Leaderette: After four years’ worth of study, the deaf Christian brother Zhou Xuan from Beijing will leave Honglongjiang Theological College, and return to Beijing to serve God. During the time of his graduation, he reviewed his student life for the past four years and expressed his expectations towards his future service.
Below is brother Zhou's testimony:
I especially thank God for selecting me for this task. I started to serve and work for God from the end of Dec, 2006 up to the present – preaching to the deaf in Beijing. However, in 2010, I found myself unable to talk about the gospel anymore because my knowledge on theology was close to zero, and I even didn’t know that Israel had a different background and language. I didn’t have any knowledge regarding any theological system, and I didn't have clear thinking, I talked about what I felt like and I added my own ideas in casually but its contents did not have any relation to the Bible at all.
In the beginning, I was thinking of going to Hong Kong or Taiwan to study theology. However, the pastoral director from the Chaoyang Branch of the Church of Beijing recommended me to go to Harbin to study. At that time, I thought Harbin was the most northern and coldest place in China. I didn’t want to go to Harbin. I requested to study at Yanjing Theology College Beijing, and the pastor agreed. He gave me the opportunity to take the entrance exam. I was lucky to go to Yangjing Theology College to take the exam and there were four subjects I have to pass. Unfortunately, the college could not accept me because I was deaf, and they didn't know how to teach me.
Eventually, in early August of 2013, I went to Heilongjiang Theology College to take part in exams and I passed. I was very happy. In September, I went there to study. I thought I would only study theology, but I found out that it was not as easy as I expected it to be. At Heilongjiang Theology College, we did not only study, but we also went out and did manual work, such as going down the mountains to do farm work, cutting vegetables at a canteen, cleaning the floor, transporting coal and cleaning the snow outside of the college.
During those four years’ of study life, I worked as the class monitor, a representative of sports and recreation, and the learning minister of the students’ union. I studied theology while managing my classmates. I kept changing myself, and learnt to get rid of the old me. I no longer belonged to myself, my body belongs to God. Thank God I learnt a lot about theology, and my spiritual life continued to grow, I learnt how to pray and how to pray for others.
A deaf’s learning style is different from normal people. Those who can hear keep notes while listening to their teachers. The deaf cannot take notes like others. The deaf cannot hear and it is a problem. The deaf cannot take notes while the teacher is translating in sign language, because when the deaf are writing notes, the teacher has already translated several sentences and it will be difficult to ask for the missed sentences. We all watched the slideshow and my classmates volunteered to help type the words. They used Pinyin because the teacher spoke too fast. When they typed characters in a hurry, they did not have time to correct the wrong spelling. We, the deaf, couldn’t understand the wrong characters. I was responsible for the typing. I typed while looking at what he typed. I had the time to correct the wrong characters, so they could also understand the teacher’s lecture. Every time we gave them a copy of the typed characters, they reviewed it when they return home.
The biggest difficulty with the deaf is to write a thesis, because the deaf are not good at writing thesis papers. We worked hard to find grounds for argument, and thought about our main arguments. We thought about our argument, wrote an article and asked the teacher or an advisor to help modify the wrong sentences or supplement the contents. Gradually, we learnt how to write a thesis, thank God!
Some of us came from Wuhan, Nanjing. I came from Beijing. We couldn’t adapt to the temperature and living habits in Harbin, especially when it comes to food. The northeast has a heavy yet tasty style of cooking and every day, they eat potatoes. We only went out to eat occasionally. We knew that the winter in Harbin was very cold and we bought a lot of winter clothes in advance. When it was minus 20 degrees, we wore a lot of clothes and wore both hat and gloves. But we still felt cold and couldn’t stay long outside. Even in April, the weather still hasn't turned warm. My skin grew red spots because of the tough temperature. I had to take a three-day drip to cure my erythema.
One month after I went to the Theology College to study for a month, my wife gave birth to my son. I couldn’t ask for a leave to visit her and I felt a bit sad not to be there with her. I very much appreciated, understood, and supported by my wife. Now, my son is two years old and he is very lively and naughty. My wife was tired so I went back home to take care of my wife and my son during my holiday. When I was at the Theology College, I always used my mobile phone to keep contact with my wife and occasionally, we speak to each other online, prayed for each other and greeted each other. Every day, not only does my wife takes care of my son, my parents also help out. I miss my whole family, and pray for them often.
Now we the deaf love each other and communicate with each other every day. We talk about God’s words and share with others at the church respectively. Every week, we pray together. Our spiritual lives have grown, thank God. Every day, when I pray, I think about God’s thoughts, follow God’s order and hope God can make use of me. The Lord said:” For my thoughts not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55:8-9). This is the motto of my life, I cannot do everything completely by following my own mind. I should only follow the Lord’s ideas and act.
In my first year, I mainly studied the main ideas regarding the different chapters of the Bible. In the second year, we studied the history of the Western church and systematical theology. And in the third year, we studied Chinese church history and history of the Western Christian thought. Finally, in my fourth year, we studied pastoral care. The study regarding systematical theology is very helpful because without systematical theology, the church’s teaching will be too casual and without a system. After one year of studying systematical theology, I understood the meaning of Christ’s personhood, the theory of the Holy Spirit and the theory of the church. I have also learnt how to lead and educate the crowd.
Both Western church history and history of Western Christianity mainly started when Jesus ascended to heaven, and a large amount of heresy and cult appeared to contradict it. These groups are from different understandings of Jesus Christ’s personhood and their thoughts are radically different. This resulted to a split and masquerade between believers. During my four years of study, I have benefited a lot in my study and spiritual life. In my daily life, I thank the other deaf students and staff from the Chaoyang Branch of the Beijing Christian Church for their help and support.
Now as graduation draws near, for me, it’s not the end of the study. Instead, it is the start of my service work. I will think more for the deaf and quietly think of God’s order. Work hard to help the deaf regain peace with God and study sign language for the benefit of the deaf. I am touched by Paul’s words: “But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all of duties of your ministry. For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time has come for my departure. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day- and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing.” (2 Timothy 4: 5-8) I will fight for it until I die.
