THE BACK TO JERUSALEM WOMEN

Genesis. Every great revival begets a great missionary vision. The great revival in China in the last quarter-century has been accompanied by a renewed vision, broadly known as the Back to Jerusalem Movement, to take the gospel to Chinas minority peoples and the unreached peoples of Central and West Asia. This vision, so recently renewed, traces its genesis back to the 1940s. On Easter Sunday, April 25, 1943, eleven Christians at the Northwest Bible Institute in Fengxiang, Shaanxi shared with one another how the Lord had called each to take the gospel to Xinjiang. Within a month, the Lord further revealed to the vice-principal of the Institute, Rev. Mark Ma, that this would be only the first step in a larger plan to take the gospel through the Muslim world to Jerusalem. Although their Chinese name literally meant Preach Everywhere Gospel Band (遍傳福音團), in the western church they became known as the Back to Jerusalem Evangelistic Band. 

Exodus. In March 1947, two men and five women left Fengxiang for the long journey to Xinjiang. The men were Zhang Moxi and Zhao Maijia, and the women were He Enzheng, Lu De, Li Jinquan, Fan Zhijie, and Wei Suxi. Li Jinquan actually came from a Muslim family. She first heard the gospel when she was 20, and after receiving Christ as Savior, she enrolled in the Northwest Bible Institute in 1941. He Enzheng, in contrast, had been born into a Christian family in Tianjin in 1920. Her parents pasted the names of places like Jerusalem, Bethany and Mt. Zion in their courtyard. 
The Seven traveled 300 miles to Xining, the capital city of Qinghai, and then another 265 miles to Ulan, considered the last Chinese outpost before the dreaded Taklimakan Desert. They traveled one month beyond Ulan into the desert when the government revoked their permits and required them to return to Qinghai. The band ministered there for a time, seeing many won to the Lord, but before they could resume their mission to Xinjiang, the Communist Party took power. The church came under great attack all across China, and the tiny band which stalled in Qinghai seemed to have failed in their mission.

Numbers. Several other groups of Chinese Christians were also called by God to take the gospel to Muslims. Shandongs Jesus Family had sent 20,000 missionaries in over 100 teams to all parts of China by the 1940s. An offshoot, known as the Northwest Spiritual Movement, sent three teams to Xinjiang. Every member of these three teams spent time in prison after the Communist takeover, and only one team leader, Zhao Haizhen (Simon Zhao), survived. He and his wife, Wen Muling, had been married less than a year when they were arrested in January 1950. Simon saw Muling through iron bars twice shortly after their arrest and then never again on this earth. She was at that time pregnant with their first child, but miscarried, and died in prison in 1959. Uncle Simon endured years of beatings and torture before his release in 1981. 

Deuteronomy. In Gods perfect time, He used Uncle Simon to renew the vision of the Chinese Church for missions. When news spread of Simons release, Xu Yongling, a prominent Henan Christian woman, traveled to Xinjiang to meet him. She persuaded him to make the long journey to Henan to share the Back to Jerusalem vision with the younger generation of house church leaders. The vision was caught, and may God be glorified by the Chinese Christians now devoted to the fulfillment of the Great Commission. Meanwhile, He Enzheng, the only surviving female member of the Band, lives in Xinjiang and continues to minister to Muslims in her 80s.

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