NK & The Word: Learning, Teaching, Resting

I've been interested in North Korea for a long time--at least 10 years, or since 2004 when I first went to the DMZ and started reading up on the country. Since moving to South Korea in 2008, I've continued to learn about the North and have had a few opportunities to get to know North Koreans. However, things had started to feel a little dry--tutoring fizzled out and volunteering for an NGO never got off the ground. But recently God has given me several exciting new opportunities to learn more and even get involved in sharing His heart with North Koreans.

A couple months ago, my friend Dawn invited me to tag along on a Bible study our pastor was leading at Yeomyung School, an alternative, secondary school for North Korean refugees. I was pretty excited, because I had actually inquired about teaching at that school a couple years ago when I was job-hunting (but they weren't hiring). It's absolutely amazing to me that God brought me back around to that same school, but in a different (and I think better :)) capacity than I had originally intended. It goes to show that God's ways are higher than our ways and He desires to bless us. Anyway, after observing two of Pastor Steve's Bible lessons, he asked me to step in for him while he went to the U.S. for two months, which brings me to where I am now.

The first week I was so nervous and felt really inadequate to teach about doctrine. We're starting out with the very basics--the Bible is God's Word, God is eternal, God is a Trinity, God is different from man, etc. But still, I had never led a Bible study for new Christians or unbelievers, or to people coming from such a different place, both culturally and spiritually. I felt totally out of my league. I'm thankful that my church brother Petros has been able to join me, help out, advise, and encourage me along the way.

Coffee with Petros at Bliss & Bless, a cafe in Myeongdong run by North Korean refugees, some who are graduates of Yeomyung School

Around the same time I got involved in the Bible study at Yeomyung, my friend Dawn (she introduces me to a lot of good things :)) sent me a text with a picture of a brochure she'd come across. It was for the International Mission School for North Korea (IMS4NK), a series of eight Saturday lectures related to North Korea and aimed at Christian foreigners in South Korea who want to learn more about what God's doing and ways to get involved. I signed up, of course, and it's been everything I hoped it would be and more. It's been so encouraging to learn about what God is up to, and also to simply gather with other Christians from around the city (and ultimately, the world), united by faith and by our common concern for the people of North Korea.

The sessions start with 30 minutes of praise and worship interspersed with prayer, followed by a 90-minute lecture, and then dinner for whoever's interested. Last week's speaker was Ben Torrey, son of the founder of Jesus Abbey, where I went for spring break last year with Kaia. It was a special blessing to have dinner with him and his wife Liz, who (I couldn't believe it) remembered meeting me at the Abbey last year. Their friend, who is a missionary for OMF, sat across from me and gave me a 31-day prayer book for North Korea. This morning, I made a last-minute decision to shove the prayer book into my bag before dashing out the door to Yeomyung School. On the subway, I pulled it out and opened to today's reading. Lo and behold, today's article was about Yeomyung School! What a blessing! I was so excited to show that book to my students at Yeomyung and to encourage them with the fact that people around the world were lifting up their school in prayer this very day! They were impressed, and I knew it was God who ordained the timing and led me to take the book along. So cool!

From OMF's prayer booklet for North Korea

The students at Yeomyung are exceptionally resilient, positive, and open to learning new things. And every week, their hearts and minds are a little more open to me and the message I bring. Please pray for God to enlarge my heart for them and to "establish the work of my hands" (Psalm 90:17 has come up a couple times this week). God also used Isaiah 55:10-11 to deeply encourage me as I prepared this week's lesson:

As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,

so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.

It's not me that does anything. God does it all! In our spiritual life, from the seed to the bread, from the rain to the bud to the bloom, God's Word does it all. And it does! His Word accomplishes and achieves its intended purpose. What a relief it is to rest in this promise, to know that the fates of these young students' spiritual growth and transformation does not depend on me having just the right words or the perfect lesson plan. God's Word is seed for the sower and bread for the eater, and God's Word will accomplish what God desires and will achieve the purpose for which God sent it. Please join me in claiming this promise by faith as you pray for the students and teachers at Yeomyung School. Pray also for the students as they take tests and prepare to enter college. Every week when I ask for their prayer requests, these are their most common concerns.