Monday's Martyrs

This is Pastor Zhang Rongliang. He is a prominent Chinese house-church leader. He was arrested on December 1, 2004. He had previously spent 12 years on and off in prison for his faith. He had been subject to harsh torture, including electirc shock, during his previous time in prison. After being in prison for a year, the officials tried to transfer him to a prison in Zhongmu, China. But they wouldn't take him because he was in such fragile condition, they thought he might die. He's been kept in a couple different hospitals. He suffers from diabetes, high blood pressure and a number of other chronic health problems. They are still trying to decide his case. He's being accused of “attaining a passport through cheating” and “illegal border crossing.” They keep stalling, citing insufficient evidence for the case. But keep moving and retrying him. He has been sentences to 7 1/2 years, in which he's served almost 4.

Dear Lord,Please be with Pastor Rongliang now. Give him strength and healing. He has been a devoted servant of yours and is being treated more than unjustly. Lord God, please comfort him and give him peace until his release. Thank you. I pray this in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Monday's Martyrs

I imagine you are wondering why I chose the most tiresome day of the week to post about my saddest topic. At first, I wondered if it wasn't a good idea. Then I decided it was the perfect day. It's the perfect day, when all of us that are free to live our own lives and have so many worries and complaints, to read about people who have it so much worse off than we do. These people are imprisoned, tortured and killed all because of their faith. I think it puts things in perspective. Makes us see that our problems (in most cases) are so much smaller than we think they are. Be thankful for what you have and try not to dwell on the bad and aggravating things in your life. I'm talking to myself first and foremost. I have a bad tendency to complain about trivial things. I always have. I have been working on that and I pray this will help me put things in perspective as well.

Today's martyr is Li Ying.

She is in her early thirties. She is now serving a 15 year sentence for helping in the publishing of a magazine of an underground church in China. She and 16 others were arrested in April of 2001. And in December of 2001 she was condemned to death. She is not allowed to have a Bible and she is forced to work 15 hours a day making things that are to be exported out of China. She had been allowed visits from her mother. But those visits have been stopped because Li refuses to admit to being a member of a cult.

Lord God, I pray right now that you strengthen Li Ying. That you give her courage and endurance in her time of great trials. Give her peace and hope. And have mercy on her and cause her captors to have mercy as well. May her conviction be overturned and she be set free. In the name of Jesus Christ I pray. Amen.