Wang Xiaoguang is co-founder of Linfen Golden Lampstand Church in China’s Shanxi province with his wife Yang Rongli. He is serving a sentence of nine years and seven months for “fraud” (a common charge against pastors of unregistered churches) and is due for release in 2031. His wife, who leads the 50,000-member Linfen House Church Network, is serving a 15-year prison sentence. Golden Lampstand is a large unregistered church that has suffered severe persecution for many years including previous prison sentences of three years for Pastor Wang and seven years for Pastor Yang. The authorities demolished the church building in 2018.
LATEST NEWS (AUGUST 2025): On 15 August Linfen Intermediate People’s Court rejected Pastor Wang’s appeal. China Aid reported that the pastor recently told his lawyer, “Though I have no Bible in hand, I often meditate on Scripture, and each morning I awake to new light, far more profound and richer than my previous understanding of the ‘theology of the cross’… My health is good.”
Pastor Wang Xiaoguang is co-founder of Linfen Golden Lampstand Church in Fushan county, Shanxi province with his wife Pastor Yang Rongli. Under the couple’s leadership since the 1990s it has grown into a network of unregistered house churches with over 50,000 members in at least thirty fellowships in Linfen city and its surrounding villages and its members have suffered severe persecution for over twenty years.
Pastor Wang is serving a prison sentence of nine years and seven months, Pastor Yang is serving a sentence of 15 years and they are not due for release until 2031 and 2036 respectively. Both were convicted of “fraud” for collecting church offerings, which is a common charge against pastors of unregistered churches. Pastor Wang was previously imprisoned for three years and his wife – who is head pastor of the Linfen House Church Network – for seven years.
Golden Lampstand Church has consistently refused to join the government-controlled Three-Self Patriotic Movement and register with the Religious Affairs Bureau, and in July 2021 Linfen city authorities launched a massive investigation to identify key members of the church. Local Christians and preachers who had visited from other regions were detained and subjected to prolonged interrogation in an attempt to identify leaders in the network.
On 7 August 2021 Pastor Wang, Pastor Yang and ten co-workers were detained and on 27 September seven of them, including Pastors Wang and Yang, were formally arrested and transferred to the procuratorate for review and prosecution on 27 December, when they were charged with “fraud” – the authorities alleged that the acceptance of donations constituted illegal activity. Five other co-workers were released on bail to await trial.
The case entered the trial phase in March 2023 but the court postponed hearings three times and made no progress until April 2025.
Trial and sentencing
On 5 March 2025 Linfen’s Yaodu District Court decided to try Wang Xiaoguang and Yang Rongli separately to their ten co-workers. The trial for the co-workers began on 8 April 2025 and from the previous day the area around the court was heavily guarded, with police at every intersection on local roads. A large number of traffic police and special police gathered outside the courthouse, guarding each entrance and preventing family members and other Christians from approaching. The trial ran until 14 April and all ten co-workers refused to plead guilty.
China Aid reported that the court “was surrounded by layers of armed police, like forming a fortress, heartlessly blocking out anxious families and fellow Christians” and added that “martial law operations began even the night before. Drones were circling overhead for surveillance. Many church members of the Golden Lampstand Church had already received warnings and were strictly forbidden from going near the courthouse.”
Hearings for Pastor Wang and Pastor Yang were postponed many times and when their case eventually went to trial on 17 April the court did not allow defence lawyers to bring computers and phones into the courtroom because, according to the court, it was a “major sensitive case”. Since all case files and software were on their computers, the lawyers could not defend without them and in the end they were unable to enter the courtroom.
Lawyer Zhang Kai posted on his WeChat Moments that they would livestream their defence outside the court, but when the lawyers reached the court entrance they found numerous special police vehicles in place. They left by taxi but Zhang Kai reported that police vehicles pursued them with their sirens on and intercepted their taxi on an overpass, where dozens of police surrounded them and forced them into a special police vehicle before escorting them to the railway station to leave Linfen.
On 17 April the court separated the pastors’ case into two separate trials, with Pastor Wang’s case to be heard first. That afternoon his son Wang Yunxiang was permitted a brief visit with his father in court and described him as “already a thin, frail old man, looking much like my grandfather in his later years, yet full of spirit, with his face filled with radiance.” (The above photo of Pastor Wang was taken many years ago and is the only one publicly available.)
Pastor Wang said he did not mind being tried but that his greatest concern was for his wife and added that it had been hinted that good behaviour on his part could lead to leniency for her. Wang Yunxiang said that as the court officer was about to end their visit his father called out, urging him to find a watch his mother had given him and saying: “Because it was from your mom, it must not be lost.” Wang Yunxiang was moved to tears and later commented, “My mom’s heart is with the brothers and sisters. My dad’s heart is with my mom.”
Pastor Wang Xiaoguang’s trial took place on 18 April, ten days before his wife’s trial, and lasted just one morning. He denied that he or his co-workers had committed any criminal activity and during his final self-defence statement he took out a sermon manuscript and preached a sermon to the court explaining the core tenets of the Christian faith and the true meaning of financial offerings. The court did not issue an immediate verdict.
In June 2025 Pastor Wang was sentenced to nine years and seven months in prison for “fraud” (although the verdict was not announced until later) and Pastor Yang was sentenced to 15 years in prison. They were fined 500,000 yuan (approximately €60,000) and 100,000 yuan (€12,000) respectively and are both being held in Yaodu District Detention Centre.
Their co-workers were given heavy sentences, with the longest (nine years and two months) for Li Shuangping, who pastored the church during the previous imprisonment of Pastors Wang and Yang and continued to co-manage the church with them after they were released.
Deputy Presiding Judge Xie Binghua had visited the detention centre many times in an attempt to pressurise the co-workers to dismiss their Christian lawyers, but some who did dismiss them and hired local lawyers were still given sentences of over five years because they refused to plead guilty. Those with leading financial roles were given harsher sentences.
The court also authorised the seizure of around €2 million-worth of church and personal assets to cover “fraudulent offerings”, citing concealment of illegal status and clerical impersonation (relating to the fact that the church is unregistered). The court confiscated all church funds, vehicles, equipment and supplies (including sound systems, computers, books and teaching materials) and 18 bank accounts were frozen. In its judgment the court concluded that the church constituted a criminal group and that the defendants participated in an “illegal religious entity”.
Appeals
Pastors Wang and Yang and their co-workers appealed their sentences and on 14 August 2025 defence lawyers submitted a written request to Linfen Intermediate People’s Court inquiring about progress in the appeal case but were told no plans were in place.
Just one day later, however, the court announced the verdict in a closed session, notifying the lawyers only minutes before it was announced: it had rejected the pastors’ and co-workers’ appeals, upholding the original verdicts and sentences. The court did not identify any victims, making its ruling on the basis that donations to the church constituted “illegal fundraising” or “fraud”.
Background
Wang Xiaoguang is a fifth-generation Christian whose grandfather was principal of the Hongdong Bible Seminary in Shanxi, established by British missionary Hudson Taylor who founded the China Inland Mission. He came to personal faith in his early teens and was forced to drop out of school during the Cultural Revolution, returning to his hometown of Hongdong to work. Despite the hardship of these years he studied the Bible and became known for his biblical knowledge and powerful preaching – China Aid describes him as “a rare and sincere servant of God”.
In the 1980s Pastor Wang met and married Yang Rongli, also from a Christian family, and they settled in Linfen, where he worked in the teaching materials office at Shanxi Normal University and she taught and worked in the editorial department of the same university. The couple attended the Linfen Church, which dates back to 1878 and was founded by Hudson Taylor. The church had long ties with Pastor Wang’s family and was under the official Three-Self Patriotic Movement following a government takeover of the church and its affiliated hospital in the 1950s.
In 1992 the two pastors decided to leave the Three-Self Patriotic Movement in a bid for greater autonomy and founded the Linfen Christian Church as a house church. Nearly all the 1,000 church members followed them. Pastor Wang became known as a writer, publishing more than ten theology books – in one of them, Theology of the Cross (based on Martin Luther’s Theology of the Cross) he developed four theological principles for China’s house churches. His wife Pastor Yang became highly respected as a preacher among house churches in the Linfen area. Pastor Wang expressed gratitude that she ran both church and household affairs, telling their son, “It was your mother who made me who I am.”
They took early retirement in 1998 to devote themselves to the rapidly-growing church, which experienced such huge growth that many fellowships were established throughout the city and in 2009 the magnificent Golden Lampstand Church building was constructed, at a cost of 17 million yuan (over €2 million), contributed by members.
Linfen Church had grown from 26 members to more than 50,000 in just over twenty years, and from the early 2000s it endured constant harassment from the authorities, including raids and water and power cuts because it refused to join the Three-Self Patriotic Church and register with the Ethnic and Religious Affairs Bureau.
2009: raids, arrests, imprisonment
In 2009 the authorities tried to force Golden Lampstand Church to sell its valuable land, but the church refused and the government threatened to demolish its new building. In September 2009 over five hundred police officers and government officials raided one of the churches in the network, Linfen Fushan Church, and its Gospel Shoe Factory where the local congregation was meeting while a new church building was constructed. The mob brutally beat the Christians, injuring over one hundred, and local authorities sent bulldozers to destroy the church building.
Pastor Wang, Pastor Yang and their colleagues organised a huge prayer rally next day and on 25 September they set out for Shanxi’s provincial capital Taiyuan to lodge a complaint. Police intercepted them on the way and detained them. The couple’s home was searched and they and their co-workers were placed under criminal detention on charges of “illegal occupation of farmland” and “gathering a mob to create public disturbance of order” because of the prayer rally they had held.
In November 2009 they were convicted and sentenced, with three- and seven-year sentences respectively for Pastor Wang and his wife. After that, over thirty meeting sites used by the Golden Lampstand network were shut down.
Pastor Wang was released from prison in 2012 and his wife was released in October 2016. After Pastor Yang’s release she repeatedly refused the demands of officials from the local religious affairs bureau that the church join the Three-Self Patriotic Association, and in January 2018 the authorities demolished the Golden Lampstand Church building.
Family
Wang Xiaoguang and Yang Rongli have a son, Wang Yunxiang, who is married with a son Ya Lun (Aaron). Wang Yunxiang struggled in his early years when his parents were busy leading the church but he later came to personal faith.
TIMELINE
1992 Pastor Wang Xiaoguang and his wife Pastor Yang Rongli left the official Three-Self Patriotic Movement and founded an unregistered house church in Linfen.
1998 The pastors took early retirement to devote themselves to the rapidly-growing church.
2009 The Golden Lampstand Church building was constructed. The authorities tried to force the church to sell its land and threatened to demolish the new building when the church refused.
13 September 2009 Over five hundred police and government officials raided one of the churches in the network, Linfen Fushan Church and its Gospel Shoe Factory, where members were staying.
15 September 2009 The two pastors and their co-workers organised a huge prayer rally.
23 September 2009 Armed police surrounded the main Golden Lampstand Church building.
25 September 2009 The two pastors and their co-workers set out for Shanxi’s provincial capital Taiyuan to lodge a complaint. Police intercepted and detained them.
25 November 2009 They were convicted and sentenced, with three- and seven-year sentences respectively for Pastor Wang and Pastor Yang. After that, over thirty meeting sites used by the Golden Lampstand network were shut down.
10 October 2012 Pastor Wang was released from prison.
10 October 2016 Pastor Yang was released from prison.
9 January 2018 The authorities demolished the Golden Lampstand Church building.
July 2021 Linfen city authorities launched a massive investigation to identify key members of the church.
7 August 2021 Pastor Wang, Pastor Yang and ten co-workers were detained.
27 September 2021 Pastors Wang and Yang and five co-workers were formally arrested and transferred to the procuratorate for review and prosecution on 27 December, when they were charged with “fraud”.
March 2023 The case entered the trial phase but the court postponed hearings three times and made no progress for two years.
5 March 2025 Linfen’s Yaodu District Court decided to try Wang Xiaoguang and Yang Rongli separately to their ten co-workers.
8 April 2025 The trial of the co-workers began, running until 14 April.
18 April 2025 Following many postponements, Pastor Wang’s trial took place, but the court did not issue an immediate verdict. His wife’s trial took place on 28 April.
20 June 2025 Pastor Yang was informed that she had been sentenced to 15 years in prison; Pastor Wang’s sentence of nine years and seven months was not revealed until later. Their co-workers were given sentences of various lengths. The two pastors and their co-workers appealed.
15 August 2025 Linfen Intermediate People’s Court rejected the rejected the pastors’ and co-workers’ appeals.
Read more about the persecution of Christians in China.
(Sources: Bitter Winter, China Aid, Congressional-Executive Commission on China, USCIRF Prisoners of Conscience, Weiquanwang/Association for the Defence of Human Rights and Religious Freedom)
Photo: China Aid