Welcome to the “Prison Pulpit” on the China Compass podcast! I'm your China travel guide, Missionary Ben. Follow me on X (@chinaadventures) where I share, among other things, daily reminders to pray for China. Also, feel free to email any questions or comments to bfwesten at gmail dot com. And last but not least, learn more about (most of) our strategic prayer and missions projects @ PrayGiveGo.us!

The Prison Pulpit

As I’ve stated all year, the goal of the Prison Pulpit series is to remind people to pray for persecuted believers as Hebrews 13:3 teaches us to do: “Remember those who are in prison, as bound with them.”

As I am recording this podcast, we have just passed the 7th anniversary of the attack and forced closure of Early Rain Church in Chengdu, China, and the arrest of Pastor Wang Yi, on December 9th, 2018.

A couple weeks ago I read the Wang Yi family newsletter that was published just 12 days before his arrest on Dec 9, 2018. Last week I shared a few updates that were put out by unnamed Early Rain Church members in the aftermath of the attack and arrest of the pastor and most of the leadership. 

As one of last week's updates reminded us, there was no guarantee that the next update would ever come. Arrests were ongoing and, for lack of a better phrase, church leaders were falling like flies. However, in spite of all this, more updates did follow, and I want to share some of them with you now:

Early Rain Urgent Prayer Update #10 (12/12/18)

May the Lord give us love for souls. These law enforcement officers greatly need the gospel of Christ. They have greatly sinned against God. We need to pray for them, for we were once like them.

May the Lord himself speak words of comfort to us, for he has given his life for us. We suffer with those brothers and sisters who suffer as though imprisoned with them. May God make peace like a river flow through our hearts… Please strengthen your resolve, brothers and sisters. Experience in the midst of every kind of tribulation and danger the filling of the Holy Spirit and the renewal of your lives.

Early Rain Urgent Prayer Update (12/15/18)

According to some testimonies of brothers and sisters that have emerged, they have been sharing the gospel while under guard. They have been using their suffering as a beautiful testimony for the Lord. Some police officers and workers have been very interested in the gospel, even giving their addresses and asking for Bibles. May the Lord choose for himself children from among these law enforcement officers persecuting the church.

Another encouraging testimony from a church member who was just released from 10 days of detention...

“It is like a monastery in there. I cultivated myself for ten days there. Thank God for his protection. I often shared the gospel in there. There was a Tibetan named Z who really wanted to hear preaching, to join a small group, and to become a Christian. There was also a master’s student who has been quite miserable since entering [the detention center]. He wanted to buy a Bible, and I told him I would give him one. He also wanted to attend a small group Bible study. There was also another person who used to belong to a traditional house church but who stumbled because of marriage problems. I am preparing to give him one of our church’s thumb drives so he can listen to preaching.

Please keep praying for the nearly 20 brothers and sisters at the detention center and for Yingxu and Shuqi, about whom we still have no information. And pray for the others, as well, because we don’t know how they are doing now. It is a high-level detention center, and it is quite strict; but from another perspective, the despair of the prisoners inside is also quite high, making evangelizing more fruitful. Thank the Lord!”

Lord, the greatest freedom in the world is the freedom of becoming your children. You say that we will know the truth, and the truth will set us free. May your Spirit fill us and make us to worship freely, to enter prison freely, to spread the gospel freely. Give us free and noble hearts. Turn us into liberated criminals willing to be detained by the world. For a servant is not greater than his master. If they persecuted you, they will persecute us.

We also ask you to forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing. Open their eyes to see your glory and turn them into free children!

In the cross, in the cross / Be my glory ever / All our sins are washed away / Only by His blood.

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