Tiananmen, Tiananmen, Tiananmen...

The images are burned on my eyes now- I see them constantly- sleeping and waking- the faces of those people on the square- wide eyed, pathetically innocent enthusiasm- grim determination- anger- hope and hopelessness. Thousands of Chinese faces, Chinese voices, crying out for progress- for freedom- for impossible things.
I guess I’m a sucker for lost causes and dead heroes. Maybe with China burning in my blood like a fever, it’s inevitable that Tiananmen should shatter my world.
But I’m trying to organize my thoughts, because I think it’s more than that- and I think that whatever’s tearing me into pieces right now has universal elements that you all should consider.
Tiananmen, Tiananmen, Tiananmen. The movement on the square two decades ago was more than a revolution. It transcends the political realm, though the millions involved may never have known it. It was a symbol of human striving towards… something- of that wild bird impulse which can bear, and bear- and then, suddenly is free, standing in defiance of tanks and trucks and automatic weapons, unable to back down- weeping, terrified, furious, but beyond retreat.
And yet, if revolutions are the goal- if an overthrow of power- or even new liberties are all that’s accomplished, this eternal hope can only end in eternal hopelessness.
Movements end. Revolutions are crushed. The saviors of the people today are their oppressors tomorrow. Nations rise and fall and are forgotten. The dead at Tiananmen are just that- dead. One man stood unarmed on a Beijing street, blocking the progress of a line of tanks, and yet, the man is gone, and the tanks rolled onward. To be an icon may be wonderful, but when beautiful emotions and symbolic status accomplish none of what you gave yourself for, then surely, nothing could be emptier.
So when I weep for Tiananmen, I am not grieving for a movement. I am weeping for millions of people who reached out for something- something- and who were flung bleeding back into their prison. I am weeping because I know they could never have satisfied their longings by overthrowing Deng’s government, by gaining the liberty they demanded, or by grabbing the attention of the world. I am weeping because true freedom- freedom which cannot be suppressed, whose voice cannot be stopped with bullets, whose hope cannot be destroyed- is found in one man only. Jesus Christ.
And when I am moved to tears by this- by the pointless suffering of millions in the nation that has all of my heart- by the crushing of the people who are bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh, blood of my blood, life of my life, it is not only because they are pouring themselves out at all the wrong altars- because they are giving their lives to dead idols and screaming their petitions into silence- it is because THEY DO NOT KNOW! They are living in a cave with no view of, any whisper of the sky. Oh, I know Romans One. They have the clues to God’s existence before them. But God is adamant that, although this leaves them no excuse, this is not the way in which they will learn to know Christ.
How will they hear? Us. His body. His ambassadors. We are to be the image of, the action of His love. Certainly He would want to include the most populous nation on earth in that mandate!
So I ask myself the question: ‘What am I doing for China?’ and the answer is unsatisfactory. I can’t go yet, though the longing is terribly strong just now. I have access to a limited pool of Chinese students and professors here, and yet, I can PRAY. I can fast. I can petition. I can refuse to be silent about the sufferings of these people. I am not giving nearly enough time to doing so now- but with His help, I hope to change. Will you do the same?
The facts of Tiananmen cannot be erased. One generation silenced. Another woefully deceived. In the United States, our generation is ignorant, passive, and often indifferent. Millions of Chinese victims, both in history and today deserve recognition and support, so I am determined now to educate myself as much as I can, and to be a voice for China here. Will you dare to be informed? Will you dare to speak out? It matters- it really does.
And more than anything, will you go? If not to China, then to the Chinese in America! If you don’t know any, find them. Start studying Chinese. Make contacts in the expatriate community. Those of us attending secular universities, especially, have tremendous responsibility! God has brought the world to us. If we aren’t living and sharing the Good News here, I doubt we’ll be much use anywhere else.
If China is such a tearing pain for those of us who love her, imagine how God, who created these precious billions, who paid their ransom in His own blood, must yearn over them! Dare to share God’s heart for China! Dare to give yourself for China! Thousands are dead- imprisoned- destroyed because of Tiananmen. The taste it leaves in my mouth is grief. Hopelessness. Finality. But a new generation is coming of age, and a new hope may arise if we are faithful.
Are you willing to bring the revolution of Life? The Truth that can NOT be silenced? The Light that cannot be quenched in the darkness of a prison camp or the smoke and chaos of a massacre? The Life that will never be reduced to a twisted young body tangled in its bicycle, bleeding the blood of a nation?
If you are not, who will? If I am not, who will? If we, the slaves of Christ, do not proclaim Christ, who will? The people rise up, and fall down, and gunshots rattle near the ‘Gate of Heavenly Peace’, but we who carry the peace of Heaven in our hearts are silent.
This must change.
This MUST change!