The Search for Awakening

The Bible speaks frequently about our dependence on God's strength when we encounter adversity.  An example is found in 1st Peter 4:
12Beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened to you;13but rejoice to the extent that you partake of Christ's sufferings, that when His glory is revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy.14If you are reproached for the name of Christ, blessed are you, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. On their part He is blasphemed, but on your part He is glorified.

This is a great passage that shows us the attitude that we can possess when we are facing trials in our lives. The challenges will come, but we can know that God is desiring to do a greater work - to develop His nature in us and to produce glory for Himself.   Even though things might be tough, He gives us the capacity to rejoice.  We can be confident that as we walk with Him in His Spirit, we can know that He is actively producing fruit in our lives.

The apostle Paul was transformed internally by the presence of Jesus, but externally he went from being the persecutor to being the persecuted.  But he loved Jesus so much and he kept his focus on Him. We read in 2nd Corinthians chapter 4:
8We are hard pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair;9persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed--10always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.

This week, the commemoration of seminal event in world history is taking place, in addition to the the anniversary of D-Day, which is coming up tomorrow.   It was 25 years ago when quite a contrasting event occurred in Beijing, China, when a large group of student protestors gathered in Tiananmen Square and were confronted with violence.

This significant date causes me to think about the spiritual journey of Bob Fu, the Founder and President of China Aid and the author of a gripping book called, God's Double Agent.  Fu is involved in helping to provide assistance and even rescue for Chinese people who have found themselves at odds with the oppressive government there.  He is perhaps best known for orchestrating the rescue of blind Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng a few years ago.

Melanie Kirkpatrick, who was on The Meeting House recently, reviewed the book for Christianity Today last year, and wrote this:

China is not the most dangerous place in the world to be a Christian, but, as God's Double Agent chillingly describes, Chinese Christians must live out their faith in a hostile environment. Beijing does not ban Christianity outright. Instead, it seeks to control it. It does so by various means, including channeling worshippers into official, government-sponsored churches; banning the printing of Bibles; limiting church-based social services; and monitoring the activities of religious leaders. Christians go to jail for distributing religious materials, founding unlicensed house churches, opposing abortion, criticizing the government, and other perceived transgressions.

Count Bob Fu guilty of all such "crimes." As Mr. Fu recounts in God's Double Agent, he and his wife Heidi fled China for the U.S. in 1997 after being tipped off that the police were planning to arrest them. They had already spent time in prison for their illegal religious activities and were not eager to repeat the experience.

She writes that...

Mr. Fu became a Christian shortly after the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989, when government tanks rolled over student protestors. He was a college student at the time and had taken part in the pro-democracy rallies in Beijing. "Those tanks didn't force China's brightest and most culturally engaged students back into conformity," he writes. "The tanks set them on a course to find truth." A friend gave him a biography of a Chinese intellectual, Xi Shengmo, who converted to Christianity and performed good works.

Mr. Fu quickly learned the necessity of being discreet about his new faith.

In the review, Melanie Kirkpatrick relates the event that Bob Fu calls his "spiritual Tiananmen":

In Beijing, he and Heidi attended a government-approved church until the authorities removed the popular pastor, who had been successful in growing the congregation. The Fus showed up at church one Sunday and found that the religious affairs bureau had installed a new pastor in the pulpit and undercover police agents in the pews. The new pastor "didn't even mention Jesus," he recalls.

He concluded that, "the 'ultimate lord' of the government-run church is communism" and "God had no place in it."

I was drawn to the statement by Bob Fu that the government's response to Tiananmen actually did not set student on a course of silence - he said, "The tanks set them on a course to find truth."

In America, even though we are seeing what I believe to be increasing instances of restrictions on religious freedom, we are not - yet - finding ourselves staring into the end of a rifle or a tank.  But, in light of the promise of Scripture that those who desire to live godly will encounter persecution, we have to ask ourselves if we are prepared for it.   Does or would resistance drive us to silence or does it motivate us to speak out with a greater devotion to Christ?   I think it's important to examine our lives and see if we would really be ready to stand in the face of opposition with a bold witness for Christ.

In the midst of our trials, I hope we would be motivated to search more deeply for truth.  We cannot allow our trials to defeat us and force us into despondency - we must allow the Holy Spirit to do His perfect work in our lives.  God has an intended work through adversity, and even though we may not understand it, that should not keep us from willingly submitting to whatever He wants to do in us to bring forth Godly character.    There may be hard times, but we can know there is One who walks with us.