NORTH KOREA
The South Korean Church has declared 2007 a year of prayer for North Korea, reports Release International (RI). In a meeting on Jan 13 at Seoul’s Olympic Stadium on the centenary of the Pyongyang Great Revival, an audience of 15,000 people heard prominent South Korean and international leaders urge Christians worldwide to focus prayers on North Korea throughout this year.
RI is one of the many organisations supporting the initiative.
Rev. Choi Hee Boum, Executive Secretary of the Christian Council of Korea, read out a forceful proclamation, as the culmination of a week-long series of meetings at the stadium. “We recollect how, 100 years ago, North Korea was mightily touched and transformed by God and how the Gospel flourished so greatly in Pyongyang that it was called the Jerusalem of the East,” he said.
“Today we stand deeply saddened that North Korea is in great spiritual darkness and crisis.”
In just 100 years, Pyongyang’s reputation has been turned on its head. Today it brutally suppresses Christians, enforces idolatry of political leaders and bans the Gospel totally. The proclamation comes amid reports from the World Bible Translation Centre that a North Korean evangelist has been executed – simply for distributing New Testaments.
Pray fervently that 2007 really would be the year that sees an end to the spiritual darkness which shrouds North Korea – and commit to pray regularly for this.
Pray for the family and friends of the executed evangelist. Pray for God’s comfort and peace on them, knowing that to be absent in this natural body is to be present with the Lord. Pray too that Christians in North Korea will entrust themselves to Christ and preach the gospel without fear and hesitation.
VIETNAM
The authorities have launched a fresh attack on the Mennonite church in Ho Chi Minh City – straight after Vietnam was allowed to join the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Police resumed their harassment of Rev. Nguyen Hong Quang’s church on Jan 9, after a brief respite during talks to establish Vietnam’s international respectability.
Officers broke up an early-morning prayer meeting, arrested 17 people and yet again demolished part of the church and the Quang family’s home.
RI sources report that senior officials apparently prevented local authorities from harassing the Mennonites as the international community trained its spotlight on Vietnam. Once Vietnam had been allowed to join the WTO late last year, Ho Chi Minh City police wanted to ‘get even’ with Pr Quang, according to Compass Direct.
Praise God for the resilience and determination of Pr Quang and his church in the face of continued harassment. Pray for God’s healing and comfort over the congregation of the Mennonite Church and that our Vietnamese brethren remain strong.
SRI LANKA
The toll of Christians and their leaders caught up in the violence which threatens to engulf Sri Lanka is rising daily. Believers are getting caught in the crossfire between warring Tamil and Sinhalese communities. They are the deliberate target of Buddhist militants trying to suppress Christianity.
In Jaffna in the north-east, the paramilitary, Tamil rebels and government security forces have all been blamed for the rising number of extra-judicial killings and disappearances.
Remember our suffering brethren in Sri Lanka. Pray for God’s comfort and peace on the many who have lost loved ones and properties.
Pray for God’s sovereignty on the country, and that the political leaders would not allow Sri Lanka to slide further into civil war.
IRAQ
The war in Iraq, soon to enter its fifth year, has become a costly setback for Christianity in that troubled land (Christianity Today, February 2007 editorial). Though Iraq has been associated with biblical and Christian history for 5,000 years, the risk remains high that the current short-term disaster will become a long-term catastrophe.
At least two broad strategies must be employed to prevent that, Christianity Today proposes. The first is pursuit of religious freedom for Christians and other religious minorities in Iraq, a crucial missing link in peacemaking regionally and internationally. Robust freedom to believe must not be lost amid strategies for a military victory.
Since 2003, church bombings, kidnappings of clergy, rape and murder of Christians, and other violence have taken a sickening toll. UN officials recently labelled the flight of refugees from Iraq as a “steady, silent exodus.”
Secondly, the Western Church must commit fresh resources to the Assyrian church. After major conflict ended in 2003, relief and mission agencies quickly set up projects nationwide. In the years since, all but 10 mission leaders have pulled out because no one could guarantee their safety. This withdrawal has usually been a wise decision.
Pray for Christian ministry and church leaders – and those who financially and prayerfully support such ministries – to reengage with Iraq, despite the obvious risks. Pray for God to sustain the Iraqi Church and for Christ’s healing presence in the torn society. |
