The Year of the Tiger and the Gospel

I have been thinking about the Chinese people a lot lately. This week with Chinese New Year, and over the past several weeks as I have been reading about the RPCNA mission in China (1886-c.1949)

My prayer is that the Lord would open the doors (Hoi Moon) to once again allow the Gospel to flourish in China. You see, my desire is not 'that we would see people converted in China', although I do desire to see converts. My prayer is that we SEE those converted in China. I believe that the Lord has been busy in China for many generations- and that we will see the fruit of that work. Someday the doors will be open again, and the light of the Gospel will shine with radiance as the sun of righteousness rises!

As I reflect on the year of the Tiger- I pray that the Gospel would go forth in the strength and beauty of the tiger. Even in the early 1900s, the beauty of Chinese Reformed Presbyterians was being seen. Beginning with one woman in her 70s- and from there flourishing as a mission. Hear this account of the first celebration of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper at the Chinese RP Mission:

July 6, 1902

As our Psalter is incomplete in Chinese we used the twenty-third psalm in going to the table and leaving it. As there was no session and no assistant, some forethought was necessary in planning, but all was done decently and in order. The observers were quiet and attentive, and we knew we were not alone. We find great comfort in the manifest growth of our one convert... Sabbath morning she said people were asking her why we were having a three day memorial service! Some time ago I gave her a little prayer to be used in asking a blessing at her meals. She eats alone at home, and evidently does not know that where numbers are eating together one asks the blessing for all, and so on yesterday when the bread was being passed to her, she closed her eyes and audibly repeated her little prayer, then broke off the bread and passed it. It is the first time I have heard a Chinese woman utter prayer in public , and her courage in doing what she thought her duty in the presence of so many others, was to us a very beautiful thing. (Hoi Moon)

It must have been a beautiful thing to see the first convert of the RP mission in China. May this year of the Tiger bring many new converts and many praises and blessings to Jesus Christ! May he throw open the doors of that wonderful country so that the Church of Christ may see her brothers and sisters who have suffered so much in the past generations!