Join the Peasants and Settle Down

-- True ministry is not just joining them but settling down

By Mo Yan

"The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us, full of grace and truth." (John 1:14a)

In the sixties, millions of Chinese educated youth migrated from urban areas to the countryside to receive re-education out in the open fields. This movement was called "Join the peasants and settle in the countryside".

In the eighties, thousands of Chinese educated youth migrated to foreign countries for schooling and work. To clone a similar term, this has often been called Join the foreigners and settle down in foreign lands.

I missed the movement of the sixties but I did experience the one of the eighties and lived in the U.S.A. for several years. Settled in a foreign country I was the one labeled an "alien". Today, however, under the Lord's guidance and by His grace, I have returned to Southwest China to fight poverty along with workers from all over the world. So now I have started on my version of joining the peasants and settling down in the countryside as an alien...

In the course of my work, I was required to go to the countryside to visit English teachers in a remote village.

The sky was blue and the scenery glorious. As I took my seat in the bus, I was in high spirits. The mountains were green, the flowers so pretty. But as the bus made its ninety-nine turns and crossed ninety-nine bridges our trip began to turn sour. Suddenly the mountains did not seem so green nor were the flowers as lovely as they had been. I found myself having to struggle to keep my head from bumping against the roof of the bus. In addition to the rough roads, I had to endure the driver's "anarchy".... He often ignored the timetable and elected to wait interminably for his friends and relatives. By the time the bus finally pulled out of the station, I had already been waiting in the hot sun for four hours. Beneath my feet was a cage with a black chicken fighting for its freedom; next to me was a can of smelly gasoline. For the whole twelve hours I was enveloped in smoke. So where was my joy in ministry? It had vanished! I found myself wanting to get off the bus and go home for good. But I bit my lips and prayed. Finally we arrived at our destination. It was no problem finding the public latrine, I had only to follow the smell. In the latrine floor there were a few black holes surrounded by a thick layer of white maggots. The ground seemed to be moving... Whenever I went in I would roll up my pants, close my eyes and hold my breath, all the time hoping that nobody else would come in and see my disgust.

The scene at the teachers' home was completely different. Awaiting me was a table laden with all kinds of delicious dishes whose names I didn't know. I sat at a low table with the teacher and her family, eating and chatting. It was wonderful! I had no sooner laid down my chopsticks than another family arrived to invite me to their home. And they, too, treated me to a feast. Not to eat it would have been considered disrespectful. That evening, I went to four families and I ate four dinners. The next morning, two more families invited me to two more meals. I could hardly refuse as the last family almost forced me to go with them. I said to my partner, "I simply can't manage it! And my backpack is full up too. Let's get out of here!" And so I ¡¥escaped' from the hospitality of these minority tribal people.

Sitting in the bus on our way back, I watched the school and the teachers slipping away into the distance and I suddenly realized I had just been joining them. But I was a long way from settling down.

Whenever I stepped into a piece of cow dung out under the blazing sun, I missed the beautiful beaches of Los Angeles. Whenever the bus shuddered and shook on the rough road, I missed the American freeways. When I went into the dark latrine, I missed the pink rug and pink candle in my bathroom at home. This ministry of joining them was a transitory thing and I hadn't really brought my heart along with me. I was still stuck in mentalities of comparison rather than acceptance, endurance rather than enjoyment, criticism rather than appreciation. Although I did go to the countryside and enter the homes of ordinary folk, I was still acting as an outsider or an alien.

True ministry is not only to join them but to settle down. To settle down is to follow Christ, to identify with the local environment, culture and people, to enter deeply into their lives, to live among them so as to become part of them and to see the Lord's abundant grace and truth at work there.

I saw the children of Western missionaries playing happily in a tribal cow shed, and I saw them grasping their chopsticks in both hands as they struggled to get the food into their mouths. That was when I saw the beauty of the Lord and the glory of the Word becoming flesh. May this beauty be manifested through me one day! May the Lord help me!

The author is from Shanghai. She immigrated to American before returning to China to take part in the battle against poverty in remote areas.