Sent to the Camp for Preaching the Gospel

Conditions at the Chinese labor camp were brutal. With the food rations down to almost nothing and the subfreezing winter temperatures, an epidemic broke out in the camp. When winter began, there were thirteen hundred prisoners. When spring came, only two hundred fifty had survived.

    Mizhong Miao was sent to the camp for preaching the gospel and for refusing to deny his faith. His five-year sentence was tripled when he refused to stop preaching to fellow prisoners.

    During that harsh winter, guards thought Mizhong Miao was dead. The life seemed to have left his nearly frozen body, but Miao’s spirit was alive, and he was praying. Left alone in the morgue, he saw a visitor—an angel dressed in white and with a shining face. The angel came close and blew upon Miao. As the angel blew, he felt the sickness leave his body and warmth enter him. He immediately knelt and said a prayer of thanksgiving.

    He walked out of the morgue to the prison doctor. The doctor stared with a look of horror on his face; he thought he was seeing a ghost. “Don’t be afraid. I am Mizhong Miao,” said the Christian. “God restored me to health. He sent me to show you the way of God.”

    Bowing reverently, the doctor said, “Your God is real.” That night he accepted Christ as Savior.

Seeing is believing. We can talk about God. We can learn about Jesus. Yet we must experience him by faith in order to confess with the doctor, “God is real.” The chances of a doctor in the Chinese labor camp coming to Christ were slim to none. However, when confronted with a living miracle, he chose to believe in Mizhong Miao’s God. Sometimes we may feel like our loved ones face similar odds. We must pray for them to experience God. They may encounter him through creation. They may see him at work through a love relationship. While miracles like Mizhong Miao’s are few and far between, pray for your lost loved ones to have a life-changing encounter with the living, loving Lord.