I was in the middle of The Heavenly Man, a book about the remarkable true story of Brother Yun, a Chinese man who has been terribly persecuted and tortured by the Chinese government for his faith. It is a book that contains miracles, heart break, and radical faith; stories that will send chills through your bones and a book I believe every Christian must read.
“The world can do nothing to a Christian who has no fear of man.” Brother Yun states shortly after being tortured and imprisoned for many years.
And then that knock came, a pounding at 11PM on our small Tibetan Hotel room door. The three of us women worriedly glancing at each other, “who would come pounding this late?”
Ashley quickly jumped out of bed and opened the door to find our hotel owner standing frantically outside, ushering us to go with him…..
Coming to China, we were told that being a Missionary was illegal. Having more than one bible was illegal. Saying Christian words in public was illegal. Words such as Jesus, Bible, and Missionary were no longer allowed to come out of our mouths. Even our hotel rooms were not safe. They advised us to hide our bibles and create code words if we wanted to talk about Jesus.
We were also required to take down our Facebook pages. Communication home was cut; no talking to our families or friends for an entire month.
So you can imagine that when a man started pounding on our hotel room at 11PM at we were nervous.
Having no translator and only broken English to work with, we somehow managed to discover that the man at the door wanted, insisted, that we follow him. The police were involved.
Not knowing what else to do and with his back turned; we shoved our bibles under our clothes and quickly proceeded to follow him.
I wish I could say I still had “no fear of man” but that was not the case. Images of the torture I had been reading about raced through my mind. Could I still proclaim the name of Jesus if they were torturing me? Would I defend my faith up to the point of death?
As we were being led up a back staircase to an unknown destination and for an unknown reason, I wasn’t so sure. I wanted to see my family again, I wanted to get married one day, I wanted to have kids, I didn’t want my life to end in this unknown location of China. My family and friends didn’t even know where I was; how would anyone find us?
For millions living in China today, they have indeed said yes to Jesus. They have given up everything to follow Him. Some of the young adults we met had been exiled by both their families and their country. They were left with absolutely nothing except their faith in Jesus, and for them that was enough.
So today I ask myself and I ask you…Do our lives reflect this radical faith, is it apparent that for us, Jesus is Enough?
