Xi Sheng Mo 席勝魔 (circa 1836-1896) also known as Pastor Hsi, was a Chinese Christian leader.

Life

He was born Xi Liaozhi in a village near Linfen

Linfen

-Administrative divisions:The prefecture-level city of Linfen is divided in one district, two cities and fourteen counties. The information here presented uses the metric system and data from 2010 Census.-Pollution:...

, became a Confucian scholar, and after his conversion to Christianity changed his given name to Shengmo or Conqueror of Demons. Having been an opium

Opium

Opium is the dried latex obtained from the opium poppy . Opium contains up to 12% morphine, an alkaloid, which is frequently processed chemically to produce heroin for the illegal drug trade. The latex also includes codeine and non-narcotic alkaloids such as papaverine, thebaine and noscapine...

 addict

Substance dependence

The section about substance dependence in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders does not use the word addiction at all. It explains:...

 himself, he ran a ministry to opium addicts in many locations over a considerable area. There is more written about Xi than any other 19th century Chinese Protestant, due largely to the two-volume biography written about him by Geraldine Taylor of the China Inland Mission

China Inland Mission

OMF International is an interdenominational Protestant Christian missionary society, founded in Britain by Hudson Taylor on 25 June 1865.-Overview:...

.

David Hill

David Hill (missionary)

David Hill was a British Wesleyan Methodist missionary to China. He served with the English Wesleyan Methodist Society. In Shanxi Province, he was instrumental in the conversion of the Confucian scholar Hsi to Christianity....

 was instrumental in introducing Xi to Christianity. After his conversion, Pastor Xi fabricated his own medications made of morphia to treat opium addicts and many sick people were brought to him for healing. Prayer was a major factor in his treatments and a number of the recoveries were considered miraculous:

At this time I still smoked opium. I tried to break it off by means of native medicine, but could not; by use of foreign medicine, but failed. At last I saw, in reading the New Testament, that there was a Holy Spirit who could help men. I prayed to God to give me His Holy Spirit. He did what man and medicine could not do; He enabled me to break off opium smoking. So, my friends, if you would break off opium, don’t rely on medicine, don’t lean on man, but trust to God. (Transcribed oral testimony of Xi from "Days of Blessing in Inland China")

Xi also wrote numerous Chinese Christian hymns, which were considered more to the liking of the local people than the hymns introduced by the missionaries.
But perhaps the most notable thing about him was the way in which he led out in the Christian missionary work in his area. The general pattern was for Western Christians to enter an area, raise up churches and then train local people as pastors and evangelists. Xi Shengmo took hold of the work with such skill and energy that the missionaries stood aside, to a considerable extent, as he established clinics and churches.

External links

• Xi Shengmo Biography page at Pray For China site

See also

• Charles Studd
  Charles Studd
  Charles Thomas Studd, often known as C. T. Studd, was born 2 December 1860, Spratton, Northamptonshire, England, and died 16 July 1931, Ibambi, Belgian Congo....
  
  
• Dixon Edward Hoste
  Dixon Edward Hoste
  Dixon Edward Hoste was a British Protestant Christian missionary to China and the longest lived of the Cambridge Seven and successor to James Hudson Taylor as General Director of the China Inland Mission, ....