Report on China Trip (23-30, December 2017)
HeartCry missionaries Yi Cho and Rufus visited China to teach the Bible and proclaim the gospel among the Lahu churches people. Below is an overview of the trip (Ed.).
As we give you our report on our recent trip to China for which you supported, we give thanks to our God for his wonderful guidance through the whole trip. We also thank you for your prayer and financial support for the trip. By the Grace of God, the trip went very well and we have been encouraged by the result.
Our team (JN, CY, AP, PL) left on 23rd December 2017 and returned on 30th. This time we visited three new Lahu villages and had a day conference in each of them, as well as in the old villages we went last year. We split into 3 groups and went to 3 different areas.
We traveled around to different hilly Lahu villages. Chi and PL visited TaPaw and PaMai villages where there are 102 families including 30 Animist families. We were able to preach at PaMai village on 25th and at TaPaw on 26th. These are neighboring villages and we held a day’s conference at both places. Around 150 attended and we preached until the evening in TaPaw village. Among the people were pastors, church leaders, village leaders, nominal Christians and animists too. Sadly Christians there are completely ignorant of the biblical teaching about salvation by Grace and faith alone. Indifferent from animism, they looked like they are doing the church activities based on tradition rather than on the Bible.
In TaPaw in the evening, many animists came here. Christians were present in day time and more animists came in the evening. Starting from the very beginning, the Creation and the Fall, we preached the Gospel of Grace and Faith which was for many of them for the first time to hear about. We had people from other villages who invited us to visit their village and preach the message they heard to the churches there too. Given very limited time, we were unable to visit more. It was very sad to see that many church leaders, even pastors do not understand and biblical doctrines of grace and faith alone and the work of Christ for salvation. They only understand the idea that good works lead to good place, which is exactly what animists believed.
JN remained in HuKhu village where there are 70 Christian families both upper and lower villages. He taught 2 days in church and preached about 8 times at family gatherings, where villagers joined together at a certain home in turn
Pastor AP visited MeuK’aw where the chief of religious affairs in the area lives. He met the chief and discuss about possible pastoral conference in near future. Also did he preach at 3 home gatherings. This was how it was to be done there instead of mass gatherings at a certain place for many days. Therefore, we requested their assistance in future for gathering pastors and church leaders only with authority’s permission. That’s what we expected last year too. And we still hope it will happen in near future.
Overall, we do give thanks to the Lord for what he has done through our preaching on this trip. A man from MeuK’aw has come to MBTC this year for training, although he has completed his theological study at a Chinese bible school. We visited 5 villages and preach the Gospel to around 500 people from over 200 families both nominal Christians and animists.
The very good news is that one of the churches we visited last year, lower HuKhu, is growing in the knowledge of salvation by Grace and faith alone. They are progressing in their understanding of biblical doctrines on salvation, the person and work of Christ and Christian life.
Although training pastors and church leaders would be ideal, this type of visit and preaching at different locations serves the greatest purpose of the Gospel, everyone hear the gospel from us directly. If their local church leaders preached it, they could still present it in different ways at this point. Finally, it was a gresat trip and we enjoyed it and did our best. We believe that our message is the power to those who believe. Thank you!
Yi Cho (January 2018)
