Peace Wang was born of non-Christian parents in 1899. She was five years younger than Ruth Lee and four years older than Watchman Nee. Her family was from the province of Anhwei. Her original Chinese name was Wang Yih-sun. After she became a Christian, she adopted the new name, Wang Pei-chen, which means admiring and wearing the truth.
Desiring that she could receive a modern education, her parents sent her to a Christian girls' high school in Hangchow in the province of Chekiang. It was there that she not only contacted Christianity but also heard the gospel, believed in the Lord Jesus, and received salvation. By that time her father was a county mayor in the province of Chekiang. It was a great shame to her parents that she had accepted a foreign religion. Hence, she was very much opposed.
She was not only saved but also very much attracted by the Lord, and she became zealous for the preaching of His gospel. This provoked her parents to be even more angry with her. Yet this was not all. Since she was so attracted by the Lord and fell in love with the Lord, she deeply felt that the Lord wanted her to give her life to serve Him in evangelistic work. This was extremely upsetting to her parents. They were greatly surprised at her announcement that she was leaving home and intended to travel for the preaching of the gospel. This was intolerable to them. They were determined not to let her leave. She prayed and fasted. Her stepmother, seeing how desperate she was and realizing that she was more than determined and that her mind could not be changed, interceded with her father and advised him to release her. Eventually, her father's anger calmed down, and he decided to let her make her own decision. The day came when she felt it was time to leave home and follow the Lord by faith. When she walked out the main gate of the house, her father and mother followed her, each standing at one of the two doorposts with tears in their eyes, saying, "My daughter! My daughter! You don't want your father and you don't want your mother; you only want your Jesus!" They all wept together. But even such parental affection did not influence her to change her mind. After leaving home she went to study at Nanking Girls' Seminary for a period of time.
Before she was saved, her father had engaged her to a young man of a well-to-do family, a recently returned student from Germany with a very promising future. In answering the Lord's call to give her life for the preaching of His gospel, she was desperate to terminate her engagement. Realizing her irreversible determination, her father was compelled to notify the young man of her decision. But the young man would not give her up until she herself had personally explained her situation to him. When this was done, he became sympathetic and released her from their engagement. Eventually, they all agreed that her cousin, the daughter of her father's brother, should be engaged to the young man in her place.
After finishing her studies in the Nanking Girls' Seminary, she began her evangelistic work. Her preaching was so convincing and prevailing that many denominations invited her to hold meetings. In the early years of her preaching, she traveled through a number of provinces, and hundreds of people were brought to the Lord through her preaching.
In April 1925 she was invited to my hometown of Chefoo to preach in the Southern Baptist auditorium. I heard the report and was intensely curious to witness such a young lady evangelist, twenty-five years old, preaching the gospel. We had never heard of such a thing before. Therefore, I attended her meeting, and I can testify that from that day to the present I have never seen preaching that was so prevailing. She preached to a crowd of over one thousand, not about sin or about hell, but concerning how Satan possesses and occupies people. She used the story of Pharaoh possessing the children of Israel as the basis of her message. I was immediately caught by the Lord.