Why Does God Not Fulfill Some Promises?

Posted on December 30, 2017 by Editor

To watch other Voice of the Martyrs videos, visit the Voice of the Martyrs Video Page!

 

Acts 16

Imagine for a moment that you are Timothy.

You’ve given up everything to follow Paul as he follows the Lord. After being circumcised and saying farewell to your parents, you take to the road with Paul and Silas. Along your journey, you visit groups of believers from around the world and share with them instructions from apostles and elders in Jerusalem.

At first, the experience is exhilarating.  Every step of the way, you are being instructed by Paul, Silas, and the global Christian community. You watch in awe as your mentors direct their steps according to the guiding hand of the Holy Spirit. Although you are still a student and several things about Christianity remain elusive, your faith has never seemed so alive! Like Peter, John, and James on the mount of transfiguration, you want to stay awash in Christ’s glory forever.

But then Paul has a vision.

When Paul first tells you and Silas about the vision, you are all excited. Recently on your journey, Paul and Silas were barred from visiting Asia or Bithynia by the Holy Spirit. For a while, you had no idea where you were headed. Now, however, Paul has been given a destination.

In the dead of night, Paul saw a vision of a Macedonian man begging him for help. So the three of you set course for Macedonia right away.

The three of you arrive in Philippi, the largest city in Macedonia, with great hope. Through Paul’s vision, God led you to Macedonia, so you figure that God must have great plans for this city. After everything that you’ve seen on your travels with Paul and Silas, you can’t wait to see what he has in store!

Within a matter of days, however, Paul and Silas have been dragged from the marketplace, stripped, beaten, and humiliated in the stocks. Now that evening has fallen, Paul and Silas have been taken off to prison and you, Timothy, are left behind to contemplate these recent events.

If God had led Paul to Macedonia and Paul had faithfully followed his instructions, why had Paul and Silas been arrested?

Why had God’s promises turned sour?

This is a question that both North Koreans and Eritreans are all too familiar with. These brothers and sisters find that sometimes the only reward for faithfully serving the Lord has been prison or persecution. Scripture has told them that their God is the God of miracles, the God of healing, and the God that is bigger and more powerful than any government. Yet these brothers and sisters often find themselves in situations where all of the promises of scripture seem false.

If God is who the scriptures say he is, why do his children find themselves in situations like this?

Standing before a crowd of our North Korean Underground University and Underground Technology students, Pastor Temesgen, an Eritrean pastor who has suffered much for his faith, said this: “Even if we are in a bad situation, we must give praise to God.”

Pastor Temesgen was not speaking empty words. Although Eritrea is not as infamous as North Korea, it is a country that takes pride in being called the “North Korea of Africa.” It is a small country, but it is one of the biggest offenders of human rights worldwide—especially when it comes to Christianity.

Eritrea and North Korea are very similar—namely, because the Eritrea government purposely tries to emulate North Korea. There has never been an election in Eritrea, as the country only allows for one political party: People’s Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ). This party is vehemently opposed to the West, and has a history of befriending countries with equally nefarious human rights records (North Korea, Communist Russia, Fidel Castro’s Cuba, etc.).

Since Eritrea has repeatedly postponed the creation of constitutional clauses pertaining to individual freedom, the people of Eritrea can be arrested and imprisoned at any time and for any reason. There is a forced and indefinite conscription into the army. Citizens are denied any form of independent media, which limits their source of information to the government’s official channels.

Just as North Korean defectors are constantly trickling into China, Eritrean defectors find ways to cross the border into Ethiopia. Crossing the border in both cases is incredibly dangerous, and so potential defectors often seek help from brokers and smugglers. Unlike North Korean defectors, however, Eritrean defectors do not receive a stipend from the government upon arriving at their destination. Eritrean defectors are tossed into a shanty town, where they are forced to build houses from mud and straw. Conditions are squalid and, despite the government’s best efforts, the defectors are often underfed.

Suffering is an old and familiar friend to Pastor Temesgen. But—just like Paul, Silas, and Timothy—Pastor Temesgen tells us that we must give thanks to God in the midst of our suffering.

“Even though Christians who defect from Eritrea have no food, they still give thanks to God because their faith is strong,” Pastor Temesgen told our North Korean students.

Although Paul and Silas may not have expected to wind up in prison, scripture tells us that they worshipped while all the other prisoners were sleeping. Just as Paul and Silas were ignorant of their imprisonment when they followed God into Macedonia, they were now ignorant that God would soon release them. Yet, they worshipped.

“We need to remember that at five in the morning, the world is always very dark, but one hour later, the sun lights up the world,” Pastor Temesgen reminded the students. “So when you are in a dark time, give thanks to God. He will bring the sun again.”

How do we know that the sun is coming? Because we know God’s character. We have learned about God’s character from Paul and Silas’ experience in Macedonia. But we have also learned about God’s character from the experiences of our brothers and sisters from around the world.

“It is true that many Christians in Eritrea are sent to prison,” Pastor Temesgen explained. “But it is also true that God has used these Christians to transform prisons into churches.”

When Christians are imprisoned and they remember to faithfully give thanks even in the darkest of circumstances, others notice. Eritrean prisoners are always drawn to Christian prisoners because of their unconditional joy. Even prison guards are drawn in by the Christian prisoners. Pastor Temesgen has seen both prisoner and guard alike becoming missionaries and pastors—all because Christians were sent to jail.

This was Paul and Silas’ experience as well. Because of their witness, they were not only able to impress their fellow prisoners, but were also able to impress the same guard who had so emotionlessly put them in the stocks.

“Governments can bind a body into prison, but they can never bind the gospel,” Pastor Temesgen said.

When Pastor Temesgen speaks of God’s work in Eritrea, it is easy to see God moving. However, what about North Korea?

“Compared to North Korea, Eritrea is more open. That is why you hear more stories about God moving in Eritrea than in North Korea. However, when North Korea opens, I know we will hear many stories about how God was moving in North Korea, too,” Pastor Temesgen promised the students.

Whether we are Christians imprisoned at the time of Acts, underground North Korean believers, or Christians in the free world, we must remember to give thanks to God in every circumstance. When we do this, we remind the world—and ourselves—that God is moving in every place, in everyone, and in every time.

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How to Not Be a Goat on Judgment Day

Posted on December 23, 2017 by Editor

To watch other Voice of the Martyrs videos, visit the Voice of the Martyrs Video Page!

 

Matthew 25:31-46

In Matthew 23, Jesus isn’t just frustrated with the Pharisees; he’s frustrated with religious people as a whole (see this blog for a better explanation). Instead of rebuking the Pharisees for being ignorant of the law, or for not following it, Jesus calls them hypocrites and rebukes them for “[washing] the outside of [their] cups and dishes, but leaving the inside with nothing but greed and selfishness” (Matthew 23:25).

In other words, Jesus is frustrated that the Pharisees know and follow the law but refuse to allow their hearts to be changed by it.

We, too, fall victim to this sin when we reduce Christianity to a mere checklist of Christ’s commands. As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13:2, “If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.”

Christianity is not about perfecting one’s own actions, but about allowing God to shape one’s own heart in the way he sees fit.

The Nicene Creed tells us that God is “the Creator of Heaven and Earth,” and the scripture tells us that in the beginning, God created mankind—with his own hands and breath—in his own image. However, we should note that God’s idea of creation is very different from our own.

When human beings create, we (1) often toss aside creations-in-progress that we feel are “irredeemable,” and (2) gradually lose interest in creations after they are completed. Even the best foods are eventually forgotten, and the newest cell phones are eventually tossed aside in favor of new and improved models.  Furniture and clothes are disposed of when old or even “unfashionable.”

Creation, to God, however, is a continuous process. He does not create human beings as wind-up toys, content to wind them up once and watch as they walk about until their energy dissipates.  Rather, as Paul says in Acts 17:28, “in him, we live and move and have our being.” Our every heartbeat is proof that God’s hands—the hands of the potter (Isaiah 64:8)—are still shaping us. If God removed his hands from us—for even a moment—we would cease to exist.

Human potters spend their days hunched over hunks of dead clay. This clay lifelessly submits to the direction of the potter’s hands. If the resulting pottery is marred, the fault lies squarely on the potter’s shoulders: dead clay cannot sculpt itself.

God, however, is a potter who lovingly sculpts living clay. Unlike the human potter, God has imbued his medium with the freedom to choose whether it will submit to his direction or not. When his fingers attempt to carve pieces of us away, for example, we, unlike the dead clay, are able to resist his instruction. When God’s hands press on us, we can submit, or we can choose to join our cry with Satan’s, claiming that we are no man’s servant; that we will be shaped by no hands but our own.

Whatever we choose, we will always be clay—and clay cannot shape itself.

Whether we are a saint, a devil, or anyone in between, we need to realize that all we are is clay. We can choose, like the saint, to submit to God’s hands. Or, like the devil, we can choose to resist. Resisting, however, does not make us independent—our every breath reveals that God is continuing to support us despite our rebellion.

Whether we accept God’s guiding hand or not, our finished form will always reflect our father: Depending on our choices, we will look like our father, God, or our father, the Devil.

However, in the meantime, “what we will be has not yet been made known” (1 John 3:2). It’s never too late to do the right thing. Even if we’ve made a mess of our lives, God can sculpt us into something beautiful—regardless of how little time remains.

Since every single one of us is clay in the hands of a potter, and we can all choose to bend (or object) to the potter’s whims, God expects us to treat one another in a certain way. As Christians, we must see other people as unbelievably valuable because they are not only created in the image of God but are constantly being created by him.

There is a reason why Victor Hugo once said, “To love another person is to see the face of God.”

However, even God’s creation process is not infinite.

There will come a day when we are no longer able to choose between submission and rebellion. On this day, we will be judged, and (as our scripture this week, Matthew 25:31-46, says) we will be given the inheritance of the father we chose. God’s children are given his kingdom, but the devil’s children inherit nothing but “the eternal fire.”

How, then, are we judged?

Jesus does not say that people are judged according to their good deeds. There are no scales of justice (Egyptian mythology) or scale of deeds (Islam) in Christianity by which Jesus judges our heart according to the amount of good we did versus the bad. However, Jesus also does not say that we are saved solely by our belief in him. In fact, in Matthew 7:22, Jesus tells us that many people who believe in him—and who even prophesied in his name!—will face the same punishment and those who do.

What we are judged by, however, is our heart.

It is interesting to note the goats’ response to Jesus in this chapter. Not only do they not repent of their sin, but they demand that the Lord tell them when they neglected to minister to him. Almost as if they had been feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting people in prison and fulfilling any number of Christ’s own commands. One can almost see the Pharisees in this group, insisting that they fulfilled every one of God’s 613 commandments.

Simply feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and visiting prisoners is not enough to warrant sheep status. Doing these things is “washing” only the outside of our hearts and it’s the inside that we need to wash most.

God puts in us a new heart for anyone willing to receive Christ—but how do we know that we have received this heart? If we look at the hungry, the naked, and the prisoner and see not a pitiable or contemptable person, but someone who is in the process of being created, then we know we have taken our first steps into receiving this heart.

No matter how useless, how horrid, or even how evil someone else seems, our new heart will see the very face of Christ.

When we see Christ in the face of others, it’s impossible to remain indifferent. To the hungry, we’ll give food; to the naked, we’ll give clothing; to the prisoners, we’ll give our time and love—even if we don’t know anything about them. We’ll do this not because we’re good people or because we’re kind, but simply because, no matter how broken they are, we can see the image of God shining through them.

Instead of cursing and judging others, we realize the truth of what Paul said in Romans 14:4: “Who are you to judge the servants of someone else? It is their own Master who decides whether they succeed or fail.”

God judges us according to how we judge other people. If we judge harshly, God’s judgement of us will be harsh, too.

The sheep are not the people who did everything right. They aren’t the people who dedicated the most time their church. They’re not even the people who knew the most about the Bible. The sheep are simply the people who, because of the new heart put in them by Christ, looked at the “foolish,” “worthless,” and “irredeemable” people of the world and found their hearts filled with love.

When they fed the hungry, they fed Christ. When they clothed the naked, they clothed Christ. When they visited the prisoner, they visited Christ.

The goats, however, may have fed the hungry, clothed the naked, and visited the prisoner, but they never did any of these things to Christ.

If we simply feed the hungry because we are commanded to (or even simply because we pity them), our help will not be effective. We will pass a can of beans to a homeless man who is too poor to afford a can opener, we will fill food banks with nutrition-less foods, or we will refuse to form deep relationships with any of the homeless people at the homeless shelter we volunteer at every week.

The person who sees Christ in those who are hungry, however, sees a friend in need. They will provide not just a meal, but a relationship. They will take the hungry man to a sit-down restaurant instead of passing him a can of beans; they will cook meals for the poor family that lives nearby, and they will form relationships with the men and women at the homeless shelter at which they volunteer.

And they will never consider this action to be “enough.” In fact, people who see Christ in others almost always think that they have not done enough. After all, Christ died for them while they were still Christ’s enemy! How could something as small as taking Christ to a restaurant begin to covering everything that he’s done for us!

What frustrated Jesus about the Pharisees wasn’t their adherence to the law; it was the fact that they were using the law to escape God’s guiding hand. Feeding the hungry is easy; seeing Christ in the hungry, and supporting God’s creative hand in their lives, is the surprising criterion of judgement, according to the words of Christ.

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Do North Koreans Actually Believe in the Official North Korean Ideology?

Posted on December 19, 2017 by Pastor Foley

More and more news reports and human rights organizations these days assert that more and more North Koreans are having doubts about the Juche ideology. (Juche is North Korea’s official belief system that is also sometimes referred to in the West as Kim Il Sung-ism, since the Juche ideology centers around the teaching of and about Kim Il Sung.) Are North Koreans losing the faith in the Kims?

It is worth noting that comparatively few Christian organizations make the claim that North Koreans are doubting Juche. The majority of claims come from secular organizations, typically ones whose work involves getting information into North Korea, i.e., balloon launchers, radio broadcasters, and those distributing Korean dramas and KPOP songs via DVD, USB, and SD card. Usually the claims from secular organizations go like this:

  • Our information is getting into North Korea.
  • Our information is changing the minds of people in North Korea.
  • We need more money to get more information into North Korea.
  • When people in North Korea have more information, North Korea will change.

It’s that third point that ought to prompt us to take a closer look at the claim. In other words, it’s not a disinterested claim. It’s a claim in support of a cause.

That doesn’t mean the claim is false, of course. We should always be looking for the most effective ways to do our work, and when we find ways that work, we should consider whether more of the same might yield an even bigger benefit. If outside information is the key to breaking the stronghold of Juche, then perhaps more outside information can crumble the castle completely.

As an organization that does balloons, radio, and distribution of DVD/USB/SD cards, clearly we at VOM Korea believe these are helpful tools. But as a Christian organization, we don’t make the claim that Juche is losing its grip on North Korea. Why?

Short answer: Because no matter what people may tell you, no amount of information can change the human heart.  

I completely and categorically reject the claim that distributing Korean dramas, KPOP songs, Western movies, and political news weakens North Korea’s Juche ideology. That such information awakens something inside a North Korean person is beyond dispute. The question is: What awakens?

Short answer: Desire. And not for anything good.

The case of the North Korean soldier who recently crossed the DMZ (nearly at the cost of his life) provides a helpful illustration. Floating in and out of consciousness, clinging to life amidst surgery after surgery, the soldier reportedly professed his desire for Choco Pies, KPop tunes, and American movies. A man risking his life for such things certainly shows that new desires have been awakened in him. Does it show, however, that the stronghold of Juche has been broken?

Short answer: No, it shows that Juche is confirmed.

Juche is not an ideology of self-denial and repudiation of desire. It is, in fact, an ideology of the supremacy of human desire. It is an ideology that claims that the key to the fulfillment of desire is absolute submission to the Kim family. If we submit to the Kim family, says the Juche ideology, then we will have a life of fulfilled desire that the South Korean running dogs can only dream of.

One only need follow Kim Jong Un on his inspection tours to see that Juche has plenty of room to embrace the most South Korean and American of desires. If you suggest that freedom is a South Korean and American desire that is not embraced by Juche, I will suggest to you that the freedom that South Koreans and Americans covet–freedom of choice–is exactly what Kim Jong Un embraces. Kim Jong Un is building bowling alleys, shopping centers, consumer electronics, and ski resorts. The message is clear: Stick with me and we’ll go places.

Consider also the small but growing number of North Koreans who are re-defecting back to North Korea, or trying to. People assume that re-defectors and re-defector wanna-be’s are either mentally ill, under pressure from North Korean spies or blackmailers, or otherwise in a state of such incapacity that they have to be stopped from doing the very thing they want to do: return to North Korea. But we can learn a lot from even a basic review of their claims, which go like this:

  • I was deceived into leaving North Korea because I was told life would be better in South Korea.
  • My life in South Korea is worse than my life in North Korea. Plus I miss my family.
  • Therefore, I would like to return to North Korea.

The second point makes us dismiss the claims out of hand. “How could any life in South Korea be worse than any life in North Korea?”, we sputter.

But that is only because we think in stereotypes. The truth is, life in South Korea is harder for some North Koreans. They actually did have better lives in North Korea, at least according to measurements like comparative material prosperity and time with family.

My point, however, is not to debate the sanity of their claims nor to suggest that re-defectors go on to peaceful and prosperous lives when they return to North Korea. My point is that we should be humbled by how little change information actually makes when it comes to breaking ideological strongholds. 

The belief that information breaks ideological strongholds is actually an ancient idea that the church declared to be a heresy: Gnosticism. The belief that strongholds are broken when people risk their lives for the chance at unfettered access to Choco Pies, KPop tunes, and American movies is also an ancient idea. It goes all the way back to Genesis 3. It is called sin. 

Sin is the state of seeking ultimate satisfaction in anything other than God. Juche declares that ultimate satisfaction–which is material satisfaction–can only be found in serving the Kim family. South Korea (and America, and other “free” countries, which are increasingly defining freedom as freedom of choice, rather than freedom to participate in the good, which is the classical definition of freedom) declares that ultimate satisfaction–which is also understood to be material satisfaction–can be found in Choco Pies, KPop tunes, and movies and dramas. The North and South Korean visions are not competing visions. These are two sides of the same coin, and they both exchange spiritual freedom for material slavery (and, more and more these days, slavery to exactly the same things). In both systems, we are slaves to our desires, and the only question is who presently can best satisfy them. (That word “presently” is key because, as the case of re-defectors demonstrates, allegiances readily shift depending upon whom we believe can supply the goods this year/month/moment.)

Juche is a difficult term to translate, and its meaning is notoriously shifty even in North Korean use. The North Korean government defines Juche like this:

The Juche idea means, in a nutshell, that the masters of the revolution and construction are the masses of the people and that they are also the motive force of the revolution and construction.

The same could be said for the “idea” of life in South Korea or America. So-called “information wars”, where balloons, radio signals, and DVDs traverse the border, do not question Juche but rather question how Juche is best achieved–or, rather, who can best achieve it for you.

So the answer to the question “Do North Koreans actually believe in the official North Korean ideology?” is, at the most basic level: Yes. Even the ones who leave North Korea continue to believe. Their belief is what motivates them to leave.

In other words, just because North Koreans defect does not mean they have rejected Juche. As in the case of the North Korean soldier who recently risked his life to cross the border, it can be said that he defected from North Korea not because he rejected Juche but rather because he believed in it so passionately; the only thing that changed was his belief in who could help him achieve it.

All of this may sound like so much philosophy to you, but actually now we have arrived exactly at the point that I want to make, namely:

The sign that North Koreans have rejected Juche is not that they reject North Korea and head south for Choco Pies. The sign that North Koreans have rejected Juche is that they stay in North Korea rather than leaving it, but they stay as changed people.

This is why Christian organizations like Voice of the Martyrs Korea don’t equate defection with rejection of Juche. Most defectors we meet are still ardent Juche-ists. They still believe that life is exactly like the North Korean government says it is: an exercise in self as the master of the revolution. Defectors are simply exercising their “rights” as masters of the revolution to change sides, motivated by Choco Pies, KPop, and Korean drama. That is hardly praiseworthy, and it should certainly not be touted as either a great victory, a psychological transformation, a rejection of the essence of North Korean ideology, or a sign that regime change is imminent. This side-switching is easily reversed, as will become even more apparent in the future as re-defections continue to mount, as the chance for North Koreans to get rich in North Korea begins to exceed that same possibility in South Korea.

By contrast, when North Koreans become Christian, it is important to note that by and large, they reverse their plans to leave North Korea. They stay in the country, or they return to it if they were attempting to flee it. Perhaps stranger still, they pray for their leaders to experience the same transformation they have. They reject Juche precisely by accepting their leaders. 

“Yes, but I don’t think you understand my question,” you may be thinking. “I am asking whether North Koreans really believe what Kim Jong Un is saying, or whether they stay there simply because they believe they have no other choice.” To which I respond, “Yes, actually I understand the sense of your question. But I am seeking to drive you to a deeper one: Do you really think that those who leave North Korea do so because they don’t believe the Kim family? Or is it possible that they leave exactly because they do?

For most North Koreans, you can take the North Korean out of North Korea, but you can’t take the North Korea out of the North Korean. No amount of Choco Pies can accomplish that. Because it turns out both Kim Jong Un and South Korea promise a lifetime supply of Choco Pies; the only question is who you believe is better equipped to deliver on that promise. The rejection of Juche is not the rejection of the Kim family. It is the rejection of the belief that any government or leader or political system can save you or make your life worth living; only God can do that. Once God does that, well, you find that you are designed to bloom exactly where you are planted.

This is the meaning of the verse of scripture from the Apostle Paul that has troubled so many, 1 Corinthians 7:20 (BSB):

Each one should remain in the situation he was in when he was called.

Or, even more controversially, as he says in 1 Corinthians 7:21 (NIV), ” Were you a slave when you were called? Don’t let it trouble you.” It’s just not, assures Paul, the essential issue. The essential issue is whether we are willing to belong to the Lord wherever he calls us.

And that is not revealed by what we say, or what we think, or what we know, or what we say about what we think we know. Rather, it is determined solely by the orientation of our heart. One cannot reject Juche by exchanging Kim Jong Un for Choco Pies. One can only reject Juche by rejecting every expression of human mastery and instead becoming, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 7:22, Christ’s slave, which makes us the servant of all for Christ’s sake. That doesn’t happen–it cannot happen–through information wars, balloons, radio broadcasts, or USBs. It can happen only through the word of God.

The ultimate question, then, is not whether North Koreans believe in Juche, but, dear friend, whether you do.

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