This book is part of Paul Hattaway’s “China Chronicles” series. The series is devoted to preserving the history of Christianity in China, each volume focuses on one particular province in the country. The author plans to have these books made available in Chinese as well, so that believers in China can be made aware of their Christian history and be ‘strengthened, edified, and challenged” by what they read (page xiii). In addition, the author desires to have “a record of God’s mighty acts in China” (page xiii).

Hainan means “South of the Sea,” it is the largest island of China (except for Taiwan) and has a population of over 10 million people (page 1). That being said, it is among the smallest and least populated provinces in China (page 19). Hainan actually is made up of over 200 islands, but most people only know about the main island (page 2). The weather for the majority of the year is both warm and humid (page 2). Powerful typhoons are common for a number of months during the year, and there are potential hazards for people that can be found on the land, these include quicksand and bubbling sulfur springs (page 2). The nickname for Hainan used to be “The gateway to hell,” but later it came to known as “Isle of Palms” (page 3).

Hainan Province, China.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

The original inhabitants of Hainan were the Li people, who “arrived from the mainland at least 2,000 to 2,500 years ago” (page 5). About 80% of the population of Hainan are Han Chinese, though the group is made up of people from different linguistic groups (page 6). The Hainanese, who have their own unique language, are the major group of the Han (pages 7). Also, “more than 30,000 people from Vietnam and Indonesia have been repatriated to Hainan since the 1950s” (page 8). Currently two industries that are major sources of income for Hainan are agriculture and tourism/hospitality (page 14).

The religious beliefs found among the people are diverse, the goddesses Mazu and Guanyin are honored, and their statues can be found along the coast (page 19). They have been worshipped for hundreds of years and are believed to protect fishermen (page 19). In addition to them, many other gods and goddesses are revered in Hainan (page 19). Animism and the influence of shamans can be found in certain areas, and ancestor worship is part of the religious tradition in Hainan (page 19).

Sanya Nanshan Dongtian Park in 2015.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

The Christian message entered into and made an impact in the above-mentioned idolatrous context. Catholics were the first to expose the residents of Hainan to the Christian faith, they did this about 250 years before Evangelical missionaries arrived (page 22). The very first Catholic missionary was Baltasar Gago in the 16^th century, he was accompanied by two Franciscans, whose names we do not know (page 22). Matteo Ricci, an Italian missionary, also had an impact on the island though he never visited it himself, his influence reached Hainan through a family contact he made in Beijing (pages 22, 23). Other Catholics who ministered in Hainan include Pierre Marquez and Benoit de Mattos (pages 23-25). A second wave of Catholic missions was begun in 1849 by French missionaries (page 26).

Lingshui, Hainan in 2013.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

The chapters that follow focus on Christianity in Hainan during a particular time period, or on a particular topic. There are chapters on: the 1890s (pages 46-51), 1900s and 1910s (pages 52-64), 1920s (pages 65-77), 1930s (pages 78-87), 1940s and 1950s (pages 102-114), 1960s and 1970s (pages 115-123), 1980s (pages 130-136), 1990s (pages 137-152), 2000s (pages 197-212), and 2010s and 2020s (pages 213-219). In addition to these there are chapters given to people groups. The Kim Mun people have a chapter devoted to them (pages 88-101), as do the the Indonesians (pages 124-129) and the Li people (pages 181-196). Other chapters in the book are: “When Heaven Came to Hainan” (pages 153-163), “Stories from the Frontlines” (pages 164-180), and “The Future of the Church in Hainan” (pages 220-222).

Below is some significant information from a number of the chapters in the book.

• 1890s: Hattaway says that Presbyterian missionaries regularly served in Hainan, in fact, they were the only missionary society that had workers on the island for decades (page 46). The missionary force during this time period included a steady stream of women (page 47).
• 1900s and 1910s: One interesting piece of information about this time period is that when churches in other provinces in China endured terrible persecution from the Boxer rebels, the small number of Christians in Hainan were, for the most part, untouched (page 53). Citing Brown, Hattaway tells us that between the years of 1909 and 1917 Evangelical church members grew from 375 to 1,642 (page 54). In 1915 the Presbyterians expanded their work into different areas of the province (page 56). They taught the new believers to be generous in giving both their time and money to God (and others), they also taught them to be self-supporting and not rely on foreign funds (pages 56. 57). A prominent missionary during this time period was Frank Gilman who served in Hainan for 32 years (page 60). He, along with his first wife, Marion, were very involved in planting mission stations in various places in Hainan (page 60).
• 1920s: During this decade medical missions remained the main way that people were made aware of the teachings of Christ, the Presbyterians continued to run the sole hospital on the island (page 66).
• 1930s: A key missionary couple served in this decade, Henry and Louise Bucher (pages 83-87). They served in Hainan (page 83) and also in Thailand (page 86).
• Kim Mun People: Hattaway tells us that after more than a century since the first members of this people group (who can be found in China, Vietnam, and Laos) became believers in Jesus they still do not have even one page of the Bible translated into their language, though they do have some audio and video gospel materials (page 101).
• 1940s and 1950s: This chapter tells us that persecution caused the church in Hainan to depend on the power of the Holy Spirit rather than on foreign help (page 103).

Rice fields near Xinlong, Hainan in 2015.
Image: Anna Frodesiak / Wikimedia Commons

• The Indonesians: The author tells us that there are about 6000 Indonesians in Hainan, who live in the county of Qionghai (page 124), “approximately half of the Indonesians who settled in Hainan were Christians” (page 125). Today, most of the Indonesians in Hainan are committed Christians (page 129).
• 1980s: The author labels these years as “a decade of harvest” (page 130). The churches throughout Hainan were overflowing by 1987 (page 131).
• 1990s: When the 1990s began less than 1% of the population of Hainan claimed to be followers of Jesus Christ (page 137). During the 1990s the church experienced remarkable growth. Part of this was due to the implementation of a house church ministry strategy of a Baptist missionary and his family (pages 141-144). Hattaway, citing an unpublished missionary report, informs us that in one network between April 1993 and April 1998 the number of believers grew from less than 100 to 55,000 (page 144). And the number of churches during this time grew from 3 to about 550 (page 144). The intentional focus on evangelism and discipleship in the house churches contributed to their tremendous growth rate (page 147). At the peak of the revival at this time the number of Christians in Hainan doubled every 7 months (page 147)!
• Stories from the Frontlines: This chapter informs us that the revival in Hainan over the last 30 years has witnessed miracles, signs, and wonders which have helped spread the gospel (page 177).
• 2010s and 2020s: The text dealing with these decades tells us that the revival in the house churches in Hainan eventually spilled over into the Three-Self Registered Churches (page 216).
• The Future of the Church in Hainan: The closing chapter of the book informs readers that the church in Hainan is currently experiencing the worst persecution in its history (except for the persecution that occurred during the Cultural Revolution), nonetheless there is hope that the church will endure, indeed flourish, in the midst of this hostility because of its foundations and strong history (page 222).

This current volume, like the others in the “China Chronicles” series, contains photos throughout the text, it also has an appendix at the back of the book that contains tables and maps.

Hainan: Pearl of the South China Sea continues in the tradition of the earlier titles in the “China Chronicles” series, it shares a part of Christian history that has largely been hidden from view. This book helps pull back the curtain so we can see what God has been doing in a country that in recent decades has a reputation for hostility to the message of Jesus Christ. God is at work in the world, and Hainan is one of the places where He is working, and we can have confidence that He will continue the work that He has begun (Phil. 1:6).

Reviewed by John Lathrop

PneumaReview.com: Underground Publishing House is a new book label, please tell our readers when and where it started.

Bethany Hope: At the end of 2022, we were doing some speaking engagements in the UK with our ministry, Back to Jerusalem—a ministry which works with the underground house church of China to take the Gospel to the nations between China and Jerusalem. The first leg of our tour was in Wales. Standing at the book table, we were approached by someone who asked us if we knew the name Griffith John. Somehow, we did not. We went away and began looking into him, eventually realising he was a key pioneer of protestant missions to China more than 100 years ago.

As we began to read his writings, we were so profoundly moved and inspired that we felt it imperative to share the writings with as many people as possible. Thus, Underground Publishing House was born.

PneumaReview.com: The company website says that it is involved in “Publishing books with a Buried Legacy.” Please tell us a little bit about what that phrase means.

Bethany Hope: There is so much Christian literature published today, perhaps more now than at any other time in history. It is easy to think that we exist independent of church history before us and that all that matters is here and now. The truth is, we stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before us. This is especially true for us with our work in China. The successes we see and experience today are the result of the sacrifices and endurance of the missionaries who went before us and laid the foundations that we today now build on. Unfortunately, so many of these people have been forgotten to history.

There are countless buried legacies lost in the passing of time, and we feel that the Church today would be spiritually richer in every sense if we took heed of the lessons these buried voices have to share.

PneumaReview.com: How, or where, are the buried legacy books that are published discovered?

Bethany Hope: The great benefit we have of taking up this vision to rediscover buried legacy in 2023, is the wealth of information available to us through the internet. The books we are looking for are usually found in faded, skewed scans uploaded online by small libraries. Our small team researches for hours, often hitting dead ends, until suddenly we stumble upon gold. Then we work on transcribing these scans and making any necessary edits to enable to work to be as accessible to a 2023 reader as possible. We also visit archives and libraries around the world, which are often treasure troves for these books.

PneumaReview.com: The first two books that Underground Publishing House released were about missionaries to China. Please tell us briefly about those two books.

Bethany Hope: Our first book was A Voice in the Darkness: Lessons from 60 Years in Ancient China by Griffith John. The book was written in the early 1900’s when China was first opening up to the foreign missionary. The Boxer Rebellion shook the foundation of China just before this book was written and led to the single largest slaughter of missionaries in the history of Christianity.

Against the backdrop of fear and death, Griffith John, the dedicated missionary from Wales, did not flee. Instead he planted his feet in the heart of the enemy’s territory and refused to leave. God flung the doors of China wide open; missionaries came flooding in, Bibles were printed and distributed throughout the nation, the Gospel message was preached, and the Chinese came running to Christ.

Our second release was The Lame Shall Take the Prey: How a One-Legged Missionary Transformed China. George Stott was not the missionary society’s first choice; at nineteen his leg was amputated and he went through life with a wooden leg. In the mid-1800s, traveling through China with only one leg was just shy of impossible. When Hudson Taylor asked Stott why he was going to China, he confidently replied, “I do not see those with two legs going, so I must.”

Rejected, attacked, persecuted, chased, stoned, and at one point even accused of cutting the hearts and liver from small Chinese children to grind up into medicine, George and Grace Stott did not stop preaching the Gospel. George, the one-legged Scotsman, limped from village to village preaching the Good News of Jesus Christ. In his own words: “the lame shall take the prey.”

PneumaReview.com: Will all of the books that are published be focused on missionaries to China?

Bethany Hope: Though our first two releases were about missionaries to China, this will not be a pattern followed by all our releases. Our focus is missionaries who went out to the nations between China and Jerusalem—considered to be the most unreached area of the world.

PneumaReview.com: Can you tell us about some of the books that will be forthcoming from Underground Publishing House?

Bethany Hope: We have 2 more exciting releases for the end of 2023. The first called The Terrible Red Dwarf. Tracts looked very different a hundred years ago on the mission field than we might imagine today. It was common for missionaries to write and publish fable-like stories with moral messages embedded that lined up with Christian principles, detailed with amazing illustrations. These were not just written for children, but the general population. The Terrible Red Dwarf is a story which shares the danger of our words and the importance of guarding our tongue. This will be available October 31st.

Image: Robert Morrison by John Richard Wildman. WikiMedia Commons.

The final release of the year is our biggest project yet. Many have never come across the name Robert Morrison, yet if you have any interest in China or missions, he should be a name we all know. Robert Morrison was the first Protestant missionary to China and the first to produce a fully translated Bible in the Chinese language. Amazingly, there is almost nothing written about him! We have written down his story, from the miraculous way the first Chinese Bible translation came to be in the face of immense adversity and the sacrifices it required of Morrison. This book honours a man who gave so much for the Chinese to have access to the Word of God. Bury Me in China will be released November 16th.

PneumaReview.com: Is there a particular audience that you are trying to reach with the books that you publish? What do you hope the books that you release will accomplish?

Bethany Hope: Our aim is that these books end up in the hands of as many people as possible. For those interested in missions, these books have an obvious attraction and will provide much encouragement and inspiration when we see how God has moved through missionaries throughout history. However, these books also provide lessons with much spiritual richness for any believer seeking to strengthen their faith.

PneumaReview.com: Where can people purchase Underground Publishing House books, and where can they learn more about your publishing house?

Bethany Hope: You can visit our website at www.undergroundpublishing.co.uk

If you would rather purchase the hard copy version of the books, you can find all of our releases on Amazon where you can purchase a print version.

The Holy Spirit has been making Jesus known in China. Veteran missionary Dennis Balcombe shares what he has seen unfolding during his more than fifty years of ministry in China.

Bible teachers believe that many prophecies will have a double fulfillment. The first fulfillment was in the Biblical days and subsequently the last days before the return of Christ.

A good example are the many prophecies relating to the dispersion and restoration of Israel. This was first fulfilled in the Assyrian and Babylonian captivities, and later the return to Jerusalem and rebuilding of the temple under leaders such as Ezra and Nehemiah.

Then in the end times we see this is the destruction of Jerusalem and dispersion of the Jews in AD 70, and the restoration of Israel as a nation in 1948.

Directly relating to this was that of Pentecost which was fulfilled in New Testaments days in the Book of Acts and is being fulfilled in our days, which may be the last of the last days.

Acts 2:1, “When the day of Pentecost had fully come” seems to indicate what happened that day in Jerusalem fulfilled all the types and prophecies relating to Pentecost. Then Peter in his sermon by revelation said, “But this is what was spoken by the Prophet Joel: And it shall come to pass in the last days …” (Acts 2:16).

The whole prophecy of Joel indicates a world-wide outpouring of the Holy Spirit resulting in all that was lost being restored and a great spiritual harvest. It would seem that this prophecy relating to a Pentecostal outpouring was fulfilled in many parts of the world in the beginning of the 20th century.

Pentecostal Christians in many nations will tell you how Pentecost came to their nation in the first few years of the 20th century. Americans talk about the Azusa Street Revival in 1906, people living in the U.K. will tell you about the early Welsh revival and the ministry of Spirit-filled men of God like Alexander Boddy, Smith Wigglesworth around 1907 and the powerful revivals that shook the British Isles around that time.

This was the same time of great revivals in Pyongyang, Korea, Ireland and South Africa, and the Khasi Hills in India. But many have not heard that Pentecost also came to China in the beginning of the 20th century.

A former street evangelist who was a part of my home church in Oakland, California, Richard Simpson, told me the testimony of his grandfather, a missionary to China.

Missionary William Wallace Simpson was sent out by the Christian Missionary Church (but no relation to A.B. Simpson) and began his ministry in Lhasa, Tibet in the late 19th century (1892). After many months of travel by land from Shanghai travelling through vast plains, forging rivers and ascending high mountain ranges he reached the outskirts of Lhasa.

To his knowledge, no Christian missionary had entered the city to bring the message of Christ, though other European explorers and travelers had previously reached the city. One of the head lamas had gotten the word that Simpson and his entourage had entered Lhasa to bring the Christian religion.

Thus, this lama stood outside the city and proclaimed that if this missionary so much as dared to enter the city to preach his foreign religion, Simpson would be struck dead by the Tibetan gods.

After prayer and knowing he was being led by the Spirit, missionary Simpson entered the city and began to prepare for ministry in the city. However, before he could do anything, this lama who was opposed to him, for some strange reason suddenly died.

This was one of the first examples of ‘power evangelism’ in China, a term that later became popular under John Wimber of the Vineyard Movement in the second part of the 20th century.

The superstitious people in Lhasa revered him as some god with great power. Of course, he denied that he was a god, but through this preached Christ to them and reportedly made some converts. Later they gave him gifts of many of their precious temple artifacts (not realizing their archeological value), which he took back to the USA and sold to the Museum of Chicago. Through this he was able to finance his missionary work in China for several decades.

A few years later the CMA denomination in America took a stand against speaking in tongues and such Pentecostal gifts. Knowing Simpson’s Church in Beiping was now Pentecostal he was ordered to cease teaching Pentecostal doctrines, tongues, and spiritual gifts, or else they would totally cut off his missionary support.

He wrote back, “I am now the pastor of this church, and they are totally supporting me. I don’t care if you cut off my support, but I will not compromise on my beliefs.”

He remained in China until 1949 when he returned to the USA. His son, William EkvalI Simpson, also was an Assemblies of God missionary. He died at the hands of bandits on the Tibetan-Chinese border in 1932. This testimony was related to me by missionary Simpson’s grandson Richard in the 1970’s.

After the Pentecostal revivals at Azusa Street and in the U.K., many Pentecostal missionaries came to China and preached the Full Gospel message. Significant Pentecostal revivals came to the Scandinavian nations, and many Pentecostal missionaries from Norway, Sweden and Finland travelled to the interior of China bringing the Pentecostal message.

Marie Monson
Image: Wikimedia Commons

One of these Scandinavian missionaries was Marie Monsen (1878-1962). Some considered her the ‘mother of the house church’. But due to her Pentecostal beliefs, she was denounced as a heretic by other evangelical missionaries.

Brother Yun introduced Monsen in his book, The Heavenly Man, as her ministry impacted the churches in Henan where he is from. You can visit her monument today in Bergen, Norway.

Many of these early Pentecostal missionaries were single young women, at great cost and much opposition, spread the Pentecostal message throughout China. Another was Serene Løland, also from Norway, who spent 50 years in China. The last several years of her missionary life was spent in Hong Kong. I was privileged to work with her in Hong Kong in the early 1970s.

Serene was the first Norwegian Methodist missionary to China landing in Fuzhou (then spelled Foo-chow) in 1921. She later worked with the famous Spirit-filled Chinese evangelist, John Sung who is reported to have led over 100,000 to the Lord through his powerful evangelical ministry followed by signs, wonders, and miracles. These converts were not only in China, but many nations throughout SE Asia.

She also spent much time in Shanghai where she helped many leading clergymen to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit. This was during the great charismatic revival in Shanghai around 1948.

At the Presbyterian Theological Seminary in Shanghai, more than 50 of the theological students including their president, the famous Chia Yu Ming, came to her meetings and he received the baptism of the Spirit. His writings were the most popular theological books in China, read by far more than Watchman Nee, whose books were only read by members of his church, The Little Flock church.

Sister Løland worked closely with the most renowned men of God during that period: John Sung, Watchman Nee, Wang Ming-tao, Andrew Gih and Markus Cheng. She was at one time a member of Watchman Nee’s congregation and she told me she prayed with him, and he received the Baptism of the Spirit. But Watchman Nee never claimed to be charismatic.

After most missionaries were forced out of China, Sister Løland remained two more years and in March 1951 came to Hong Kong. She was greatly used of the Lord to promote the Pentecostal movement throughout Hong Kong, especially among the Pentecostal Holiness Church. She left HK to return home to Norway in 1972. Her powerful testimony is related in her autobiography, God in China (now out of print).

Many in the Charismatic/Pentecostal movement have become aware of missionary Heidi Baker. She and her team have been greatly used of the Lord to plant thousands of churches in Mozambique, other parts of Africa and other nations.

Heidi and her husband Rolland were a part of my church in Hong Kong for many years and even today we can converse in fluent Cantonese. I converse with Rolland in Putonghua (Mandarin), for he comes from a family of missionaries to the Chinese.

Rolland’s grandfather was the famous H.A. Baker who wrote the book Visions Beyond the Veil (published 1920), and several other books. He ministered in Tibet from 1911-1919, in Yunnan China from 1919-1950 when all missionaries were forced to leave China. Later in 1955 he went to Miaoli County, Taiwan until his death in 1971.

With his wife Josephine, H.A. Baker started a mission for street children living in the village areas in Yunnan Province, called Adullam Rescue Mission. The children, 6-18 years old were uneducated and few had any knowledge of the Bible and Christianity.

But H.A. Baker led them to be baptized in the Holy Spirit, and they saw a series of visions of angels, Jesus, heaven, and hell, totally confirming the Bible. This was part of a significant Pentecostal revival in that part of China.

Many of these children grew up serving the Lord, and many were later pastors of both house church and official Three-Self Patriotic churches in Yunnan. This amazing book documenting the working of the Holy Spirit in the lives of these children is available free as a PDF file on the internet.

My close friend and co-worker, Rev. Moses Yu (1920-2010), born and raised in Shandong, was only 12 when this great revival swept NE China. He could personally recount many events in this revival and he was associated with the great men of God during that period – Rev. John Song, Wang Ming-Tao, Andrew Gih, Chia Yu-ming, Watchman Nee, Allan Yuan and others.

He told me that the indigenous Chinese Pentecostal revivals from the late 1920s through to 1949 were powerful and widespread resulting in hundreds of thousands of conversions. However few if any books giving testimonies to these revivals are available in bookstores.

The reason is most of the publishers of books of Chinese church history are evangelicals, and all their associated denominations theologically hold to the cessation theory. This belief which is adhered to by many even today teaches that all supernatural gifts of the Spirit, speaking in tongues and miraculous healings ended in the 2nd century with the death of the apostles.

Thus Rev. Yu was invited to Hong Kong to conduct a week-long seminar at the Assembly of God Bible Seminary in which he in detail documented the great Pentecostal revivals in indigenous Chinese churches. They can be found today in the Ecclesia Bible Seminary archives.

Space will only allow me to briefly mention a few. Probably the most significant was the Great Shandong Revival which began around 1932 in Shandong Province. The great Korean Pyongyang Revival of 1907 came after years of Western missionaries and Korean pastors associated with the Presbyterian Church seeking the Lord in prayer and fasting.

At a certain time in history, the Holy Spirit moved mightily, and many stood up and openly confessed their sins. Subsequently thousands were baptized in the Holy Spirit with tongues, prophecy, anointed preaching, divine healings, and casting out of demons.

Anyone visiting the house churches and even official churches in Shandong Province today will realize much of the present church leadership are the descendants of this great revival that began in 1932. In fact, this great Pentecostal Revival spread throughout all of NE China.

A Baptist missionary, Mary Crawford published a book, The Shantung Revival in 1933. Again, in as much the manifestations of the Spirit in that revival go against the theological position of the Baptist church, it is not available from the Baptist Press. But the copyright period expired, and the charismatic leader Randy Clark has republished this book which is available today on Amazon.

Directly related to the Shandong Revival, the Jesus Family movement was established in 1921 by Jing Dianying in the rural village of Mazhuang, Taian County of Shandong Province. This was a unique Pentecostal communitarian church.

They lived in Christian communes in which resources were pooled and needs of the poorer in the community were met. In the rural and semi-rural areas, the Jesus Family was formed into small communes of up to a few hundred with the believers working and living together and holding property in common under the direction of the ‘family head.’

There were well over one hundred of these Jesus Family communities by 1949, with a total of several thousand members. All were run entirely by Chinese under the leader Jing Dianying (1890-1957).

The Jesus Family was strongly millenarian, anticipating the imminent return of Christ, and it was very Pentecostal, basing its worship and behavior on the gifts of the Holy Spirit. All the Jesus Family communities were disbanded in 1953, but even today many former adherents or their children are active members and leaders in the Chinese Christian community. In the 1980s, some Jesus Family groups reappeared, but they are technically illegal and subject to persecution by the authorities.

I was privilege to meet many of the leaders of the Jesus Family when China opened in the 1980s and several years ago visited some of the local Shandong house churches whose roots can be traced to the Jesus Family. They would all rehearse testimonies of miracles, healings and gifts of the Spirit that even today are in operation in their local churches.

Another indigenous Pentecostal movement is the True Jesus Church. It was started in 1917 by Paul Wei, Barnabas Zhang and others. It is a powerful Pentecostal Church with many gifts of the Spirit, healings, and miracles. However, they are considered a oneness church because they do not believe in the trinity. They also meet on Saturday as they believe they must keep the Sabbath.

The True Jesus Church is currently one of the largest Christian groups in China and Taiwan, as well as one of the largest independent churches in the world. A few years ago, on a visit to Wuchang, the head leader of the Three-Self church took me to visit one of the True Jesus churches. They had a huge building that could sit several thousand. He told me one-third of all the Christians in the Wuhan area went to churches associated with the True Jesus movement.

He said since they are considered an indigenous Chinese grass-roots movement with no connection with the West, they are not persecuted in the same manner that denominational churches related to the West are persecuted. There are many very large True Jesus congregations in Hong Kong and parts of England.

When I first arrived in Hong Kong in as a missionary called to China in 1969, there was virtually no accurate information about the church in China. The prevalent belief was that Christianity had been basically eliminated from China.

It was common knowledge, though, that all religion had been prohibited during the Cultural Revolution (1967-1976). Even the Three-Self Patriotic Church, which was totally under the control of the Communist Party and preached only liberal theology, was closed. House churches were prohibited, all clergy were sent to labor reform camp or prison, seminaries and Bible Schools were closed, and all Bibles and religious books were destroyed by the Red Guards.

It was assumed by many that the whole nation had become atheistic. As China began to open in 1978, one major ministry printed a tract which simply described the beautiful mountain scenery in Guilin (such as you see depicted in Chinese landscape paintings), and ended with this question, “Is it possible all this somehow occurs through natural processes, or might there perhaps be a Creator?”

One would ask why the Gospel tracts would not be more specific in presenting Christ and the Gospel message. The reason is there was a fear that any religious literature would be confiscated and those distributing it would be arrested. It was thought except for a few older people in the villages, the whole nation was now atheistic.

Liberal churchmen stated, “While the people were relatively poor compared to most in capitalist nations, what they had they shared one with another, the government provided basic educational and medical services, everyone loved greatly Mao and the Communist Party, and most were very happy.”

It was then often stated, “There is no need for Christianity, a Western religion that puts guilt on people and allowed imperialism to take root in China.”

However, within weeks of my first trip to Guangzhou in the spring of 1978, I found all that was totally false. During the past several decades we have been learning about the terrible atrocities, massacres, famines, political infighting, and horrendous persecution of religious believers.

Prostitution then and today was rampant, but prostitutes then sold their bodies to get ration coupons, which were needed to purchase food. We saw this everywhere after China opened in 1978, as even then food could only be purchased with both money and ration coupons. As we begin to travel throughout China, we saw not only prostitutes, but beggars everywhere. Poverty was widespread and in visits to hospitals we saw dirty and rundown buildings with almost none of the equipment or medication that a hospital would need.

I was quickly made aware of one group of believers in a certain district in Guangxi Province of 40,000 believers meeting in multiple house churches but was told they only had one full complete Bible for that many believers.

Due to that report in the first of 1979, we began our Bible ministry to China (called Donkey’s for Jesus) and during the 36 years to 2015 (when Xi Jinping began to take tight control of the nation), countless millions of Bibles were delivered to China from Hong Kong. Most were provided free to house church leaders, and thus during those years I was privileged to travel this vast nation.

Due to the strict control of people’s movements, including that of foreign visitors, it is impossible for anyone to conduct an accurate religious survey. But these estimates are based on the percentage of known Christians in different districts and an analysis of general religious beliefs in the different provinces.

My story: From 1979-1997 I made multiple trips all over China, weekly taught English in Guangzhou leading a few hundred students to Christ and baptizing them in the Guangzhou reservoir, helped to coordinate the Bible ministry in which weekly thousands of Bibles entered China, and travelled all over the nation where I met the Christian leaders in hotel rooms or public parks in the major cities.

Today’s Chinese Version Bible, first published in 1979.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

I had a great desire to visit the rural home churches, especially in Henan (where Hudson Taylor previously worked), but was told it was far too dangerous for a foreigner to visit these house churches. But knowing that our church was a Spirit-filled Pentecostal church, and almost 100% of the Bible couriers and those supporting the ministry were Pentecostals, they desired for me to visit their home church co-workers’ meetings and teach on this subject.

Thus, in early 1988, they arranged for me to go into the rural areas of Henan, Anhui, and Zhejiang provinces to teach in co-workers’ meetings. The co-workers would number from 80-800 or more. Meetings would last 3-5 days in one village and then we would go to another village to share.

Usually, I would teach and preach for up to 9 hours a day, but during that time in every session we would pray for them to be baptized in the Holy Spirit. This continued until 1997 when I lost my visa, but when my visa was restored in 2003, I continued this ministry until 2015 when I again lost my visa.

Before we visited China and taught the Pentecostal message, they would experience miracles of healing and supernatural deliverances. But this was due to the prayers of the Christians. Even decades before I entered the rural areas to teach the Pentecostal message, the churches had a habit of gathering early in the morning for prayer, often lasting up to 2 hours.

Space would not allow me to share even a small percentage of what I saw. Just to state that we saw thousands of co-workers filled with the Holy Spirit with speaking in tongues, and a massive outpouring of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Miracles, signs, wonders, and divine healings were seen everywhere we went.

Many told me the main reason people became Christians was due to the testimony of divine healing, deliverance from demonic powers and other such miracles. While the Chinese church is not perfect, mistakes have been made, some false doctrine and teaching emerged during those years, nobody can deny the fact that the Chinese church is like the Church in the Book of Acts. The Gospel is being widely preached with signs following, but as in the 1st century persecution is prevalent.

The last several years there have been a lot of restrictions on Christian ministry in general and many overseas missionaries have been forced to leave China. The government is restricting the evangelism of children and the youth, and Bibles can only be purchased in official church bookstores. Atheistic Marxist education is the norm for all Chinese young people. It would seem the present leadership of China is reversing the ‘open door policy’ of Deng Xiaoping which began in the 1980s.

But we thank the Lord during the few short years that China was opened, thousands of Spirit-filled Christians from overseas entered China to provide Bibles, teaching materials and prayed with countless tens of thousands of Chinese Christians to be baptized in the Holy Spirit.

Thus, the Chinese church has a very good solid foundation based on the Word of God in which the Holy Spirit is honored. I believe despite temporary setbacks, the doors to China are still open in that the Chinese people are very open to Christ and the Holy Spirit. I believe before the return of Christ, perhaps in our generation, this nation of 1.4 billion of Han Chinese and other ethnic groups will be reached with the Full Gospel.

Pastor Dennis Balcombe
Hong Kong

This article is adapted from an earlier version of “Pentecost in China” as it first appeared at ChinaSource.org. Used with permission.

Is the Church in China Predominantly Pentecostal?

Author’s Preface
Part 1: Introduction
Part 2: The House Church Networks
Part 3: Gaining Perspective: A Contextual Assessment

PneumaReview.com reader ISC wrote:

Actually, I don’t think the True Jesus Church [discussed in “Is the Chinese Church Predominantly Pentecostal? Part 3: Gaining Perspective“] was directly influenced by Pentecostal Truths (Wuxunjie zhenlibao). I had a chit-chat with Prof. Bays during the break time at a symposium in 2013, I asked him how he made the conclusion that Pentecostal Truths influenced the TJC? This periodical reflects a quite strong Holiness Pentecostal perspective while the TJC has its root in Oneness Pentecostal missionary Berntsen. He said to me that leaders from the TJC told him this way when he visited its general assembly in Taichung, Taiwan many years ago.

According to what I have known, many TJC folks do not know that Classical Pentecostals can be divided into Holiness, Finished work, and Oneness. Most of them think all the Pentecostals believe in salvation and Spirit-Baptism identical experiences as what Oneness Pentecostals do. To put it simply, most of them do not know that Pentecostals mostly believe in “subsequence” except Oneness Pentecostals. So, it’s not necessary for them to look into what type of Pentecostal sub-traditions the Pentecostal Truths actually carried.

According to some more overall field investigations, churches in China including those with Pentecostal characteristics mostly feel uncomfortable with being called “Pentecostal” or “Charismatic”. I think one should be cautious of using a Western-made term such as Pentecostal or Charismatic to describe Christianity in the global south.

Furthermore, leaders from the five largest house church groups in China such as Zhang Yinan tend to avoid identifying themselves as Pentecostal or Charismatic. Rather, they would like to learn from various Christian traditions.

Robert Menzies responded:

First, let me say that I appreciate the reader’s interesting comments and informed suggestion with respect to the origins of the TJC.  Nevertheless, I still have to side with Daniel Bays on this one.

Although the TJC was a oneness Pentecostal group, this does not preclude its early leaders from being influenced by the Pentecostal Truths (Wuxunjie zhenlibao) as Bays argues. One can see how both the Pentecostal Truths and Berntsen both exerted influence.  Pentecostals tended to feature Acts, so a oneness perspective flowed from this literalistic (and I would add, in the case of oneness Pentecostals, myopic) perspective.

In response to the reader’s comments about attitudes toward the terms, “charismatic” or “Pentecostal,” in China, I offer the following. While it is true that the term “charismatic” (lingen) often has pejorative connotations in China, the term “Pentecostal” (wunxunjie) is generally viewed favorably. Some groups are quite willing to accept this label. Leaders of the Fangcheng group, for example, emphasize their Pentecostal beliefs. Other groups that are not “classical” Pentecostal but accept most of the features of Pentecostal theology and praxis, may be more cautious in using the label. I suspect that the language they use often depends on the context and with whom they are speaking.

Have you posed this question to Dennis Balcombe? I believe Dennis has had more first-hand experience with these groups than any person I know. I’m confident that Dennis would affirm my conclusion, based on my own experience with leaders from various house church groups (as well as a written survey – see my ”Pentecostals in China,” in Vinson Synan and Amos Yong, eds., Global Renewal Christianity: Spirit-Empowered Movements Past, Present, and Future, vol. I: Asia and Oceania [Lake Mary, Fla.: Charisma House Publishers, 2015], 67-90).

I would add that to suggest that the term, “Pentecostal,” is Western, is simply wrong. Most Pentecostals today do not live in the global West. Furthermore, the term is biblical and flows from the Bible. While I hope we all want to learn from the various Christian traditions, this should not blind us to the Pentecostal character of much of the Chinese house church movement. Perhaps the more important question is, how do we define the term, “Pentecostal”? I have been careful to clearly define this term in my writings and I do believe that the term must be understood theologically, not simply phenomenologically.

Robert Menzies

Part 3: Gaining Perspective: A Contextual Assessment

The strong Pentecostal orientation of the Church in China is striking, but it should not surprise us. In fact, when the recent revival of Christianity in China is viewed against the backdrop of its historical, global, and sociological contexts, this is precisely what we would expect. Let us examine each of these contexts.

The Historical Context

One of the striking aspects of Christianity in pre-1949 China was the emergence of strong, vital indigenous churches. These churches were founded and led by Chinese Christians. They were established and operated entirely independent of foreign finances, control and leadership. Although these groups were largely overlooked by missionaries and have been neglected by historians, it is evident that these groups were extremely significant. More recently, Daniel Bays, a noted historian of Chinese Christianity, has highlighted the significance of these groups. Speaking of these independent Chinese Christian groups, Bays writes, “I believe that this sector [of the Christian Church] was far more interesting and significant than it might have been thought.”[1] Bays estimates that by the 1940s these indigenous groups accounted for between 20-25% (or 200,000 believers) of all Protestants.[2] Furthermore, Bays notes that these groups have exerted a tremendous influence on the Christianity that has flourished in China since the 1980s:

Moreover, judging from what we know of the churches in China today, it is clear that a great many of the older Christians whose experience dates to before 1949 came out of these indigenous churches.[3]

The largest of these groups, the True Jesus Church, was and remains Pentecostal in character. Bays has established important links between the Azusa Street revival and the key founders of the True Jesus Church.

Another link between the Azusa Street revival and the True Jesus Church can be traced through a Mr. Bernsten, a missionary serving in China who was profoundly impacted by his experience at the altar of the Azusa Mission. After his experience at the Azusa Mission, Bernsten returned to China and, along with a small group of Pentecostals, opened an independent mission station in Zhending (just north of Shijiazhuang) of Hebei Province. In 1912 this group began to publish a newspaper, Popular Gospel Truth (Tongchuan fuyin zhenlibao). This paper, along with the Hong Kong paper noted above, provided inspiration for the early founders the True Jesus Church. Additionally, two of the key Chinese founders of the True Jesus Church, Zhang Lingshen and Wei Enbo were impacted in Beijing by members of the church Bernsten’s group had founded, the Faith Union (Xinxinhui).[5]

These two men (Zhang Lingshen and Wei Enbo), along with Barnabas Zhang, all of whom had Pentecostal experiences that included speaking in tongues, determined that they would form a Pentecostal church in China. They founded their first church in Tianjin in 1917. The church grew quickly and spread to Shandong, Hebei, Henan, Zhejiang, and other provinces. Its key areas of strength were in Hunan, Fujian, and Henan. Hunter and Chan note that the church’s “estimated membership was at least 120,000 by 1949” with 700 churches throughout China.[6]

The series, “Is the Chinese Church Predominantly Pentecostal?” is an excerpt from The Church in China. Robert Menzies used a pen name, Luke Wesley, to write The Church in China: Persecuted, Pentecostal, and Powerful (Baguio, The Philippines: AJPS Books, 2004).
Read the 2023 Author’s Preface to this series.

Another large indigenous Chinese Church which was also Pentecostal in nature was the Jesus Family. The Jesus Family was founded in the 1920s by Jing Dianyin in the village of Mazhuang (Taian County) in Shandong Province. The Jesus Family’s worship was marked by prayer for healing, speaking in tongues, prophecy, and other spiritual gifts. The Jesus Family also featured a communal way of life in which everything was shared. The Jesus Family was especially strong in the poorest parts of China. Hunter and Chan provide a wonderful description of the church from a present-day believer’s perspective: the church was “a love fellowship, a meeting-place for the weary and a place of comfort for the broken-hearted…where you are, there is our home, and our home is everywhere.”[7] In its heyday in China the Jesus Family totaled over a hundred communities and around six thousand members.[8] The church still continues today in Taiwan.

The Spiritual Gifts Church (Ling’en hui) was a loosely knit independent church movement that emerged in the early 1930s. The movement centered in Shandong Province and was linked to the famous “Shandong Revival,” which impacted and divided a number of mainline churches and missions organizations. Bays notes that the Spiritual Gifts Church was composed of Chinese churches and pastors “who broke away from denominations or missions that refused to approve their controversial Pentecostal doctrines and practices.”[9] The church did not develop organizationally and it is difficult to ascertain its strength or influence.

There were, of course, other indigenous churches that were non-Pentecostal in character, such as The Little Flock (Xiao qun) established by Watchman Nee (Ni Tuosheng) in the mid-1920s. And there were certainly a number of non-Pentecostal Chinese church leaders of stature. Wang Mingdao, for example, apparently had a Pentecostal experience in 1920, but later “backed away from full Pentecostalism.”[10] Nevertheless, the fact remains that of the three largest independent Chinese churches that sprang up in the early part of the twentieth century (The True Jesus Church, The Little Flock, and the Jesus Family), two were Pentecostal. And one of these Pentecostal groups, the True Jesus Church, was by far the largest single indigenous Chinese church group of that era. This fact, coupled with the significant impact of the Pentecostal form of revivalism that swept through China in the 1930s, indicates that the majority of Chinese Christians prior to 1949, when able to develop their own Christian identity, gravitated to Pentecostal forms of worship and doctrine. It is worth noting, then, that indigenous Chinese Christianity was predominantly Pentecostal.[11]

Tony Lambert points out that today the Church in China is generally strong in those areas where historically the missionaries were most active; that is, in the eastern coastal provinces of Fujian, Zhejiang, and Jiangsu. However, Lambert goes on to note that the Chinese church is also very strong in some provinces where the missionaries were not as active, provinces like Henan and Anhui. He offers no rationale for the growth of the church in these regions, but does note that “the witness of independent, indigenous churches, such as the Little Flock and the Jesus Family, are also vital factors to be taken into account.”[12] What Lambert does not state, but what is especially striking is this: strong, indigenous Pentecostal churches were active in these regions prior to 1949 and today, strong, indigenous Pentecostal churches have blossomed in these same regions. It is difficult to deny that the legacy of these early indigenous churches lives on in the Christians and churches birthed in the revivals of the 1980s.[13] This legacy is conspicuously Pentecostal.

In the light of these historical facts, I would raise this question: If the majority of indigenous Chinese Christians prior to 1949 gravitated to Pentecostal forms of worship and doctrine, why would we expect it to be any different today? The lessons of history suggest that the predominantly Pentecostal character of the contemporary Chinese Church should not surprise us.

The Global Context

If we step back and look at the current revival of Christianity in China from the vantage point of contemporary trends in the global Christian community, again we see that our description of the Chinese Church as predominantly Pentecostal is precisely what we should expect. Historians and researchers of Christianity all agree that one of the most significant religious phenomena of the past century (and many would say the most significant) is the astounding growth of the modern Pentecostal movement.[14] At the beginning of the twentieth century, the Pentecostal movement did not exist. Today, there are over 200 million denominational Pentecostals and over 500 million charismatics and Pentecostals around the world.[15]

This movement, which ranks as the second largest family of Christians in the world (after the Roman Catholic Church), has experienced staggering growth, especially in the developing countries of the world.[16] Over 70% of charismatics and Pentecostals worldwide are non-white and 66% are located in the Third World.[17] Today, in continents like Latin America and Africa, a large majority of evangelical Christians are charismatic or Pentecostal. David Barrett estimates that there are now over 126 million charismatics and Pentecostals in Africa, and over 140 million in Latin America.[18] Charismatic and Pentecostal groups have also grown rapidly in Asia, where they now number over 134 million.[19] Barrett suggests that over 54 million charismatics, neo-charismatics, and Pentecostals (which he defines largely in ecclesiastical terms) now reside in China.[20] And, speaking of the Han Chinese worldwide, Barrett claims that by 1985 over 25% were tongues-speakers. Furthermore, he sates that the proportion of all Han Chinese Christians who are “phenomenologically” Pentecostal or charismatic may be as high as 85%.[21]

The Sociological Context

The reasons for the growth of Pentecostal Christianity worldwide are complex and one should resist the temptation to view these developments totally in terms of naturalistic explanations. Nevertheless, sociologists may provide insight into some of the factors which have encouraged this amazing growth. One of the most striking features of contemporary China is the startling pace of its modernization and economic development. Strange as it may sound, this process of modernization and development may represent a major factor in creating a context conducive for the growth of Pentecostal Christianity.

Ryan Dunch, in a very perceptive article, notes that modernization does impact the religious makeup of a nation. However, he suggests that rather than “producing a straightforward decline in religion,” modernization tends to change its nature. More specifically, Dunch suggests that religion, as it meets modernization, tends to become more voluntary (rather than acquired at birth), individualized, and experiential. These shifts in turn force religious institutions to change accordingly. Dunch views the Pentecostal movement as especially well-suited to minister to the needs of people in societies, like that of China, which are shaped by industrial market economies:

Pentecostal movements, once routinely presented as reactions against modernity, are now being reevaluated as especially reflective of these forces, in their emphasis on the self, and in equipping their adherents, especially in the developing capitalist societies of Latin American and South Korea, with the ‘values of ascetic Protestantism…so essential for social mobility in a capitalist economy.’[22]

We have already noted that Pentecostal doctrine and praxis were particularly appealing to indigenous Chinese Christians in the 1920s and 30s. Certainly many Chinese were attracted to this new form of religion, “which preached good conduct, promised fellowship with divinity, afforded healing and exorcism and offered forms of worship that could be corporate or individual according to the circumstances.”[23] And, as Hunter and Chan recognize, “the religious revival of the 1980s suggests that these are still deep needs.”[24] It is not unreasonable to suggest, then, that the forces of modernization have, in part, enhanced this sense of need. All of this suggests that China, like other societies being shaped by modernization, represents fertile ground for the seeds of Pentecostal revival.

Conclusion

We are in a position to summarize our findings. I have analyzed the theological orientation of the five largest house church groups in China. My analysis was based on my own personal conversations, the findings of fellow researchers, and selected written documents. I have concluded that these five groups should be categorized as follows:

1. China for Christ: largely classical Pentecostal, partly Pentecostal
2. China Gospel Fellowship: largely Pentecostal, partly charismatic
3. Yin Shang Church: largely Pentecostal, partly charismatic
4. Li Xin Church: largely Pentecostal, partly charismatic
5. Word of Life Church: largely non-charismatic, partly charismatic

These conclusions suggest that the overwhelming majority of the Christians in China today are at least charismatic, this would include 90% of house church Christians and perhaps 80% of the total Christian population in China. Furthermore, it is also apparent that a significant majority of the Christians in China today are not only charismatic, but also Pentecostal in their theological orientation. Approximately 75% of house church Christians and 60% of the total Christians population in China would fall into this category. Finally, while it is evident that classical Pentecostals represent a minority of the believers in China, it is a significant minority, encompassing approximately 25% of house church Christians and 20% of the total Christian population in China.

I have also suggested that these findings should not surprise us. Given the strong history of Pentecostalism within the Chinese indigenous churches prior to 1949 and the dramatic growth of Pentecostal churches around the world in recent years, particularly in developing countries, this is precisely what we would expect. I have also noted that Chinese society, which is to a significant degree shaped by the forces of modernization, appears to be particularly fertile soil for the growth of Pentecostal Christianity. Thus, historical patterns, global trends, and sociological factors all serve to strengthen our conclusions.

First, there is Lambert’s curious description of the house church: “There is a strong wing who are charismatic or Pentecostal, but they are not in the majority.”[26] Lambert makes this claim and yet he fails to define the crucial terms, charismatic and Pentecostal, or to offer any supporting evidence.

Secondly, Lambert rather consistently refers to charismatics and Pentecostals in a pejorative way. He links Chinese charismatics and Pentecostals with divisive extremists,[27] uncritically cites a very negative assessment by a TSPM pastor of a prophetic utterance,[28] refers to the “hyped artificial atmosphere of ‘healing meetings’” in the West,[29] perhaps implies that the teaching of classical Pentecostals is “extreme”,[30] and speaks of some charismatic (and evangelical) churches in the West where “preaching is at a discount” and the focus has shifted away from the Bible to “the shifting sands of subjectivism and emotionalism.”[31]

Finally, Lambert generally refuses to refer to Chinese groups and individuals as charismatic or Pentecostal even when they clearly are. This is especially striking with respect to the indigenous Pentecostal groups which emerged in pre-1949 China, the True Jesus Church and The Jesus Family. Lambert discusses these groups in both of his books, but, with one exception, fails to mention that they are Pentecostal.[32] Lambert also cites two testimonies that almost certainly come from Pentecostals. The first testimony is cited as illustrating “the authentic spirit of spiritual revival” and offering “insight into the deeper evangelical spirituality of the house-churches.”[33] Any reference to the Pentecostal nature of this believer’s faith or church is conspicuously absent. The second testimony is so dramatically Pentecostal that Lambert feels compelled to comment: “Not all Christians in China would be as Pentecostal or charismatic as the writer of this letter…”[34] This testimony is reproduced in condensed form in China’s Christian Millions, but with all of the overtly Pentecostal content discretely edited out.[35]

Image: Christian Lue

My purpose here is not to denigrate what are by all accounts two well-researched, highly readable, and extremely valuable books about the Church in China. I simply want to suggest that many evangelical researchers appear loathe to acknowledge the dramatically charismatic and Pentecostal character of the Chinese Church. I do believe that this is an omission that needs to be rectified. This is particularly the case since the most capable and prolific researchers writing on the Chinese Church for western Christians are evangelicals with apparently non-charismatic leanings, such as Tony Lambert and Jonathan Chao. I trust my comments will be understood in the larger context of my great appreciation for these men, their gifts, their dedication, and their writings.

So, it would appear that a clearer, more objective assessment of the theology and practice of the Chinese Church, at least when it comes to charismatic and Pentecostal issues, is needed. I hope this essay represents a small step in that direction. We all are inclined to see only what we want to see. This was certainly the case with many of the missionaries who were contemporaries of those first indigenous Chinese Christians. As Hunter and Chan, speaking of this largely Pentecostal revivalist movement, note:

The missionaries perhaps failed to appreciate the significance of these expressions of popular religiosity, which they compared unfavourably to the quieter and more orderly forms of worship they advocated themselves. As we look back from the 1990s they seem a quite natural form of religious behaviour among peasant communities and recent immigrants to cities.[36]

I do hope that our generation will not make the same mistake. I trust that we will acknowledge and respect the significance of this powerful, indigenous, and largely Pentecostal form of Christianity that has emerged in China over the past two decades.

PR

This excerpt is part of Chapter 3 from The Church in China: Persecuted, Pentecostal, and Powerful (Baguio, The Philippines: AJPS Books, 2004). Used with permission.

Notes

[1] Daniel H. Bays, “The Growth of Independent Christianity in China, 1900-1937,” p. 309 in Daniel Bays, ed., Christianity in China: From the Eighteenth Century to the Present (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996).

[2] Bays, “Independent Christianity,” p. 310; for similar estimates see Hunter and Chan, Protestantism, p. 134, n. 60.

[3] Bays, “Independent Christianity,” p. 310.

[4] Daniel Bays, “Indigenous Protestant Churches in China, 1900-1937: A Pentecostal Case Study,” p. 129 in Steven Kaplan, ed., Indigenous Responses to Western Christianity (New York: New York University Press, 1995).

[5] Bays, “Indigenous Protestant Churches,” p. 130. Bays also traces a link with a Pentecostal group associated with Pastor M.L. Ryan of Salem, Oregon, which established a Pentecostal center in Shanghai (pp. 130-31).

[6] Hunter and Chan, Protestantism, p. 121.

[7] Hunter and Chan, Protestantism, p. 121; on the Jesus Family see also Bays, “Independent Christianity,” p. 312.

[8] Hunter and Chan, Protestantism, p. 121; Bays, “Independent Christianity,” p. 312.

[9] Bays, “Independent Christianity,” pp. 312-13. See also Hunter and Chan, Protestantism, pp. 129-130.

[10] Daniel Bays, “Christian Revival in China, 900-1937,” p. 171 in Edith Blumhofer and Randall Balmer, eds., Modern Christian Revivals (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1993).

[11] Murray Rubinstein states that the “churches of the Holy Spirit” in Taiwan “have come the furthest toward creating a Christianity that is congruent with basic patterns of traditional Chinese religion” and feels they are on the “cutting edge of Christian progress” (Murray A. Rubinstein, “Holy Spirit Taiwan: Pentecostal and Charismatic Christianity in the Republic of China,” p. 366 in Bays, ed., Christianity in China (1996).

[12] Lambert, Resurrection, p. 154.

[13] See also Hunter and Chan, Protestantism, p. 140.

[14] Vinson Synan notes that “some historians refer to the 20^th century as the ‘Pentecostal century’” (Vinson Synan, The Century of the Holy Spirit: 100 Years of Pentecostal and Charismatic Renewal [Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2001], p. 2). See the similar judgment issued by William and Robert Menzies, Spirit and Power: Foundations of Pentecostal Experience (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000), p. 15.

[15] Synan, Century, p. 2. The global statistics are conveniently chronicled in D.B. Barrett and T.M. Johnson, “Global Statistics,” pp. 284-302 in The New International Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements (NIDPC). See also Synan, Century, especially chapters 14 and 15.

[16] Synan, Century, pp. 1-2.

[17] Synan, Century, p. 383.

[18] See the NIDPC, p. 287.

[19] See the NIDPC, p. 287.

[20] See the NIDPC, p. 58.

[21] See the NIDPC, p. 297.

[22] Dunch, “Protestant Christianity,” p. 215 (citing Andrew Walker, “Thoroughly Modern: Sociological Reflections on the Charismatic Movement from the End of the Twentieth Century,” p. 36 in Charismatic Christianity: Sociological Perspective).

[23] Hunter and Chan, Protestantism, p. 140.

[24] Hunter and Chan, Protestantism, p. 140.

[25] On the evangelical nature of the Chinese Church, see for example Lambert, Resurrection, pp. 282-83 and China’s Christian Millions, pp. 30-33, 68, and 188. Note also his positive assessment of miracles and healing in the Chinese Church in Lambert, Resurrection, pp. 112-114 and China’s Christian Millions, pp. 117-20.

[26] Lambert, China’s Christian Millions, p. 45.

[27] Lambert, China’s Christian Millions, p. 48.

[28] Lambert, China’s Christian Millions, p. 111.

[29] Lambert, China’s Christian Millions, p. 120.

[30] Lambert, China’s Christian Millions, p. 64 and note our discussion of Lambert’s interpretation of the house church Statement of Faith above.

[31] Lambert, China’s Christian Millions, p. 188.

[32] See Lambert, Resurrection, pp. 14, 154, 158, 246, 271; and China’s Christian Millions, pp. 49-55. The one exception is found in China’s Christian Millions, p. 49, where Lambert indicates that one of the founders of the True Jesus Church, Paul Wei, was “inspired by the Pentecostal movement.” He also mentions various practices of the church, including speaking in tongues. Lambert goes on to discuss the Jesus Family at length (pp. 50-52) without a single reference to their Pentecostal roots or orientation.

[33] For the testimony see Lambert, Resurrection, pp. 159-62; the first quote is from p. 159, the second from p. 162.

[34] For this testimony see Lambert, Resurrection, pp. 163-67; the quote is from p. 168.

[35] See Lambert, China’s Christian Millions, pp. 171-72.

[36] Hunter and Chan, Protestantism, p. 135.

Part 1: Introduction

By Robert P. Menzies

The Wind of the Holy Spirit Will Blow Everywhere

From the East coast to the West coast/

The wind of the Holy Spirit will blow everywhere/

From the East to the West/

The glory of the Holy Spirit will be released/

Good news comes from heaven/

Good news rings in the ear/

Causing dry bones to become moist/

Frail bones to become strong/

Full of the Holy Spirit, we will not turn back/

Step by step we go to distant places/

The lame skipping/

The mute singing/

The fire of the Holy Spirit, the longer it burns the brighter it gets.[1]

The Urging of the Holy Spirit

The Holy Spirit is urging/

Distant lands call/

Asking for the sound of salvation to ring in their ears/

Countless pairs of expectant eyes/

Oh, have not seen, have not heard the servants of God/

No matter what you feel/

No matter what you see/

We must declare the good news everywhere/

The Lord has already enabled us to see the land/

Oh, servants of God, you must boost your courage/

The Lord has already won the victory/

Satan has been bound/

Only one step further/

And we enter Canaan land.[2]

The series, “Is the Chinese Church Predominantly Pentecostal?” is an excerpt from The Church in China. Robert Menzies used a pen name, Luke Wesley, to write The Church in China: Persecuted, Pentecostal, and Powerful (Baguio, The Philippines: AJPS Books, 2004).
Read the 2023 Author’s Preface to this series.

It is now apparent that since the early 1980s the Church in China has experienced unprecedented growth. Once viewed as an essentially foreign faith, Christianity has taken root in the Chinese soil. And it has blossomed. If the trends of the past two decades remain constant, by 2020 there will be more evangelical Christians in China than in any other country in the world.[3]

Researchers are agreed that the form of Christianity that has emerged in China is both evangelical in character and Chinese in expression.[4] It is evangelical in that the vast majority of Chinese believers exhibit a firm belief in the authority of the Bible, faith in Christ as the sole means of obtaining salvation, and the necessity of evangelism.[5] And yet this evangelical faith has been expressed in ways that are especially appropriate to the Chinese context. Church life is often experienced in small groups that feature close relationships and family ties. There is a strong emphasis on the miraculous, with prayer for healing taking on an important role in the life of faith. The experiential dimension of Christian spirituality, expressed in prayers and worship charged with deep emotion, is significant to many Chinese believers. And the vast majority of Christians in China worship in ‘house churches’ (or, as some prefer, ‘autonomous Christian communities’) that are independent of state or foreign control.[6]

Observers in the West are still attempting to understand this burgeoning Christian movement and much is still unknown. It is evident that there is much to be learned from the Chinese Church, dynamic, multifaceted and polymorphous as it is, and that we in the West would do well to attempt to understand it more clearly. This is the case, not only because increasingly many western missionaries seek to minister in this great country; but, it is also the case because an understanding of the Church in China might shed light on ourselves, our own strengths and weaknesses, and stimulate new insights into our understanding and application of God’s Word. In short, a greater understanding of the Church in China might help us more fully understand and fulfill God’s plans and purposes for our lives.

Methodology

In order to answer our question, I shall analyze the five largest house church networks in China. Based on my own personal interviews with leaders from these groups, additional information gleaned from other researchers, and an analysis of relevant written documents, I will seek to characterize these five groups in terms of the following four categories:

1. Non-Charismatic – those Christians who believe that the Spirit’s work flows out of regeneration and who deny both a Baptism in the Spirit distinct from conversion and the validity of at least some of the gifts of the Spirit listed in 1 Cor. 12:8-10 for the church today.
2. Charismatic – those Christians who believe that all of the gifts listed in 1 Cor. 12:8-10, including prophecy, tongues, and healing, are available to the Church today.
3. Pentecostal – those Christians who believe that all of the gifts listed in 1 Cor. 12:8-10 are available to the Church today and who also believe that the Bible encourages every believer to experience a Baptism in the Spirit, an empowering for service distinct from regeneration.[9]
4. Classical Pentecostal – those Christians who, in addition to the beliefs ascribed to Pentecostals above, also affirm that speaking in tongues is the accompanying sign of Baptism in the Spirit.

I am using the terms listed above as theological rather than ecclesiastical descriptions. The New International Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements (NIDPCM) tends to define the terms based largely on ecclesiastical considerations. Therefore the NIDPCM classifies 99% of the 54.2 million Pentecostals and charismatics who it claims reside in China as “neocharismatics.” The term “neocharismatic” refers to charismatics not affiliated with the historic, classical Pentecostal groupings or to traditional, mainline denominations.[10] Of course, by definition, virtually all of the charismatic house church Christians in China would fall into this category. This system of classification is less helpful for elucidating the specific nature and theological orientation of the various groups in the Chinese church. We are primarily interested in what they believe.

It should also be noted that all of the categories listed above are compatible with the term ‘evangelical’. With the designation evangelical, I refer to those Christians who affirm: the authority of the Bible; that salvation is found only in Christ; and that evangelism is an important part of the Christian’s mission in the world. As I have already noted, the vast majority of Chinese Christians are evangelical in this sense. And, I might add, all five of the house church networks which we will analyze are also evangelical in nature.

In addition to defining key terms, I would also like to clarify the nature of my sources. I will be working with a variety of oral and written sources. First, I will utilize notes from my personal conversations and interviews with various house church leaders. Second, I will also draw upon responses to questions which I have posed to others who are experienced researchers of Christianity in China. Most of these researchers wish to remain anonymous so that their continued service in China might not be jeopardized. For this reason I will describe and list these sources as follows:

“A” – refers to notes sent to me on August 28, 2003 by a researcher who is associated with a large, evangelical, and generally non-charismatic denomination.

“B” – refers to notes sent to me on Sept. 1, 2003 by an independent researcher who is affiliated with a non-denominational mission.

“C” – refers to notes sent to me on Sept. 9, 2003 by a missionary in the classical Pentecostal tradition who works closely with house church groups in China.

“D” – refers to written notes and oral comments presented to me within the past year from an independent Pentecostal missionary who works closely with several of the house church networks listed above.

A third source of information will come from documents draw up by the house church networks themselves, especially the Statement of Faith produced and signed by leaders of several of the churches listed above on November 26, 1998.[12] Finally, I shall also draw from a number of books and articles which speak to our topic.

Image: Christian Lue

The five house church networks which I will examine are: China for Christ, a group with origins in the Fang Cheng district of Henan Province; The China Gospel Fellowship, a group which began in the Tang He District of Henan; The Li Xin Church, which stems from Li Xin region in Anhui Province; the Yin Shang Church, which also has its origins in Anhui Province; and finally, the Word of Life Church, sometimes called the “Born Again Movement”, which was founded by Peter Xu. These groups have been chosen for analysis because it is generally agreed that they represent the five largest house church networks in China.

It is extremely difficult to determine with any degree of precision the size of these groups. Estimates for these groups run as high as 12 million for China for Christ (Fang Cheng), 10 million for the China Gospel Fellowship, five million for the Word of Life, and five million each for the two Anhui groups.[13] My purpose here is not to argue for specific numbers, but rather to affirm that all of the researchers contacted agreed that these five house church networks represent a significant majority of house church Christians in China. This is especially significant in that virtually all researchers also agree that house church Christians represent the vast majority of Christians in China today. Thus, it is reasonable to conclude that these five groups represent a very significant cross-section or sampling of the Chinese Church.

 PR

Next Issue: “The House Church Networks: A Theological Assessment”

This excerpt is part of Chapter 3 from The Church in China: Persecuted, Pentecostal, and Powerful (Baguio, The Philippines: AJPS Books, 2004). Used with permission.

Notes

[1] Lu Xiaomin, Sounds of the Heart, p. 806 (Song #747).

[2] Lu Xiaomin, Sounds of the Heart, p. 826 (Song #767).

[3] Tony Lambert, China’s Christian Millions (London: OMF/Monarch Books, 1999), p. 179. In this book Lambert offered what is by all accounts a conservative estimate of the number of evangelical Christians in China: 30-50 million.

[4] Due to the limitations of my knowledge, I am not able to include Chinese Roman Catholics in this study. When I use the terms Christianity or the Church, it should be understood that I refer to Protestant Christianity and the Protestant wing of the Christian Church.

[5] On the evangelical character of the Chinese Church, see Tony Lambert, The Resurrection of the Chinese Church (Wheaton, IL: OMF/Harold Shaw Publishers, 1994), pp. 282-283 and China’s Christian Millions, pp. 30-33, 45, 48, 188; Alan Hunter and Kim-Kwong Chan, Protestantism in Contemporary China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), p. 82; Ryan Dunch, “Protestant Christianity in China Today: Fragile, Fragmented, Flourishing” in Stephen Uhalley, Jr. and Xiaoxin Wu, eds., China and Christianity: Burdened Past, Hopeful Future (London: East Gate/M.E. Sharpe, 2001), p. 215.

[6] The emphasis on healing and the miraculous in the Chinese Church is noted in Hunter and Chan, Protestantism, pp. 85, 145-146; Lambert, Resurrection, pp. 112-114 and China’s Christian Millions, p. 112; and Dunch, “Protestant Christianity,” p. 203 and the experiential focus of the Chinese Church is highlighted in Dunch, “Protestant Christianity,” pp. 203, 215-16; and Hunter and Chan, Protestantism, pp. 85. 140, 155. Some researchers prefer to use the term ‘autonomous Christian communities’ rather than ‘house church’, see in this regard Hunter and Chan, Protestantism, p, 81.

[7] Stanley Burgess and Eduard M. Van der Mass, eds. The New International Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements (revised and expanded; Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2002), p. 58.

[8] Lambert, China’s Christian Millions, p. 45. Unfortunately, Lambert does not offer a clear definition of the terms, “charismatic” or “Pentecostal.”

[9] This empowering experience might be designated by various terms, including ‘being filled with the Spirit’ or ‘anointed by the Spirit’. However, crucial concepts would include the belief that this experience is given by God in order to equip the believer for service, that it is available to every believer, and that it is logically distinct from conversion.

[10] See the NIDPCM, p. xviii-xxi, 58.

[11] Hunter and Chan, speaking of China, correctly note that “within the Pentecostalist movement one can find relatively restrained as well as exuberant groups…” (Protestantism, p. 155).

[12] See the English translation provided by Lambert in China’s Christian Millions, pp. 60-64.

[13] These numbers are taken from D, but are also very much in line with the estimates given to me by B, with one exception. D did not give an estimate for the number of believers in the Word of Life Church. B noted that the Word of Life group claims that it represents 23 million believers. This group is quite fragmented and it is difficult to take this estimate seriously. In 1998 an article in Christianity Today suggested that this group totaled around three million believers (see Timothy C. Morgan, “A Tale of China’s Two Churches,” Christianity Today 42 (July 13, 1998), pp. 30-39). Although it is likely that this group has grown significantly since then, five million appears to be a more realistic number. A and C did not offer specific estimates, but A indicated that these five groups represented a significant majority (60%) of the house church Christians in China.

By Robert P. Menzies

The essays that follow are not descriptions of the current state of the church in China.[1] Rather, they represent a slice of Chinese church history, albeit an important slice. Dr. Kevin Xiyi Yao of Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary has described 1990 through 2010 as the “Golden Age” of the church in China,[2] an assessment with which I concur. This was a period of rapid growth, missionary endeavor, and, in terms of the political and social environment, relative openness. The following essays, drawn from my book, The Church in China: Persecuted, Pentecostal, and Powerful, were written around 2000 and reflect the situation of the Chinese house church movement during this Golden Age (more specifically, in the 1990s).[3] Thus, they are now out of date and do not describe the current state of the church in a fast-changing China. Due to urbanization, changes in leadership, fragmentation, and increasing political pressure (especially since 2018), the five house church networks that I describe is these essays either no longer exist or have significantly changed. Nevertheless, this slice of history is important for it describes a particularly vibrant and dynamic period in the history of the Church. Furthermore, the essays that follow represent an early, pioneering effort to describe an aspect of the Chinese church that was often not acknowledged, let alone described. I refer to its Pentecostal character.

A number of more recent works have added important context and detail to my early study and largely support its central thesis that the Chinese house church movement of the 1990s was predominately Pentecostal. I think here especially of the writings of David Aikman, Paul Hattaway, and Dennis Balcombe.[4]

Robert Menzies used a pen name, Luke Wesley, to write The Church in China: Persecuted, Pentecostal, and Powerful (Baguio, The Philippines: AJPS Books, 2004).

The same may be said of more recent academic studies, with one important caveat. The strong experiential nature of Protestant Christianity in China, and particularly the emphasis in the house churches on healing, exorcism, and prophecy, has led many scholars to describe the dominant form of Protestant Christianity in China as Pentecostal. While Tony Lambert describes Chinese Christianity as “biblical supernaturalism,” others, such as Gotthard Oblau, Edmond Tang, and Chen-Yang Kao speak of the specifically Pentecostal features of the church in China.[5] Scholars do, however, disagree concerning how we should define the term, Pentecostal.[6] The general charismatic and Pentecostal orientation of the Chinese house church movement is widely acknowledged as the key to its rapid growth over the past four decades.[7] Nevertheless, sociologists like Oblau and Kao tend to minimize the significant role that the Bible or theological convictions play in shaping the praxis of these “Pentecostal” Chinese Protestants.

In the following essays, I presented at an early date evidence for the Pentecostal nature of the house church movement that grew so rapidly during what is now understood as the Golden Age of the church in China. While, as I have noted, some scholars downplay the role of the Bible in shaping Pentecostal practice in China, and thus they also deny that Chinese Pentecostals possess a clear theological identity, these essays challenge this assessment.[8] Certainly, not every Christian that prays for the sick, exorcises demons, or prophesies, would affirm a baptism in the Spirit distinct from conversion that is marked by speaking in tongues. Nevertheless, there are a significant number that do.[9] And their influence, as well as the clarity of their biblical convictions, should not be underestimated. The common thread that unites Pentecostals in China with other Pentecostals around the world is their sense of connection with the apostolic church as reflected in the book of Acts. Chinese Pentecostals pray for the sick, worship with joyful abandonment, speak in tongues, and seek the enabling of the Spirit for bold witness in the face of persecution because they find all of these experiences described in the New Testament. The message and methods of the early church are models for their lives and ministry. I sought to demonstrate this thesis through an analysis of five of the largest house church networks in China during this remarkable period. I will leave it to others to assess the extent to which these earlier networks have influenced contemporary house church groups; but, from my vantage point, the impact is evident.

PR

Notes

Image: Christian Lue

[1] For a more contemporary, but now slightly dated description, see Robert P. Menzies, “Pentecostals in China,” in Global Renewal Christianity: Spirit-Empowered Movements Past, Present, and Future , vol. 1: Asia and Oceania, ed. by Amos Yong & Vinson Synan (Lake Mary, FL: Charisma House, 2016). See also my blogs on ChinaSource.org: “Pentecostal Theology and the Chinese Church” (Jan. 21, 2015); “Urban Churches in China: A Pentecostal Case Study” (June 26, 2015); “The Seed of the Church and the Modern Missions Movement” (Feb. 21, 2022). [Editor’s note: See David Bradnick’s review of Vinson Synan and Amos Yong, eds., Global Renewal Christianity: Spirit-Empowered Movements—Past, Present, and Future, Volume 1: Asia and Oceania]

[2] In his March 27, 2021 ChinaSource presentation.

[3] The essays are drawn from Chapter 3 of my book, written under the pen-name, Luke Wesley, The Church in China: Persecuted, Pentecostal, and Powerful (Baguio, The Philippines: AJPS Books, 2004).

[4] David Aikman, Jesus in Beijing: How Christianity Is Transforming China and Changing the Global Balance of Power (Washington, D.C.: Regnery Publishing, 2003) [Editor’s note: see Tony Richie’s review]; Paul Hattaway, The Heavenly Man (Oxford: Monarch Books, 2003), and The China Chronicle Series [Editor’s note: see Paul Hattaway’s author page and reviews of books from The China Chronicle series including Guizhou, Zheijiang, and Tibet]; Dennis Balcombe, One Journey One Nation (Chambersburg, PA: eGen Co, 2011) and China’s Opening Door (Lake Mary, Fl: Charisma House, 2014).

[5] Tony Lambert, China’s Christian Millions (London: OMF/Monarch Books, 1999), 112; Gotthard Oblau, “Pentecostals by Default? Contemporary Christianity in China” in Allan Anderson and Edmond Tang, eds., Asian and Pentecostal: The Charismatic Face of Christianity in Asia (Costa Mesa: Regnum, 2005), 411-36; Edmond Tang, “‘Yellers’ and Healers: Pentecostalism and the Study of Grassroots Christianity in China” in Asian and Pentecostal, 467-86; Chen-yang Kao, The Cultural Revolution and the Post-Missionary Transformation of Protestantism in China (PhD thesis, University of Lancaster, 2009).

[6] I agree with Simon Chan, “an adequate definition of Pentecostalism cannot be restricted to phenomenological description” (Chan, “Wither Pentecostalism” in Asian and Pentecostal, 578).

[7] Kao, Cultural Revolution, 99.

[8] This is true of my earlier book, The Church in China (2004), from which these essays are drawn, but also of my more recent study, “Pentecostals in China,” in Global Renewal Christianity (2016).

[9] I define Pentecostals, then, as those who believe that: the book of Acts serves as a model for contemporary Christian life and ministry; the baptism in the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:4) is a post-conversion enabling for ministry; and speaking in tongues marks this experience. Neo-Pentecostals affirm all of the above except they reject the notion that tongues serve as a normative sign of baptism in the Spirit. For more on Pentecostal identity and related definitions, see Robert Menzies, Pentecost: This Story is Our Story (Springfield, MO: GPH, 2013), 11-20.

China for Christ (Fang Cheng)

Let us begin with what appears to the largest of the house church networks currently operating in China, China For Christ (sometimes called the Fang Cheng Church). The China for Christ Church began in the Fang Cheng district of Henan Province. It has grown very rapidly since the early 1980s and constitutes a large network of house churches which span the length and breadth of China.

On Nov. 26, 2002 I met with the top leader of the China for Christ Network, Brother Z. We met and discussed various items for about an hour and a half and then shared a meal together. While we were eating, Sister D, the second highest leader in the China for Christ Network, joined us.

During our meal Sister D, who was sitting next to me, raised a question about a book on Pentecostal doctrine that I had made available to them.[1] She suggested that baptism in the Spirit, although possibly an experience subsequent to conversion, could also take place at the moment of conversion. She felt the book implied that Spirit-baptism must take place after conversion. I assured her that we were all in agreement on this point and that when most Pentecostals speak of baptism in the Spirit as subsequent to conversion, we actually mean that it is logically subsequent to conversion, a distinct work of the Spirit. Temporally, both could occur at essentially the same moment (as with Cornelius and his household in Acts 10). We continued our discussion and Sister D indicated that their church was classical Pentecostal in nature.

The series, “Is the Chinese Church Predominantly Pentecostal?” is an excerpt from The Church in China. Robert Menzies used a pen name, Luke Wesley, to write The Church in China: Persecuted, Pentecostal, and Powerful (Baguio, The Philippines: AJPS Books, 2004).
Read the 2023 Author’s Preface to this series.

Sister D then stated emphatically that their church came to these classical Pentecostal conclusions, not of the basis of receiving this tradition from others; but rather, as a result of their own experience and study of the Book of Acts. She indicated that in the 1970s and 1980s they were quite isolated and experienced considerable persecution. In this context of persecution they developed their classical Pentecostal orientation. At this time their church began to grow. Today, as I have indicated, the China for Christ Network is widely recognized as the largest house church group in China.

I then asked the group if they felt the majority of Christians in China were Pentecostal. Brother Z answered and said that apart from the TSPM churches and various smaller house church groups, the vast majority were indeed Pentecostal. He considered, in addition to their own church, the China Gospel Fellowship, the Li Xin Church, and the Yin Shang Church to be Pentecostal.

On another occasion late in 2002 I had the joy of teaching in an underground Bible school associated with the China for Christ Network. During one of the breaks, the leader of the school showed me around and introduced to me some of the other faculty members. In the midst of our conversation, I noted that their theological tradition was similar (lei si) to mine (he knew of my classical Pentecostal orientation). He stopped, looked at me, and said emphatically: “No, our theological traditions are the same (yi yang).” Later, with great excitement, he spoke of the hunger for the things of the Spirit in the churches in the countryside.

This evidence, admittedly anecdotal in character, is substantiated by the responses I have received from the other researchers mentioned. Virtually all of them would agree that the China for Christ group should be classified as classical Pentecostal, although certainly there may be some in this large network that might be best described as Pentecostal.[2]
China Gospel Fellowship

The origins of the China Gospel Fellowship can also be traced to Henan Province. This network of house churches has grown rapidly since the early 1980s and now has evangelists working in virtually every province in China. I have developed close relationships with a young couple sent out as evangelists by this group. This couple has been very effective in planting churches among village people in our region. They are very open to all of the gifts of the Spirit listed in 1 Cor. 12:8-10. Their testimonies are laced with references to healing, visions, prophetic insight, and persecution. They also speak of being “filled with the Spirit,” an experience which enables them to face hardships and adversity. While they do not appear to view tongues as integrally connected to this experience, they do view tongues-speech as a valid and edifying experience. If this couple is reflective of the group as a whole, I would say that the group is Pentecostal. This conclusion is consistent with the judgments of the three other researchers I contacted with knowledge of this group, two of whom categorized the group as, at least, charismatic (A and B). One other (D) indicated that the group is Pentecostal in its orientation.

I have participated in a number of house group meetings associated with this group. The following example, an excerpt from my personal notes, reveals a bit of the excitement and sense of community that characterize these meetings.

On December 23, 2002 I participated in a house church Christmas service. I walked through the door of the small apartment, roughly 600 square feet in all, and entered into the main room. It was very simple, with concrete floors and bare walls. The walls were now adorned with Christmas decorations. One banner proclaimed, “Pu Tian Tong Qing” (The whole world celebrates [His birth] together). The crowd grew to the point that the small adjoining rooms had to be pressed into service. All told, around 70 people packed into the little sanctuary.

The people were simple, country people. This house church is situated at the edge of a large city. The people living in this area represent village people who have migrated to the city. Urbanization is taking place at a breath-taking pace in China. In cities across the country there are large populations of village people attempting to “make it” in the cities. It was apparent that these folks were marked more by the village than the city.

The service, [led by the capable young Chinese couple noted above], began and a sense of joy quickly permeated the small make-shift sanctuary. Songs and scripture readings celebrating Christ’s birth followed. It was then my turn to preach. I greeted the crowd, which now seemed like a large family, and began to share about Christmas.

After the short, simple message, a call to accept Christ as Savior and Lord was given. Nine people responded joyfully. There was a lot of clapping and celebration as they moved to the front of the room. I led the small group in a prayer of repentance, commitment, and thanksgiving and followed with a prayer of blessing.

The next stage of the service was filled with a number of truly amazing and very culturally authentic forms of worship. Small groups of believers, usually two or four, sang songs based on Scripture as they performed Christian folk dances. It was incredible – a wonderful form of worship which instructed and edified the entire group. Everyone entered in and the joy was almost tangible.

When the service finally came to an end, the nine new believers gathered together for instruction. I was especially touched by one family. The husband had just committed his life to Christ. He along with his wife and their small one year-old baby stood together. Their faces beamed with new-found joy.

The Yin Shang Church

This house church network began in Anhui Province in the late 1970s. It claims to have over 20,000 distinct congregations and approximately five million followers.[3]

On Nov. 25, 2002, I met with Brother C., the leader of the Yin Shang Network. Persecution was a major topic of our discussion. One of Brother C’s colleagues had been arrested a few weeks before our meeting and he was still in prison. After we prayed for this man, Brother C. noted that just two days prior to our meeting the Chinese government had conducted high level meetings with various departments within their bureaucracy. In these meetings they discussed their policy toward the house churches. The government officials concluded that they would strictly enforce new measures which demanded that all house churches register with the government. The government attempted to present this new policy as an opportunity for house church groups to register and receive government recognition. During our meeting, Brother C. received many calls from his colleagues asking how they should respond to the new policies. Brother C. said they would not register, but wait and watch how things developed. He felt that this new policy actually represented a new wave of persecution, not a new opening. In the past, the government had often issued fines for not registering. Now, Brother C. stated, they are intent on arresting people who do not comply. Brother C. indicated that they would only register if there were no conditions placed upon them. He stated that currently the government was asking for the names of leaders, the number and names of believers, and the location of their meetings. This was not acceptable to him. Approximately one month after our meeting, Brother C. was arrested and imprisoned. He is currently still being held in prison.

During the course of this meeting, Brother C. stated very clearly that the Yin Shang Church did believe in the baptism in the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues. He stressed that they seek to maintain a balance between the Word and Spirit. Although I would not say that this group links tongues with Spirit-baptism in the classical Pentecostal sense, they are indeed Pentecostal. This was explicitly stated by Brother C.[4] It is likely that, in a manner similar to the members of the China for Christ Church (and, I would add, the early Christians in the book of Acts), their experience of persecution has shaped their theology at this point.

The Li Xin Church

This church takes its name from the Li Xin region in east central Anhui Province where it was first established. The church was founded around 1980 and was especially strong in Shandong, Anhui, and Henan. It then rapidly spread from this base to other parts of China. One of the strongest leaders of this movement is a woman.

I have not had much personal contact with this group or its leaders. One research colleague, D, who has had considerable contact with the Li Xin leaders insists that this group is Pentecostal, but that they are not classical Pentecostal in that they do not insist on tongues as the initial evidence of Spirit baptism. Another research colleague, A, characterized this group as charismatic with some Pentecostal leanings. B characterized this group as charismatic and C was not able to make a judgment due to lack of knowledge. It would appear that the group is predominately Pentecostal with some segments perhaps best described as charismatic.

The Word of Life Church

The origins of the Word of Life Church, sometimes called the “Born Again Movement” by outsiders, can be traced to 1968.[5] At this time, Peter Xu began to preach in his hometown in southern Henan. By 1979 he was leading a group of evangelists whose ministry was now reaching into other areas of Henan. Beginning in the early 1980s they experienced tremendous revival. Many accepted their message and hundreds of churches were established. In 1982 they began to send teams of evangelists to other provinces. The first teams were sent to Sichuan Province. Initially, a number of these teams were arrested and sent back to Henan. However, in spite of these setbacks, the church persevered and finally a strong work was established in Sichuan. This also became a major center of ministry.

In 1982 Peter Xu was arrested and imprisoned. However, he was able to escape from the labor camp and resume his ministry. In 1983 a wave of persecution came and many Word of Life evangelists scattered to other provinces. During this time they developed a “seven point missions strategy” (see below) and sent out other full-time evangelists to plant churches.

By 1988 more than 3,000 churches had been planted. Peter Xu was re-arrested in 1988 for attempting to meet with Billy Graham when he visited China. Xu spent three years in prison and was released in 1991. Xu was arrested again in March of 1997 and again spent three years in prison. He was released in May of 2000 and now resides outside of China. Since his departure from China, the Word of Life Church has experienced significant fragmentation. In 1998 an article in Christianity Today estimated that the church numbered around three million believers. This article also rejected some claims that this group was heretical and concluded that it was evangelical in character.[6]

The Word of Life bases its theology on John 3:3-5 and emphasizes that the only way to eternal life is to repent and have a new birth in Jesus. In some respects they are quite charismatic. They love the “Fire Bible,” the Chinese translation of the Life in the Spirit Study Bible, pray regularly for the sick, and are very much attuned to the power of the Holy Spirit.[7]

The have been criticized for supposedly emphasizing that believers must cry for prolonged periods of time in order to be truly saved. Thus, they have been called the “criers” and “the born again movement.” It is true that they are very emotional and frequently cry when they pray, but Peter Xu and other leaders insist that crying is not a requirement for salvation. It is quite possible that in a movement this size that some extremes might be propagated at the grass-roots level which do not in fact reflect the more orthodox views of the leaders.

Their theology, described as a “theology of the cross”, led to the following seven point missions strategy:

1. Preach the salvation of the cross in order to make sure one repents and experiences the new birth.
2. Take the way of the cross to persevere in faith during suffering.
3. Recognize that the TSPM embraces a worldly authority.
4. Plant churches (this is the goal of evangelism)
5. Build up spiritual life (through spiritual life training)
6. Build up fellowship (fellowship in church and with co-workers)
7. Grow through planting churches (send out evangelists, plant churches, and establish Bible schools).

My first encounter with this group came in Beijing in October of 1998. I had the joy of meeting with a group of eight Word of Life leaders. The eight leaders, who came from their ministry posts in various parts of China, were, with one exception, all young, in their mid-to late twenties. Most, however, had already been preaching for close to ten years. Seven of the eight were women. Their testimonies were incredibly inspiring. All but one had been in prison. One young lady who had been arrested along with Peter Xu the previous year had only recently been released from prison.

A colleague of mine asked one young lady, D, if she had been mistreated in prison. In a very matter of fact way, she said, “yes, they beat me.” She recounted how the prison officials tried to prevent her from preaching or praying: they beat her and shocked her with an electric baton in the chest. In spite of these difficulties, she was able to minister to many in prison. One prostitute was healed and accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior. On one occasion a guard attempted to rape her, but as she prayed the guard fell unconscious and had to be taken to the hospital. Their testimonies of God’s faithfulness and protection were filled with many stories of miraculous intervention.

Since this meeting in 1998 I have had considerable contact with various members of this group. On June 4, 2003 I interviewed one of their leaders whom I know quite well. I asked her about her group’s attitude toward spiritual gifts and baptism in the Holy Spirit. She confirmed that they were conservative evangelicals. She also stated that:

1. They do not encourage speaking in tongues. Although this may rarely happen, it is not really encouraged and a small element in the group would see it as demonic.
2. They emphasize healing, but they do not practice prophecy or speaking in tongues.
3. They do emphasize the importance of the Spirit’s power in their lives, especially in evangelism and ministry. And, although they might connect this with baptism in the Spirit, this appears to be an area where their theology is not clearly developed. They appear to be open to the Spirit’s empowering after conversion, but whether they would describe this as a definite experience available to everyone or connect this with Acts 2 is not clear. My friend did say said they did not emphasize the term, “baptism in the Holy Spirit.”

Image: Christian Lue

In short, the Word of Life Church represents an interesting mixture of conservative theology and experiential piety. They expect to see miracles, pray for healing, and look to the Holy Spirit for supernatural guidance and deliverance. At the same time, they are generally quite closed to some manifestations of the gifts of the Spirit, such as prophecy and tongues. One researcher, B, after classifying the group as “charismatic”, put it this way: “Overall, [the Word of Life Church is] similar to the Southern Baptists in theology (eternal security, etc.). Yet the first time I met Xu he was on his way to try to raise from the dead one of his workers who had suddenly died.” According to the definitions I have listed above, I would classify this group as non-charismatic. As I have indicated, they do not appear to see all of the gifts listed in 1 Cor. 12:8-10 as valid for the church today.

The House Church Statement of Faith

On November 26, 1998 a group of four house leaders, including the leaders of the China for Christ Network and the China Gospel Fellowship, signed a statement of faith that they had forged together during meetings convened throughout the previous days. This statement represents the most significant theological statement issued by house church leaders to date. It is thoroughly evangelical and organized around seven key headings: On the Bible; On the Trinity; On Christ; On Salvation; On the Holy Spirit; On the Church; and On the Last Things. The statement on the Holy Spirit is especially significant for this study. It reads:

On the Holy Spirit: We believe that the Holy Spirit is the third person of the Trinity. He is the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ, the Spirit of truth and the Spirit of holiness. The Holy Spirit illuminates a person causing him to know sin and repent, to know the truth and to believe in Christ and so experience being born again unto salvation. He leads the believers into the truth, helps them to understand the truth and obey Christ, thereby bearing abundant fruit of life. The Holy Spirit gives all kinds of power and manifests the mighty acts of God through signs and miracles. The Holy Spirit searches all things. In Christ God grants a diversity of gifts of the Holy Spirit to the Church so as to manifest the glory of Christ. Through faith and thirsting, Christians can experience the outpouring and filling of the Holy Spirit. We do not believe in the cessation of signs and miracles or the termination of the gifts of the Holy Spirit after the apostolic period. We do not forbid speaking in tongues and we do not impose on people to speak in tongues; nor do we insist that speaking in tongues is the evidence of being saved.

We refute the view that the Holy Spirit is not a person of the Trinity but only a kind of influence.[8]

This statement contains several significant declarations that highlight the Pentecostal leanings of its framers. First, the notion that charismatic gifts were given only for the apostolic period (cessationism) is explicitly denied: “We do not believe in the cessation of signs and miracles or the termination of the gifts of the Holy Spirit after the apostolic period.” Thus, it is not surprising that the statement also declares that the Holy Spirit “gives all kinds of power and manifests the mighty acts of God through signs and miracles.” This statement, at the very least then, identifies the framers and the house church groups they represent as charismatic.

But there is more. This statement contains another significant declaration: “Through faith and thirsting, Christians can experience the outpouring and filling of the Holy Spirit.” Since this “outpouring and filling” may be received by Christians, this phrase must refer to a work of the Spirit subsequent to (at least logically, if not temporally) the regenerating work of the Spirit experienced at conversion. Although the purpose or impact of this gift is not explicitly stated, it is interesting to note that the language used to describe the experience (i.e., “outpouring and filling”) is drawn from the Book of Acts.[9] It seems obvious that a strengthening or empowering of the believer by the Spirit in accordance with the experience of the early church as recorded in the Book of Acts is in view here. The only prerequisites for receiving this gift which are listed in the statement are “faith” and “thirsting.” Surely this is another way of saying that this gift is available to all earnest believers who desire it. This statement then speaks of an empowering by the Spirit that is distinct from conversion and available to every believer. It thus identifies the framers as not only charismatic, but Pentecostal as well.

Finally, let us examine the reference to tongues: “We do not forbid speaking in tongues and we do not impose on people to speak in tongues; nor do we insist that speaking in tongues is the evidence of being saved.” Tony Lambert, noting this passage, states: “the careful neutrality concerning speaking in tongues is very far from the extreme teachings current in some charismatic or Pentecostal circles.”[10] It is not entirely clear what Lambert has in mind when he alludes to “extreme teachings current in some charismatic or Pentecostal circles.” Is he talking about the belief held by classical Pentecostals around the world that speaking in tongues is the sign or initial evidence of baptism in the Holy Spirit? If so, Lambert not only states that this doctrine is “extreme,” he also implies that this house church statement rejects this doctrine. I would suggest, however, that this ‘reading’ of the statement tells us more about the interpreter’s presuppositions than it does about the intent of the original framers. The phrase, “we do not impose on people to speak in tongues” probably should be taken in light of what follows to mean that they do not force believers to speak in tongues by means of emotional or psychological coercion (e.g., by declaring tongues to be a sign that they are truly believers).[11] It is highly unlikely that the framers, with this phrase, were consciously renouncing the initial evidence doctrine of classical Pentecostalism. This seems to be an obvious conclusion in view of the fact that one of the four cardinal framers is the head of a classical Pentecostal group, the China for Christ Network.

The only doctrine that the statement specifically rejects and which is relatively common in evangelical circles in the West is the doctrine that denies the current validity of speaking in tongues. The statement is very clear: “We do not forbid speaking in tongues.” The statement, of course, also rejects the strange and rare notion that tongue-speech is a sign of salvation. It is possible that this indeed is what Lambert has in mind when he speaks of “extreme teachings,” but it is such a rare and unusual doctrine, certainly not representative of mainstream charismatic or Pentecostal Christianity, that one can only wonder.[12]

In short, the statement on tongues does not appear to be a rejection of the classical Pentecostal position. However, it does not affirm this position either. It reads like a very diplomatic attempt to steer a middle path between two extremes. It rejects the position of those who would seek to forbid tongues and it refutes those who would seek to use manipulative means to force believers to speak in tongues. In fact, the careful way in which this statement is framed suggests that it is a wise compromise which accommodates both classical Pentecostals on the one hand and charismatics and (non-classical) Pentecostals on the other.

We are now in a position to highlight the implications which the house church statement of faith has for the question at hand. Our analysis has revealed that this statement is indeed significant. With its carefully worded phraseology concerning the work of the Holy Spirit, the statement of faith suggests that its framers and the churches they represent are, at the very least, Pentecostal and perhaps even classical Pentecostal in their theological orientation.

Summary

I have surveyed what are generally recognized to be the five largest house church groups in China. Collectively these groups almost certainly represent a significant majority of the house churches in China,[13] and possibly a majority of the Christian population in China as a whole. In any event, these groups represent a significant cross-section of the Church in China. More specifically, I have analyzed the theological orientation of these groups, particularly as it relates to Pentecostal and charismatic issues. My evaluation has been based on my own personal conversations, the findings of fellow researchers, and selected written documents. Although my conclusions must be viewed as somewhat tentative since hard sociological data in the form of grass-roots surveys are lacking, these conclusions are based on what would appear to be the most extensive research on this issue available to date.

My research suggests that the five groups should be categorized as follows:

1. China for Christ: largely classical Pentecostal, partly Pentecostal
2. China Gospel Fellowship: largely Pentecostal, partly charismatic
3. Yin Shang Church: largely Pentecostal, partly charismatic
4. Li Xin Church: largely Pentecostal, partly charismatic
5. Word of Life Church: largely non-charismatic, partly charismatic

Based on this analysis, I would conclude that the overwhelming majority of the Christians in China today are at least charismatic. This study suggests that 90% of house church Christians and perhaps 80% of the total Christian population in China would affirm that the gifts of the Spirit listed in 1 Cor. 12:8-10 are available to the church today.[14]

Furthermore, in the light of the significant strength of the Pentecostal groups listed above, it is reasonable to conclude that a significant majority of the Christians in China today are not only charismatic, but also Pentecostal in their theological orientation. I would estimate that 75% of house church Christians and 60% of the total Christians population in China are accurately be described by this designation.

It is also clear that classical Pentecostals represent a minority of the believers in China, but it is a significant minority nonetheless. This is evident from that the fact that what appears to be the largest house church network in China today is best described as classical Pentecostal. I would suggest that approximately 25% of house church Christians and 20% of the total Christian population in China are classical Pentecostal.[15]

In addition to these conclusions concerning doctrine or beliefs, some general observations may also be made concerning behavior. The praxis of the House Church Movement in China may be described as exhibiting the following characteristics:[16]

1. A strong emphasis on personal experience, often reflected in emotionally-charged prayers and worship. God is understood to be present, personal, and vitally interested in communicating with and relating to individual believers. Exuberant, participatory worship and emotional responses to preaching are quite common and might be described as typical.

2. A strong expectation that God will intervene in miraculous ways in the daily lives of believers. House church Christians exhibit a firm belief in God’s ability and willingness to work miracles in their midst. Their testimonies often refer to God healing the sick, raising the dead, granting special wisdom or direction, communicating through dreams, visions, or prophetic messages, providing boldness for witness, or granting miraculous strength and protection. This expectation is often expressed in an openness to the gifts of the Spirit and is certainly encouraged in part by such biblical passages as 1 Cor. 12:8-10.

3. A strong sense of their own weakness and dependence upon God. Perhaps due in part to their experiences of marginalization and persecution, house church believers often reflect a keen awareness of their own weakness and a strong sense of dependence upon God’s supernatural power and leading. This is reflected in an emphasis on receiving strength and encouragement from the Holy Spirit, often in specific moments of prayer. This perspective is undoubtedly patterned after the experience of the early church recorded in the book of Acts. It is often associated with the expectation that one can receive needed strength or encouragement through a definable experience, regularly described as being “baptized in” or “filled with” the Holy Spirit.

PR

Next Issue: Part 3: “Gaining Perspective: A Contextual Assessment”

This excerpt is part of Chapter 3 from The Church in China: Persecuted, Pentecostal, and Powerful (Baguio, The Philippines: AJPS Books, 2004). Used with permission.

Notes

[1] A Chinese translation of William W. Menzies and Stanley M. Horton’s Bible Doctrines: A Pentecostal Perspective (Springfield: Logion Press, 1993).

[2] B, C, and D all affirmed that the China for Christ Network is classical Pentecostal, although B and C suggested that some might be better termed Pentecostal. A’s response was more general, and simply acknowledged that this group and the others listed were at least charismatic and very often Pentecostal in orientation.

[3] D provided this information.

[4] A characterized this group as at least charismatic with Pentecostal leanings; B characterized this group as charismatic; C had little contact with this group; and D characterized the group as Pentecostal.

[5] The material for the following historical and theological survey of the Word of Life Church comes largely from two unpublished papers, both produced by Chinese Christians: one paper, “A Case Study of The Way of Life (New Birth): A Chinese House Church Network,” was written in March, 2001 by an outside observer; the other paper, “Our Church History,” was written by a Word of Life Church leader in April, 2003.

[6] Timothy C. Morgan, “A Tale of China’s Two Churches,” Christianity Today 42 (July 13, 1998), pp. 30-39

[7] The Life in the Spirit Study Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan/Life Publishers, 2003) was first published as the Full Life Study Bible (1992).

[8] See Tony Lambert, China’s Christian Millions, p. 62 for this English translation. I have included the sentence, “In Christ God grants a diversity of gifts of the Holy Spirit to the Church so as to manifest the glory of Christ,” which is found in the Chinese original, but which is omitted in Lambert’s version. This appears to be an editorial oversight.

[9] The Chinese characters translated “outpouring” (jiao guan) and “filling” (chong man) of the Spirit in this statement are also found in Acts 2:17 (“pour out”) and Acts 2:4 (“filled”) of the He He Ben translation, the standard and most widely used Chinese translation of the Bible.

[10] Lambert, China’s Christian Millions, p. 64.

[11] The Chinese characters translated by the phrase, “do not impose upon” (mian qiang) certainly convey the notion of “force.” There is perhaps a slight difference in the nuances of the English terms “impose” and “force”, with force representing a slightly stronger term. The semantic range of the Chinese term, mian qiang, would certainly include the stronger connotations of “force.”

[12] Only a few ‘Jesus only’ groups, such as the United Pentecostal Church, would affirm this doctrine. These are fringe groups very much out of sync with mainstream charismatic or Pentecostal groups.

[13] This conclusion was affirmed by A, B, C, and D. Of course there are other large, significant groups that are non-charismatic, such as the Wen Zhou Church and the Little Flock. (I might note that I have spoken to one of the leaders of the Little Flock and he indicated that he has had a Pentecostal experience which included speaking in tongues. This experience and his contact with China for Christ leaders has encouraged him to relate more constructively to other to this and other church groups.) However, there are also other large, significant groups which are Pentecostal as well. One such classical Pentecostal group which C relates to is 400,000 strong.

[14] A word concerning the method used to arrive at these percentages is in order. I have taken the largest five house church groups as representative of house church Christians in China as a whole. I have used the estimated strength of these five churches listed in the methodology section above to arrive at specific percentages. Although these specific numbers may be high, the general proportions they represent are probably relatively accurate. Thus, the percentages for house church Christians were: non-charismatic (10%); charismatic (90%); Pentecostal (75%); and classical Pentecostal (25%). I have considered the China Gospel Fellowship and the two Anhui groups to be largely, but not entirely Pentecostal. This accounts for the variance between the percentages for charismatics (90%) and Pentecostals (75%). As a result of my own personal observations and my reading of the research available, I have also assumed that in China house church Christians are three times as numerous as Christians affiliated with the TSPM churches. I then estimated, based on my own personal experience, concerning the percentage of TSPM Christians that might be classified as non-charismatic (50%), charismatic (50%), Pentecostal (20%), and classical Pentecostal (10%). This was the rationale, then, behind the final estimates.

[15] These conclusions are generally consistent with the assessment of the other researchers consulted: A suggested at least 90% of house church Christians were, at the very least, charismatic; B affirmed that a significant majority were charismatic without stating any specific percentages; C and D also indicated that very large percentages were charismatic and Pentecostal.

[16] We have already noted the strong biblical focus of the house church movement and need not repeat it here.

This book is volume 6 of Paul Hattaway’s China Chronicles Series. It focuses on the province of Xinjiang, which is located in the northwest area of China, it serves as a passageway “between China and the rest of the world” (page 1). It is the largest province in China and borders the countries of “India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Mongolia” (page 2). The province began being called Xinjiang in 1759 when it was given this name by rulers who were part of the Qing Dynasty (pages 4, 21-22). The author also mentions other interesting facts about this province, including its population numbers, which, with one exception, have grown over the years (page 3), that Marco Polo visited this area (pages 6-8), and that Islam is believed to have entered the province in AD 708 (page 8). Xinjiang has been the entry point not only for Islam but for a number of other religions as well including Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, and Christianity (page 15). Islam spread in this area through the use of force (pages 24, 26). Hattaway says that the province has experienced great cruelty throughout the centuries (page 13). In early 2021 it was believed that there were about 15,000 mosques in the province, this is, at least in part, due to the presence of the Uyghurs (page 29).

Xinjiang Province within China.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

But the focus of the book, as is true of all the other books in the series, is the Christian history of the area. Hattaway says that the history in this province can be divided into two major eras. The first concerns the significant impact that Nestorian Christians had in the area from 7^th century through to the 13^th century, and the second is the spread of the faith in the last century and a half (page 13). The author further notes that Swedish believers carried on significant ministry in Xinjiang and that Muslims in this province came to faith in Christ, hundreds of them (pages 13-14). In the book he covers Catholic missions (pages 43-54) but he indicates that Catholics make up a very small part of Christians in Xinjiang (page 54). The majority of the text is given to a consideration of Protestant missions and native Chinese workers. Hattaway says that today there are approximately “twenty times as many church members” in Evangelical Christianity as in Catholicism (page 54). As readers work their way through the book, they will find that many of the chapters are given to consider particular decades of Christian history. There are chapters devoted to the 1890s (pages 55-65), 1900s-1910s (pages 66-77), 1920s (pages 101-116), 1930s (pages 124-135), 1940s (pages 153-161), 1950s-1960s (pages 196-203), 1970s-1980s (pages 204-216), 1990s (pages 217-230), 2000s (pages 231-253), and the 2010s (pages 273-281). In addition to these chapters there are others devoted to key missionaries who served in Xinjiang and important events that took place there.

One chapter is devoted to George Hunter who was born in 1861, he was a Scottish missionary who served in the northwest part of China for 57 years carrying on significant ministry to Muslims (page 78). Hunter was called the “Apostle of Turkestan” (page 78). He could preach in 7 different languages (page 82), did not like the limelight (page 78), and never married (page 79). It seems that he did not see a lot of conversions as a result of his ministry (page 85). However, he remained undeterred in the work of evangelism (page 87). He was a picture of commitment.

This photograph of the Pamir mountains was taken near Karakoram Highway in Xinjiang.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

In addition to the chapters I have already mentioned there are some that focus on other topics as well. These included chapters on: The Modern Back to Jerusalem Movement (pages 254-272) and the Future of the Church in Xinjiang (pages 306-310). Throughout this book you will find the names of people who have engaged in Christian ministry in Xinjiang.

As is true of all of the volumes in the China Chronicles Series, this volume contains a wealth of pictures throughout its pages. It also contains extensive facts and figures in the tables found toward the back of the book. Paul Hattaway has once again brought to light some Christian history that we would likely not find on our own. This volume demonstrates that not all of God’s heroes are household names. Some have served very faithfully outside of the spotlight. Their life stories are truly challenging and inspiring.

Reviewed by John P. Lathrop

Henan is book number five in Paul Hattaway’s series “The China Chronicles.” This series focuses on true accounts of Christianity in China; it is thus a work of history. The author points out that this book is not the same as the one he wrote in 2009 called Henan: The Galilee of China; the text of this current volume contains changes, improvements, and new material not found in the earlier book (page xvii).

In speaking of the history of Henan, Hattaway says that it extends back approximately 3,500 years (page 2). At one time Buddhism was popular (page 2). Perhaps surprisingly, during the course of its history thousands of Jews have lived in Henan (page 3), they have been in the province for 2,000 years (page 9). The population of the province is currently close to 100 million (pages vi, 7) and it has more Christians than any other province in China (page 7). This is not because the church has not suffered persecution, on the contrary, the church there has suffered much (page 7).

The author says that Christianity has been in Henan for more than 1,300 years (page 17). Though it has a large Christian population today, the gospel did not bear much fruit for most of this time, it was not until the 1970s that significant growth took place (page 17). The first to bring the Christian message to the province were Nestorians, they arrived in the AD 600s (page 18). In the late 1500s Jesuit (Catholic) missionaries arrived (page 19). Evangelical missionaries did not arrive in Henan until the late 1800s (page 23).

Henan Province, China. In 2020, total population was estimated at over 99 million people.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

As Hattaway recounts the history of Christianity in this province, the reader will encounter the names of many Christian workers, both men and women. Some of them were missionaries who came to China from other countries and some were national workers. Readers who have some knowledge of missions will recognize names like Jonathan Goforth and Marie Monson. The author gives considerable space to discussing the ministries of Jonathan and Rosalind Goforth (pages 55-70) and Marie Monsen (pages 99-116). Readers who are more familiar with the Chinese church will recognize the names of Brother Yun, Zhang Rongliang, and Peter Xu Yongze.

In addition to individuals the author gives attention to some of the house church movements. These are the churches that are not part of the government approved Three-Self Patriotic church. The networks he writes about are: The Born-Again Movement (pages 155-178), The Nanyang Church (pages 198-217), The China Gospel Fellowship (pages 218-234), and the Fangcheng Church (pages 252-278).

Henan is a very balanced book in that it includes accounts about the hardships of the church in the province and the miracles that have taken place through the ministry of the church there. The church has experienced tremendous growth. One of the factors that has contributed to this growth is the uncompromising commitment of the Chinese believers to stand for Jesus no matter what. The book contains some very notable accounts of people being raised from the dead. An eighteen-year-old girl was raised after having been dead for three days, this took place after hours of worship and prayer (pages 207-208). In another very powerful account a man was raised from the dead. A Chinese believer went to a morgue three days in a row to pray for a dead man, after the third day the man came back to life (pages 213-217). Interestingly enough, the man who prayed for the dead man did not see the miracle happen, he heard about it later (page 216).

Reviewed by John Lathrop

Read an excerpt: Marie Monsen – The Mother of the Chinese House Churches

Asia Harvest’s page about Henan: https://www.asiaharvest.org/henan-inside-chinas-revival-a-new-book-by-paul-hattaway