The Present Need for Bibles in China

Imagine not having enough Bibles in your church. Think of how your life would be different if you and your family could not obtain a one of any kind. What if there was a new convert and you had no Bible to give him? As we all know, the Scriptures are critical to a person’s spiritual growth. Without it, our relationship with the Creator will not be able to progress.

Sadly, the picture painted above is not a simple flight of imagination. This is a reality for millions of Christians throughout China. Multitudes do not have the chance to ever receive the Bible. Many have waited and will continue to wait for years to own their first page of Scripture.

Up until Communism gripped the country in October 1949, the Chinese had been able to practice their faith and print Bibles, for the most part, without much opposition from the government. This all radically changed with the founding of the Republic of China. Over one hundred thousand missionaries were forced from the country, Christians were persecuted, and their Bibles burned. Christianity was, in the mind of the government, no more. For thirty years, missionaries were kept out of China, and the church went into hiding.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the bamboo curtain began to come down. Christians in the West found out that, after three decades of silence, the Church in China was still alive. Millions were still worshipping God in underground churches. However, there was an incredible lack of copies of the Bible. For years the people had been starved of God’s Word and an untold number was desperately needed to fill this void. As a result, millions were smuggled into the country. Finally, in 1986, the government allowed the opening of Amity Press for Bible printing. Unfortunately, almost all of these were, and still are, made available only to the government approved churches in the cities. This left tens of millions of Christians in unregistered house churches without the Scriptures.

Since it started over twenty years ago, Amity Press has produced around forty-six million Bibles. Another twelve million have been smuggled into the country. Large numbers have also been printed by the house churches themselves. Although these numbers are greatly encouraging, they are far from filling the need, especially in rural areas of China. Here’s why…

There are around a hundred million Christians inside China. Using the information given in the last paragraph, this means there could be more than thirty million Christians without Bibles. And that number continues to grow as the amount of Bibles printed each year is greatly out numbered by the amount of converts. Every hour over one thousand people in China turn to Christ for their salvation. The printing presses simply don’t have the funding to produce enough.

We believe that must change.

This is why we are raising thirty thousand dollars to print these Bibles. Each one costs only about one dollar and fifty cents to print. Please take the time to consider giving to this project. Millions are without the Scriptures, but it doesn’t have to be that way. You can be the change. What better investment to make but one for eternity?

Below are two of the many reports from Chinese church leaders, asking for help to obtain the Bibles they need. Try to put yourself in their shoes and imagine what this must be like for them.

“In Heilongjiang Province [in northeast China] we have sent Bibles to many counties. We recently preached to policemen and to farmers, and 500 hundred received baptism! We also sent workers to Shandong Province, and hundreds of workers there are waiting for Bibles…”

“We received the 4,100 Bibles and 650 study Bibles from your contact. Praise the Lord! In the past twelve months the Lord has graciously enabled us to reach more than 60,000 souls for Christ, and we are now praying and striving to nourish these newborn babes in Christ. Without God’s Word this is impossible. The Scriptures you sent us were received like hungry children longing for good and lasting food. Please pray that we will be able to receive at least 50,000 more Bibles from the hand of the Lord, so that none of our new believers would be without a copy of God’s holy Word.”

-Reagan Schrock, GOA blog manager

*Figures and statistics are taken from Asia Harvest (www.asiaharvest.org) and the books Operation World and Henan: The Galilee of China.