Recently, the severe COVID-19 outbreak in Jilin Province has attracted much attention, among which Jilin city and Changchun city are more serious.
On March 11, the city of Changchun was forced to press the pause button and start round after round of citywide nucleic acid testing. According to the latest news of the pandemic, 1,317 new local confirmed cases had been reported in Jilin on March 15, including 455 in Jilin and 268 in Changchun. In such a difficult time, churches in Changchun also participate in the anti-epidemic action.
On March 14, Rev. C's church launched a fundraising campaign for the outbreak, and at the same time, they issued an appeal, saying that believers who feel moved can serve as volunteers if conditions permit.
Rev. C stated that he was touched to donate money for the pandemic at that time, and posted the donation initiative on his personal platform, hoping to influence some people. "Whether they have faith or not, they can see that someone is doing it, which can arouse their love," he shared.
Many believers began to donate after learning about it, and some also signed up through the community to become volunteers. In the community, they help to do some disinfection work, deliver vegetables, food, and other daily necessities to some residents.
One of the female Christians, Yang, stayed up all night because she needed to come to the house to do nucleic acid testing for residents. After the church staff learned about it, they asked others to pray for her body: "We're worried that her heart can't take it anymore if she stayed up all night. Please pray for her." Yang replied, "Thank you for praying for me and giving me strength." She replied with a hug emoji. On March 15th, another pastor surnamed Fan in the church also took part in volunteer activities with his daughter and sister.
Due to certain limitations, some pastors and believers could not participate as volunteers, so they offered prayers for the believers and volunteers who were engaged in the service. For a long time, the church organized an hour of prayer every night. At first, they interceded for people's lost souls. Recently, due to the severity of the pandemic, they began to pray for the virus and the various pandemic prevention efforts.
C said, "Although we can't do anything together with them, we hope that the power of prayer can come to them." Through this hour of prayer, many believers also reported that their souls were awakened.”
"In this era, our faith should go out even more. The Lord Jesus said that we are the light of the world and the salt of the world, and the light must shine the darkness of the world, with salt keeping the world from corruption, so we need to bear witness to the Lord in a socially acceptable way. In the past, we used to talk about faith in the church and in front of the congregation, but now it is different, as we can be part of the community. We may not have to say that we are believers, but we can let the unbelievers around us see our faith through our actions, as this testimony will truly glorify God.”
C emphasized that social service was what the church should do. "From the perspective of evangelism, we should do our best and do our duty when the surrounding environment is difficult. Seeing that many enthusiastic people are actively participating, those of us who believe in God should also do like that, which God told us to do,” he added.
They were also involved in the relief work of the flooding in Henan and the Wuhan outbreak.
In the end, C said that in fact, not only his church was doing this, but also many churches opened their churches for the fight against the virus. Many Christians were participating in their own way, an example of which was to cook breakfast for the volunteers.
Translated by Leo Liu
