China Persecution on FULL Display: Beijing Olympics in 2008 vs 2022

Millions of people around the world are watching the 2022 Winter Olympics in China, but something has changed since the last time China was on display for the 2008 Olympics and it isn’t just about Covid-19.

Something has deeply changed.

In the 2008 Olympic games, China seemed to shine. Everything seemed to be teeming with excitement and hopes of future freedom. Underground house church members gathered together and cheered each time China won a gold medal. Around the same time as the 2008 Olympics, BTJ hosted a meeting in China with house church leaders and western mission directors and the top Chinese pastors surprised everyone when they shared their plans to begin working with the government to start the legal registration process.

In 2008, there was a hope buzzing in the air among Chinese Christians. The government had eased up their attacks on the churches. Evangelism, printing Bibles, and sharing the Gospel with children was still illegal, but there was a feeling of freedom seeping into the cracks of the church and it was contagious. The lines were blurring between the official government church in China and the underground churches, but today that feeling is gone.

The difference between the 2008 Olympics in China and the 2022 Olympics is as drastic as summer is from winter.

Today, persecution against the house church is worse than it has been in two decades and the 2022 Winter Olympics gives us a rare peek of what the church is going through. The relationships that had developed between the underground house church and the government authorities have gone icy. The freedoms that the church had enjoyed during the season of summer have frozen over.

The China that was on the rise in 2008 and needed the world’s approval has now risen and no longer needs the consent of any other nation. Today, in 2022, it is now other nations that need to win China’s approval. The tables have turned and China has the power.

The persecution of Chinese Christians is reaching historic proportions, but it is the increased heavy-handedness of the new police state that the world is seeing on full display at the Olympics this year.

Since 2008, the number of Christians in China has skyrocketed, going from less than 70 million to over 150 million. The number of Christians now far out-numbers the members of the Communist Party. In fact, the number of believers in China is currently on track to double the Communist Party membership by 2030. This dramatic increase is the direct result of Christians around the world praying for the believers in China.

The spiritual enemy is undoubtedly concerned with the number of new believers in China and wants to put an immediate end to it. Atheism has been the ruling belief system in China for over 70 years and Satan would like to keep that power. I believe that it is this spiritual dynamic that is manifesting in the return of the draconian rules that we are seeing on full display at the 2022 Olympics.

As we watch the winter olympics from our homes today, let’s not be anxious but remember, “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.”

Continue to pray for the believers in China.

 

Dr. Eugene Bach is a known trouble-maker with an active imagination and sinful past. He has a PhD, but is not a real doctor, so please do not call for him during a medical emergency on an airplane when someone is having a heart attack. Eugene started working for Back to Jerusalem in the year 2000 after a backroom deal involving Chinese spies, the NRA, Swiss bankers, and a small group of Apostolic Christians that only baptize in Jesus’ name. He spends most of his time in closed countries attempting to topple governments by proclaiming the name of Jesus and not taking showers. From time-to-time he pretends to be a writer. He is not good at it, but everyone around him tries to humor him.

2 Comments

  1. Mary Elllen Gilvey

    I believe that Jin Ping has softened. I see a big difference since 2019. Don’t forget change takes time for some but others can change instantaneously. Everyone is different. You can’t expect a person to be like everyone else. Being like everyone else is boring. I myself am an Individualist and do my own thing. I don’t copy cat others and I don’t follow anyone but Jesus Christ. President Xi Jing Ping has done an outstanding job with the Winter Olympics. It is running beautifully and everything there looks spectacular. The Opening Ceremony was tastefully done. Thank you Xi Jin Ping for standing behind your good friend leader President Vladimir Putin. This is how World Peace among Nations happens. My heart wants World Peace and to have every Nation and World Leaders be Allies. Not enemies. We must never hate another World Leader for who the Leader is great and small the Nation is. By doing this we accomplish World Peace. This is my desire. Then we never need to launch any nuclear ballistic missiles at anyone for shear hatred over who the Leader is or what Religion they follow or what happened in the past or what they did for someone or for Power or to say we are more powerful than you and other reasons causing walls and barriers to be up rather than have open borders welcoming each other. Peace Among All Nations Please.

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  2. Joel Gani

    We appreciate your work, we got a lot of blessings after reading your articles, may God bless you in abundance.

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