Outpourings of gratitude
from rural Chinese Christians

The China Christian Council, with the support of the United Bible Societies, sends free Scriptures on request to Christians in poor rural churches who are unable to afford them. Below are extracts from some of the many letters of thanks received from rural Christians.

l “I am Brother Wang from a church in Yunnan Province. We would like to thank you for the Scripture gifts. When we received the delivery note from the post office for the free Bibles that had come from thousands of miles away to this poor region of ours, we shed tears of joy. Our village is located in a poor and mountainous region and the roads are not good. We took a horse cart to the post office, which is 70 km away, to collect the Bibles and this is why we have taken so long to send this letter.

“The night after we arrived in the village with the new Bibles, we were so filled with joy that we could not sleep. The news spread to neighbouring villages and the next day Christians came from all over to find out if it was true. Some elderly Christians told the story of how the Gospel of Jesus first came to this village, and shared about how they had continued to experience God’s grace throughout times of suffering. That day, God’s love was again in evidence in the gift of the Bibles.

“We thank God for his marvellous work! We have received the free Bibles you sent us. When some of the Christian brothers and sisters carried their Bibles home, some could not believe that what had happened was real. We thank God for letting them see something that they never thought would happen.

“‘In this age, people pursue fame, wealth and power but Christians do not seek this,’ said one of the new converts. ‘They just want Bibles. The way they love one another is stronger than brotherly love.’”

l “We are a group of Miao Christians living in a cold remote mountain area in Guizhou Province. There are few sources of income here and many people have been forced to leave the area to find jobs to support their families. We are a new church and we prayed to God and wrote to you hoping you could help us by sending us some Bibles and other Christian books.

Miao people of the new church testified that the gift of 80 Bibles from the China Christian Council was an answer to prayer“God listened to our prayers. Thank you for acting so promptly by sending 80 Bibles to us. Each Christian family now has a Bible and this has renewed their faith and caused seven other families to become Christians. These families repeatedly thank God for his mighty act.

“Together we decided to collect money to offer you a token of our gratitude. People offered what they could and we used the money to take a photograph of us all and make two traditional Miao costumes to send to you. We hope you will take a photograph of your staff and send it to us so that we can see you even though we are thousands of miles apart.” (WR 361/20 - 7/8.01) [PHOTOS]