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0::~fn!~eri1~~8J around the wo rld Prague z I Czech Repu / on J oinville Actlan_t_eams abroa_d , international ~ Audio t a p e s List of speakers Keynote speaker cassettes available include: Alistair Brown David Coffey Ian Coffey Steve Gaukroger Andrew Green David Hall Martin Hewitt John James John Lewis David Martin Geraint Morse Alan Pain John Passmore Michael Quicke Peter Dewi Richards Bill Slack ud o tap I guess sacrifice is not something we think about a lot. My dictionary New town churchplanting gives one definition for it: "the act How the church is going for growth of giving up something valued for the sake of something else more imporlant or INTER NG TIMES worthy". Well, maybe, we can do it once in a while, Challenge to their faith but it's easy to slip into the mentality of the age Conce rn about returning to Chinese rule which denies itself nothing. This issue focuses on the church in China and HIN I Hong Kong, something that has been brought to -0 Past, present and future the forefront of all our minds as the handover of How the chu rch has developed Hong Kong to China draws ever nearer. Christians in China over the years have had to make 10 u ? sacrifices, that make our giving up of incidentals The sleeping tiger look incredibly petty and almost profane. What price religious freedom in Chin a? Meanwhile Christians in Hong Kong, having enjoyed a life of comparative security, must now face the 11 unknown, and the uncerlainty that brings. You will also find included with this edition of BMS NEWS m h your second instalment of the BMS Prayer Guide. Thank you for all your positive comments LO about the first Prayer Guide; we've been amazed, WORLD MISSION LINK as always, as to how God has led us to include cerlain items at specific times • just when they seemed to be needed most! So keep praying! Our CENTRE SPREAD God delights to answer our prayers • even if the Dorothy Smith - miss ion to Hong Kong answers aren't quite what we expected! OUR TOWN Joinville, Brazil PASTORS ABROAD Andrew Phillips visits Italy TAKE TWO General Director Alistair Brown Subscription for 1997 mh and Mission file of facts, figures and background B~IS Prayer Guide are published Managing Editor Ri chard Wells as a compiate pac ka ge. £6. 00 Editor Jan Kend all through church mh cll stributors ACTION TEAMS £7 .98 by direct mail (inc p&p) . Regular Contributors Alistair SLx iss ues of m h with three of They're out at the sharp end Brown. Owen Clark. Sam Gibson . BM S Prayer Guide plus free Jan Kenda ll. John Passmore. Annual Review. Overseas p&p aL Ri chard Wells. the rate applicabl e. MISSIONARY DIGEST Design Editor Anth ony Vin ey Th e views and opinions Prayer points to support BMS colleagues Art Editor Sarah Pre nti ce expressed by contributors are not necessa rily those of the B~IS Director for Missionaries Sian 35 JOHN PASSMORE Williams (for enquiries about @ Copyright 1997 service) Baptist Missionary Society The last word NEXT ISSUE JULY-AUGUST Transmitting the Word Th e place of broadcasting and multi-media in the work of sharing the gospel .. May/ June 1997 mh · B\CCHRIS REVELEY Hong Kong: The t would appear that Christianity for someone who is too pushy, talkative or about 10 football pitches! The ground impressive skyline of in Hong Kong has a good name. salesy is that they are 'talking Jesus'. floor of each block is reserved by the a high-tech city but A Chinese colleague phoned me Christianity has done a good job meeting Government for a social function such as what future awaits at work a few weeks ago and Hong Kong's social and material needs, a kindergarten. These services have been its children? I asked if I could introduce him to yet seems to have by-passed the heart and 'privatised' so that groups such as someone at Kowloon City Baptist so still only about five percent of Hong churches, who undertake to manage and Church. I was pleased to hear that he was Kong's six million people are Christians .. fund them to regulated standards, then suddenly interested in going to church. get use of the premises in the evenings He quickly explained that the church New Town Church Planting and at weekends. ran one of the best kindergartens in Over half the population of Hong Kong Tai Po Baptist Church has planted a Hong Kong and so he was willing to do now live in the area called the New daughter church on the new Fu Heng whatever it took to get his child in there! Territories which is characterised by estate on the edge of town. This involved One University, many hospitals, schools modern 35-storey high-rise blocks with undertaking to finance and run a 550- as well as kindergartens, youth centres the average family having just 400 square children-a-day kindergarten at the and elderly centres are run by churches feet in which to live. Organised into bottom of a block. A young local pastor, and so Christianity is seen as a good and estates of 30,000 residents, one can find an elderly Baptist missionary from the worthy influence. the population of a town such as USA with a trainee couple from England And yet the Cantonese slang saying Aldershot living on the ground area of and 20 committed church members, a May /June 1997 mh ~ few of whom had flats on Fu Heng churches, has re-structured and trained FOR PRAYER: estate, started a Sunday service and an up for a cell church model, equipping the Please stand with your outreach in 1992. Over the next few years Christians and reducing the dependence brothers and sisters, many came to commit themselves to on pastor or place or Sunday service. and, every time you Christ and the church grew to about 120. Perhaps God is needing to purify his hear Hong Kong Many new Christians were first people here as he has purified and mentioned this year, contacted through the kindergarten. strengthened his church in China. pray for the pastors and When the social and spiritual elements of Perhaps, as many believe, this is God's the churches, God's the gospel are in unity then the love of time for Hong Kong and many will turn people there, during God draws people to him. At the to him. Perhaps the mixture of the this special time in beginning of 1997, Pastor Wong, with his Spirit-filled and dynamic Chinese history. wife and daughter, were commissioned by evangelists coupled with the well-taught the church to go to France to learn and affluent Christians of Hong Kong is French prior to heading to northern a force that is going to change the rest of Africa as ambassadors for the gospel. the world. What we do know is God is in control What future the Hong Kong church? and he will work out his purposes. • In the aftermath of the death of Deng and as 1 July 1997 draws closer, the Chris R veley is married to Lucy and works for church in Hong Kong faces the the International Bank. They have two children challenges of a very different and uncertain future. Although most people do not expect immediate dramatic changes, the new administration may well review a policy that gives churches such a powerful relevance in the community. It may be harder for missionaries to go in or out of Hong Kong. There is some speculation that churches may be required to register as the first step to a greater level of regulation. Fu Heng, along with many other or Christians in Hong Kong doubts about the Chinese side's sincerity thing to happen in Hong Kong. We want these are, in the words of the in keeping to their promises, especially to be good citizens, but also want to take traditional Chinese curse, after Beijing brutally suppressed the pro care of our own religious affairs on our F "interesting times". There democracy movement in June 1989. own" he said firmly. are both inescapable challenges and Under British administration people Not surprisingly when asked about opportunities in the period during which have been left largely to their own the future, his reply began, "We have to the British-run colony will be returned to devices, as have the churches too. China's take care of the Church and State mainland Chinese rule. communist administrators, however, relationship." Questions and concerns about the don't have such a benign view. "We have Many people find what has already handover have been playing on the mind heard stories about how the Chinese happened ominous, and the need to of Revd Timothy Lam, Senior Pastor at persecute Christians" said Timothy. address their concern has added to the Mongkok Baptist Church. Seemingly this attitude has already workload of the Church. The most "As a pastor I have thought of this spilled over into Hong Kong. obvious problem is emigration. question for a long time" said Timothy. The example cited by Timothy The figures are telling. In the past ten "I have prepared, like the government, concerns the Lutheran Congress planned years Mongkok Baptist Church has lost a for thirteen years." for July this year which Beijing's effective total of 100 members. That being said, Thirteen years ago, the British and embassy in Hong Kong, the New China attendance is plateauing at around 800 Chinese governments agreed in the Joint News Agency, attempted to get stopped.