10 million Bibles Reach Chinese Christians
It is no secret that China is not the most welcoming place for Christians. With the recent crackdown on Chinese house churches and the tearing down of crosses on Christian facilities, many are looking for signs of hope.
Now comes news that Asia Harvest, a church-planting ministry in the region, has reached its goal of delivering 10 million Bibles to the communist nation.
"With great thanksgiving to God, I commend Asia Harvest and all of their supporters as they celebrate 10 million Bibles provided to the Church in China," China Harvest Director Gary Russell said in a statement.
The mission to deliver Bibles began in 1988 when Paul and Joy Hattaway say God told them to smuggle Bibles into Mainland China.
"In the 12 years from 1988 to 2000, the teams we hosted carried a total of around 174,000 Bibles into China. Then in 2000 a door opened for us to work with house church networks to discreetly print Bibles directly inside the country," Asia Harvest reports.
The ministry says the accomplishment is nothing short of supernatural.
"This hasn't been a human accomplishment, but a miracle from the Living God," ministry leaders says in an online newsletter. "From a human perspective, our ministry had no chance of producing significant numbers of Bibles....The Lord Jesus Himself decided to be our fundraiser."
Support from around the world poured in, resulting in millions of Bibles being printed and delivered across communist China.
"Instead of connecting us with a few large donors, the Lord chose to link us together with hundreds of normal believer throughout the world," the ministry said.
Ministry leader see this as an example of the amazing things that happen when God's people come together for the gospel. While the surpassing of the 10 million Bibles goal is something to celebrate, there is still much to be done.
"China is a huge nation, and while we are thankful that millions now have access to Bibles, we grieve that many millions of believers are still unable to access God's Word -- not counting the hundreds of millions of potential seekers," Russell wrote.
Asia Harvest is pledging to continue to print and distribute Bibles until every person in China has a Bible in their hand.
