Despite her grim condition, the hospital staff fought desperately to save her, unsure at the time of what had caused the infections filling the center of her chest—more often than not, a guaranteed death sentence. (They would discover later it was an infection caused by a fish bone that had torn her esophagus weeks earlier.)
Over the next six weeks, she would slowly begin to recover. She and her husband would also come to saving faith after seeing the truth lived out through the hospital staff and her caretakers during her six-week stay at the hospital, and they would bring the medical team to share that same truth with their village.
Even though the truth was not welcome in their village, the young couple continued to seek it out, visiting the hospital to learn more and grow, and persistently bringing the truth back to the closed ears of their fellow villagers.
But in March, the tragic news arrived.
Her name was Mai Tai Sing
“Buddhism is often described as a peaceful religion opposed to killing even an insect,” said one of the NGO doctors at the hospital who had helped treat Mai Sing. “But in reality, there are radical religious zealots who will stop at nothing in the name of their religion. Take Myanmar and the Rohingya crisis as a prime example.”
Because of their stand for the truth, Mai Sing and her husband and two young children were forced to live in a 15-by-15-foot elevated bamboo hut just outside the village.
Still, the couple begged the hospital team to come tell the truth in their village. The visit was cordial, the doctor recalled, and several of Mai Sing’s family came to hear the truth—but it was also made clear that the team was not welcome to return to the village. Mai Sing and her husband made several trips back to the hospital in the following months, however—only partially because of Mai Sing’s follow-up appointments.
“They were hungry for more of [the] Word,” the doctor said, “and at each visit devoured what [was] shared with them.” The doctor said he and his coworkers provided resources in their native language, both written and audio transcripts.
“They were very excited and growing in their faith.”
But then, in the midst of this great joy, tragedy struck.
The night of March 14, 2019, Mai Sing had just finished eating when she suddenly began foaming at the mouth and collapsed. Within minutes, she was dead. Her poisoning came after many threats towards her and her family and much pressure to return to Buddhism.
“She has entered her peace, where disease and pain are no more,” the doctor wrote later. “She was a child of the living King of kings. She was a life lived to its end, who endured persecution and remained faithful even to death. She has entered her reward with the words ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.’ We will meet her again one day, wearing the white robe of the martyrs singing praises to her Lord and Savior.”
But Mai Sing’s story doesn’t end with her death. The hope she found lives on through her husband as he stands in the face of persecution from their village.
“This man lost his wife and his father in the same day,” said Jan G., wife of Harry G., ABWE Executive Director of South Asia. “Yet, he continues to live in the village which killed them. And he has hope.”
Rather than handing her body over to the village to be buried through Buddhist rituals, Mai Tai Sing’s husband dug his wife’s grave himself. “I didn’t know what to do,” he told the missionaries. “So I just said a prayer, and then I buried her.”
When Buddhists began pressuring him into handing their young son over to the monastery, he pleaded with the hospital team to find a Christian family for his son to live with, so that the boy could be raised safely and in a Godly home. Their youngest child—a daughter—still lives with him in the village.
Though illiterate, the husband kept returning to the hospital for training seminars, learning the Scripture and how to teach Scripture to others through audio recordings. Recently, he was baptized—along with nine other local men—at one of the hospital’s training conferences.
“He is not only unwavering in the face of incredible opposition,” Jan said. “He is jubilant, and hungry, asking to be fed and willing to help people come and tell his village—despite the persecution.”
Revelation 6:9-11: “When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained. They called out in a loud voice, “How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?” Then each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to wait a little longer…”
The Open Initiative was founded to reach 7 unreached people groups in 7 years. And it’s already making a gospel impact around the world through partners like you. Will you join us in reaching the lost?
