A face full of tears and a dusty mountain road are the perfect recipe for a dirty face. The ending of a week full of cool mountain air, beautiful scenery and small villages full of your brothers and sisters receiving their very own copy of God’s Word is the perfect recipe to create that face full of tears and a lifetime of memories.
All I could think as we came down that dusty road for the last time was, “How am I going to explain everything I saw, heard and felt to the people back home?” And I don’t know if I ever will be able to capture our trip to China in a picture or story the way that we experienced it first hand, but as I think on all that happened, I can’t help but see some major themes stick out from the trip.
God Holds Our Lives In His Hand: We should have known that this would be a major theme on our trip but it started from the beginning. Seconds away from boarding the plane to Shanghai they threw an emergency halt to boarding (half the plane was already full). We found out that one of the wings was leaking fluid. Not only did God keep us from taking off on that plane but He also provided another plane about an hour later and the delay in Chicago rid us of a 2-hour wait in Shanghai. Throw in a road with sheer rock face on one side, a 500-ft drop on the other and a driver who admits to having lost sight of the road in the sun a few times–there was no doubt that God was protecting us and guiding us throughout the trip.
God Is Already Doing Something Amazing In China: God didn’t need us to do something amazing in China but He allowed us to be a part of what He is already doing in the Church there. One of the stories the pastors shared with us is that the areas we were in had a history of Christianity because in the 1930’s, a missionary couple had come to the region, and we were playing a part of a story God had started over 83 years ago (The missionaries were actually still buried on the hill opposite the last village we visited). The number of Christians in China grows daily, and it is a privilege to be able to be part of getting them their own copy of the Word of God.
The one thing that I wanted to bring back to us is the need to pray for our brothers and sisters in China. God has opened a lot of roads that were formerly closed for the Gospel to touch more and more hearts, but there is still a raging spiritual battle for the people in China (just like there is for the guy who lives next door), so please pray for them and continue to thank God for all He has done in China and all He will continue to do!