Some popular media depict North Korean underground Christians as superheroes of faith barely fazed by their government’s relentless persecution. Other media depict the group as barely surviving, desperate for help from their fellow Christians abroad. But according to a new batch of letters released by persecution ministry Voice of the Martyrs Korea, North Korean underground Christians are not too different from Christians in the rest of the world.
“They report facing the same temptations as we do, and experiencing the same grace to overcome them,” says Voice of the Martyrs Korea Representative Dr Hyun Sook Foley. Her ministry has partnered with underground North Korean underground Christians for more than 20 years. She says Voice of the Martyrs Korea periodically releases excerpts from the letters they receive from North Korean underground Christians in order to help Christians in the rest of the world better understand what underground Christian life is like inside North Korea.
A North Korean defector holds up a North Korean study Bible.Continue reading →
The house of a pastor in the Donetsk region of Eastern Ukraine was destroyed by a February 15 rocket strike, but the church building attached to the house remained intact and the pastor and his family are safe and eager to continue their ministry, reports Voice of the Martyrs Korea.
The remains of the home of Vladimir Semenov, pastor of the Registered Baptist Church in Selidovo. The home was destroyed by a rocket strike on February 15. (Credit: ECB Telegram Channel.)
According to Voice of the Martyrs Korea Representative Dr. Hyun Sook Foley, the home of the pastor of the ECB (Registered Baptist) church in Selidovo, Vladimir Semenov, was destroyed on the night of February 15 as a result of a rocket attack by the Russian Armed Forces. “Pastor Semenov and his family were spending the night away from home that night, so they were unharmed, though they lost all of their worldly goods,” says Representative Foley. “The church building—or house of prayer, as they call it—which is separated from the pastor’s home by a long, thick brick wall, remained intact except for a few broken windows and a burned-out electrical meter and wiring. The windows were covered with boards by members of the congregation, and the church’s meetings have continued on as normal.”
The homes of all ten Christian families in a village in the South of Laos (name withheld for security reasons) were torn down one by one by fellow villagers over an eight-month period last year. According to Voice of the Martyrs Korea Representative Dr Hyun Sook Foley, a building the families were using for church gathering was also destroyed, and the pulpit was burned.
Lao Christians stand amidst the remains of their homes and church building which were destroyed by their fellow villagers last year.
“These families had to leave their village and have been wandering for more than six months, but they have not left the faith,” says Representative Foley.
According to Representative Foley, the ten families had all become Christian within the past five years and were the only Christians in their remote village. “The tiny village where they lived is not accessible by car or foreign missionaries, but it is reachable by ordinary Lao people who share their faith with other ordinary Lao people, and that’s how they came to know Christ,” says Representative Foley. “In 1994 there were 400 Christians in Laos, but by 2020 there were over 250,000, and today Lao Christians believe there may be over 400,000.”
But Representative Foley says that sharp increase has led to challenges for the Lao Christian, especially those who like the ten families live in remote areas where they are the only believers.
“Most of the tribal people are animists. They also worship their ancestors, like their deceased fathers or mothers,” says Representative Foley. “When families in their village become Christian, other villagers claim to experience things like sickness as a result of the local spirits being offended. So they believe that the Christian families have to renounce their faith or leave the village in order to fix the problem.”
She says that after these ten families became believers, other people in their village destroyed their homes and church building one by one because the Christian families refused to renounce their faith.
Burning pulpit from a church recently destroyed by villagers in a remote Lao community.
According to Representative Foley, the ten Christian families left their village last year and are still trying to find places to resettle, such as in rice fields or in the jungle.
“But even as they wander, they are still worshipping God, and they are evangelizing those they meet,” says Representative Foley. “Now their fellowship has increased to more than 100 people from across the region, and more people are continuing to come to Christ through them.”
She says a Voice of the Martyrs Korea field worker visits them often and is in regular communication with them.
“Our worker himself also donated some land for them to stay on as long as they need, and another believer donated land on which they can build permanent homes,” says Representative Foley. She noted that some of the families have found places to build homes in another village.
According to Representative Foley, the experience of these ten Christian families is not unique in Laos.
“One of our Voice of the Martyrs Korea field workers is assisting Christian members of a non-Christian family in the north of Laos. The father passed away, and the mother, son, and daughters were left. The mother and son are animists, but the two daughters became Christians and kept attending worship services. Their brother tried to chase them out of their family due to their faith.”
Another small rural church in Laos faced a violent attack from neighbors last month, according to Representative Foley. During the morning worship service, villagers and relatives of the believers came and destroyed the church, though further details cannot yet be shared due to safety concerns for the church members, says Representative Foley.
Still, though persecutions like these against Lao Christians are not uncommon, Representative Foley says she sees a common response from Lao Christians to their persecutors: forgiveness.
Lao Christians gather at a recent worship service.
“They are not angry with their persecutors because as Jesus says from the cross, the persecutors ‘know not what they do’,” says Representative Foley. “The persecuted Christians see their persecutors are sinners who don’t know Christ and don’t have the light of the gospel in their hearts. So, the families are quite sincerely not angry with the persecutors, and they are still praying for them.”
Representative Foley says that the suffering of the Lao believers is not causing them to abandon their faith. “They believe that God allowed these things to happen in order to make their faith strong so they in the future they will be able to endure and also to encourage those who will be persecuted like them,” she says. “Voice of the Martyrs Korea will continue to stand with them in their persecutions, replacing their burned Bibles, helping them to rebuild their homes and churches, and also equipping them to share their faith wherever the Lord leads them.”
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