All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. Romans 3:23-24
Lai Manping (1993)
Beaten by Church Members
In March 1993, eight Public Security Bureau (PSB) officers broke up a meeting of a house church (unregistered church) in Taoyuan, Shaanxi Province, China, and beat church members with truncheons and electric batons. The officers singled out five of the congregation who had travelled from another area in order to attend the meeting. They then forced the 26 remaining church members to beat the five visiting Christians. The next day the officers wanted to take the quintet to the regional PSB centre but the men and women had been beaten so violently that the regional command would not accept them. One of the men, Lai Manping, was in a very bad condition. The authorities released him eight days after the beating, but he died the following day as a result of his injuries.
They tell me I must bruise
The rose’s leaf,
Ere I can keep and use
Its fragrance brief.
They tell me I must break
The skylark’s heart,
Ere her cage song will make
The silence start.
They tell me love must bleed,
And friendship weep,
Ere in my deepest need
I touch that deep.
Must it always be so
With precious things?
Must they be bruised and go
With beaten wings?
Ah, yes! by crushing days,
By caging nights, by scar
Of thorn and stony ways,
These blessings are!
Annie Johnson Flint (1866-1932) from Streams in the Desert