{"id":4685,"date":"2014-06-18T09:20:52","date_gmt":"2014-06-18T16:20:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/?p=4685"},"modified":"2014-06-18T10:06:32","modified_gmt":"2014-06-18T17:06:32","slug":"china-house-church-in-the-21st-century","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/?p=4685","title":{"rendered":"CHINA: House Church in the 21st Century"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Source: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.commissionstories.com\/asia\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-cke-saved-href=\"http:\/\/www.commissionstories.com\/asia\/\">Asia Stories<\/a>, June 8, 2014<\/p>\n<p>The house church in China is growing rapidly in the midst of the changing tides of the nation. \u201cLiu Qiang\u201d remembers 12 years ago bicycling past churches in the countryside. Believers met behind boarded up doors and windows.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cObviously they are doing something bad if they are having to close up everything,\u201d Liu recalls thinking as a teenager.\u00a0After Liu became a Christian he learned why the house churches\u2019 secrecy was protection. He is now a house church pastor himself.<\/p>\n<p>Times have changed, Liu said. There\u2019s a chalkboard in front of his home where his house church meets\u2014an open invitation to their neighbors to worship Jehovah. Freedoms, at least in some areas of the nation, have grown.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cZhao Jun,\u201d a pastor and church planter, says the house church is still persecuted in many areas of China, but some provinces have a little more breathing room.\u00a0Zhao said the faithfulness of Christians under persecution has touched government officials. It\u2019s a good testimony, Zhao believes, for the government to see the church\u2019s perseverance.<\/p>\n<p>Thirty years ago, Liu says, believers had to be careful about bringing out a Bible in public. Christians in this province now buy Bibles in the Three-Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM) church\u2019s bookstore.<\/p>\n<p>\u00bb <a href=\"http:\/\/www.commissionstories.com\/asia\/stories\/view\/baptisms-in-factories-and-using-smart-phones-meet-the-21st-century-chinese\" data-cke-saved-href=\"http:\/\/www.commissionstories.com\/asia\/stories\/view\/baptisms-in-factories-and-using-smart-phones-meet-the-21st-century-chinese\">See full story with pictures<\/a>. Also read <a href=\"http:\/\/www.christianpost.com\/news\/panel-looks-at-christianitys-rapid-growth-in-china-despite-persecution-120850\/\" data-cke-saved-href=\"http:\/\/www.christianpost.com\/news\/panel-looks-at-christianitys-rapid-growth-in-china-despite-persecution-120850\/\">Panel Looks at Christianity&#8217;s Rapid Growth in China Despite Persecution<\/a> (Christian Post), or better yet and listen to the three-hour <a href=\"http:\/\/www.brookings.edu\/events\/2014\/06\/03-christianity-as-a-force-for-change-in-china\" data-cke-saved-href=\"http:\/\/www.brookings.edu\/events\/2014\/06\/03-christianity-as-a-force-for-change-in-china\">panel discussion<\/a> (Brookings Institute).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Source: Asia Stories, June 8, 2014 The house church in China is growing rapidly in the midst of the changing tides of the nation. \u201cLiu Qiang\u201d remembers 12 years ago bicycling past churches in the countryside. Believers met behind boarded up doors and windows. \u201cObviously they are doing something bad if they are having to &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/?p=4685\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">CHINA: House Church in the 21st Century<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-briefs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4685","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4685"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4685\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4700,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4685\/revisions\/4700"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}