“Who’s in charge?” the Communist soldiers shouted as they brandished a sickle before a small group of North Korean believers. The believers were gathered outside of a small church in a mountainous village in South Pyongan Province, North Korea while other village members watched cautiously.

A young preacher stepped forward and the soliders instructed him to put his neck under the sickle. As the preacher bent down to put his head under the sharp blade, an elder of the church, with a white beard stepped forward. “This young man should not die. I will die in his place,” the elder said. The preacher objected, but the elder once again said that he should be the one to die.

The soliders were shocked. One of them said, “Everyone asks for their life. But both of you are willing to die. You are the only ones who are willing to die for what you belive.” Confused, the soldiers walked away.

One of the village members who witnessed this event, was a frightened 12 year old girl. Now 96 years old, Mrs. Lee will never forget what happened in the village that she lived before the Korean war. Although the Kim regime had not yet been established, Communist soldiers were already actively persecuting Christians across North Korea. The details are forever etched in her memory. 

Although not a Christian at the time of that persecution, the Lord continued to work in her heart in other ways. Her uncle, an NK Christian, gave her a Bible and a hymn book and told her that she must believe in Jesus. Her grandmother, also a Christian, preached the gospel over the mountain passes as she traveled through North Korea. The Lord used her family members to plant the seed of the gospel in her heart, which would eventually sprout to full maturity shortly after she came to South Korea.

Enduring Persecution in South Korea

Since Mrs. Lee wasn’t a Christian inside of North Korea, she was never persecuted for her faith in the ways that many North Korean Christians are.  But after becoming a Christian, she was persecuted in an unlikely place—South Korea—from an unlikely source . . . her husband.

During the Korean war, like so many North Koreans, Mrs. Lee, her husband and her two children fled to South Korea. She was only 22 years old when she left North Korea, but she had already been married for 7 years. After coming to South Korea, she and her husband had five additional children.

But Mrs. Lee’s husband did not approve of her new faith in Christ. Not only did he not approve, he was willing to do almost anything to stop her from going to church.

Mrs. Lee recounts that her husband would cut off her hair, hide her clothes and severly beat her in order to discourage her from going to church. She remembers one particular time when she was sitting on the floor feeding their baby that he hit her so hard that she was knocked over violently. He did this so that he could grab her bag, where she was hiding her Bible. He threw the whole bag into the stove and burned it.

Her husband used to beat her so severely that her face was often extremely bruised and swollen. During those difficult times, Mrs. Lee reminded herself that if she suffered persecution, she would have a crown. In fact, every time she was beaten she would imagine another crown appearing on the spot where her husband had beaten her.

One night, when Mrs. Lee was participating in a late-night prayer meeting at her church, her husband came in, looking for her. But in his confusion, he mistook a different woman for Mrs. Lee and dragged this other woman out of the church and beat her in the church yard. The woman just happened to be the wife of the head of the village. When Mrs. Lee’s husband found out that he had just beaten the wife of the village leader, he was afraid of what would happen to him. But the woman he beat did not tell her husband, instead enduring the beating for the sake of Mrs. Lee.

This was the event that changed his life dramatically. Mrs. Lee’s husband immediately stopped beating her and even started going to church. He allowed Mrs. Lee and the children to go to church whenever they wanted. And after many years, he finally surrended his life to Christ shortly before he died.

Still in Ministry at 96 Years-Old

Mrs. Lee survived war, plague, and persecution. But she also experienced various personal tragedies incling the the death of 4 of her 7 children. She remembers that after the death of one of her children, someone asked her if she would still believe in Jesus.  Mrs. Lee replied, “My children were given to me by God, and God is the one who has taken them away. I will not leave Jesus no matter what!”

Even though Mrs. Lee is now 96 years old, she continues sharing about Jesus with whomever she meets. When we first met her, we expected our North Korean Underground University (UU) students to minister to her. Our students are training to be missionaries to their own people, so when they met Mrs. Lee their immediate thought was to evangelize and disciple her. But our students, even though they are in their 60s and 70s, became like children as they listened to Mrs. Lee share about her life.  And Mrs. Lee not only shared about her life, she also encouraged the UU students never to take their faith lightly.

She charged them to tell their family members and neighbors about Jesus. And at one point, Mrs. Lee lurched forward, and pointed her finger at one of our UU students and said, “You have to evangelize your children!”  At Mrs. Lee’s admonition, the UU student’s heart was almost visibly pierced as she sat back and shouted in agreement, “Ahh! Okay!”. The UU student immediately thought of her son who is an animist and opposes Christianity.

Mrs. Lee reminded the students that when persecution comes, the only way we can endure hardship and persecution is by holding on to God. She said that we should pray, “God, do it!”.

Our UU students were both challenged and thankful to meet a 96-year-old North Korean great-grandmother, a living witness who has saw “tribulations, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger, and the sword.” She was able to testify witness that nothing is “able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:35, 39).