Tortured for the Scriptures
Seven Chinese guards surrounded Gao Feng, who was handcuffed to a chair. The guards took turns shocking him with cattle prods. “Eat!” they commanded. “And we will stop.” Feng had gone on a hunger strike to get back his copy of the Scriptures which the guards had taken from him. They were torturing him to get him to stop the hunger strike. At times, he thought he could no longer stand the pain, but he didn’t give up. They never broke his spirit. “You couldn’t reason with the guards,” Feng said, “because they weren’t human.”
Fighting for Legal Recognition
Gao Feng, a 30-year-old worker at Chrysler’s Jeep plant in Beijing, had tried to work within the Communist government system to get a Protestant church registered. Only government-sanctioned churches are legal in China. All others are illegal, their services are often disrupted by the police, and the pastors and congregations are beaten and imprisoned.
Feng collected signatures for a petition seeking government registration for his church so they could meet legally. For this “crime” he was arrested and sent to prison without a trial, his home and possessions confiscated.
Re-Education and Hardship
As a result of his hunger strike, Feng was sent to a northern province for “re-education through labor.”
While there, he lived in a 12-by-20-foot cell with sixteen other prisoners. They spent twelve hours each day working in the fields. At night, with so many in such a small cell, they had to arrange themselves a certain way so that everyone could lay down.
When he was transferred back to Beijing, he refused to chant the pro-government slogans with the other prisoners, so his “re-education” was continued. This time, his brainwashing included being forced to watch the news every evening on government-controlled TV.
Freedom Through Perseverance
Finally, after more than two years in prison and in re-education camps, Feng was released on February 7, 1998.
To Feng, it was all worth it, and he would happily go to prison again. “I would prefer to be in prison for two years than to do nothing for God,” he said. In fact, he feels lucky. As news of his situation reached believers in many countries, people wrote to the Chinese government demanding his release. Feng says the international attention focused on his case earned him better treatment from the Chinese authorities. “Others who are less well-known are simply executed.”
Advocating for the Voiceless
Open your mouth for the speechless, In the cause of all who are appointed to die. Open your mouth, judge righteously; And plead the cause of the poor and needy. Proverbs 31:8-9
Date: 11th March 2023
Martyr: Gao Feng
Location: Mainland China circa 1997
Source: Jesus Freaks
Author: DC Talks and The Voice of Martyrs
Suffering Saturday 031
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