregnant—they had only been married a short time. She was also arrested and suffered a miscarriage in prison. She died a few years later, and he never saw his wife again. Simon Zhao said that many nights in the prison labor camps he would face toward the west, toward Jerusalem, and he would say, "God, the vision that you've given us has perished, but I pray you'll raise up a new generation of Chinese believers to fulfill this vision."

Simon Zhao got out of prison in 1983 and had no money, no family. He didn't know any Christians anymore. People had forgotten that he existed. He began to live right outside the prison labor camp, just under a piece of canvas, because he had nowhere to go and no money and nothing to do. Once the believers heard about his story, they brought him back and had him share his vision. God used his ministry to raise up this new generation. He died recently. . .

The Free Methodist Bible School in Kaifung China also felt strongly led to send young missionaries "Back to Jerusalem" in the late 1940s. The descendants of this group most of whom now worship in Three Self and in Unofficial Churches in Henan Province are still pursuing this goal of reaching the unreached peoples along the Silk Road...

God is still at work!

GHT