Editor’s note: Due to some website difficulties, we were unable to finish publishing our series on Kunming in February, and are instead wrapping it up at the beginning of March. Today, four Kunming pastors shared how we can pray for their city, and which Bible verse reminds them of Kunming.

China Partnership: How can we pray for your church and your family?

Wu Yexin: Pray that God’s gospel can be widely spread in Kunming. The weakest group is university students. As far as I know, work with this group has stopped.

Second, pray that young professionals in Kunming will hear the gospel soon.

Pray for Kunming churches to understand the gospel and follow the tradition of Word, sacrament, and order to build the church. Evil spirits have entered Kunming, promoting another kind of gospel.

Pray that my family can be more united, because both my wife and I are in ministry. My wife serves at a school, and our son is also active in church. Pray that our family can have a better relationship with the Lord, and that the ministry in our hands will be more in line with God’s will.

Ou’yang Qiang: Pray that our church will continue to preach and be renewed and changed by the gospel. Our congregation are in different levels. But as long as the church has the gospel, it will continue to increasingly manifest Christ’s glory. Pray that we can be brave, no matter what, to preach the gospel.

Because my three children go to school far from our home, sometimes I feel this keeps me from devoting more energy to the church. Wo we are considering if we should make changes in their education. No matter how we educate them, we hope that our family can carry on the Great Commission. We pray the seeds of the gospel will be preserved from generation to generation, so in the future our children can testify for Christ.

Guan Ju: Pray that brothers and sisters will be practically guided by God’s word, and know how to live a life that glorifies him.

Pray for my wife; she doesn’t sleep well. Since we came to plant a church, we’ve experienced difficulties, including losing a child. My wife is physically weak and suffers from insomnia, so please pray for her. She has always played a significant role in my ministry and in the church, and is a great helper to me, but I’m afraid she’ll collapse.

Finally, ask the Lord to help us faithfully preach and uphold God’s word, scatter the enemy, and bring the dry bones to life.

Huang Gudai: The church faces spiritual warfare. May the Holy Spirit strengthen and enable us to rest in the Lord’s presence and fight this spiritual battle by the Holy Spirit. I’m seeing more and more that, as we serve the church, we don’t rely on our own strength. Pray that the Lord will continue to use our family and will build up the church. Pray that God will protect my relationship with my wife and give us wisdom in raising our children, because this is difficult.

CP: What passage of Scripture do you feel is representative of Kunming?

Ou’yang Qiang: Amos 8:11: “’Behold, the days are coming,’ declares the Lord God, ‘when I will send a famine on the land—not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord.’”

Whether on a worldly or a spiritual level, whether externally or internally, I think the church hasn’t been a faithful watchman in this city. Because the church hasn’t blown the trumpet for God and held fast to his word, so the city is going through all these things. I think the biggest responsibility lies with the church. And the church’s problem is that we don’t listen to the words of the Lord.

I don’t dare represent all churches, only our own. Our failure towards the Lord is not listening and holding fast to his word. We are spiritual only within the four walls of the church. Because we haven’t truly fulfilled our role to be light and salt in this city, the city is going through all these things.

Huang Gudai: Because Kunming is relatively inclusive, I think of Gal. 3:26-28: “For in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God through faith. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

I think our church reflects this. No matter what ethnicity, in Christ we are all one family. On one hand, this verse encourages us that we need to serve these ethnic minority groups. On the other hand, we also hope that all churches in Kunming can be united in Christ.
Wu Yexin: Phil. 1:12-13: “I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel, so that it has become known throughout the whole imperial guard and to all the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ.”

This city and the church should know that, no matter what we encounter, it is for the Lord. Then we can be bold.

Phil. 1:21 also flashed through my mind: “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.”
Guan Ju: I thought of Is. 32:18: “My people will abide in a peaceful habitation, in secure dwellings, and in quiet resting places.” We pray unceasingly for the peace of this city and for the gospel in this city.

Wu Yexin, Ou’yang Qiang, Guan Ju, and Huang Gudai are pseudonyms for preachers and leaders at house churches in the southwest China city of Kunming.

Pray for the gospel to spread throughout Kunming and to bring peace to the city.