A Martyr at the Turn of the Century

By Xiao Ruozhi
 

In first cen­tu­ry Jerusalem, Stephen was mar­tyred for the Lord. He became the first mar­tyr of the New Tes­ta­ment era. Acts records:

.…But Stephen, full of the Holy Spir­it, looked up to heav­en and saw the glo­ry of God, and Jesus stand­ing at the right hand of God. “Look,” he said, “I see heav­en open and the Son of Man stand­ing at the right hand of God.” At this they cov­ered their ears and, yelling at the top of their voic­es, they all rushed at him, dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Mean­while, the wit­ness­es laid their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul. While they were ston­ing him, Stephen prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spir­it.” Then he fell on his knees and cried out, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” When he had said this, he fell asleep (See Acts 6:8–8:3).

A blood-strewn path­way extends from Jerusalem.…

Octo­ber 16, 2000, Xiayi Coun­ty, Henan Province, Chi­na. A young Chris­t­ian by the name of Liu Haitao, age twen­ty-one, is mar­tyred for the Lord.

For three days since Octo­ber 16, the cas­ket had been sit­ting on the side of an asphalt coun­try road. Passers­by formed their opin­ions. Some shed tears of sym­pa­thy while oth­ers decried the dark­ness of the times-how a man who had become a believ­er and had done good things could end up being per­se­cut­ed to death. Tears of sor­row streamed down his fam­i­ly’s cheeks.

Liu Haitao was born on June 24, 1979 (Lunar Cal­en­dar) in Liu­fan­glou Vil­lage of Xiayi Coun­ty, Henan Province, and grad­u­at­ed from mid­dle school in 1996. Since his child­hood, Haitao learned how to pray from his moth­er who fre­quent­ly knelt in prayer with him. In the spring of 1999, Haitao repent­ed of his sins and received Jesus Christ as his Sav­ior. After his spir­i­tu­al regen­er­a­tion, Haitao drew close to the Lord and grew spir­i­tu­al­ly in life, knowl­edge, and spir­i­tu­al gifts. He was eager to learn spir­i­tu­al knowl­edge from the Word of God and was espe­cial­ly dili­gent in study­ing the Bible. What touched oth­ers most was Haitao’s desire to ded­i­cate him­self to the min­istry. In a pri­vate jour­nal, he wrote, “The Lord in His infi­nite love has saved me and giv­en me eter­nal life and adop­tion as His son. I can­not receive His grace in vain. My spir­it mourns for the over nine­ty per­cent of my coun­try­men who do not know Christ. If the Lord wants to use me, I am will­ing to ded­i­cate my youth to mis­sion work, and serve Him with my whole life.”

On Sep­tem­ber 4, 2000, while attend­ing a train­ing meet­ing in Qinyang City, Haitao was arrest­ed along with twen­ty-sev­en oth­er Chris­tians and put in the local jail. There, they encour­aged each oth­er to endure the hard­ships of prison. Despite the hard life in jail, Haitao was spurred on by God’s love and he man­i­fest­ed His love to oth­ers. He fre­quent­ly encour­aged oth­ers by quot­ing from God’s Word. He would say, “We must look up to our Lord, the author and fin­ish­er of our faith,” and, “Per­se­vere to the end and expe­ri­ence our Lord.” He prayed for oth­ers and shared what lit­tle food he had with fel­low inmates. Many believ­ers in jail were deeply touched by Haitao’s love for God and his sac­ri­fi­cial deeds for oth­ers.

On Sep­tem­ber 27, 2000, after hav­ing spent twen­ty-three days in jail, the Qinyang City police noti­fied the Chris­tians that each of them would be returned to the juris­dic­tion of their respec­tive home­town police sta­tions. Fur­ther­more, the Qinyang police announced that release orders had been pre­pared for each Chris­t­ian and that the police sta­tions of their home­towns were to release them imme­di­ate­ly upon receiv­ing the orders. When Haitao and anoth­er Chris­t­ian broth­er returned to Xiayi Coun­ty, not only were they not released, they were charged with “sab­o­tag­ing the insti­tu­tion and prac­tice of fed­er­al law by par­tic­i­pat­ing in a cult.” They were re-arrest­ed by the Xiayi police and jailed.

Now the church to which Haitao belonged holds to a pure Chris­t­ian faith. Their fun­da­men­tal doc­trine con­sists of the fol­low­ing:

• All six­ty-six books of the Bible are inspired by God and inerrant.
• There is only one God: Father, Son, and Holy Spir­it.
• Jesus Christ is the Son of God, the Word who became flesh and came into this world. He was tempt­ed as a man but was with­out sin.
• Christ will­ing­ly died on the cross for our sins, shed­ding His pre­cious blood to redeem believ­ers from sin and death.
• Christ rose from the dead, ascend­ed to heav­en, and sits at the right hand of God.
• Christ gives the Holy Spir­it to those who believe in Him.
• Christ will return and judge the world.

Haitao’s church does not believe that the apos­tolic age with signs, won­ders and gifts of the Holy Spir­it has end­ed. They do not for­bid speak­ing in tongues, nor do they force oth­ers to speak in tongues. Speak­ing in tongues is not con­sid­ered proof of sal­va­tion. In addi­tion to gath­er­ing for Sun­day wor­ship, the church also cel­e­brates Christ­mas and East­er, observes Com­mu­nion and Bap­tism, and teach­es believ­ers to meet peace­ful­ly and live a devout life of lov­ing coun­try, church, and neigh­bor. They have nev­er threat­ened to under­mine the imple­men­ta­tion of fed­er­al law, nor harm the envi­ron­ment, nor edu­ca­tion, nor the health of the peo­ple. On the con­trary, they have prayed for the sick and many have recov­ered from their ill­ness­es.

On Sep­tem­ber 28, the Xiayi police noti­fied Haitao’s fam­i­ly that he could be released in return for 5,000 yuan (US$604). His par­ents were unable to afford this sum of mon­ey and Haitao remained in jail. The father of anoth­er Chris­t­ian went to vis­it his son at the jail, but was inter­ro­gat­ed by the police and beat­en to the point of spit­ting up blood. Being just a civil­ian, he could not lodge a for­mal com­plaint. After all, such com­plaints would often lead to more trou­ble for them down the road. Prison days were dif­fi­cult for Haitao. Not only was prison life harsh by itself, but also he was mocked and beat­en by inmates and fre­quent­ly inter­ro­gat­ed and tor­tured by prison per­son­nel. As a result, Haitao’s kid­ney dis­ease, which had been in remis­sion up to that point, recurred. He blacked out sev­er­al times in a five to six day peri­od. He asked for treat­ment many times but was ignored. His con­di­tion was so bad that even fel­low inmates were con­cerned to the point of report­ing to the police that Liu Haitao’s con­di­tion was crit­i­cal and need­ed imme­di­ate atten­tion. Yet the author­i­ties’ response was, “He’s OK. He won’t die. He is just liv­ing a life in par­adise.…..” It was not until Haitao was near death, and upon the adamant insis­tence of inmates, that the police final­ly noti­fied the fam­i­ly.

In the after­noon of Octo­ber 14, 2000, Haitao’s father rushed to Xiayi Coun­ty jail only to see his son in crit­i­cal con­di­tion. He plead­ed with the author­i­ties to allow Haitao to be hos­pi­tal­ized. Instead, the offi­cial response was, “The rule is no one may be allowed out of the jail at night. If you have mon­ey, give it to the jail doc­tor and he will decide how to treat the patient.” The father hand­ed 100 yuan (US$12) to the doc­tor and returned home.

After a sleep­less night, Haitao’s father and moth­er rushed back to the coun­ty jail. There they asked per­mis­sion to take Haitao to the hos­pi­tal. The author­i­ties replied, “We do not pro­vide trans­porta­tion. You’ll have to rent your own trans­porta­tion.” The par­ents rent­ed a pedi­cab. By then Haitao was not only crit­i­cal­ly ill, but his feet were still locked in leg irons that weighed sev­er­al pounds. With­out the strength even to walk, Haitao was lift­ed onto his father’s back as they climbed into the pedi­cab. The prison doc­tor accom­pa­nied them as they made their way to the hos­pi­tal.

On the way, the father asked his son, “Did they give you any treat­ment last night?” The son replied, “They only gave me a few pills.” Real­iz­ing the sever­i­ty of the sit­u­a­tion, the prison doc­tor refund­ed 90 yuan to the fam­i­ly on the spot. After arriv­ing at the hos­pi­tal, the doc­tors imme­di­ate­ly ordered Haitao hos­pi­tal­ized. Upon real­iz­ing what they had done, the local police belat­ed­ly scram­bled to process Haitao’s jail release in order to be relieved of respon­si­bil­i­ty. It was not until about 5:30 p.m. that Haitao’s leg irons were final­ly tak­en off. The police hand­ed over the jail release form and left abrupt­ly.

Around mid­night, Liu Haitao passed away. He was full of peace and joy before depart­ing. He said, “Mom, I am very hap­py. This is so good. You must per­se­vere in faith and fol­low the Lord to the end. I am depart­ing ahead of you, please pray for me.” He lay in his moth­er’s arms as she prayed for him. He died as he uttered a weak yet dis­tinct “Amen.”

Liu Haitao’s leg irons did not come off until about six hours before his death.

Oh, my home­land, my Chi­na of the 21st Cen­tu­ry! My beloved home­land that pro­claims, “Cit­i­zens can ful­ly enjoy reli­gious free­dom!”

The Lord Jesus said on the cross, “Father! For­give them, for they know not what they do.” “Father! Into Thy hands I com­mit my spir­it!”

When Stephen was mar­tyred, he cried to the Lord, “Lord Jesus, receive my spir­it.” Then he fell on his knees and cried out, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”

Our Father who art in heav­en, dear Lord Jesus Christ, please for­give them, for they know not what they do. Lord, please have mer­cy on us, have mer­cy on Chi­na! Lord, may your Gospel be preached through­out Chi­na. May you pour down the love that was man­i­fest­ed through your blood on the cross, so as to melt those cold and heavy leg irons. Indeed, melt that which is even more love­less and cold than leg irons-the human heart! Lord, have mer­cy on us, and save our coun­try­men!

The fol­low­ing day, Haitao’s par­ents returned home with bro­ken hearts. They returned not with a liv­ing son, but with a body in a cas­ket.

No! Unless a seed falls into the ground and dies, it remains one seed. But if it dies, it will bring forth many seeds.

There will be great revival after great per­se­cu­tion.

After broth­er Haitao was mar­tyred, broth­ers and sis­ters held memo­r­i­al ser­vices in var­i­ous loca­tions. Haitao was their exam­ple-to deny one­self, to give up the com­forts of home for itin­er­ant min­istry, and to sac­ri­fice one’s life, all for the King­dom of God. After two days of fast­ing and prayer, the church was great­ly revived. Church lead­ers repent­ed in tears before the Lord as they embraced each oth­er and asked for­give­ness for all the bick­er­ing in the past. Fast­ing and prayers end­ed in a final cli­mac­tic memo­r­i­al ser­vice that was held on the evening of Novem­ber 16, 2000. On the wall where the memo­r­i­al ser­vice was held were ban­ners that read, “In his suf­fer­ing, broth­er Liu did not utter one com­plaint. He offered his young life in pro­claim­ing the Gospel. Remem­ber this mar­tyr at the turn of the cen­tu­ry.” Indeed, in order not to sell out his Chris­t­ian broth­ers and sis­ters, Haitao had cho­sen to remain com­plete­ly silent in prison. On the wall, sur­round­ed by the ban­ners, was mount­ed an enlarged pho­to­graph of Haitao.

With eyes brim­ming with tears dur­ing the ser­vice, they sang a song writ­ten by one of the mem­bers, titled, “Per­haps:”

Per­haps one day I will go to prison,
Per­haps one day I will go to be with my Lord,
Do not sor­row, broth­ers and sis­ters!
Do not count the injus­tice done to us!
Did not our Lord endure the same?
So what if we die?
As long as you and I die a mean­ing­ful death,
I may die,
But some­one will rise up after me.
The Gospel of the King­dom of Heav­en will nev­er cease.

Dur­ing the memo­r­i­al ser­vice, the believ­ers eulo­gized Haitao’s life, express­ing how much they cared about him, and their desire for revival:

Liu Haitao’s life was short but filled with eter­ni­ty. His life was full of suf­fer­ing yet full of hope. His life was sim­ple yet pleas­ing to God! Even though he passed away, his death was dif­fer­ent from ordi­nary death in mean­ing and sig­nif­i­cance. He lives for­ev­er in our hearts; he has ever­last­ing life!

He suf­fered and gave his life for the Lord. When Haitao’s father car­ried him for emer­gency med­ical treat­ment, the weighty leg irons still bound him, right up to six hours before his death. Haitao nev­er com­plained. There were no final strug­gles with death. He left qui­et­ly and peace­ful­ly in the mid­dle of a dark night, amidst his moth­er’s tear­ful prayers. Like Jesus, in order to be faith­ful to his beliefs and for the sake of ful­fill­ing his mis­sion, he was like a lamb led to the slaugh­ter and like a sheep that is silent before her shear­er. To defend God’s truth and for the sake of the tens of mil­lions of lost souls, in patience, silence, unwa­ver­ing willpow­er, and res­olute faith, he brave­ly sac­ri­ficed his pre­cious and young life. His life was a life of chal­lenges. While oth­ers went after the rich­es of this world, he left them behind, denied him­self, and took up the cross-fac­ing mock­ery and insult with courage. While some in the church stayed silent and lived a life of self-preser­va­tion, he was will­ing to pay the price of being a true dis­ci­ple. While some strived for sta­tus and recog­ni­tion in the church, he humbly obeyed and took to train­ing him­self for the min­istry. For these rea­sons, his fiancee left him, but he per­sist­ed in his stud­ies. He is unknown in this world, but his name is in the book of life.

At the ser­vice, a preach­er point­ed out: Stephen was the first mar­tyr after the church was estab­lished. Stephen was also a young man full of grace and pow­er. He per­formed signs and won­ders among the peo­ple. He was a war­rior for the Truth who spoke words of wis­dom and the Spir­it; and yet he was stoned to death. Like­wise, Haitao, for the sake of the Gospel, was also mar­tyred by the police. Our God is espe­cial­ly gra­cious to his mar­tyrs. After His res­ur­rec­tion, Christ Jesus sits at the right hand of the Father and prays for the saints. Upon see­ing Stephen and Haitao, the Lord Jesus stood up to wel­come them. The gates of heav­en opened and the glo­ry of the Lord was man­i­fest­ed to them. What glo­ry! What bless­ing!

After Stephen’s death, Saul was con­vert­ed and became Paul (Acts 22:20). Amidst great per­se­cu­tion, the Great Com­mis­sion was car­ried out from Jerusalem to Judea and Samaria (Acts 8). Haitao died, but his father, moved by God’s great love, has since received Jesus Christ as his Sav­ior. Some wor­ry that Haitao’s death will cause fear and dis­cour­age­ment among the believ­ers. On the con­trary! The Holy Spir­it has moved the believ­ers to action, many of whom have resolved to fol­low in Haitao’s foot­steps and to fin­ish the mis­sion he has left behind. Is this not the work of God?

At the ser­vice, Haitao’s par­ents shared with every­one the numer­ous let­ters of com­fort and encour­age­ment they had received. One per­son wrote, “.… The Lord has tak­en Haitao home, today I am will­ing to be your son…allow me to call you Daddy…if you need me just let me know and I will imme­di­ate­ly come by to help you.” The local church also resolved to des­ig­nate Octo­ber 16 as a memo­r­i­al day for Liu Haitao and set up a fund in his name, from which a month­ly stipend of 300 yuan (US$36) will be drawn to help pay for the liv­ing expens­es of Haitao’s par­ents. Right then the believ­ers made con­tri­bu­tions to this fund.

At the ser­vice, every­one prayed with the preach­er, “Dear heav­en­ly Father, we still praise you with tears in our eyes. Broth­er Liu Haitao has fought the good fight, he has fin­ished the race, he has kept the faith. Lord, we know there is a crown of right­eous­ness pre­pared for Haitao. This crown is not just for Haitao, but also for all who fol­low in his foot­steps. May your Spir­it of con­so­la­tion bring com­fort to his par­ents. Replace their funer­al gar­ments with gar­ments of joy. We pray for Haitao’s church, for the two impor­tant church lead­ers who are still in prison. Please keep the believ­ers in peace and strength­en this suf­fer­ing church. May she still be firm­ly estab­lished on your rock after the storm. Lord, please hear our unit­ed prayer. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, Amen!”

Tears, praise, and singing nev­er ceased through­out the memo­r­i­al ser­vice. Liu Haitao may have fall­en, but many oth­ers will rise up. They will fol­low Haitao’s exam­ple of devot­ing them­selves to itin­er­ant min­istry, sac­ri­fic­ing their lives for the Lord’s King­dom. Those songs, sung with tears, expressed their desire to deny them­selves, take up the cross, and fol­low Jesus:

Since I have fol­lowed my Lord,
I will not look back;
Since I have affirmed my Lord,
I will not regret.
Though the path is dif­fi­cult,
I will not com­plain;
Though tears fill my face,
My heart feels sweet­ness!
I do not serve God only in the shade,
I do not serve God only in a green­house,
It is in the prison cell,
It is through the val­ley of tears,
I must go through Marah,
To enter Elim.

The Apos­tle John wrote these words on the island of Pat­mos:

Then I heard a voice from heav­en say, “Write: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.” “Yes,” says the Spir­it, “they will rest from their labor, for their deeds will fol­low them” (Rev. 14:13).

.….I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the tes­ti­mo­ny they had main­tained. They called out in a loud voice, “How long, Sov­er­eign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhab­i­tants of the earth and avenge our blood?” Then each of them was giv­en a white robe, and they were told to wait a lit­tle longer, until the num­ber of their fel­low ser­vants and broth­ers who were to be killed as they had been was com­plet­ed (Rev. 6:9–11).

All over vast Chi­na, num­bers upon num­bers of those who had been saved by Christ Jesus took up their cross, and stood up. The blood-strewn path­way out­side Jerusalem con­tin­ues to extend for­ward.…

By Xiao Ruozhi, a Chris­t­ian in Chi­na. This arti­cle orig­i­nal­ly appeared in Chris­t­ian Life Quar­ter­ly, Decem­ber, 2000, Vol­ume 4, Issue 4.