When You Work for the Church

Did you know that mission work might require you to be “an evangelist, a professor, a first responder, a church planter, a chief executive, a writer, a development worker, a peacemaker, an advocate, and a spy”? That’s how long-time missionary Reg Reimer describes his work in his new book, On the Cruel Edges of the World: A memoir of carrying help and hope into dark places in dangerous times.

I’ve known Reg and his wife, LaDonna, for some years, and have his earlier book on Vietnam’s Christians: A Century of Growth and Adversity (2011). But it wasn’t until I read his memoir that I realized the breadth and depth of his decades of ministry—the many roles and responsibilities he has taken on, the questions and challenges he has faced, and what those have meant for him and his family.

The Anatomy of Advocacy

by Reg Reimer, from chapter 20 of his book, On the Cruel Edges of the World: a memoir of carrying help and hope into dark places in dangerous times (2024).

And since we know that the system will not change the rules,
we are going to have to change the system.
—Martin Luther King Jr. 

It is a strange trade that of advocacy. Your intellect, your highest
heavenly gift, is hung up in the shop window like a loaded pistol for sale.
—Thomas Carlyle

My advocacy work was, of course, far more than a series of random and risky adventures. Forty years of these efforts taught me much about being an international advocate for persecuted Christians. Here are some basics.

The Christian foundation for human rights, including freedom of belief and religion, is the dignity of humankind created by God in His own image. Jesus is the only completely inclusive and non-discriminatory founder among the great religions. Women, children, men, outcasts, sinners, lepers, the sick and the deformed, the possessed, foreigners, beggars, aristocrats, fishermen and nobles—all experienced zero discrimination from Jesus. It is the ultimate egregious violation of God’s law to abuse any of his highest creation, for seeking, believing, and worshipping Him.

Today, freedom of religion and belief (FORB) is widely considered a fundamental, God-given, human right. It is enshrined in the world’s best-known international human rights instrument, the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is listed first in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It is the foundational freedom for all other freedoms. If you are not free in your own conscience, free to profess your faith before God, or free not to believe, then no other freedom is secure. Yet hundreds of millions of Christians live in countries where this precious freedom is restricted or even outlawed. The belief that freedoms are God-given, contrasts sharply with communism and other authoritarian ideologies that hold “freedoms” are the prerogative of the state to be doled out in dribs and drabs as the state sees fit or thinks its people deserve.

Why is there persecution? How does persecution work, how do Christians respond to it, and what interventions can alleviate suffering from it? Opposition to Christian believers often begins by spreading disinformation about them. This is followed by acts of discrimination, and finally persecution, including violence and killing. Globally about eight thousand Christians are martyred every year and hundreds of millions live under various levels of restriction, increasingly so, even in Western democracies.

Persecution was predicted, even promised by our Lord himself. As they hated him, he said, his followers could expect the same. Persecution may come by violent “smashing” or by systematic “squeezing.” Some main engines of persecution are Islamic extremism (Iran), atheistic Communism (Vietnam), and religious nationalism (India). The three age-old responses of Christians to persecution since New Testament times are to flee, to endure, or to resist. Many flee persecution, but faithful endurance is often the only choice and thus the most common response. Advocacy resists and fights persecution, as, for example, when Saint Paul told his persecutors, “You can’t do this to me, I’m a Roman citizen.”

International interventions on behalf of the persecuted can, in my experience, be successful but are often messy and controversial. Without discretion, these interventions can result in more harm than good. Prayer is non-controversial and usually the first request of the persecuted. Creatively sending encouragement to those suffering persecution is a huge boost in assuring them they are not alone. “Remember those in prison, as if you were their fellow prisoner” (Hebrews 13:3).

. . . .

I reflected carefully. More than anyone in our Vietnam missionary community, I had both documented the growth of churches in Vietnam after communism and been in frequent direct touch with the persecuted. Rapid church growth had indeed overlapped some of the worst waves of persecution. And some imprisoned had reported their experience as very tough but salutary to their spiritual growth.   

My considered response, however, was that it was much more accurate to observe that churches grew despite persecution—not because people were smashed and squeezed for following Jesus. There are plenty of historical examples where persecution wiped out churches. Sometimes persecution could be salutary for personal growth, but at other times the persecuted became bitter and even lost their faith under pressure. I interviewed one pastor newly released from prison and found him psychologically and spiritually crushed, estranged from his wife, and angry at his colleagues for not understanding him.

It cannot be pleasing to God, who redeemed them at the cost of His Son Jesus, to see his children so unjustly mistreated, imprisoned, deprived, beaten, raped, burned, and murdered.

Most importantly, Đòan Văn Miêng, long-time patriarch of Vietnamese evangelicals had begged me on my first communist-era visit to expose persecution and advocate for its victims in the outside world. That call was much stronger than some theoretical critique made from safety. Does anyone wish cancer upon someone because some victims find God or grow deeper in their trust in Him while enduring it?

I’d be very happy with “Advocate” engraved on my tombstone!

This excerpt from On the Cruel Edges of the World is reprinted with permission of the author, Reg Reimer. To enter the draw for a free copy, please respond to this post below, or send me a note using my contact form.