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immensely widened. In the forties, as we have seen, it focussed on the corridor leading from NW China back to Jerusalem, targeting about 7 countries. However, today we are told that BTJ includes the countries not only along the northern Silk Road but also all the countries in SE Asia including Mianmar, India etc-in fact, a total of more than 50 from China as far as Morocco! BTJ missionaries will ‘march across the borders of the Buddhist, Hindu and Islamic worlds. This widening of the vision may be legitimate but it is fair to point out it differs from the specific parameters of the vision given to the original pioneers.

BTJ IN CHINA TODAY

BTJ’s overseas spokespersons quote certain key house-church leaders, such as Brother X., Brother Y. of the Born Again Movement and Brother Z. of the Fangcheng Church-all large house-church movements based in Henan province. These leaders issue staggering statistics – a minimum of 100,000 Chinese missionaries will be trained and sent out over the next few years as a tithe of the house-church movement. Asia Link is now claiming 120 or even 150 million Christians in China – a very speculative figure for which there is no firm evidence. (See my recent article in the International Bulletin of Missionary Research, January 2003, ‘Counting Christians in China – A cautionary report’, in which I prick a few balloons of exaggerated statistics.)

Many Western Christian will be surprised to learn that some of China’s most respected house-church leaders are very cautious, even sceptical, about BTJ. Moses X. in Beijing told me that the problem with BTJ was that its spokesmen ‘duo shuo hua, shao zuo shi -a crisp Chinese phrase which translates as ‘much talk, little action.’ Several have dismissed it as a ‘slogan’ (kouhao). We should not underestimate the effect of 50 years of Communist sloganeering even on the church so that people can be very adept at saying all the right things and going through the motions. There is a real danger of this in regard to BTJ. One of the saddest stories I have heard relates to a rural house-church pastor who confessed in tears to a Beijing house-church leader that his church has prayed for several years for BTJ but nothing had happened in terms of effective mobilisation.

It is difficult to get a handle on all that is already happening in China now in regard to BTJ. However, one network has 20 training-schools in operation not only in Henan but also in Kunming. One group in Henan has several dozen young people learning English and studying the Bible in preparation to go to Turkey. At the risk of being speculative I think it is highly likely there are several hundred and possibly several thousand mainly young people already receiving some form of training. One overseas spokesman stated in late 2003 that 75% of the 100,000 would be peasants. Another stated that some 30,000 missionaries will be sent out from China over the next five years.

However, it is now becoming clearer that the BTJ vision in China is not limited to rural charismatic house-churches. There is evidence from at least two Three Self seminaries that well-educated young theological students and some teachers also have a similar vision. I spoke to one myself. House-churches in Beijing and Wenzhou have a strong vision for mission.

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也大大拓寬了本來的範疇。正如我們所見，在四十年代，它專注於從中國西北地區通往耶路撒冷的走廊，目標大約是七個國家。然而，今天我們被告知，BTJ不僅包括北方絲路沿線的國家，還包括東南亞所有國家，包括緬甸、印度等——事實上，從中國到摩洛哥，總共有50多個國家！ BTJ的宣教士將「跨越佛教、印度教和伊斯蘭世界的邊界」。這種願景視野的拓寬或許合情合理，但公平地說，它與最初先驅者所獲視野的具體參數有所不同。

今日在中國的 BTJ

BTJ的海外發言人引用了一些主要家庭教會領袖的話，例如X弟兄、重生運動的Y弟兄和方城教會的Z弟兄——他們都是河南省的大型家庭教會運動。這些領袖發布了令人震驚的統計數據——未來幾年，至少將有10萬名中國宣教士接受培訓並被派遣出去，作為家庭教會運動的什一奉獻。亞洲連接會目前聲稱中國有1.2億甚至1.5億基督徒——這是一個非常的推測性數字，缺乏確切的證據。 （請參閱我最近在《國際宣教研究公報》（2003年1月）上發表的文章《統計中國的基督徒人數－一份警示報告》，我在文中戳破了一些誇大統計數據的謊言。）

許多西方基督徒會驚訝地發現，一些中國最受尊敬的家庭教會領袖對「歸回耶路撒冷」（BTJ）非常謹慎，甚至持懷疑態度。北京的謝模善（摩西）告訴我，「歸回耶路撒冷」的問題在於其發言人「多說話，少做事」——這是一個簡潔的中文說法，意思是「多虛談而少行動」。有些人認為這只是一句「口號」。我們不應低估共產黨五十年來的口號，甚至對教會的影響，因為人們可以非常熟練地說出所有正確的話，並敷衍了事。對於「回歸耶路撒冷」（BTJ）來說，這種口號確實存在危險。我聽過的最令人悲傷的故事之一是一位農村家庭教會​​的牧師，他淚流滿面地向一位北京家庭教會的領袖坦白，他的教會多年來一直為“回歸耶路撒冷”禱告，但在有效動員方面卻毫無進展。

我們很難掌握目前中國關於「回歸耶路撒冷」的所有情況。然而，一個網路經營20所培訓學校，不僅在河南，也在昆明。河南的一個團隊有數十名年輕人正在學習英語和聖經，為前往土耳其做準備。冒著猜測的風險，我認為很可能已經有幾百人，甚至幾千人，主要是年輕人，正在接受某種形式的培訓。一位海外發言人在2003年末表示，這10萬人中75%將是農民。另一位發言人表示，未來五年將從中國派遣約3萬名宣教士。

然而，現在越來越清楚的是，在中國，歸回耶路撒冷的願景並不限於農村靈恩派家庭教會。有證據表明，至少有兩所三自神學院的，受過良好教育的年輕神學生和一些教師也抱持類似的願景。我自己也曾與其中一位交談過。北京和溫州的家庭教會都擁有強烈的宣教願景。