Chinese pastors’ letter becomes 4,400-signature petition

Posted on October 10, 2020 by Pastor Foley

Voice of the Martyrs Korea sent the Chinese Embassy in Seoul a copy of a letter originally written and signed by 439 Chinese pastors, with one addition: 28 pages of signatures from 4,400 Christians from Korea and around the world showing their support and concern for the pastors.

The signatures were gathered through an online petition website set up by Voice of the Martyrs Korea, www.chinadeclaration.com. The website shared the original Chinese document, along with translations of the document into Korean, English, and Russian. It invited Christians around the world to add their signatures in solidarity with the original signors, 439 pastors from across China. The signatures were collected over the past year.

In September 2019, 439 Chinese pastors published a document entitled, “A Joint Statement by Pastors: A Declaration for the Sake of the Christian Faith”. It was written by Wang Yi, the pastor of Early Rain Church in Chengdu who was later arrested along with more than one hundred members of his church. Pastor Wang remains imprisoned, and many of the other pastors who signed the document are now facing similarly serious difficulties. We set up www.chinadeclaration.com to give Christians around the world the opportunity to show the Chinese government that we stand with these pastors and will continue to closely monitor and publicize how they are treated.

More than 4,400 Christians signed the petition—that’s more than 10 Christians for every Chinese pastor who originally signed the document.

The joint statement published by the pastors contains four declarations:

1.            Christian churches in China believe unconditionally that the Bible is the Word and Revelation of God. It is the source and final authority of all righteousness, ethics, and salvation.

2.            Christian churches in China are eager and determined to walk the path of the cross of Christ and are more than willing to imitate the older generation of saints who suffered and were martyred for their faith.

3.            Christian churches in China are willing to obey authorities in China whom God has appointed and to respect the government’s authority to govern society and human conduct.

4.            All true churches in China that belong to Christ must hold to the principle of the separation of church and state and must proclaim Christ as the sole head of the church.

In addition to the declaration and the 4,400 signatures, Voice of the Martyrs Korea sent a cover letter in Chinese. A translation follows:

Dear Honorable Ambassador,

Herewith please find attached a petition consisting of 4,400 signatures from Christians in Korea and around the world, to be added to the signatures of the 439 Chinese pastors who authored ‘A Joint Statement by Pastors: A Declaration for the Sake of the Christian Faith’, which was originally published for your government’s consideration in September 2019.

These 439 Chinese pastors are members of the one body of Christ which extends around the world and across history. As members of the same body, the 4,400 signors of the attached petition do hereby signal our intent to continue to monitor closely the treatment of your government toward the pastors who originally authored this declaration.

We implore you to remember that as you treat them, you are thus treating the Jesus Christ himself, the Lord of heaven and earth, and the one authority before whom every knee will one day bow.

Be reconciled to God and to his servants, including the 439 Chinese pastors who authored this declaration. They remain your faithful servants for Christ’s sake. They also remain beloved members of the Christian body around the world. On their behalf we will be diligent to update the leaders and fellow citizens of our countries—from South Korea to Russia, from the USA to Europe, from Chile to Cameroon—on your treatment of each of them.

With prayers for you as commanded by Christ,

The Voice of the Martyrs Korea

Individuals interested in learning more about Voice of the Martyrs Korea’s work in partnership with the house church Christians of China can visit https://vomkorea.com/en/china/.

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An uncrucified body is a lowly body

Posted on October 6, 2020 by Pastor Foley

I had a very interesting experience last year. We have a cross hanging on one wall of our apartment. It is a rather nondescript wooden one that came from a Christian bookstore, as I recall. It is not large, less than a foot tall. It is not even very attractive. Not unattractive either. Just your standard issue retail cross.

On a particularly difficult morning in a particularly difficult stretch of time that comes from time to time in our line of work, I was in Dr. Foley’s and my apartment alone one day. Tears and sobs had finally come to me in great number, and I felt close to passing out due to the dizziness they induced. I had been sitting on our couch, but I got up and went to the cross. I grabbed the left side of the tiny crossbeam with my left hand and the right side of the tiny crossbeam with my right hand. And I let go of all my weight. It was obvious to me–axiomatic, really–that the cross would merely come off the small nail on which it was hanging, and I would crash down to the floor, with the cross likely bouncing off the top of my head. But instead, the cross held. In our lives, it is the only thing that has held.

In life, there is the cross and there is everything else. The cross is the wisdom and power of God. It is not merely one expression–or even the best expression–of that wisdom and power; it simply IS the wisdom and power of God, in totality. The cross is not God’s response to human sin. It is not God’s response to anything. It is God’s nature. It is wisdom and power, in the rawest form and also in the most refined.

On the cross it is the self-saving life which ends. The laying-down life of the righteous God triumphs over it. Christ’s victory is not a victory over the cross. It is the victory of the cross. On the cross, self-saving life is put to death, and the way is opened for humans to live from now on by Christ’s laying-down life. Thus, we should not anticipate eternal life as a kind of post-war period where we may safely and comfortably resume our quest for self-fulfillment, now that sin, death, shame, and Satan have been defeated.

On the cross, our self-saving life was defeated just as fully as sin, death, shame, and Satan were defeated. Our self-saving life had always conspired with these principalities and powers against the Lord. On the cross, that conspiracy was permanently defeated.

Christ does not toss aside the cross when he exits the open tomb, like handcuffs discarded by a freed prisoner. Instead, the cross is revealed to be the outward expression of God’s innermost nature. That nature is the same yesterday, today, and forever. It does not change during Christ’s death on the cross or at his resurrection or when he will return in glory.

Likewise, we ourselves will not toss aside the cross when we die or when Christ returns. Instead, what will be revealed then is that we have been made like him. The external cross we bore will no longer be needed, not because it has been overcome but because we have been overcome by it and now our hearts perfectly bear its imprint. God’s promise to give us new hearts will be fulfilled. Our new hearts will be cross-shaped.

Shame will end. Suffering will end. Opposition to Christ will end. But the cross will not end; it will be fulfilled, like all of God’s promises. The cross will end as an outward tool, but only because it will have accomplished its full work of circumcising our hearts.

When Christ is resurrected, he bears forever the marks of his crucifixion on his hands and his side. He no longer carries the cross because now he embodies it, i.e., it is imprinted on his resurrected human body. The same will be true for us in our resurrected bodies. As Paul writes in Philippians 3:21, “The Lord Jesus Christ . . . will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body.” An uncrucified body is a lowly body; the Lord’s body is glorious because it forever bears the imprints of his crucifixion, the external manifestation of his nature.

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Martyrs: Not bold or noble, but foolish and weak

Posted on September 22, 2020 by Pastor Foley

The way of the cross is the essential context for a biblical understanding of martyrdom. We wrongly associate martyrdom with bold and noble action on the part of the martyr: We think of the martyr as enduring persecution and torture, defending the faith, giving his life for Christ. This sounds praiseworthy and causes us to honor the martyr for his self-sacrifice. We imagine Christ appreciatively acknowledging the martyr as the martyr enters heaven triumphantly, with Christ proclaiming, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”[i]

In scripture, however, the emphasis in martyrdom is not on the martyr’s action but God’s. The martyr is not portrayed as standing up for God or defending the faith, because neither God nor the faith needs to be defended. Instead, the martyr is made a martyr by placing his life in God’s hands. The martyr’s only hope in life and death is that God will act according to God’s promises. This means that the martyr will often appear passive, not active, from the standpoint of the world. The martyr’s actions may even appear cowardly, not noble, according to the world’s standards. With patient endurance, the martyr awaits deliverance at God’s hands, in God’s way, according to God’s promises. Because God’s promises are often hidden under the opposite, the martyr is left to look weak and foolish in the eyes of all observers. As the Apostle Paul wrote, “For it seems to me that God has displayed us apostles at the end of the procession, like prisoners appointed for death. We have become a spectacle to the whole world, to angels as well as to men. We are fools for Christ, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are honored, but we are dishonored.”[ii]

Jesus is the exemplar. On the way to the cross he looks weak and powerless in the eyes of observers, even his followers. He does not look noble. He looks foolish. The gospel writers do not hide this, nor do they emphasize Christ’s heroic endurance. Instead, they emphasize his trust in his Father. The gospel writers show him living out the words of Isaiah 53:7: “He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth.” He does not struggle with his persecutors but with his Father. We overhear him in Luke 22:42 saying to his Father, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.” On the cross he addresses his Father, not his followers, when he asks, “Why have you forsaken me?” He understands his followers’ absence but not his Father’s. Yet even his final words are words of trust: “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.”[iii]

In the same way, the martyr commits his spirit into God’s hands, trusting in God’s promises over the forces that futilely seek to overpower us each moment. Christ does not praise martyrs for boldness or sacrifice on his behalf. He commends our simple trust in him.

Martyrdom is thus not bold action for God but rather simple trust in God and his promises. We do not sacrifice ourselves for Christ. Christ prepares us as a sacrifice. Paul writes in Romans 8:36, “As it is written: ‘For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.’” Paul is not complaining. He does not mean that we are badly outnumbered and outmanned by our enemies. Rather, like sheep, our purpose is to be slaughtered. The slaughter is not a tragedy but the purpose for which sheep are born and raised. Christ, the good shepherd, oversees the process from start to finish. He knows the right time for our sacrifice. He determines when and how, and who participates. No part of it happens without his command, consent, and control.

That is why in Romans 12:1, Paul does not urge us to sacrifice ourselves for Christ but instead to present ourselves for sacrifice. To whom are we presenting ourselves? To Christ, who is the one who prepares us for sacrifice, and who prepares others, even our persecutors, for their role in the process. The Father used many people to participate in the sacrifice of Christ on the cross. In the same way, Christ uses many people to participate in us being sacrificed. But ultimately, just as all things concerning Christ’s death were in the hands of the Father, all things concerning our death are in the hands of Christ. The life that is sacrificed in us is his, not our own. Our own life was put to death for sin on the cross, slain by his word. Now it is his laid-down life that lives in us, and it lives for the purpose of being laid-down again and again. When it is laid down through us, it is not a sacrifice for sin. As the writer of Hebrews tells us, Christ’s sacrifice for sin was “once for all”.[iv] But sacrifice is not only for sin. It is for praise,[v] for doing good and sharing with others,[vi] and for sharing in his holiness.[vii] These sacrifices will never end. They are pleasing to God.[viii]  The Apostle Paul says that when we present ourselves to Christ to be used by him as this kind of living sacrifice, God is well-pleased.[ix]

John 3:16 declares that the Father loves the world and thus gives his Son. The Son does not sacrifice himself for the world. He places himself in the Father’s hands, so that the Father may use him as the Father sees fit. In the same way, the Son loves the world and gives his church. The church does not sacrifice itself, whether for Christ or the world. The church simply places itself in the Son’s hands, for the Son to use as he sees fit. The martyr’s role is not to sacrifice himself but to trust in the promises of God. It is up to God, not us, to determine the meaning and purpose of each moment of our lives. This is why, as John notes, “what we will be has not yet been revealed. We know that when Christ appears, we will be like Him, for we will see Him as He is.”[x]  Our role is to place ourselves in God’s hands by trusting in his promises, no matter the cost.

In 1563, a book was published that went on to become the most popular book on martyrdom in Christian history. John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments of the Christian Church (commonly called “Foxe’s Book of Martyrs”) tells the stories of martyrs from the beginning of Christianity on up to Foxe’s present time. The book is extraordinary for many reasons. Perhaps what is most extraordinary is how ordinary the martyrs are. In previous books of martyrs, martyrs are portrayed as possessing supernatural strength of both body and soul. They taunt their persecutors and laugh as their bodies are burned. But in Foxe’s book, nearly all the martyrs whose stories are told are very ordinary laypeople living very ordinary Christian lives. They are apprehended and interrogated for simple acts of faithfulness, like reading the Bible and praying the Lord’s Prayer in English. As they face interrogation and torture, they at times even show weakness.

Over the past 18 years, we have had 36 members of our Voice of the Martyrs Korea team whose lives have ended in martyrdom. These 36 were not our boldest preachers. They were not known for their self-control or pain tolerance. They were not especially altruistic or self-sacrificing. They were certainly not our most astute theologians. But what they did have in common was a notable awareness of their own weaknesses. They were not simply humble; they were openly suspicious of themselves. Thus, they were quick to turn outside of themselves and to depend on God, even in little things. Having been suspicious of themselves in little things, it was natural for them to be suspicious of themselves in big things and to trust God instead of themselves in those moments also. In other words, they were martyred long before they laid their bodies down the final time.

[i] Cf.  Matthew 25:23.

[ii] 1 Corinthians 4:9-10.

[iii] Luke 23:46.

[iv] Cf. Hebrews 10:10.

[v] Cf. Hebrews 13:15.

[vi] Cf. Hebrews 13:16.

[vii] Cf.  Hebrews 12:10.

[viii] Cf. Hebrews 13:16.

[ix] Cf. Romans 12:2.

[x] 1 John 3:2.

[xi] Woolf, 1995, pp. 249-250.

[xii] Ibid, p. 255.

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