10

“In the final analysis, character is more important than reputation,” I wrote in my new journal. Not only did I copy the “beautiful sentences” from the little booklet Jack had given me, I also wrote down thoughts and new ideas from my devotionals. “One’s reputation may be good when one’s character is not. The opposite may also be true.”

I used my new theology like a sword, or—considering my lack of knowledge—like a chopstick. Maybe even a toothpick.

I didn’t have a Bible, so I relied on Lao Wu’s English translation. I desperately wanted to share the gospel with everyone I knew, but it was hard to tell my Chinese friends about this new gospel that I could only read in English. Of course, that didn’t stop me. In the most basic terminology, I told people about Jesus.

Though people weren’t scurrying to hear my spiritual thoughts, they did notice a change in my demeanor. I used to hang my head low and avert my eyes when my old friends passed by. When they treated me like I was invisible, I simply disappeared into the background. Now that I no longer felt the shame of that punishment, I walked tall, shoulders back, head high.

“What are you smiling about?” a student asked when I walked into the English department. My deputy hadn’t arrived yet, so I had a little time before I’d be forced to sit silently while he graded my work. “The last time I saw you, your head was down on the desk and you were crying.”

“Yeah,” another student said, “I think I failed my test because your sobbing was such a distraction.”

I walked to the chalkboard, picked up a piece of chalk from the tray, and wrote “JOHN 3:16” right in the middle of the board. “I want everyone to know I became a Jesus follower.” I tapped on the board with the chalk, and a little cloud of chalk dust tickled my nose. Only about ten students had gathered in the class early, but all ten stared at me with blank looks. Eventually, they all looked back down at their books and study materials in silence. “So, if anyone wants to go to church with me,” I added as I walked back to my desk, “I’m going on Sunday!”

A few minutes later Heidi, who still sat in the front with all of the girls, walked back to my desk. She had a funny look on her face, and I figured she might be finished with dating me. After all, it hadn’t been the easiest road.

“I’ll go to church with you,” she said, with a very sly smile.

“You want to do opposition research?”

“Not quite,” she responded, her eyes looking down at the floor. Then she looked up, smiled, and said, “I’m a believer too.”

She gently placed the biography of Xi Zizhi on my desk and walked back to her seat. Apparently, Heidi had read the book. As I watched her very calmly settle back into her seat, I wanted to scream with joy! God didn’t let her be my persecutor for very long. I’d never known a Christian, yet suddenly I was dating one. I was one!

I kept living my normal life of forced confessions and surveillance, but my sense of drudgery was replaced by elation. During the days, I tried to memorize some of the English translation of Lao Wu’s Bible, and at night I’d pray before dropping off to sleep. One night, however, I got out a pen and paper to do one last thing.

“Dear Dad,” I wrote in my next letter home. “I just wanted you to know that I have become a Jesus follower.” I had no idea what he’d say or how he’d feel, but I couldn’t wait to tell him. My only regret was that I couldn’t tell Mom.

The next morning, I went to the campus post office to mail the letter and pick up my campus mail. I thumbed through the stack on my way to the garbage can. But I stopped when I noticed an in-campus letter from the English department. I stopped, slid my finger under the seal, and opened a request from the deputy dean of the English department for an in-person meeting.

I left the post office and headed to the administration building, wondering what would require a meeting. Was I being reinstated to my classes? Or had I done something else wrong? Normally, one would call, make an appointment, and meet him at a scheduled time. However, my mind began racing as soon as I read his letter. I couldn’t wait for normal protocols. After all, I was a social outcast. How much worse could my reputation be? When I got to his office, I knocked on the door, let myself in, and held up the folded letter.

“I came just as soon as I received this,” I explained.

“Yes,” he said, peering over his glasses and looking at me very intently. “Please.” He motioned to a chair sitting alongside the wall.

I walked over and lowered myself into it without a word. The last time I had a conversation with him, he was helping me plan the student protests. Now he was stopping me from getting into grad school.

“Tell me,” he said, in a very caring tone. “Are you okay?”

It felt as if he were asking me a trick question. Why would he suddenly care about my well-being? “Yes, sir,” I responded. “I’m fine, actually. Thank you for asking,” I said, trying to make my voice light and unconcerned, but my back stiffened in the chair.

“The reason I asked is that you’ve always been a very good student. You have always been a class monitor, until now, of course. You were a very effective student leader, and you made wonderful grades.”

I didn’t move as I waited for the bad news. Surely, he was simply warming me up to lower the hammer on me. My mind raced. What could he possibly be taking away from me now? I exhaled slowly and tried to calm myself.

“Thank you,” I said. “I’ve been very pleased with my grades.” Back when I was allowed to earn actual grades, I thought.

“What I’m trying to say is that the university isn’t going to deal too harshly with you.” Then he smiled and walked over to my chair. “Everything is going to be okay for you. Don’t fret.”

I ran my hand over my knee, rubbing out an imaginary crease. For three months none of my classmates except Heidi would be seen talking to me. Occasionally, someone would glance at me sympathetically. So I was a little perplexed by the sudden concern of the deputy dean of the English department. It just didn’t make sense.

However, I could tell by the quick pat on the back he gave me that the meeting was over. He shook my hand and sent me on my way. I walked back to my dorm, trying to process the purpose of the meeting. If he were really concerned for me, he could’ve asked the surveillance agents to give me some space. Or, even better, he could’ve let me attend classes again. Surely it wasn’t just a little pep talk. As I pondered the interaction, I saw Joseph and some former friends around the corner of a building. He was laughing, as if someone had said something terribly clever.

“Joseph,” I called out. He stopped, completely stunned. It was the first time I had spoken to him in public for months.

“Aren’t you still under surveillance?” He laughed. The people in his group stifled laughter. “Or did your special agents finally get sick of you?”

“Listen,” I said. “Something strange has happened. I think the deputy dean just gave me a pep talk.”

“Come here.” He pulled me aside, away from the ears of the group. I could tell I’d piqued his interest.

“I was told he needed to see me,” I explained. “But when I got there, he encouraged me and my school work.”

“Don’t you get it?” Joseph asked.

This was our first real talk in months. Before Tiananmen Square, I was the leader and Joseph was my faithful assistant. He helped me plan activities, he took orders, and he even switched English names with me so that I could be the more easily pronounced “Bob.” Yet here he was, condescension dripping from his tongue. He acted like he would rather be doing anything in the world other than talking to me. His group of friends—who used to be my group of friends—waited for him as we talked.

“Everyone is talking about you now,” he said.

“What are they saying?”

“That you’re strange.”

“So, now I’m not an ‘enemy of the people,’ I’m just odd?”

“More than odd,” he stressed. “You changed too much, too fast. You went from depression to laughter.”

“I became a Christian,” I beamed. “I’ve changed!”

“Well, they think you’re,” he paused a moment, then looked back at his group of friends, “mentally disabled. People are saying the university put too much pressure on you and then,” he held up his hand and snapped his fingers, “you lost it.”

I wanted to speak harshly to Joseph, to remind him of the days when the campus was talking about me because they supported me as I led them in a just cause. But when I looked at his face as he criticized me, I knew he was simply relaying the truth. Joseph let out a little chuckle. “Listen, I bet the deputy dean was just making sure you weren’t about to kill yourself. That’s all.”

When Joseph said the words, “kill yourself,” perspiration formed immediately on my forehead. How close I came, I thought, as I watched him walk away.

When I got back to my room, I pulled out my little notebook and began writing down my thoughts. “Many times in history, good people have been harmed by fake statements, slander, and false accusations. Their reputation was bad even though their character was good. In reality, the only thing we can control is our character, so that should be my primary concern. An active hatred, animosity, or a simple misunderstanding may soil my reputation. I want a good reputation, and for the most part it would seem a good reputation follows good character.” I paused a second, as I thought about my predicament. “So my primary concern must always be character . . . what I do even when nobody’s looking.”

When Sunday came, I realized I’d invited half my class to go to church with me. I got dressed in my best clothes and walked to the government-sanctioned church. Lao Wu and some of the other American teachers worshiped there, and I couldn’t wait to see what a real Christian church was like.

“I’m heading to church,” I announced to a group of students sitting in a restaurant near the student dining hall, reading newspapers. To my surprise, a few people actually put down their morning paper and joined me. Later, we passed another restaurant, where I noticed a few other acquaintances. “Would you like to go to church with us?” I asked. “It could change your life, like Jesus changed mine.”

Sure, I was the not-so-flattering talk of the campus. But by now I was used to being unpopular. By the time we got to the government-sanctioned service, there were about ten students who probably went to see what kind of “happiness spell” had been cast over me. Part of me wondered if they went to the church with me for a deeper, culturally significant reason. Students across the nation were grieving after the Tiananmen Square massacre, which set them both politically and emotionally adrift. They’d been taught Marxism was the only way to peace and prosperity, but had lost faith in it when those students lost their lives. Those tanks didn’t force China’s brightest and most culturally engaged students back into conformity. Those tanks set them on a course to find truth.

Much to my delight, some of the students who went to church with me that morning gave their hearts to Christ. I couldn’t believe that these people, many of whom had pretended I didn’t exist, now believed in God. This, of course, made me even more enthusiastic about sharing the news about Christ to my friends. The next weekday night, I went to the English department with a plan.

“Jack,” I said to the guy who sat in front of me during my nightly grading. “I appreciate you giving me that book.”

“At least you’re not crying all the time now,” he said, barely turning around.

“Want it back?”

“I’m not interested,” he snapped.

“Well, let me tell you about the message in the book. It’s really good news.”

That’s how Jack became a believer. The students who’d attended church with me told others about Jesus too. Many students on the campus believed in Christ. In fact, so many students from all areas of studies became followers of Jesus that this period of time was known as the Liaocheng Revival. We were considered to be one of the first generations of Chinese Christian students.

I was reveling in the goodness of the gospel as I walked back to the dorm from the English department that night when someone grabbed my arm.

I whipped around to see who’d gotten me. For so long, I’d been terrified of the special agents lurking behind every shadow. During my months of seclusion, the university didn’t even let me go home to see my family. It was a pretty scary and demoralizing time. But when the fall semester arrived, I was allowed to go back to the classroom. This allowed me to relax a bit. I didn’t look out for the agents, or think of them as much. On rare occasions, I’d catch a glimpse of them off in the distance. They were always just staring, like dogs waiting for the command to attack. They scared me, of course, but I had no other choice than to just keep going and live my life. And thankfully, after a while, they seemed to disappear.

Until now. The hand wrapped around my arm firmly so I couldn’t pull loose.

“Stop it,” I yelled, looking up to see one of the agents who’d been assigned to me. It was the older, thicker one, the one who looked like he could snap my spine with one hand. Behind him stood his cohort, smirking like a cat who had finally caught his mouse. I knew my life would somehow end up like this, getting snatched without committing any real crime. I’d feared this moment for many months, and yet as I stood in their grip, calmness overcame me.

“Xiqiu,” the thin one said very sternly. He hiked up his pants, which were already too high on his waist, and revealed shoes that were disturbingly shiny. “We need to talk to you about your recent behavior.”

“What do you want to know?” I asked, looking around to see if I’d have any witnesses. We were standing beneath a tree near the sidewalk on the way to my dorm. They’d caught me just as I was about to go into my building.

“Did you write some sort of Bible passage on the blackboard in the English department?” he said, through impossibly thin lips.

“I did,” I said. “I became a Christian!”

“Don’t you know that’s illegal?”

“There are state-run churches,” I said. “Why would it be illegal to join one?”

“Well, you’re a university student,” he said. “Don’t you know the Communist Party forbids students from converting?”

I sighed and the agent released his grip on my arm upon seeing my resignation. There were so many government restrictions I’d need a chart the size of the Beijing phone book to keep up with them all. Why would I pay attention to rules governing, of all things, Christianity? I’d never cared about it before. I took a handkerchief out of my pocket and wiped my forehead.

“Christianity is a danger to national security,” the older one said. “It’s the party’s policy that all university students be socialists.”

“But this isn’t about politics,” I said. “It’s a spiritual decision. Do you know the gospel?”

“No!” He put his hand over my mouth for a moment. “And I don’t want to know. You shouldn’t share Christianity with me, and you shouldn’t share it with the other students.”

“Honestly,” I said, plaintively. “I didn’t know.”

“Religion and politics are always intertwined,” he scolded. “Do you realize you were a counterrevolutionary student leader and now you’re going around asking other people to join you in illegal religious activities?”

I swallowed hard, trying to maintain my composure.

“You could lose your student status if you don’t stop.” He sneered. “You’d be farming potatoes for the rest of your life.”

Both agents turned their backs to me and began walking away. After taking a few steps, the thin one turned around and added, “And if you don’t stop, there’s no telling what else could happen to you.”