Posted on 06/11/2019 10:37:35 AM PDT by Gamecock
Wayne Cordeiro, pastor of New Hope Christian Fellowship in Honolulu, Hawaii, is praying that American Christians become more like Chinese Christians.
In a sermon, the pastor of the Hawaiian megachurch shared an experience he had on a trip to China, where the church went to train leaders.
On that particular trip, he brought up twenty-two Christians from the Hunan Province, who road thirteen hours on a train to attend the leadership training.
They sat in a 700 square foot hotel room, with no air conditioning, or couches to sit on, with Cordeiro leading the gathering.
“If we get caught what will happen to me?” Cordeiro began by asking.
“Well you will get deported in 24 hours, and we will go to prison for three years,” the Chinese Christians responded.
He followed up by asking how many had spent time in prison, and out of the twenty-two, eighteen shared that they had been imprisoned for their faith.
The twenty-two that had gathered came from the mountainous province in southern China, yet amongst themselves oversaw 22 million people in China.
“We forget that there are 1.3 billion people in China,” Cordeiro added.
He shared that shortly after they began their lesson, in 2 Peter. He only had fifteen Bibles so seven people went without.
“I said turn to 2 Peter 1, we are going to read it. Just then one lady handed hers to the person next to her, and I thought ‘hmm interesting,'” he shared.
Once they began reading, he quickly realized why she had given her Bible away, she had memorized the whole book.
“When it was done, I went over to her at a break and said ‘you recited the whole chapter.'”
“In prison, you have much time in prison,” she responded
“Don’t they confiscate the Bible?” he asked.
She shared while they indeed confiscate any Christian material, people smuggle in scripture written on paper and hide it from the prison guards.
“That’s why we memorize it as fast as we can because even though they can take the paper away, they can’t take what’s hidden in your heart,” she shared with him.
After the 3 day study was complete, he asked the Christians from the Hunan Providence how he could pray for them.
“Could you pray that one day we could just be like you?” One man asked, referencing the ability to worship as desired in America.
“I looked at him, and said ‘I will not do that.'”
“When they asked him why not, he explained: “You guys road a train thirteen hours to get here, in my country, if you have to drive more than an hour, people won’t come.”
“You sat on a wooden floor for three days, in my country if people have to sit for more than 40 minutes they leave. You sat here for not only three days on a hard wooden floor, in my country if it’s not padded pews and air conditioning, people will not come back.”
“In my country, we have an average of 2 bibles per family, we don’t read any of them. You hardly have any bibles and you memorize them from pieces of paper.”
“I will not pray that you become like you, but I will pray that we become just like you,” he concluded.
Just like Fahrenheit 451.
My thought exactly.
Very nice article.
They need to proof read better. It’s very jarring to see road twice when it’s rode.
—
It’s difficult for believers in China to have enough Bibles to go around.
The Chinese translation is known as the Union Bible.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Union_Version
We need to pray for translators, among others.
May the Chinese brethren be greatly blessed through their diligence.
I think as I please
And this gives me pleasure
My conscience decrees
This right I must treasure
My thoughts will not cater
To duke or dictator
No man can deny
Die gedanken sind frei
Tyrants can take me
And throw me in prison
My thoughts will burst forth
Like blossoms in season
Foundations may crumble
And structures may tumble
But free men shall cry
Die gedanken sind frei
Yup. Coming to a theater near us.
Or The Book of Eli
Now they know.
That’s exactly the reason why our churches stress Bible memorization starting with two or three years old — in Sunday School, Bible Memory Association, AWANA, etc.
I find this ironic in that China is said to be the biggest BIBLE PRINTER in the world!
Unless the scripture exposure results in spiritual rebirth, it is essentially useless.
The thinking is free
Of course. But it makes a person more ready to easily “give an answer” if necessary (the Holy Spirit will let you remember). And if the time ever comes when Christians’ Bibles are confiscated, having critical Scriptures committed to memory will allow sharing to those who may not have heard.
I just read an article in Catholic World report about the atate of the Church in China. It's horrendous. After stalwartly resisting the Communists for 70+ years, the present regime (I won't call it a papacy) of the Peronist, Bergoglio, and his apparat (chiefly, the Vatican Secy of State Pietro Parolin) have in practice allied with the Party and are promoting the Regime Church, known as the "Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association."
The venerable Cardinal Zen says that the Vatican is "feeding the faithful to the wolves."
But the great thing is that the faithful are still resisting. They have memorized Scripture,Liturgy, and popular devotions as well.
I have never been more proud of the Catholic faithful, and more ashamed of the "pope".
Not to be a downer here, but most American Christians have gotten to the point where they just download their Bible and devotions from a phone app. Their church likely just has an app as well. Do you know what that means?
Potentially, the government now has access to everything you do as a Christian. And some of these Bible apps are the most prolific data collectors of all, but claiming they are doing it just to improve your “experience.”
You should be using a hard copy Bible and memorizing it.
That’s great that you memorized Hebrews. I’ve often said if I could only have one book of the Bible (God for bid) it would be Hebrews
Bible App data collection:
https://www.expressvpn.com/blog/delete-these-now-the-worst-apps-for-privacy-in-2019/
2. The YouVersion Bible App
The YouVersion Bible App is on more than 300 million devices around the world. It claims to be the No. 1 Bible app and comes with over 1,400 Bibles in over 1,000 languages. It also harvests data as if the Rapture is coming tomorrow.
Notable permissions the app demands are full internet access, the ability to connect and disconnect to Wi-Fi, modify stored content on the phone, track the device’s location, and read all a user’s contacts.
It’s not immediately clear why the app needs all this data. One can only assume that it’s reporting it all to your deity of choice. Well, that or ad agencies.
UPDATE: A representative of YouVersion wrote to say that the app’s permissions are meant to ensure the “best possible experience for our users” and that the developer, a non-profit, “will not sell users’ data or personally identifiable information.”
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