I found it profoundly moving that Hong Kong freedom protesters were singing our anthem and waving our flag.  For years folks have been talking about being very careful in Hong Kong because no one wants to make the communist Chinese government mad.  So some folks didn’t do the things that they could have done to promote freedom and push back against communism.  Some folks didn’t do the things that could have done to make a clear witness to Christ in the mission field.  They didn’t want to rock the boat.  Well now the boat is being rocked in ways no one thought possible. All the chances over the years that were never taken is a shame.  

People laugh about deep state actors and pretend that they are a part of a conspiracy mindset.  It is interesting that part of the frustration many of us have had in the mercy and the mission areas is a churchly deep state that has existed for years and are responsible for a wishy washy kind of non mission mission emphasis that ultimately turns into syncretism.  When called on it of course there are the usual attempts to appeal to trust and slack cutting for the “people on the ground” who know better than the rest of us poor slubs who pay the bills and try to raise funds for missions.

So now we watch as millions of Hong Kong folks get out in the streets and get into the faces of tyrants; the very tyrants we were afraid to irritate by talking about Jesus too much for so many years.  There is irony there somewhere and I will find it after I get over my frustration.