Episode 94

On this episode of the Removing Barriers podcast, we interview missionary Austin, who is on his way to serve the Lord in Guangdong, China along with his wife and young son. Though the COVID-19 pandemic has slowed progress toward that goal, he is not deterred and he continues to serve the Lord in every capacity he can, wherever he can. In this interview, we explore the realities of serving in Southern China, including the barriers he anticipates engaging with in order to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ. Join us as we follow missionary Austin onto the mission field.

Really what China needs is someone who’s going to take a Bible in their hand and sit down with a Chinese man, sit down with a Chinese woman and preach unto them Jesus.

Thank you for tuning in to the Removing Barriers podcast. I’m Jay. And I’m NCG, and we’re attempting to remove barriers so we can all have a clear view of the cross.

This is episode 94 of the Removing Barriers podcast. And this is the 7th in the series of on the Mission Field. And in this episode, we will be going on the mission field with missionary Austin to China.

Austin is a pleasure to have you and welcome to the Removing Barriers podcast. Well, thank you, MCG and Jay, it’s a pleasure to be here with you. Thank you for having me on. Great. We’re glad that you were able to fit us in your busy schedule.

Well, let’s dive right into it. Tell us about yourself, your family, your calling, whatever you feel comfortable sharing. Yeah, sure. Well, myself, along with my wife Annie and our son Abraham, we are church planning missionaries to the country of China. I was about 16 years old when the Lord put missions on my heart, and it was a few years later that the Lord put China on my heart. And when I was, let’s say I was 22 years old and the Lord actually gave me an opportunity to go to China and work there as an English teacher. I wanted to do some sort of preaching ministry, evangelism, that sort of thing. But at the time, I really didn’t know how to go about doing that in a place like China because of some various challenges to Mississippi there. But I knew that the first step I needed to take was to go there. And so I went. And Lord blessed, while I was there, I actually met Annie. My wife is Chinese, and we met there. We got married there. And shortly after getting married, we got married during my fifth year there in China. And shortly after getting married, we learned about an opportunity to do some church planning training here in America. And so we came back to the States. We’ve gone through that training and have raised our mission support. And right when we were about to leave for the field, COVID happened. And so actually, for the last couple of years now, we have been more or less stuck in trying different ways to get to the field. What we’re wanting to do is to take a couple of years and work with some veteran missionaries in Taiwan before heading over to mainland China. And so that’s kind of where we’re at currently, trying to get into Taiwan.

Great. I’m sure the covet pandemic haven’t made things any easier on that. So how long have you been on the mission field? You haven’t been yet? What’s the situation around that? Yeah, so we have not been as church planning missionaries I was there for a total of five years teaching English. And my wife grew up there in China. She is Chinese. And so we’ve both spent various lengths of time there. However, we haven’t been since becoming church planning missionaries and sent out of our home church here in the States. And so we’re willing by the end of this year, by the end of 2022, will be in Taiwan and working under those senior missionaries there.

You mentioned that the Lord put on your heart China, and specifically when you’re around like 16 or so, was that around the same time that the Lord came to know you? Is that around the time that you were saved or were you saved before that? Could you give us like a nutshell testimony of your salvation? Yeah, absolutely. So the Lord saved me when I was twelve years old. I had grown up in church. I had heard the gospel many times, but never really understood it. Never really understood that I needed to trust the Lord. And truly trusting the Lord was evidenced by a changed life. And when that finally clicked for me, I was twelve. And just very simply, I called upon the name of the Lord and he saved me. And it was a few years later, I was 16 years old and I had actually just come back to America from my first ever short term mission trip to Brazil. And while I was there, the Lord really opened my eyes to the need for the gospel around the world. And coming back a few weeks later, there was a youth camp that I was a part of in Florida. And while I was at that youth camp, I surrendered to be a missionary. I wasn’t sure exactly where yet, though China at that time was on my mind. Interestingly enough, while I was at that youth camp, my father was actually on a short term missions trip to China. And what’s perhaps even more amazing, it just shows God’s hand in it all. He was on a mission trip to the city that I would eventually spend those five years in teaching English in the same city that my wife is from. And so it’s really interesting how the Lord worked all of that out when he put China on my heart specifically. It was a few years later. My first time to China was in December of 2007. I was 19 years old at the time and went to China. Wasn’t at the time particularly feeling led towards China, though I certainly wasn’t against missions in China long term. And the Lord, through encounter with a college student there, really began to speak to my heart about the need there and how China is in many ways a very dark country in that there’s not much gospel. Like so many people simply don’t know anything about the gospel. And there would be many others who would know bits and pieces but wouldn’t even have a full enough picture to be saved. And I realized that, and it was shortly thereafter that the Lord made it very clear to me that I should be a missionary to China.

All right? So I’m sure many people, if we give them a blank map of the world and tell them to find China, they can put their finger on China. But I don’t think a lot of people know much of any cities or any place in China. So where in China are you planning to go? Maybe a general direction. East, west, north, or south? Yes, we really prefer southern China. And that’s in part because my wife is from Southeast China. That’s the part of China that I was in while I was teaching English there. We were in Southeast China. The province that’s right across from Taiwan province is called Fujian, and that’s where we were. However, going back, we really have a desire to go. One province over there is a province just to the west of Fujin called Guangdong, and it is actually China’s most populous province. It has over 100 million people. I want to say it’s like 105 or 110,000,000 people. The population of the one province is about the same as the population of the entire country of the Philippines. And we’ve been there a few times before for various reasons, and for whatever reason, we really feel drawn to it. And so once we do our two years in Taiwan, we are very seriously considering going to Guangdong in southern China. Another word for Guangdong that might be a little bit more recognizable for some is canton. So you talk about Cantonese food or the Cantonese language. That is the Cantonese language way of saying guandong. So in the Mandarin language, they say guandong, and in Cantonese they say canton. So, Lord willing, we will most probably be there. We’re praying about that.

So the area that you’re praying about, does it have a similar religious make up as the rest of the country, or is it special in its own right? And what is that religious make up? I would say that Guangdong is probably a pretty good reflection of the country as a whole. China, generally speaking, traditionally, was a Buddhist country with influences from other Chinese religions like Taoism and Chinese folk religion. However, in more recent years, specifically since China became a communist country, the government has been officially atheistic, and that has, in some ways, tripled down to the populace. And so most people would have a more not so much an adamant atheistic stance. I feel like in America and in Europe, when you encounter atheists, it’s often because maybe grandmother or someone else in the family was a strong believer or at least a very religious, quote unquote, Christian, whether they were actually saved or not. And so the atheist kind of has this very bad attitude, almost a chip on his shoulder towards the things of God in the bible, whereas in China it’s more of almost like an agnosticism where they don’t really think there’s a God. Evolution is taught in schools, the Big Bang theory is taught in schools and they more or less accept that to be true, especially in the younger generations, probably age 40 or 50 and below. And they think well, our grandparents go to a Buddhist temple and pray to Buddha, burn incense. And so we’ll kind of tag along just to be respectful of our elders. But we really don’t know that our prayers are getting through to anyone. Interesting.

So you say you’re married to Chinese and I’m sure this has come up. The cultural differences between China and America can be great at times and I’m sure you probably have a lot of experience in your home then. But how do you plan to handle the difference in culture with the people of China? Or you would say man, I’ve been married for X amount of years, I think I have this down path. Well, I don’t know that I would say I have it down path though I do feel like I do have a leg up on other missionaries who might just getting ready to arrive in the country or maybe those who have just arrived within a year or so. I would just say that there are so many differences from the way people speak. And when I say that, I don’t just mean the language, but even what details to include or what details to admit when telling a story or when having a conversation. When should we be direct when we speak and when should we be a bit more round about in the way that we speak. There’s differences in expressing thanks. And I’ll give an example at that point. It’s interesting. We all know that the Bible tells us that we are to give thanks, we’re to be thankful people. That’s the clear teaching of scripture. However, having lived in China and also being married to a Chinese, I noticed that Americans, we tend to express our thanks verbally. And if someone does a favor for us or if someone gives us something, we feel like a simple thank you is the proper response and the best way to give thanks. Whereas to a Chinese mind that’s kind of a cheap way to be thankful. And they would think that the best way to be thankful is to reciprocate. And so if someone gives you something then the next opportunity that you have, it’s not necessarily a huge rush, but the next opportunity that you have, you might want to give them a gift as well. If someone buys you a meal, then the next time you’re spending time together you might buy them a meal. And that’s just their way of being thankful. And especially with people who are closer, family, close friends if you simply say thanks, it’s almost offensive. They think well why would you just say thank you? You could just return the favor sometime. And so it’s just kind of a different way of approaching being thankful.

All right, curious minds want to know, can you use a chopstick? Yes, I can. That is a necessary skill. You don’t get very far without at least semi good chopstick skills.

Okay, what’s your favorite Chinese food? Oh, wow. This is a hard one. You know, I really like dumplings, steamed dumplings. Is it because they’re easier to use with a chopstick? You know, depending on the dumpling, they may not be easier. It’s funny that you say that. Just a few days ago, we had an event. Our China team with our mission board had an event, and we took some young people to a little Chinatown area in the Atlanta, Georgia area here, and we were letting them try to use chopsticks to eat. And it was funny watching them try to pick up dumplings with chopsticks. Some of the dumplings were tearing open, and the meat was dropping out, and others were falling on the table and face planning. It was pretty funny to watch. But, yeah, dumplings I enjoy. And China is home to so many different varieties of stirfry, so just about any way you do it, it’s really good. Some favorites would be a really common dish is stir frying eggs and tomato together. So they would just chop up a tomato and stir fry it with eggs, and so the eggs kind of scrambling with the tomato. That’s pretty good. Another thing that I really like that Chinese incorporate a lot in their food is eggplant. So, like, stir fried eggplant or barbecue eggplant, things like that. It’s really good.

So you described some things about the differences in culture between, say, America and China or pretty much China and the world. Would you say that the culture that you know of in China, whether it’s China as a whole or maybe perhaps just the area of Guangdong, is it an Acts chapter two type culture where the people have some kind of understanding of God, and you could probably start explaining messiah to them using Old Testament scripture? Or is it more of an act 17 culture where they have absolutely no concept of God and you’ve got to go way back to creation in order to share the gospel with them? I would say that for at least 95% of the people in China, they are going to be a part of an act 17 culture, and they have grown up either just in this communistic atheistic theory of evolution, big bang theory type of mindset, or even a Buddhist mindset, and they would have no concept of even one life and then judgment and eternity because they would believe in reincarnation. Now, the other, I’ll give it 5%. I don’t even know if it would make 5%, but there are some parts of China, some groups in China that are Muslim. And so with those I’ve had a few conversations with Muslims in China and they have what would be a more acts too type mindset. They would know some things of Jesus. They’re not even necessarily extremely devout Muslims, but they would have some idea and maybe would have read the Quran before or have a bit of knowledge towards that more monotheistic, only one God mindset, if that makes sense.

Now, from what I understand, maybe this is just a caricature of China that I have a misperception that I have, but would you set me straight? I was under the understanding that because the government is communist and atheist and they can be a particularly brutal regime in certain ways. I was always under the understanding that if you were religious, you probably had to keep that deathly under wraps. Like you couldn’t really talk about it openly, even in conversation because you were afraid of who might, I don’t know, turn you in or something. Is that a caricature of life in China as a non? What should we say as someone who doesn’t buy into communism or atheism? Or is it actually like that? First of all, that’s a very good question. I would say that China’s brand of communism is going to be a bit different from, say, the kind of communism that was in Soviet Russia in that when China became communist. So Mao Zedong and the Red Army took control of China, I believe it was in 1949. And as they were drafting the People’s Republic of China’s constitution, there are actually stipulations in the constitution that says that China is a country with freedom of religion. And that sounds strange, I know, to most Americans, because we know that while they’re basing their communist ideology on Marx, who said that religion is a drug, it’s the opium of the masses, and he frowned upon religion. But the Chinese have kind of taken the approach that we’re not going to be able to stop people from wanting to believe some religion. And so what they’ve done is they’ve said that we’ll give you five options to choose from. And so in that sense, you have this semblance of freedom of religion. You’re free to pick any of the five. However, when you pick one of the five, you have to adhere to that religion in our way. And so those religions let’s see if I can recount all five. There’s Buddhism, I guess another one would be Taoism, perhaps there’s Islam. And then they divide what we in America and Europe would consider Christianity. They actually divide that into Protestantism and Catholicism. And so they’ll say we have these five officially recognized religions and they have churches or temples or mosques that are more or less government run that are there, but they exercise very tight control over the ones that the government is set up. And so in a church in China that is set up by the government and keep in mind, atheist government, the government is very clear that they don’t believe in God, but they would set up churches and they would actually establish seminaries that would quote, unquote, train preachers. And they will tell preachers which churches to pastor and will even require each week before delivering a sermon, they submit their sermon outline to a governing religious body for approval. There are certain things that they’re not allowed to talk about. So churches in China aren’t allowed to preach from the Book of Revelation. And my assumption there is that, well, if you preach from Revelation, you’re going to preach that there is Jesus Christ who is going to come back and he is going to overthrow the governments of the world and establish his own government. And the Chinese Communist Party obviously doesn’t like that and they don’t want that taught. And so they just say, well, let’s just get rid of the whole book and just not allow it to be taught in our churches. And so very tight controls like that going on.

Wow. So how do you plan to establish a church in China with these restrictions or if there’s something around them that you can do? Yeah, so the goal would be to start churches, what are oftentimes called underground churches, or they’re also sometimes called house churches. And so with that, calling them underground, of course, is just a fancy way of saying trying to fly under the government’s radar a bit. And so I think a challenge is trying to find that line between being bold for the Lord and being bold in our witness for Him and at the same time not wanting to draw any unnecessary attention to ourselves. So, for instance, personally, I don’t know that it would be the wisest thing to take a bullhorn out to the corner of first in Maine and downtown Beijing and begin to preach the gospel. It probably wouldn’t be wise to hang a big, large church sign over our meeting location that says First Baptist, Beijing or anything like that. But at the same time, what I’m about to say is speaking from the experience of having done this and also the experience of or not the experience, but talking to others who have started churches in China have started underground churches and strategies like passing out gospel tracks on a more one on one basis and starting Bible studies with one or two Chinese people who are interested in learning more about the gospel and about Jesus and then just kind of slowly building from those contacts and having regular meetings with them. That would be church meetings even, and slowly letting the word get out in the community without it getting out to the authorities that there is a place where they can come and they can learn about God, they can learn about the Bible, they can learn about Jesus.

What’s going to my mind just now as you’re talking about that is that how much we take for granted the freedoms we have man. Twice per week I go knock on doors or go out and share the gospel somehow. And I’ve never been concerned about the government coming down on me or something, but that’s definitely be praying for you for that. Wow. Thank you.

What are some things that folks should keep in mind if they feel called to serve the Lord in China? I know you just go to a lot of stuff, but I feel like that question at this point is pretty appable. Absolutely. I think that the thing to keep in mind, I would say two things. One is that we as believers were called to be bold in our witness oftentimes. And I noticed this when I was in China as an English teacher, there were other Americans in China who were teaching English, and they were believers, and they had a very reserved kind of stance towards sharing the gospel. It was almost like they would want to, in kind of hush tones, talk about the gospel. Even with Chinese friends. They would want to be in my mind, they would kind of err on the side of sheepishness and extra caution. Whereas we see in Scripture that Paul even asked the caution church to pray for him to be bold, and he was bold in his witness. Now, he traveled from town to town, and there were times when he did preach to the point of being kicked out or being stoned. And his mindset, I think, is something that we as believers should emulate. Obviously, we don’t want to go in, as I mentioned earlier, bull horns blazing or just being very overt, drawing unnecessary attention to ourselves. But we do want to draw all the attention that we can to the gospel, and I think that boldness is key. Another thing I think that goes along with that to keep in mind is the promise that Jesus makes to us believers in Matthew chapter 28 and verse 20. And that is he will be with us always, even into the end of the world. And so as we go and we teach all nations, as we baptize them, as we teach them to observe all things whatsoever, he has commanded us, he’s with us. Even in a place like China, even in a place where persecution is very possible and perhaps even likely, he is with us. And so because he’s with us, we really don’t have anything to fear. Yes, there are things that men can do to us. There are things that the government can do to us. And yet ultimately we know from Scripture that Jesus is with us. And when he’s with us, who can be against us?

Another verse that comes to mind where the Lord and manages to be wise as serpent but harmless as dove definitely need that wisdom over there in China. So tell me, what are some needs that, if filled, would make your task of sharing the gospel in China easier? I think that one thing that is needed is materials. It’s very common in China to encounter believers who have very limited Bible knowledge and very limited knowledge as far as doctrine and sound Bible teaching. And that’s really because in so many places throughout China, due to persecution and the government trying to kind of root out these underground churches, you oftentimes find a church where the pastor may only have been saved himself for a handful of years, and he’s trying to shepherd this small flock of people who have only been saved for a few months or maybe just a year or two. I think materials is one thing, and admittedly, I think that another thing really is China is in need of more labor. Of course, Jesus said in Matthew chapter nine, and also in Luke chapter ten, that the harvest is plenty of, but the laborers are few. And I really do think that there is much to be said about. We as believers, even here in America, should be praying and begging the Lord to raise up more laborers to go out into the harvest fields of China because there are so many people there who know little to nothing of Jesus Christ. And we know from Romans ten, how shall they hear without a preacher? Yeah, definitely.

I wonder if you could flesh that out a little bit by answering or at least by explaining. What does it mean to go and serve in a country as a missionary, I fear that some people, particularly the young, that tend to glamorize or gloss over things, don’t have a clear understanding of what it’s going to cost us personally to do the type of work that you’re setting out to do. For example, what does it mean to and what does the person have to give up in order to go and be a laborer in a field that is ripened to harvest and yet the laborers are few? What does that practically look like in the mind of someone that would perhaps go to China to serve? Sure, I think that practically it looks like well, for starters, heating what Christ has told us in Luke chapter nine and Matthew 16, that we are to deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow after him. And obviously we as believers all should do that. But how that plays out and the various paths that the Lord has us on will be different. But for those of us who would go to a place like China in Luke nine, he actually says, take up your cross daily. And there is this kind of daily dying to sell, and there’s small things and big things. I’m going to go to church, and I don’t know if the police are going to be waiting at the door for me. Maybe they found out about our location that’s happened. To a few friends of mine, it would look like passing out gospel tracks. And another friend of mine passed out a track, and there was a big crowd of people crowding around him. They saw this American giving something away. So this huge crowd kind of pressed in. He was giving out tracks. And so he’s looking down at the stack of tracks in his hand and just putting tracks into hand and all. He’s looking at his hands. He puts a track in one hand, and that hand takes the track, looks at it, and then reaches back out and grabs him. And it turned out he gave it to a security guard that was at work in this area, and they arrested him and took him in for questioning.

But it may not be something as big as those things. It could be something as simple as realizing that you are going to eat different food when you eat out at least, and perhaps even at home sometimes, you’re going to be eating different food, and you’re going to be eating things in a different way. And you’re going to eat in a place where their table manners and their table etiquette are vastly different from what you grew up with in America. And you’re going to be in a place where the way that they think and the way that they perceive the world and their thoughts on everything from politics to just kind of general about religion or anything else are very different from what you’ve grown up with. It’s going to mean leaving family behind, leaving parents behind, leaving siblings behind. And there’s so many things, I guess it could be said, but there certainly is this taking up your cross and following after the Lord. And at the same time, having said all of that, I would also say that on the flip side, it’s actually not all that complicated. Recently was reading through Acts chapter eight, and about halfway through there, Philip, the Lord told him to arrive and go and head toward the south, toward Gaza, which is desert. I found it interesting that the Lord actually didn’t tell him where he was going. He just gave him a direction. He just said, Go that way, go southward, go toward Gaza, go toward the desert. And the next verse says, And Philip arose and he went. God said, Arise and go. Philip arose and went. And as Philip goes, he’s probably wondering, well, Lord, I don’t know where you’re taking me, but I’m just going to follow after you. And the next thing that happens is, hey, behold, there’s this Ethiopian unit that’s coming along. And the Holy Spirit tells Philip, go up and join the chariot. And so that was his next step. And so he goes and he runs up and he runs alongside the chariot, and he hears this man is reading from Isaiah 53. And you want to talk about almost like a gimme opportunity to share the gospel with someone. I mean, at this time, I would imagine that the four gospel accounts hadn’t been written yet, but he stumbled upon a man who’s basically reading an Old Testament gospel account. And he’s reading it, and then as he’s reading it, Philip says, what do you understand? And he says, well, how can I unless a man guide me? And so you can almost in your mind’s eye, see the Ethiopian unit slide over in his chair in his chariot and he just kind of passed the seat beside him and invites Philip to come up and sit with him. And it says in Philip, beginning in that passage, preach son to him Jesus.

And I think that despite all of the things that a missionary might have to give up to arrive on the field, at the same time, really what China needs is someone who’s going to take a Bible in their hand and sit down with a Chinese man, sit down with a Chinese woman and preach unto them Jesus and tell them about Jesus, and tell him that for God to love the world that he gave His Son, to tell them that God commends his love toward them and that while they were yet sinners, christ died for them and just to tell them the simple truths of Scripture. And what’s so amazing in my thinking is that for so many of us believers here in America, these are more simplistic truths that maybe we learn at a very young age if we grew up in church. They’re verses that we memorize and truths that we incorporated into our hearts and into our minds from so young that we don’t even recall when we memorize John 3:16. We don’t even remember the first time we heard the name Jesus. And yet there are adults in China who don’t know who Jesus is. They’ve never seen a Bible, they don’t know what the Bible is. And all they need is someone like us with some scripture knowledge and the ability to share the Gospel, to go there and to speak with them about the Gospel. And obviously that is a bit of an oversimplification because you do need to leave America. You do need to invest two, three, maybe even four years learning Chinese. You do need to invest time to understand the culture and to understand their way of life. But at the end of the day, what they need is what Romans Ten says that they need. They need a preacher. They need somebody like Philip who’s going to go and open up the Bible with them and preach Jesus to them.

Yeah, I always imagine missionaries like this, right? Let’s imagine that there’s a pit somewhere out in the middle of nowhere that someone has fallen into. And in order to rescue them, someone outside the pit has to wrap a cord around someone who’s going to be lowered into the pit in order to go get that person and do the work to lift them out of the pit. And when we consider that there are certain things that, like you’ve been telling us that you have to give up, that you’re going to have to die too, David. You’re going to have to deny yourself in order to equip yourself in order to do that very important work. So I wonder if we can visualize church planting and missions, work like that. And let’s say the missionary is the one in your case, for example, the Chinese is the one that fell in the pit. The person with the rope around his waist going down to get them is the missionary. And the one holding the rope and guiding the missionary down would be the church, say, back in America, for example. Would you tell us in your mind what you believe? And I know that you haven’t gotten to the field just quite yet, but with the experience that you do have now, what do you think are some of the things that the church back here in America is doing that makes the job of a missionary more difficult? That person that’s holding the one going down to the pit, is he like how is he flopping around and moving around too much or doing the wrong thing that makes your job more difficult? You know, I think that perhaps one thing would well, you see, the thing is, churches do pray. I know that we have churches that have partnered with us and they do pray for us and they pray for us regularly. And I think, admittedly, just to be extremely frank, I think that sometimes maybe that even comes on us missionaries. We need to be a bit more informative, maybe in our communication and our prayer letters back home to churches to fill them in and to let them know what’s going on so they can pray better or they can pray more effectively. Yes, I think so.

Just kind of as a side note, I recently read the biography of a missionary to China named James O. Fraser. He was a missionary in southwest China around 100 years ago, perhaps a little bit longer than that. And he was in a very remote area on the border of Burma and he still made time to write personal letters to various members of his home church back home on a near daily basis. And he would write to these individual members and of course, he would have to send them with some messenger not even through China, but the faster way was actually through the mountains, over into Burma and then off to the coast. And then the letters would be packed on a ship and then sailed through the Indian Ocean around Africa and up to England, where he was from. But he wrote these letters and he had a very strong prayer team back home. And I mentioned that again, I want to say. I do know that churches that partner with missionaries do pray for their missionaries. I think that maybe one thing there is that we as missionaries need to do a better job of informing objects of prayer, prayer requests and such, to those who have committed to pray for us. At the same time, I do think that let’s see things that the church here in America, that the church does that might hinder things. I firmly believe that China is in need of more labors. And I mean, Jesus said the laborers are few, and I believe it was it Jim Elliott? It was Jim Elliot. Or maybe one of the ones who was killed along with him there in Ecuador said that it’s not that God has stopped calling missionaries, it’s that many people have stopped heeding the call. And I think that if churches would have an even stronger emphasis many churches do have a strong missions emphasis, but an even stronger emphasis, not simply on the support of missionaries, but on the training up of missionaries within church and preparing their young people to one day perhaps take the Gospel to a place like China. One of the many things that China needs is more boots on the ground, more preachers there, more laborers, more shepherds. And that’s only going to happen if churches are essentially producing those creatures and keeping China and the rest of the world in front of them as they grow up in these churches, to let young people know that there is a need in China and they do need a gospel witness. And perhaps I could be one person to fill in a need and to go and make much of the Lord Jesus Christ in some part of China or in some other part of the world. And I think that so oftentimes not that missions is an afterthought in the church, but that maybe it’s more of an afterthought when dealing with young people in church and to keep that need out there, so that even from a young age, young believers here in America are thinking, yes, I could maybe one day, if the Lord see fit, use my life to preach Jesus in China or somewhere else around the world.

What popped in my mind? The Bible, of course, the laborers are few, but I almost wonder, because as a soul, when a coordinator at my church, the laborers seem to be few everywhere. So you almost want to say, man, I’m so glad that the Lord said, you know what? Pray to the Lord of the harvest, because otherwise, what do we do? China needs laborers. Papua New Guinea needs laborers, and quite honestly, American needs laborers. Absolutely. We’re just going to have to prepare a lot of the harvest that he will send out laborers, because a lot of Christians are not submitting to that call, even if they’ve been called and not submitting to it.

Yeah. All right. So before we go into this break, Austin, I have two things here that go into my mind. The American people tend to have what I would call maybe a love hate relationship with China, at least with the Chinese government. We love the cheap stuff that comes out of China, but we also have a little bit of problem with the government. Is that real underground in China, or is it just when you talk to Chinese people, that is not even an issue as it is here in the news in America. I think that it comes and goes in waves. And really the waves come and go based on their media. Now, the media in China is all operated by the state. It’s all government controlled media. And I would say that lately there’s probably a lot of anti American sentiment there in China for various reasons. One being things going on between China and Taiwan and things that America has said in regards to that, those comments have certainly drawn the ire of China. And so when it suits China, they will end their media, begin to pump out antiAmerican rhetoric, and that will, for a time, get Chinese people somewhat fired up, I guess you could say, with their own sentiments towards America being less than good, less than ideal. And at the same time, if for whatever reason the government feels like they don’t want there to be a very strong anti American feeling among the people, they’ll ease up on that. And that could be for various reasons as well. Maybe China wants its people to be a bit more anti Japan for some reason, or anti Korea or something like that. And so they kind of will divert attention away from America for a while or something. But it really does. And we see this to a point here in America, but I think it’s even more so in China. It kind of rises and falls with the media and how the media portrays things.

All right, as we go into this break, I know you mentioned to me off here that you have a podcast and everything. Tell the folks about the podcast, how they can find your podcast and how they can listen. Yeah, absolutely. So our China team, with our mission board, our team, we call ourselves Vision for China. And if you go to www.visionforchina.org/podcast visionforchina.org/podcast. That’s the web page for our podcast. I am the host of the podcast, and episodes range anywhere from stories from missions history to interviews with some of our teammates on the Vision for China team. Occasionally there’s an episode, maybe about a certain aspect of Chinese culture or something like that. But the podcast is called the thousand Lives Broadcast. And that comes from a quote of Hudson Taylor where he said that if I had a thousand lives, China should have it. If I had £1000 British pounds, China should have them. And then he paused and he said, well, no, not China, but, Christ, can we do too much for him? Can we do too much for such a precious savior? And we called the podcast, the thousand Life Broadcast, because we’re praying that the Lord would actually in this generation raise up 1000 missionaries, 1000 church planning missionaries even to go to China with the gospel. And so throughout the podcast, one of the big things is challenging people to consider what the Lord want for you to go to a place like China with the gospel. So we explore a lot of things from church history or mission history rather, and the scriptures, as well as just talking with other missionaries and kind of unpack what it’s like being a missionary in China and what some of the challenges are, but also what some of the methods and strategies and philosophies are that, Lord willing, will enable the Gospel to take root there.

You’re listening to the Removing Barriers podcast. We are sitting down with Missionary Austin and we’re finding out all about his mission field. We’ll be right back.

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All right, Missionary Austin, before we go into a little bit of fun section to find out all about your favorites, tell me, I’m just curious, how is language chain and going? Are you fluent? Would you consider yourself fluent in Chinese or Mandarin at this point, or do you still have to learn some stuff? I’m more or less fluent, I would say I can read the Bible in Chinese with virtually no problem. Occasionally there might be a more obscure Chinese is written, what they call characters, symbols. And so occasionally I might be reading about the construction of the Tabernacle and Exodus or reading maybe a more obscure passage in a place like Job and encounter a character too, that I’m not very familiar with and I might have to look it up. But on the whole, I would be able to read the Bible in Chinese. I can preach in Chinese, I can certainly get around in China with virtually no issues as far as language is concerned. And at the same time, there’s always room to learn more, there’s always room to improve language ability. So I do feel like I’m constantly learning. It’s not an uncommon thing, even just in conversation with my wife, for her to say something and me to say, I’m not sure what you mean by that, and she’ll have to kind of explain it to me or something. Anyway, I would hesitantly say that I guess you could say I’m fluent.

All right, this is a test. If you’re fluent, what about your dreams? Have your dream speaking in Chinese or it’s still English dreams. You know, I have dreams in both, and so, yes, I have dreams in Chinese. I will say, since you brought that up, I distinctly remember being in China and waking up one day. I’d probably been there for about two or three years and waking up, and I was so excited because I finally dreamed in Chinese. That was a huge I’ve arrived. Yes. And it was funny because there really wasn’t many people to tell until I Skype back home and talk to family. But I just remember thinking, like, wow, I had a dream in Chinese and I understood what I dream. That is great. Well, this might be the first time, but I’m declaring you fluent. If you have a gym in Chinese, you’ve officially gotten the Removing Barriers podcast seal of fluency or something. Oh, goodness. All right, thank you.

Let’s go in a little bit of fun facts and find it to your favorites. What is your favorite scripture verse? Yeah, my favorite verse would be Romans, chapter eleven, verse 36. For of him and through him, and to Him are all things to whom the glory forever. Amen.

What about your favorite biblical historical account? We call it that mouthful of words because some people call them Bible stories, but the word story gives this idea of connotation that it’s not true, like it’s a myth. And we believe everything in scripture actually happened is actual history. So what’s your favorite biblical historical account? You know, I don’t know that I have what I would say is consistently over a long period of time, my favorite Bible history, though, currently, as I mentioned earlier, I’ve really been enjoying studying the story of Philip there in Act Eight and about how he shared the gospel with the eunuch. And I’m impressed with how the Lord told him to do something and he didn’t know what the end result was going to be. He didn’t know where the Lord was ultimately going to get him, but he just step by step did what God asked of him, and the Lord used him in a great way there in that chapter. Can you imagine what it was like after Philip talk? You know how sometimes we have some soul winning encounters and we go back and we talk to our brethren about it? So Philip has just talked to the unit and he goes back, luke, they tell you what happened there. And then Luke’s like, Oh, yeah, tell me more, and didn’t even realize he drank down scripture. Isn’t that crazy to think about it? Or maybe that’s just me. I think he had a pretty amazing story to tell everybody. Definitely.

What is the most convicted scripture passage to you? Well, you know, every time I think on numbers, chapters 13 and 14, it really makes me stop and think about things. And of course, just to recap, numbers 13 and 14 is the story of people of Israel finally getting to the other side of Jordan. They’re that close to the Promised Land, and they send the spies in, and the twelve spies come back, and two of the spies firmly believe that the Lord will give the land to them. And then you’ve got ten spies who weren’t so sure, and they lacked faith in God. And not only that, but their lack of faith was contagious, and it spread to all the people. And the way God dealt with them in Numbers 14, I think, is very sobering in that, of course, God still loved them. It’s not as though God stopped loving that generation in Israel. He’s still provided for them for 40 years. He gave them mana every day to eat. He gave them water to drink. We learned elsewhere in Scripture that their shoes never wore out during the 40 years. And so God took care of them, and yet he didn’t let them see the fulfillment of his promises because of their unbelief. And I read that and I think, Lord, please help me. Give me faith that will allow me to believe in you, even when I think, you know, there are these giants in the land. And I don’t know how I’m going to deal with this, but just to simply trust that, Lord, you are greater and you can overcome any obstacle that I would run up against. And it goes back to what I said towards the beginning about Matthew 28, that the Lord, he’s with us always.

What is the most comforting Scripture verse for you? Well, actually, probably Matthew 28 20, that the Lord is with us all the way, even to the end of the world. He’s with us. He’ll never leave us or forsake us. He’s right here by our side. And we see, like in the Old Testament, he’s the God that went out in front of Israel, and he’s always looking out for us. It’s wonderful.

What about your favorite hymn of the faikth? My favorite hymn is before the Throne. Before the Throne of God Above. I love that hymn. I’m not sure I know that one. Before the throne I’ll spare you me, but I’ll try to recite a bit of it. Before the throne of God above, I have a strong and perfect plea, a great high priest whose name is love, whoever lives and pleads for me. Okay. That’s how it starts out. All right. Wow. That is a beautiful way for a song to start out and goes back to the one that you said. It’s a great comfort to you, the fact that he’d never leave us nor forsake us, but he’s also our high priest. The Bible says he’s not a high priest that’s untouched by the feeling of our infirmities. And so that is a great comfort that does a perfect Him and neither what you just said.

Now, what about your favorite giant of the faith? You know, it’s probably Abraham. Probably Abraham simply because he stepped out his faith. He had no idea how long it was going to be before he even got to see the first inkling of God fulfilling his promise. It was going to be 25 years before Isaac was born, and yet he just trusted the Lord, and he kept on following after the Lord, despite what I’m sure in his mind was perhaps even years of silence from the Lord. I would assume he would just remind himself of what he had heard God said before and just kept on trusting that the Lord would bring it to pass. All right, great.

What would you say are some of the biggest barriers to the people of China, or at least to the people of that area of China from receiving the gospel? You know, I think really it’s just an ignorance, just a general ignorance of anything related to the Bible. They’re ignorant of God, they’re ignorant of Scripture, they’re ignorant of the gospel. I have spoken with people in China who would ask questions like, what is Jesus? Or who is this Jesus that you’re talking about? Or a friend of mine was talking to a girl and she heard him talk about the Bible and about Jesus, and she said, Oh, Jesus, I know what you’re talking about. I really like that myth. Oh, wow. And so there’s just so much ignorance there. They simply don’t know anything, really, in so many instances in China, there’s just kind of this general darkness towards the gospel.

Those barriers that you described, the barrier of the lack of knowledge, the ignorance there, to the degree that they believe Jesus is a myth, which interestingly, some people, even in the states would believe that. How do you think those barriers can be removed? What is the gospel in that light? How would you use the gospel to help them see where they stand and how those barriers of being ignorant to the things of God, those things can be removed? Yeah. Well, I think it goes back to, as we said earlier, they are more of an act 17 type culture. And in most cases, I think it would be very helpful for them to hear from a believer the story of the Bible, to hear that the God who created them is the God who will one day judge them, to hear that this God that created them is the one and only true God, that he created a perfect world, the world fell into sin, and yet God loves the world. So much so that he sent his son Jesus to live in this world, to live a perfect life, to die on the cross, and really just with Bible in hand in almost every case, it’s going to take a lot of time and a lot of opening the Scriptures together, discussing it letting them ask questions and letting them see that. Well, one Corinthians 15, he died, he was buried. He rose again on the third day according to the scriptures, and he was seen of many witnesses. This is something that is historical, that actually happened in history. This isn’t myth, this isn’t fable, this isn’t some sort of folklore. These things actually happened and because they happened well, extremely important and it’s worthy of us studying and the gospel is worthy of them believing.

Missionary austin, it was a pleasure. Thank you for joining us and the Removing Barriers podcast. Well, thank you both MCG and Jay. I really appreciate this opportunity. It’s been a pleasure.

Thank you for listening. To get a hold of us to support this podcast or to learn more about removing barriers, go to Removing barriers.net. This has been the removing barriers podcast. We attempted to remove barriers so that we all can have a clear view of the cross.