When I worked at Orbotix I had to visit our manufacturer to get a few things straightened out on the production line. My trip spanned a weekend so my coworker and I visited the local park on Saturday. They had a shooting gallery set up with balloons and BB guns that looked like SKS rifles. Man, folding plastic bayonet and everything!
After we demonstrated our Yankee shooting ability, hitting 18/20 targets (that as I remember, it was 2012) we went on for a walk. China is about industry. And to make things you need things. We ended up along a road of dusty, small warehouses. Not like the Grainger or Ace Hardware we know here in the states.
This was, best I can term, the power transmission store. If you needed to convert between RPM and torque this was your place.
On the way back to the hotel I saw a sign with an arrow on it along the roadway. “Christian Church 0.5 km” so I thought “Hey, I’m game.” I walked in that direction and found the door, planning to return at 9:30 AM the next morning, Sunday.
When I arrived it was somewhat of a stir, being a white guy. Someone seated me and then put a nice women next to me who translated everything from Mandarin to English in perfect tone. There was a choir who had travelled by bus to sing and that was also a big deal.
The glowing cross was a new one for me. And also, it behind glass. I didn’t think much of it; hey it was their church not mine. But in retrospect was this an artifice?
Afterwards I was smiling and saying hello to all the people who attended - they were interested and amazed at this tall white guy - and eventually some dude in his late 20s walked over, smoking a cigarette. Without directly addressing me he said “You know this isn’t a real Christian church, right?” I glanced at him and he nodded. “Yeah, this is a Communist front. None of the ‘Bibles’ have the name of Jesus in them. It’s all platitudes.” I just stared at him and not only because he used that word. “This is the Communist party feeding the hungry1 a pack of lies. If you want a real Christian church service its in homes and only by word of mouth.”
Call me a coward but I wanted to return home so I didn’t ask for more information because in China anything can happen - like locking you up in a box and throwing away the box.
I said this wasn’t going to be a gun or Bible study blog, maybe I violated both of those in this post. But please do think about this: what fancily packaged thing that is 80% true have you bought into without realizing the last 20% was a lie? And taking you way off course?
The repeated theme of my blog is rational self-reliance. To accomplish that you need to study and test things out for yourself.
Don’t even trust me, just go do it yourself.
Spiritually hungry, which we all are if you realize it or not.