The Bouyei Courtyard
One of the ladies in the courtyard
prayed and seemed to have made a decision to follow Jesus
last month. But on a follow-up visit, it became
apparent that this lady and her family had been very active
in
ancestor worship back in their home village.
When my friend told her that all ties with spirits and idol
worship needed to be cut off, she became visibly
upset. She was very fearful and began to
complain of a bad headache. Since then, she has told
my friend she is no longer interested in learning about
God. I talked to Mrs. L about this (she and her
husband are now the only believers in this courtyard) and
she said all the other ladies in the courtyard practiced
ancestor worship at home. They are now saying to each
other, “ If we believe in God in the city, what are we going
to do with our ancestors in the country?”
Both of the woman’s two daughters, aged
12 and 9, had shown keen interest before. The older one
seemed especially motivated to learn and to sing
songs. Not long after the incident with her mother, however,
she began to say that it was interfering with her school
work and she didn’t have time. The 9 year old girl had
been very interested one week and then the next week would
avoid us and say she didn’t want to participate. This
kind of erratic behavior really puzzled us. This past
week, the girl’s mother told us her daughter had closed her
eyes and prayed aloud in school. Her teacher noticed
this and asked her what she was doing. When she told
him, he got angry and
made her stand up in front of the
class as punishment. Later that day he escorted her home
and told her mother that she must stop her daughter from
participating in this sort of outside activity. He
said that if she continued, she would not want to do any
of her regular schoolwork. The mother told us
that her two daughters do not want to learn about God any
more.
I have never seen such a clear case of
spiritual opposition to the Gospel. Through
ancestor worship they have been in bondage to Satan for many
generations. Breaking free will not be easy. In
Guizhou, the Bouyei commonly maintain ancestral altars in
the home with food and drink offerings. Incense and paper
money are also burned as offerings to ancestral
spirits. They believe that the happiness of the dead
depends on these offerings. They believe these departed
spirits have power to confer blessing or calamity on the
living relatives. You can see how afraid they would be
to leave their age-old practice.
The Bouyei in the city have another
stumbling block. They have an oft-repeated mantra,
“We are too busy; we don’t have time ( to learn about
God.)” They say sorting their trash takes
all their time, everyday from morning to late at night. Mr.
and Mrs. L believe this lie as strongly as the nonbelievers
around them. They have not yet trusted Him to be first
in their lives.
- Please pray for the conviction
of His Spirit in this critical issue of
priorities.
A
Patient
Praise the Lord that the patient with
the severe rheumatic heart disease really did pray to join
the family about 3 weeks ago. He is feeling a little
better after we revised his medical regimen. He seems
eager to learn. Please pray he would grow and be
established in his faith. Because of his poor health,
he is home a lot more than the usual Bouyei person making it
is easier to find time to teach him. Pray for his
family’s finances. They rely on his wife to bring home
income from trash collecting and they have 3 children, the
youngest being only 5 months old. They are in debt from
medical treatment at a local hospital and don’t have money
for rent and barely enough for their food. He says he is
praying twice a day about this and hasn’t seen God answer
yet.
- Please pray that God would show Mr. W
that He is his provider. We need wisdom to know when
to help and how to do it!
MY and XF are two young women who have
been part of the children’s program in the courtyard.
MY is eager to share the good news and loves children.
I’ve only recently gotten to know XF. She is from the Yi
ethnic minority. She has had a burden for reaching
Bouyei people for over 2 years and has a gift with
music. The two of them have continued to go to the
courtyard even when it seemed we were not welcome
there. We have now done away with the structured
program and the two of them just go to
play with the
children. In the course of their play, they still have
been able to teach a song and tell a Bible story.
- Pray for their ministry, that His
love would shine through them.
A retired couple have a heart to
minister! Last night, they came to the Sunday women’s group
and shared on marriage. What a blessing to have a
godly couple who have been married nearly 40 years to
share their experience. the usual group of 4 expanded to 16
last night! It just shows how important this topic is
in Chinese society where
divorce and troubled marriages
are epidemic. We had single ladies, divorcees, new
believers and non-Christians in attendance. They plan
to share once a month on topics of practical Christian
living.
