Let my people go - the battle for the next generation

【Exodus 1:15-22】There were two Hebrew midwives, one Shiphra and one Pua, and the king of Egypt said to them, "You take in the Hebrew women, and watch them give birth. At that time, if it was a boy, kill him, and if it was a girl, let her live. But the midwife feared God, and did not do what the king of Egypt had commanded, but saved the boy's life. The king of Egypt called the midwife and said: "Why did you do this to save the boy's life? The midwife said to Pharaoh, "Because the Hebrew women are different from the Egyptian women, the Hebrew women are strong and strong, and before the midwife arrives, they have already given birth. "God favored the midwives. The children of Israel increased in number and became extremely powerful. Because the midwives feared God, God ordered them to set up families. Pharaoh said to all his people, "You shall throw away all the boys born to the children of Israel." In the river, all girl, you shall save her life. "

The so-called "every nine will be chaos" is another prophecy. In 2019, the 100th anniversary of the May 4th Movement; the 30th anniversary of the June 4th Movement; this year, the anti-extradition movement was staged in Hong Kong, and these are mainly based on the younger generation.

Important moments in history are driven by the younger generation, who of course are often the victims first.

The first chapter of the Exodus begins with a fierce battle for the next generation.

Pharaoh was going to exterminate the next generation of Israel. He called Israel's midwives, and when he asked them to deliver, if it was a girl, let her live, and if it was a boy, kill her. This is actually the family planning policy that Pharaoh gave to the Israelites, that is, only girls are allowed, not boys.

Why did Pharaoh do such a thing? The reason is explained at the very beginning of Exodus: the people of Israel multiplied and prospered, and were extremely powerful, and filled the land. Why was the Israelites extremely powerful a threat to Pharaoh? You know, the Israelites were not Egyptians, but foreigners who lived there. When they were fruitful and extremely powerful, and filled the land, the Egyptian Pharaoh began to worry. Because this threatens the stability of his rule, or it is a big issue related to political national security.

Faced with the extremely powerful Israelites, Pharaoh took several measures. The first is to keep them busy to death, so that they don't have enough time for family life, and they feel that life is very hard and may not want to have children. Does this trick work? No, because the Bible says that they "worried them more and more and more and more and more and more".

Therefore, Pharaoh came up with the second measure, that is, forced family planning, which is the order we just mentioned, and he required the midwives to obey the order during delivery. Does this command work? According to the scriptures, it was useless, because the two midwives did not do what Pharaoh ordered. But do Israelis only have these two midwives? Obviously not, so what about other midwives? We don't know, but it is common sense that they may have complied. Just like China's family planning policy, are there any family planning workers who respect life? There are definitely, but there are definitely not many. Most of them obey the government's policy requirements, because disobeying them is a matter of losing their jobs, not to mention that in Egypt, the two midwives committed the crime of deceiving the king, and they will lose their heads. Therefore, the Bible specially recorded the names of the two of them as a remembrance. What the scriptures do not record is that there are still baby boys in Israel who were destroyed at the command of Pharaoh.

But Pharaoh felt that using the Israelites to murder the Israelites was always ineffective and direct, so in the end he simply let the Egyptians do it directly, which was to force the Israelites' boys into the river. This is tantamount to genocide. In this way, Pharaoh's worries can be put aside, because as long as there are no children in Israel, even if there are many women, it will have little influence. This was the Pharaoh's plan.

We know that the entire book of Exodus records God’s plan to lead the Israelites out of Egypt and into Canaan. This is God’s promise to Abraham early on, and it is the hope and plan that the Israelites never gave up. As the Israelites prospered and the time for God to lead them out of Egypt was getting closer and closer, the battle against God’s will from accomplishing became more and more intense. The focus of this battle was concentrated on the next generation of Israel, who was was systematically massacred.

Why the next generation? Because the next generation represents the future, and at the same time they are the weakest, undiscerning, and powerless group, the devil's work in every age is to make us lose the next generation and interrupt the work of God.

The same thing is happening in China today! The control of thoughts has been continuously strengthened in recent years, and the most direct manifestation and conflict are the restrictions on young people's participation in church activities.

Many churches now have signs outside saying that minors and college students are not allowed to participate in religious activities. The nearest church in Haidian to us has stopped Sunday School for Children and the fellowship of college students. In universities, Christian students are also required not to preach to their classmates on campus, or even to have religious activities. Those enlightened Christian teachers are also required not to spread the Christian faith to their students, and their academic level and professional title evaluation may be linked to this. In primary and secondary schools and colleges, it is forbidden to spread religious beliefs to students. They can only accept the teaching of Marxist beliefs and use various methods to guide young and outstanding young people to join the party. We are facing a great spiritual battle, and this battle is focused on the next generation.

Of course, we can see some positive messages from this persecution, that is, Christianity has developed tremendously in China, just as the Israelites were so powerful in Egypt that they had to attract the attention of Pharaoh. It sounds like the reason is the same as the Pharaoh back then. We must prevent foreign forces from infiltrating us under the guise of religion, so as to affect our national political security. In fact, this just shows from another angle that God has specially blessed our country, and in the past few decades, there has been a huge development of the Christian faith population. Therefore, like the Israelites today, we are faced with various persecutions. Among these many restrictions and persecutions, the battle for the soul of the next generation is the most critical, because this is directly related to the future and development of the church. s future.

Let's go back to the time of the Israelites and imagine if you were one of the Israelites, what would you do? Of course, if you travel back to being a midwife, you know who to follow. What are you going to do with other Israelis? Or maybe you're a young couple with a baby and you must find ways to protect your children, as Moses' mother did. But what can we do about the larger community of Israelis? Yes, cry to God for his help and deliverance! I think that when the Israelites faced the slaughter of their next generation, they must have sincerely prayed and shouted to God! Did God answer their prayers? You can say no, because God did nothing to stop Pharaoh's hand in time to end the slaughter; but you can also say yes, because God has prepared in this next generation Moses, the deliverer of Israel.

If you are familiar with the story of Exodus, you know, what happened next? Moses was born, and her mother hid her. Later, she couldn't hide it anymore, so she could only put him in a rush box and be a "drifter", resigned to fate. The amazing thing is that God's hand guided this cattail box to escape the slaughter of the pharaoh and his men, escape the mouth of the crocodile, and finally be guided to the pharaoh's daughter to learn to grow up. It took God forty years for God to prepare this young man to grow up to realize his mission. When he realized it was his duty to stand on the side of his fellow Israelites, he gave up the good life in Pharaoh's palace, fled Egypt, was called by God in the wilderness for another forty years, and went back to save the Israelites from leaving Egypt. It can be said that it took 80 years for God to reveal his deeds to the cry of the Israelites, but in fact, at the moment Moses was born, God had already answered the prayer and prepared for salvation.

The next generation is the crux of the spiritual battle and often the way God prepares for salvation. When Moses' mother had just given birth to Moses, he must have been earnestly praying to God, asking the Lord to help and protect his child and the entire nation of Israel. At that time, God answered his prayer and let the baby who was still in swaddling Be the savior of the future.

God wants to do new things, often beyond our plans and calculations, and we need patience and waiting to discover what he is doing. He has established power in the mouths of babes and sucklings to show that this is his only glory and power. We can see many young people in the history of Israel who were greatly used by God.

There was Gideon, the warrior, who was a coward when he was called by God; there was David, when Samuel went to anoint God's chosen servant, he did not feel that this little one was the one raised up by God to be the king of Israel; And Daniel and his companions, when they were taken captive to Babylon, they were still young teenagers, but they never thought that God raised Daniel up and made him the ruler of a nation; when Jesus called the disciples , they are also young people in their twenties. There is also Paul, who was greatly used by God. The Bible records that when he appeared, he was still a young man. (Acts 7:58)

Throughout the history of the church, it goes without saying that many people were called by God when they were young, and they were willing to give their full devotion to God.

Why the younger generation? Because when a history turns in a new direction, people who have lived half their lives often have no time to adapt to the new changes, let alone play a role in changing and leading them. Therefore, God has raised up a young generation to respond to the needs of the times, because young people are full of vigor, vitality, and ideals, and most importantly, they are willing to put their own youth for this. Therefore, God uses the new generation to complete the mission of the new generation. The young people we see are just some of the leaders. In fact, God is preparing a group of people to respond to the call of the times.

The same thing is happening in China's modern history. Do you all know the three most influential people in the Chinese church in the last century?

Wang Mingdao, Watchman Nee, and Song Shangjie were all leaders of the Chinese church used by God. When Wang Mingdao was young, he decided to devote himself completely to the Lord and opened a Christian synagogue in Beijing. Song Shangjie put down his high education and generous job opportunities after he completed his doctorate in chemistry in the United States, and responded to God's call to be an evangelist. Watchman Nee, with his fluent English, published many original works, and Established a Christian meeting place. God has done an important thing through them, that is, the era of Chinese missions (1807-1907) has entered the era of Chinese churches (1907-2007). The so-called Chinese mission era is an era led by missionaries and pioneering wasteland in China, but the Chinese church era is an era dominated by Chinese people and local churches flourishing.

The interesting thing is that they were all born around 1900. At that time, the most appalling thing happened was the Boxer Movement. The Boxers slaughtered missionaries and Chinese Christians along the way with the slogan of helping the Qing Dynasty and destroying foreign countries. There were hundreds of foreigners. Missionaries were killed, and tens of thousands of Chinese Christians and their descendants were killed in this catastrophe. Perhaps missionaries and Chinese Christians were also praying earnestly at that time. Where is God's salvation and where is the future of the Chinese church? So, God gave birth to these three spiritual leaders in turn. Wang Mingdao's father was killed in the Boxer Movement. In the darkest time, God prepares his salvation in the next generation and leads the direction of the age.

Today, if you want to understand the development of contemporary churches in China, especially the development of urban churches, you must not spare the generation of young people 30 years ago. You have heard the testimony of Jin Mu and you know what happened 30 years ago. During the Tiananmen catastrophe, God made college students many years ago experience the shattering of their dreams and be reborn in Christ. They have experienced the darkness of death, so they are willing to let go of the bright future that the world sees, and devote themselves to the development and shepherding of the church. Many senior pastors in urban churches today are students of that generation.

Also, I think God in this day and age, in a time that seems depressing and hopeless, still has his wonderful and unpredictable plans that are going to be realized through the younger generation, it could be you, or you God’s children, no matter what, God’s salvation is not in vain, He is also working, but we need to see God’s plan accomplished in the next generation.

Therefore, we must pay special attention to spreading the faith to the next generation and helping them establish correct values in Christ. Although many churches today are limited by space, Sunday school for children cannot be held. But in any case, we know that the influence of parents on children is far greater than that of schools and churches. Therefore, parents can use their own lives to infect their children, and the best gift you can give them is your example of the fear of God.

For college students who leave their families to study, and for lambs who have already believed in the Lord, we need to find them so that they can have a stable fellowship and church life. Today, there are more than 99% of the lost college students in Chinese universities. a way to bring the message of the gospel to them. In this session, less than 1% of Christian students are very important, they are the messengers of the gospel of Christ who live in them.

In Chongqing in 1945, an important epoch-making significance was that during the Anti-Japanese War, the universities in the rear had the revival of the gospel, and a joint camp for Christian college students was held at that time. Although there were only a hundred people in this battalion, it was a miracle in itself to have such a gathering in the war years and the transportation was extremely inconvenient.

Not only that, in this conference, God raised up many young people to fully present themselves, including the familiar brother Bian Yunbo of National Central University who wrote "The Unknown Preacher". Soon after the end of the Anti-Japanese War, there was a civil war between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party. After 49 years, churches in the mainland suffered a wave of persecution. However, some of the young people God raised at this time stayed in the mainland, some went to Hong Kong and Taiwan, and some went further to North America. If you trace the history of Chinese churches, you can basically find this root. Many of us are in Christian books published in mainland China came from Taiwanese campuses, and it was the student leaders who arose here who later came to Taiwan to initiate campus ministry.

I think God is also looking for and preparing a new batch of leaders among the young people today, just as God prepared Moses in the darkest hours.

Let my people go! God's plan for the salvation of his people is finally coming to fruition, let us be an active prayer, preparer, and participant.

August 1, 2019