1999 - Liu Rongyao

1999

Hefei, Anhui

Liu Rongyao is remembered as a faithful believer and zealous soul-winner for Christ among the house churches in Anhui Province. He was part of the Lixing house church network based in Hefei City and containing tens of thousands of believers. Anhui is one of the provinces of China that has experienced great revival. In response, the government has conducted much spiteful persecution and oppression of the believers there, yet the more persecution they give to the church the more it continues to grow.

Liu Rongyao and other house church elders came together for prayer and fellowship in 1997. The meeting was raided by Public Security officers, and all seven Christians were arrested and sent to a prison coal-mine labour camp for three years. The seven men were treated with brutal disdain by the prison authorities. One leader had coal forced down his throat into his stomach, so that the lumps of coal could clearly be seen pressing against the walls of his stomach. This didn’t stop him from preaching the gospel, however, and many prisoners found Christ. The guards then smashed his legs so that he was unable to walk, but still he continued to preach to everyone he came into contact with.

Liu was treated barbarously in the prison. Local gang members, who had been called into the prison by the guards in order to meter out punishment against the Christians, smashed Liu’s head with rocks. The prison authorities saw he was badly injured, but refused to provide any medical treatment. When it became apparent that he would die, Liu Rongyao’s relatives were told he had suffered his injuries from smashing his own head against a wall. He was taken to a hospital where doctors found fragments of embedded coal rock smashed into his brain. Miraculously, Liu’s condition improved, and he was able to walk and talk, but about 18 months later Liu was diagnosed with brain cancer in the place where his skull had been smashed. He died in 1999, leaving a wife and children behind.