Many are finding the true hope in Jesus Christ
Life for most of China’s 300 million+ migrant workers is one of desperation for a better life for them and their children. These workers endure horrendous conditions that often strip them of self-respect, tear families apart and fall well short of the promises of prosperity. But God is raising up church leaders among these precious, often exploited people who are bringing the hope and love of Jesus Christ into their communities.
China's cities are growing at an unprecedented rate fueled by an estimated 300 million+ migrant laborers moving from rural areas to the cities in the past decade – the greatest migration on record in human history. The migrants provide a constant source of cheap labor for China's booming cities. But these migrant workers end up on the fringes of China's booming cities and growing middle class population of urban professionals.
Imagine for a moment leaving your children behind for you and your wife to travel 1,500 miles away to take a job that pays at or below poverty wages for you to work 7 days a week for 12-15 hours a day.
In desperation to provide some type of income for your family, you couldn't wait for the proper work permits (or couldn't pay the bribery fees to the corrupt officials to obtain the proper papers), so you go anyhow – now with no government assistance to see a doctor in your new province in case you get sick. And even on days that you are sick, you work anyhow to meet your quotas so that you don't lose your job the hundreds of others vying for jobs as well.
Unregistered work permits as part of China's "hukou" system (tying things like education and medical care to their home province) invite exploitation and oppression. At or below poverty wages, 7-day work weeks and 12-15 hour days, unstable living conditions, poor hygienic conditions, little or no access to health care and low-self esteem is the norm. The 20 million migrant children who sometimes accompany their parents only add to the problem with the inability to access education in their "new" provincial home and little or no supervision at home. The children left-behind in their home villages often fare no better without parents there to care for them and raised by other family members or friends – the stress often tears families apart.
Such is the life for most of China's 300 million+ migrant workers. Out of desperation for a better life for their children, these workers endure horrendous conditions which strip them of self-esteem and often seems hopeless. But God is raising up church leaders among these precious, exploited people who are bringing the hope and love of Christ into their communities.
To put it in perspective, China's poverty level migrant worker population (300,000,000 and growing) is approaching the size of the entire population of the United States. While 70% of the population used to live in the rural areas, now 47% of China's population live in cities. Estimates are that 59% will live in cities by 2025, and 70% by 2035.
The desperation and hopelessness of migrants workers' situation has created a unique opportunity for them to hear about and respond to the love of Jesus Christ. The stage is set for the type of unprecedented spread of the gospel that swept through China's rural communities in the 1980s-90s – and migrant churches are beginning to be planted all around China's major cities. Please pray for this move of God to continue in a way that can only be explained by His power and His glory.
Pray that God will continue to raise up passionate, devoted men and women with a love of Christ that equips them with the special gift to love on and minister to the vulnerable and poor in a way that adds millions of these workers into the Kingdom.
Your support will be used to help train and support pastors working among these migrant communities and planting churches in tool sheds, factory store rooms and dorms, and even in open fields and construction sites to share the hope that only Jesus Christ can provide.