September Newsletter

DEAR FRIENDS, I WANTED TO UPDATE YOU AS TO WHAT HAS TRANSPIRED ON OUR RECENT TRIP TO SE ASIA. God used a man named Pastor Allen Yuan years ago to challenge my life and inspire me to help the Chinese Church……I made a promise to the Lord, after Allen’s challenge, that I would do everything that I could to assist the Chinese Christians and bring as many Bibles as I can to help them. Our first stop was Vietnam, where we have been coming for over 17 years, carrying Bibles, flannel graphs and discipleship materials. Our team of four flew in with several hundred Hmong Study Bibles. One of the team members was stopped, but after we talked with them, the head Customs officer came over and told us we could go with the Bibles. Our contact and his grandson met us at the airport and then we went to the contact's house to unload the Bibles. The contact and his wife have 20 Bible students living in their house and so they all helped us to unpack the duffels. They were grateful for the Bibles and even more so for the fellowship. When asked if any had suffered for their faith, everyone raised their hand. One said they had spent three days in jail, all have been questioned by the police and harassed, and one Pastor has even received over 100 summons to the police station. Persecution and opposition is an everyday experience in their lives. After returning to Bangkok to pack Bibles, I sensed that we should call the Intercessors in the US and ask them to pray for our trip to China the next day. The next morning the team was up early and we had breakfast and then packed the duffels full of Chinese Pastor Study Bibles. There are over 400,000 Chinese Pastors and Church leaders who want these Bibles and if possible they would pay 6-12 months salary to buy one on the "Black Market." For every one of these Bibles distributed it is reported that at least 40 people come to faith in Jesus Christ. We loaded the duffel bags into the van and a Burmese brother prayed for our trip and then our Thai brother prayed for us as well. There was also a team of Intercessors from the US who said they would be praying as well. We have never had so much prayer cover leaving Bangkok before! We checked in at the airport and were charged about $400 for the overweight charges. Since we have delivered Bibles to

Kunming for many years and only once had problems and that was with Hand Wind Tape Players, I fully expected that we would sail through Customs unhindered. Our contacts in Kunming have been asking for these Bibles for over a year so I was glad that we could help meet the need. Upon arriving in Kunming I was surprised to see the increased security as every person had to put their bags through the x-ray machine. There were more customs guards than I have ever seen before. I sensed that Forrest (78 year old grandfather) should go first with his 15 year old grandson following him. Normally older people are respected

and given more grace in Customs. This did not happen this time, as Forrest was immediately stopped and searched, Stephen was stopped next and then Steve and lastly myself. The Customs officials were visibly upset and proceeded to bring us into their office and made us remove all the Bibles. They then took out all my clothes and searched my personal bag. I had a small plastic bag in my hand with personal papers, cash and receipts. The Customs officer said to open the bag and I refused saying it was my personal belongings to which he said, "You have no personal items in China, we can search anything!" After seeing all of the Bibles confiscated, we discussed as a team what we should do. Since we have been hearing so much propaganda about China, that there is religious freedom in the country, and that the Chinese Government is printing millions of Bibles, we decided that we would stay in Customs until the Bibles were returned. The Customs officers refused to return them to us, so we refused to leave. I think this is something the Chinese government is not used to, having people stand up to them. They were confounded as to what to do with us, but after about an hour they asked us to leave their office and move to the lounge where they were couches and a television. I think they fully expected us to back down and leave. The team decided to fast so we only drank water for the first 20 hours while waiting in Customs. Our sleep was often interrupted, as Customs officers kept waking us up and telling us that we needed to leave the airport. They said we could apply to the Religious Affairs Office to petition them to get our Bibles back, a game the Chinese Government plays to try to appease foreigners. "The millions of Bibles printed by the state-permitted press in the last 25 years are not enough to replace worn out Bibles or to provide any Bibles for new converts. (Is your only Bible 25 years old?) According to these regulations, rural Christians are on a "20-year waiting list." Believers are willing to risk everything to obtain God's Word. They are unashamed of the gospel, the power of God for the salvation of all who believe (Romans1:16). They are willing to lay down their lives so they can share Christ with others. They encourage us to do the same." We repeatedly asked the officials to show us a copy of the law that they said we had broken. It took them almost eight hours to show us a copy of the law and then it was written in Mandarin. This law was approved on June 1, 2007 and stated that any foreigner coming to China is only allowed to bring one piece of religious material for their own personal use. If a foreigner brings more than one piece it must be preapproved by the Religious Affairs Office (they will never approve Bibles being carried in). Our goal in bringing Bibles has been to help the Underground Church in China which now numbers over 130 million people and is growing by more than 30,000 people daily. God used a man named Pastor Allen Yuan years ago to challenge my life and inspire me to help the Chinese Church. Pastor Allen had spent over 22 years of his life in prison for the cause of Jesus Christ and he said, "Please bring us Bibles-we are desperate for Bibles!" I made a promise to the Lord after Allen’s challenge, that I would do everything that I could to assist the Chinese Christians and bring as many

Bibles as we can to help them. Our intention was not to cause trouble, but rather to help the Chinese Christians, as we have been doing for over 20 years. We talked to a Chinese friend in the US who encouraged us to stand our ground and he e-mailed a press release to major news companies. We prayed that God would somehow use this situation to bring glory to His Name, and that the Truth about religious persecution of Christians would be brought out to the world. We were amazed at how God used this situation to cause a stir throughout the world. We received phone calls from all over the USA, The UK, New Zealand, Columbia, the major news networks and newspapers, and radio stations worldwide. We never expected that this would be called an "international event." Almost everyone was supportive and we were able to tell them why we were in China and refused to leave. We shared that our ordeal was minimal compared to what many of our brothers and sisters in China face every day because of their faith in Jesus Christ.

WE HAVE HEARD REPORTS THAT MANY PEOPLE WERE PRAYING FOR US, BUT EVEN BETTER THAT THEY ARE PRAYING FOR THE CHINESE CHRISTIANS AND ARE NOW AWARE OF THEIR PLIGHT. "The human rights record in China is one of the worst in the world. Its system of "re-education through labor" detains hundreds of thousands each year in work camps, without even a court hearing. Again in 2007, church property and Bibles were confiscated. Christians were harassed, questioned, arrested and imprisoned. More Christians are in prison or under detention in China than any other country. The house church movement (unregistered churches), which comprises approximately 90 percent of China's Christians, endures unimaginable persecution, yet stands on its commitment to preach the gospel, no matter the cost... Christians in prison are routinely beaten and abused." Voice of the Martyrs, Jan 2007. The US Embassy Staff in Beijing were unaware of this new law in China and offered to come to our aid. They called the Customs office and requested to see the law that they claimed that we broke. After interpreting the law into English, they told us that we had broken a law of China, and that Customs refused to return our Bibles to us while we were in China, but that we could get them back when we left the country. After 26 hours of intermittent sleep, tired and battle weary- we decided as a team to go to a hotel and get a decent meal, a hot shower and some sleep. The phone continued to ring for the next several days as we did more interviews with people all over the world who wanted to know what is really happening in China.

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We played tourists for the next two days, and when we returned to the airport, three hours early the Customs officials were waiting for us. They had been following us around for the last two days. I saw a man come out of our hotel room after searching it; he was surprised to run into me. A Chinese lady posed as a radio reporter called us twice and asked us leading questions to discover who our contacts are in China: she received no information. There were 10 Customs officials at the airport along with two video cameras and one still camera, but when we took out a camera, they threatened to take the camera away. We were given the Bibles back and watched constantly, and then escorted to Immigration by security so that we couldn't turn back We felt like we were being deported,. We felt like we were being treated as criminals - just for carrying in Bibles to a country which claims to have religious freedom. A couple years ago, I heard on the radio in the US a Chinese woman from the Three Self Patriotic Movement (The Chinese Government Church). She stated, "There are no Pastors in

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prison in China for their faith, there is no religious persecution in China, you can believe whatever you want and please don't bring us any more Bibles: we have enough Bibles!" I would rather believe a Chinese Pastor who spent more than 20 years in prison for his faith than some government puppet who lies and tells a compromised Church what it wants to believe. The True Church in America and around world needs to stand together and help each other and not put our heads in the sand and act like it's not our problem. The True Church will hear the call and go to prayer and will act on behalf of our persecuted brothers and sisters!

The True Church will hear the call and go to prayer and will act on behalf of our persecuted brothers and sisters!