Illegal Bibles
How many Bibles do you have at home? I know I have at least five or six.
Pastor Cau lives in a country where Christians are persecuted, and Bibles are rare. In fact, it's against the law for Christians from the Hmong tribal group in Vietnam to have a Bible in their own language.
When Pastor Cau started his ministry in 1998, not one person in his church owned a Hmong Bible. He was only 19 years old.
Pastor Cau knew that the Word of God was a treasure more precious than gold, so he used his life savings to buy Hmong Bibles for every person in his church. Even though they were illegal items, Pastor Cau risked everything so that his brothers and sisters in Christ could have the words of eternal life (John 6:68).
To get his Bibles, Pastor Cau travelled over 1000km. It was a long, difficult journey. But when he picked them up, he was full of joy.
As he travelled back to his village he was arrested by the police. They confiscated all of his Bibles!!
Pastor Cau had given up everything to buy these Bibles and now they were being taken away from him. It would be easy to give up after this, but he and his wife continued to trust the Lord and serve Him wholeheartedly.
Arrested, Interrogated, Tortured for Christ
Pastor Cau is now 31 years old. In his 12 years of ministry, his church has grown from 20 people to 230. He has planted nine new churches and is committed to training young leaders in these new congregations.
He has also been arrested 14 times.
In May 2010, he was transporting more Bibles for Hmong believers when he was stopped by the police. They confiscated the Bibles and kept him in prison for three days.
During this imprisonment, Pastor Cau was interrogated by the police. They tied each of his arms with two ropes, one around each wrist and another around each bicep. Then they stretched his arms out until it felt like they were being torn out of his shoulder sockets.
He was left like this for 12 hours as the police questioned him, and asked him where he got his Bibles from.
They threatened to cut one of his ears off if he did not answer their questions. Pastor Cau refused to tell them as he did not want to endanger the life of his co-workers. Thankfully they did not cut his ear off.
Pastor Cau told me,
I have faced the police so many times. But one thing I know: God will protect me.
Persecution is a normal part of his life and ministry, yet nothing can stop him serving Christ and sharing the Gospel. I was amazed at his steadfast commitment to Christ.
They need more Bibles
When I asked Pastor Cau what he needs, he immediately replied "we need more Bibles!".
This is the cry of every Hmong pastor we met during our time in North Vietnam last year. Today, most Hmong believers have their own Bible. But the church is growing rapidly and many more Bibles are needed for new believers.
Hmong pastors like Cau are leading many people to the Lord and they long for each person to have the Word of God so they can continue to grow in their faith.
