China (MNN) — “If you really want to be a rebel…read your Bible…because no one is doing that,” says Washington Pastor Mark Driscoll.
It may sound odd, but it’s true. Wendell Rovenstine, President of Bibles for China, explains, “We’re living in a community where we are not too prone to pick up God’s Word or let the Word be our standard. But we’re seeing just the opposite in China.”
And why China? In 1949 when the Chinese government began confiscating individuals’ Bibles, it followed that many Chinese Christians started to take their faith more seriously and radically under pressure.
“If someone knocks at my door and says, ‘Can we see your Bibles? We need to take those,’ I think they’d be a little hard-pressed,” says Rovenstine. “In this community, if every Bible were removed, all of a sudden there would be a spiritual awakening within our community. If you tell me that you’re taking God’s Word from me, then I’m going to be adamant that I’m going to serve the Lord.”
With China’s population of 1.3 billion people, thousands of Chinese Christians hunger for God’s Word. But they can’t always get their hands on a Bible, often due to limited access or not enough money; the average rural Chinese earns $100 per year.
That’s why Bible for China works within China’s legal guidelines to get as many Bibles as they can to rural Christians there. They have three Bible distributions in rural China planned for 2013, and at each distribution they typically hand out 10,000-15,000 Bibles.
Even so, Rovenstine estimates that around 50-80 million Chinese Christians are still waiting to get their hands on a Bible.
“To show up and be one of the persons who can give them a Bible and see the emotion that they’re overcome with is something beyond compare,” says Rovenstine. “When someone in China gets a Bible, they do not just lay it down. They carry it with joy, and they share it with those they come in contact with.”
Bibles for China’s next Bible distribution will take place in February 2013; they already have funds designated for those Bibles. Two more distributions for 2013 are scheduled to take place in May and November.
But they need help. Every Bible costs $5 to be printed, stored, and distributed to a Chinese Christian. For every $5 donated to Bibles for China, an anonymous donor matches dollar-for-dollar. So a donation of just $5 turns into two Bibles in the hands of Chinese believers. A contribution of $100 blesses 40 Christians in China with God’s Word.
Especially in the Christmas season, what better gift to give than God’s promise of hope through Scripture? Click here to donate.
