Desperate for Bibles
00:00 – Intro & Welcome
01:10 – Smuggling Bibles into China: The Green Backpack Story
05:40 – Panda’s House & the Underground Church Gathering
10:45 – A Young Couple’s Desperate Search for Bibles
14:00 – Then vs. Now: How Bible Distribution Has Changed
17:45 – Why the Bible is Still Feared in China
JOY: Welcome to Ron’s Adventures — the podcast series where Ron shares stories from his many, many years in ministry. With me in the studio today are Iranian and Charis. Welcome, guys!
RON: Hi Joy.
CHARIS: Hi Joy.
JOY: We haven’t done a Ron’s Adventures in some time, so I’m very excited to hear what you have to share.
RON: Well, today I’d like to take everybody back many, many years to when I was in China. It was a really exciting meeting. We went into Beijing — this was in the old, old days. You probably have some questions about this one. This was during the time when we were smuggling Bibles into China.
We had backpacks — and I still have my green backpack that I used for smuggling.
CHARIS: That’s funny.
RON: Yeah, it’s the same green backpack. We loaded it up in Hong Kong, then smuggled it through customs. We went to visit our friends, dropped off our bags, maybe had a cookie with them, or sat and talked, etcetera.
This one time, we went through with the backpack and visited Panda and his wife — two of the original pioneers of the church in China after the 1949 revolution, when the house church movement really took off. He had been in prison for — I forget exactly, I’d have to look it up — but around 15 or 20 years. He was a real icon, a hero to Christians in the country.
So we went to his house. It was very, very simple — just a big room, really. A bed, a small cooking area to one side, and I think a little table. When we walked in, Panda and his wife were sitting on the end of the bed. I still have a picture of it somewhere.
We sat and talked, and then all sorts of people started coming in. I didn’t realize it at first, but we’d hit them on Bible study night. The room filled up — really, really packed. My translator and I sat at the back, watching it all.
I slipped out for a moment because I wanted to get a picture of what was happening. Now, picture this: a one-storey house with a big room, and outside was a narrow 7 or 8‑foot wide pathway, almost like a lane. There were bicycles going up and down. Across this little street was another building, and I noticed a wire — probably about 7 feet in the air — going from Panda’s place across to that building. I figured it wasn’t a power line, so I followed it to see what it was.
Turns out, it was connected to a little speaker in the other building, which was also packed with people. It was an overflow room. They had a microphone and a little amplifier set up on Panda’s side, and that speaker carried the message across to the people crammed in over there. Just overflowing. Definitely.
Back in the main house, people were praying — I still remember them on their knees, crying out to God. Keep in mind, these were the days where you could still do these sorts of things without immediate arrest. There were rules against it, yes, but there wasn’t the same level of surveillance. There were roving police gangs who might crack down, but they wouldn’t go near someone like Panda. He was too well-known. The government didn’t want the international backlash of persecuting someone like him.
So we went through the Bible study, and after everyone left, we stayed and chatted with Panda and his wife, still sitting on the end of their bed. I started asking questions, learning more about their history and what they were doing.
Then, all of a sudden, this young couple came in — very polite, maybe early to mid-20s. The woman was very timid. They knelt at Panda and his wife’s feet, just out of respect. My translator told me they were asking if there were any Bibles they could take home.
And you could just see the look in their eyes — like they were holding their breath, hoping and praying for a yes. You didn’t need a translator to understand that look.
Panda, very slowly — he was an elderly gentleman — reached over, grabbed the green backpack I had brought, and opened it up. He knew what was inside. He pulled out two Bibles and gave them to the young couple.
She broke down in tears. She clutched that Bible to her chest, like, “I found it.” The young man just kept saying, “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
Then she — or they — said, “Now we can go home.”
They had been commissioned by their house church to go and search for Bibles and weren’t allowed to return until they had found some. I don’t know exactly how long they’d been on the road — could’ve been weeks, even months — but somehow they had heard of Panda. The Lord guided them there.
He didn’t have any Bibles left until we walked in the door. He’d already given away everything three times over. So those Bibles — they were a divine appointment.
JOY: I’m trying to picture your backpack. It couldn’t have been very big, right? So you couldn’t have brought very many Bibles.
RON: No, definitely not large ones. The Bibles for China were very small — pocket-sized, really. We probably brought in around 20 or 25 at a time. Just enough to fill a backpack.
CHARIS: And you did this every time you went to China?
RON: Yep, as often as we could. Things have changed a lot since then. We don’t smuggle Bibles into China anymore.
JOY: Because of surveillance?
RON: Exactly. These days, your bags are x‑rayed. Back then, you could sometimes just walk through customs. They might pull you over for questioning, or they might not.
I’m sure some people still try to smuggle in small amounts, but we’ve found other ways — much larger ways — of getting Bibles into China.
JOY: But you can’t say how?
RON: No, we won’t go into the details on that. But last year alone, we were able to get 900,000 Bibles into China — using other means.
CHARIS: That’s a lot of backpacks!
RON: (Laughs) Yes, it is. So while smuggling is not as common now, I’m sure there are still people doing it in small ways. But what we’re doing now allows us to get Bibles in by the hundreds of thousands.
JOY: During those earlier years — when you were smuggling — were you scared?
RON: Scared? No, not really. Tense, yes. You didn’t want to lose the Bibles. But being arrested? In those days, foreigners weren’t treated the same as they would be now. They might confiscate the Bibles and take you in for questioning — I’ve been questioned plenty — but it wasn’t too serious. Unless you were high-profile. Then it could’ve been different.
CHARIS: And now, you don’t even go into China anymore.
RON: Correct. Things are just too different now. We won’t go into that, though. That’s all I’ll say.
JOY: That was an incredible adventure. Anything else to add?
RON: Yes — one more thing. When you see the intensity of how the people gathered together — this was probably 25 or even 30 years ago — you might think, “This is a one-off.” But it’s not. That same hunger for the Word of God still exists in China today.
Leaders I’ve spoken to estimate the current need is about 40 million Bibles. That’s 40 million people praying to have a Bible in their hands — just like that young couple. The demand hasn’t gone away. It’s only grown.
CHARIS: And the Bibles are so cherished — shared, hidden, studied deeply.
JOY: Yes. We have shelves full of them here, but over there, they’re treasured and protected. It’s a love for the Word of God that drives them.
RON: That reminds me of another story — this one’s a free add-on, OK?
There was an elderly woman, and a young man had come to her home to read her Bible. Suddenly, they heard that the police were raiding homes, looking for Bibles. There was no time to think.
In China, people use night pots — a kind of chamber pot — especially in rural areas. It’s like a little box used before going to the outhouse.
She took her Bible and hid it under the bedpan.
CHARIS: Oh wow…
RON: The police didn’t want to look there. They wouldn’t touch it. But she didn’t think about herself. She thought about protecting the Bible. That’s how valuable it was to her.
Even today, the Bible is seen as dangerous by the authorities. It represents freedom — spiritual, ideological, personal. That’s why it’s so threatening to them.
JOY: Wow. That’s powerful.
RON: It is. And that’s the reality of life for many believers. It might be shocking to some, but it’s real.
JOY: Thank you, Ron. You’ve been listening to Ron’s Adventures. Ron has recorded so many stories from around the world — Vietnam, Ethiopia, India. You can find more of these exciting and faith-filled stories at ronpearce.org.
