The Hong Kong Chinese lion leapt and the dragon twirled, the bagpipes and steel drums played and the 3,500 capacity crowd sang and danced to contemporary music. The crowd also heard the call from Donald Lawrence, president of the Youth Department of Baptist World Alliance (BWA), to choose Jesus Christ, who brings true life, when the 14th Baptist Youth World Conference began Aug. 5.
Hong Kong Baptists welcomed guests from more than 70 countries to their home for this meeting of the Youth Department of the BWA, held every five years.
Hong Kong Baptists used this opportunity to tell the story of how the gospel came here by missionaries in the early 1800s and today has borne lasting fruit in the work of the Hong Kong Baptist Convention that numbers 161 churches with 62,000 baptized members.
Hundreds of their Baptist young people with glowing lights held high, called on their listeners to pass the gospel on in the same way that someone had brought them the good news of Jesus Christ.
After three nights of continuous travel, Sanggra A. Gitor from India arrived at the conference.
“All the tiredness [of travel] was washed away,” he said when he saw the drama from the Hong Kong Baptist Convention.
For Judy Bailey, worship leader, this opening day of the conference “has been a taste of heaven.”
She pointed out that in the first half hour of the opening evening program there was music from Jamaica, Norway and Hong Kong. “This encourages people to be pliant and respectful of each other. It encourages each of us to love each other and it’s a good time to pray together,” Bailey said.
Already the young people have prayed for the poverty that plagues so much of the world. They saw the statistics that show 1.5 billion people live on less than $1 a day and every 3.6 seconds someone dies of hunger.
Eight hundred and forty million people are malnourished, 1 billion are unable to read and eight children out of 100 do not live to be five years old. (BWA)
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