Prayer for North Korean Refugees: Faith in Fear

Crossing Borders' work was recently mentioned in FOX Files, as North Korean refugees in our care were interviewed on the news network. Today, we would like to share more about the life of this refugee. In Jesus' ministry, a man, whose daughter was close to death, approached Jesus with an urgent request for the Son of God to enter into his home and heal his ailing daughter. Jesus obliged and followed the man to his home. When they arrived it was too late. She was dead.

In a house full of mourning, Jesus entered with hope. He went to her room and raised her from the dead.

This account in Mark 5 is stunning on many levels. When someone said it was too late, Jesus responded, “Do not fear, only believe.”

We have seen the desperation and fear of so many North Korean refugees in Northeast China.

Crossing Borders staff once met with a family of four North Korean refugees who had only a few hours to flee from the North Korean police. In a rash decision, they decided it was best if the youngest, still in elementary school, was left behind in North Korea. They were afraid that she would slow the family down and that they would all be caught, sent to a prison camp and never emerge.

Our staff spoke with the family in a restaurant in Northeast China. It had been months since they had last seen their daughter and they couldn’t bring themselves to eat the enormous spread of food our staff had ordered for them.

Soon after, Crossing Borders decided to send for their daughter through a network of brokers and smugglers in North Korea. But her fate was uncertain. She could easily be caught by the police and sent to a prison camp where she would be held hostage. She could have been sold in China as a sex slave if caught by one of the many networks of smugglers who traffic North Korean refugees. She could get injured and die on her journey through the North Korean wilderness.

Through her journey, Crossing Borders held to the words of Jesus. “Do not fear, only believe.”

It took weeks of waiting but finally, the family was reunited. It was through moments of utter desperation that the family came to believe in the saving hope of Jesus. He was their only hope.

Once reunited, the family of four made another journey. This time, together, they trekked through China into Southeast Asia, where they were able to receive refugee status. From here, they travelled to South Korea and gained safe entrance. When the family arrived in Seoul they thought their journey of suffering had ended. But their youngest daughter, after the struggle and toil they had suffered to be together as a family, contracted H1N1 and died shortly after the completion of their journey.

Many say that North Korean refugees in China are rice Christians. Critics say they only act like Christians to receive aid. But at least for this family, this was not the case. In their utter devastation they turned to God and began rebuilding their lives.

Together, with Crossing Borders, they leaned on the words of Jesus.“Do not fear, only believe.”

As we go about our week, let us remember that God is near to the broken hearted. He meets those in desperate need. He has sustained Crossing Borders for 10 years with little trouble from the Chinese authorities, we believe, to minister to the North Korean refugees in fear. We hope that with your help, we can continue to work to share the words of Christ with them. "Do not fear, only believe."

Prayer for North Korean Refugees: Kyung Joo's Story

Join Crossing Border this week as we pray for Kyung Joo, one of the North Korean refugees in Crossing Borders' care, and her son. Kyung Joo’s arrival to China from North Korea was similar to the story of many North Korean refugee women. She was guaranteed a job in China by a “friend” in North Korea. When she crossed Kyung Joo was forced into the trunk of a car, sold as a commodity to the highest bidder and trafficked into the hands of a husband who didn’t love her.

What is different about her story is that, when the Chinese police caught her and turned her over to a North Korean prison camp, Kyung Joo was eight months pregnant.

North Korea does not take well to “tainted” blood of outsiders. So when the North Korean officials of Kyung Joo's prison camp discovered she had a half-Chinese baby in her belly, they beat her mercilessly. They beat the baby in her belly too.

Kyung Joo said she was “an inch away from death” when they released her. She somehow found her way back to China where she had her baby.

Our staff met with Kyung Joo and her son recently on a visit to the North Korean refugees in our care. Crossing Borders is helping her with food, shelter and her child’s education. Her son was severely impaired. He cannot walk. Our staff stated that his impairment was unlike any natural disability they had seen. It looked like someone had broken his legs permanently. He could not walk, talk or eat without assistance.

Kyung Joo is determining whether she should stay in China or flee through the Underground Railroad to South Korea. Her journey would be difficult given her son’s condition.

Please pray for her and her son. We will keep you posted.

Prayer for North Korean Orphans: Hardly a Chance

Please pray with us as we serve North Korean orphans while navigating through the difficulties and frustrations of Chinese government's bureaucracy. We have written in the past about how urgent the situation is with the half-North Korean, half-Chinese population - the North Korean orphans, stateless children - we serve in China. While China has made some concessions to accommodate this population, their system of bribes and corruption has made it almost impossible for most children to pull themselves out of poverty.

In China a child does not have access to education, health care or any government service unless he has legal identification. China now allows stateless, North Korean orphans to legally register and receive an ID, but, as we will explain, laws are not straightforward in China.

For a stateless child to receive legal identification, he must pass through three official Chinese offices:

First, the child must get an official document to prove their father is indeed a Chinese citizen. This can be obtained in most hospitals and in rare cases at an office of record keeping.

Second, the North Korean orphan must go to the police bureau and obtain proof that his mother was taken by the Chinese police and sent back to North Korea. The child can also make the argument that his mother has escaped to South Korea but in our experience it is much easier to pass through the police requirement if the mother was actually sent back to North Korea.

Let’s be clear about what this means. In order for a stateless child to obtain legal status, he must prove that his mother was sent back to North Korea where she will be put in a gulag and potentially executed. Earlier this year Yonhap News, a South Korean wire service, reported that four such people were publicly executed.

The last and most difficult hurdle comes at the end, after the child has gone through the first two steps. A stateless child must take his case to the Family Registration Department where, if the child can show proof of paternal citizenship and maternal arrest, he should be granted a legal ID. But this is not how things work in China. A bribe of 3,000 to 5,000 RMB ($475 to $793 at today’s exchange rate) is necessary to complete this step. There is no receipt for this fee and there is no official record of it.

For there to be any substantial improvements in the lives of North Korean orphans, change must come at a systemic level. And with China’s one-party, pseudo-totalitarian government, we are not holding our breath. This is why we firmly believe that outside intervention is necessary for these children to have a shot.

Please pray for us as we continue to navigate the confusing, ever-changing bureaucratic muddle of China on behalf of our North Korean orphans.

Prayer for North Korean Refugees: Suicide

Mia came to China from North Korea at the height of the North Korean famine in 1998. Like many, many North Korean refugee women, she was captured by traffickers right after she crossed the border. What was unusual about her case, however, was that she was put in a burlap sack and thrown into the back of a truck. “I felt like I was less than a pig,” said Mia.

She was sold for 5,000 Chinese RMB (about $600, according historical exchange rate data) to an abusive Chinese farmer, with whom she had a son.

Mia’s husband beat her so mercilessly that she saw suicide as the only escape to her situation. She tried sleeping pills, which didn’t work. She tried rat poison, which hospitalized her.

When Mia came to in the hospital, she was placed in a bed next to a Korean-Chinese prostitute, who told Mia to be strong and that there was a way out of her situation. Mia didn’t want to believe her. When Mia was ready to go back home, there were policemen outside her room patrolling the hospital. As a North Korean refugee, she would be arrested, imprisoned, sent back to North Korea. Mia's roommate told her to step outside. What happened next was both horrific and extraordinary.

Mia’s roommate exchanged her body for Mia’s freedom. After the police emerged from the hospital room, they allowed Mia to move to another village with her son. There, she was sold to another man, who was disabled but did not beat her.

She now attends church and has a job in the kitchen in a small boarding school in the countryside. She said that she realizes now that suicide was not her hope, her hope was God.

We believe there are many more like North Korean refugees who are living hopelessly in forced marriages and are waiting to be set free.

As we pray today, let us ask God to mobilize the church so that North Korean refugee women like Mia can be saved from their utter despair.

Staff Notes: Crossing Borders Work, Contentedness

The following post was written by Crossing Borders staff: My wife and I have recently been looking at houses to buy. It’s a good time to buy, they say. Especially because we just gave birth to a newborn boy, our second child.

He’s a month old and his things are piling up around our small, two-bedroom apartment. Diapers, clothes, a crib, creams, bags.

As I searched online for a home, I said to myself, “If only I was making $__ more, then we could afford the home we need.”

And then last week a rare moment of clarity came over me. "Need? What does one really need?"

When a North Korean refugee comes to Crossing Borders and expresses thankfulness to us about all that we have done for him, I remember what I truly need.

Crossing Borders furnishes our refugees with what we consider basic necessities. Food, a small apartment, a television. And with these things, some come to us gushing with thanksgiving. Many refugees who have been in our care say that they want to go back into North Korea with the blessings they have received through Crossing Borders in China and share the Christ's compassion with others.

I remember a boy in one of our orphanages who used to look through every garbage can he could find. With just a little food, a meager place to live and a good education, we have seen his life transform. He now wants to become a pastor to train and teach in the gospel.

In order to help others, we at Crossing Borders must first realize how blessed we are. Looking through those real estate sites on my Macbook Pro with my speedy internet connection, somehow I forgot what it meant to be content.

I recently listened to a sermon by Tim Keller. He was talking about his wife, who was unsure of whether to move her family from Virginia to New York City in the difficult transition of building a church there. She was looking at a communion table and heard the voice of God saying:

“If I’ve done this for you, then it should be okay for me to ask you to spend the rest of your life living in a cardboard box in the streets of Calcutta.”

After that she agreed to move to New York City and God blessed the world through her and her husband’s ministry.

I am not saying that poverty is equal to godliness. Nor am I saying that being rich is bad. All I am saying is that the desire for more could hinder us from seeing what we have and from helping those in need.

As we pray this week I ask that we would all ask God to give Crossing Borders and those who share our vision the desire to “seek first his kingdom” and not “all these things.”

Prayer for the North Korean People: Typhoon Bolaven

Please pray for the North Korean people and North Korean refugees today. East Asia, especially the Korean Peninsula, currently braces for what appears to be a strong weather system. Typhoon Bolaven is set to hit the west coast of the Korean Peninsula today. From here, the typoon will barrel up the west coast into Northeast China. This is an area where many North Korean refugees are in hiding.

The North Korean people have already suffered from floods this year, which resulted in the death of an estimated 170 citizens, according reports from the The Guardian. The Guardian also reported 400 citizens missing, approximately 84,000 of the North Korean people rendered homeless due to the flooding earlier this summer. The arrival of Bolaven will no doubt make things worse and do further damage to the Hwanhae Province, where it will make landfall.

In North Korea is already a flood-soaked land with an infrastructure that cannot handle a large-scale natural disaster. This weather event has the potential to be catastrophic for its people. Let's pray that God would have mercy on the North Korean people as they brace themselves for Typhoon Bolaven.

*This is footage from earlier this year showing the flooding that has already occurred in North Korea.

Prayer for North Korean Refugees: Imprisonment

The topic of imprisonment comes up a lot in our work with North Korean refugees. One refugee woman we helped reported to us that she was imprisoned in a gulag in North Korea for illegally trading in minerals with Chinese businessmen because her family didn’t have enough to eat. She subsisted on 24 kernels of corn each day in prison. When they let her out she immediately fled to China. Through God's grace in circumstances, she was later placed under our care.

Another North Korean refugee escaped her abusive husband and family after she was sold to them in the mid-2000s. Her husband’s family beat her for not knowing how to speak Mandarin. They beat her if she didn’t cook Chinese food right. She was raped repeatedly by her husband and her husband’s teenage son. Upon escape, she was also taken in by Crossing Borders.

Many refugees found daily life in North Korea stifling. They were always being watched, monitored by their neighbors, family members and even their own children (children are taught at school to report their parents if they speak ill of the regime). North Koreans are denied freedom of thought, movement and speech.

The North Korean refugees we’ve spoken with in South Korea have more money than they have ever seen in their whole lives. The government helps them with housing, education and job training. And yet there is a profound emptiness in the North Korean refugee community in South Korea. Some report discrimination. Some say they are depressed from the trauma of what they have endured in China and North Korea. Other North Korean refugees say they just miss their families in North Korea. Whatever it is, they too are in a prison of grief and distress.

There is an even greater imprisonment that all North Koreans feel whether they are in a gulag in North Korea, whether they are in China and afraid of being captures, or whether they are free in South Korea. We believe this is a spiritual imprisonment. They in bondage to sin and it is our job as believers to pray for their spiritual freedom in Christ.

As we pray this week, let us remember the prison that North Koreans all over the world are trapped in. Let's pray for light to overtake the darkness.

Prayer for North Korean Refugees: Discernment

For the past few months, Crossing Borders has been continuing its search for missionaries to serve North Korean refugees in China. As we continue to interview and speak to individuals, there is one quality in a missionary that we have realized is hard to identify, but is absolutely essential to our work: Discernment. Crossing Borders has a policy to be cautious in approaching anyone about our work when working China. We realize that in some aspects, we are a foreign organization with some resources, but mostly a passion to do good. In an ideal world this would be all you need. But this world is not an ideal one, and the fact is that China possesses is a radically different from what we are familiar with.

One of our American staff members once noted, "Whenever I go to China I feel like I’m stepping into the Cantina in Star Wars, Episode IV. There is a different rhythm, a different culture."

Perhaps China quite as foreign to us as Tatooine, but reality is that one can get lost in the confusing backdrop of China, if not careful.

These are some basic questions we have to ask our missionaries on the field, and one which we hope any new field workers in our organization will be able to answer when meeting new North Korean refugees:

1. How do we know the North Korean refugees who have approached us for help are really North Korean refugees?
2. How do we know if the North Korean orphans we help are really in need?

These are questions that we analyze constantly and, to be honest, it’s an inexact science.

But what Crossing Borders will continue to do is ask questions relentlessly. Where do our North Korean refugees come from? Who do our refugees and our workers know? What was their experience crossing the border? How did North Korean refugees come to hear about us? Can we trust those who refer them to us? Do their stories hold up?

Please help us to continually approach our work with much caution and God's provision of wisdom. Constantly being on guard can be a necessary but exhausting process for our workers and staff.  A lack of discernment can severely affect the safety we have built in our network.

Please pray for those on the front line who, through God's aid in discernment, make our mission to reach North Korean refugees possible.

Prayer for North Korean Refugees: Effects of Hiding

A member of our American staff recalls his experience not too many years ago, standing over the Tumen River on a broken bridge. Not far from where he stood, across the river, was North Korea. Our staff member remembers seeing a few guard houses, mountains stripped of their vegetation. The river had frozen solid in the Siberian cold, and in the snow were the footprints of North Korean refugees who had fled across the ice. Once a North Korean refugee flees into China, their lives depend on how quickly they are able to blend in. Steps must be taken to avoid being noticed. Clothes must quickly be changed in the dark. They must clean themselves of any marks of travel or fatigue. Two things have a potential tip their hand: their height and their language. They must always be mindful of who is watching. Fear and suspicion begin to settle into their every waking moment as their lives depend on how cautious they are in everything they do.

Our staff was able to visit a small village in the Chinese countryside where the police had raided and captured much of the North Korean refugee population. One boy, now an orphan, had witnessed his mother being tackled by the police and dragged away.

One of the few remaining refugees approached our missionaries, dropped to her knees and begged. She pleaded, “Can you please help me get out of here?”

She couldn’t muster up any other words. She was shaking and visibly terrified.

North Korean refugees are aware that they have been watched for almost their whole lives in their homeland. Relatives and even their own children may be asked to inform on them as a test of their loyalty. They have heard of spies who will report any "unpatriotic activities". But in China, where refugees cannot grow close to anyone, cannot distinguish generous help from malevolent deception, cannot begin to even consider trust as a valid option, North Korean refugees are trapped in a state of unending instability and paranoia.

Some North Korean refugees in China have lived with this looming shadow of fear for more than a decade. For them, the anxiety and dread has seeped deep into their lives and have taken their toll.

One North Korean refugee who made it to South Korea after more than five years in China told us that, the day she got her legal ID, she slept with it in her palm and cried herself to sleep.

Please pray for those who are hiding this week. It is no way to live. Please help us as we minister to them, comfort them, and pray for their healing in the security and protection of Christ.

"Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who have an anxious heart, 'Be strong; fear not! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you.'"

- Isaiah 35:3-4

Prayer for North Korean Orphans: The Future

It’s always interesting to read reports from our missionaries in China about the North Korean orphans in Second Wave. The children have day-to-day lives and, like many children in the developed world, have simple dreams. A boy in Second Wave, "Jo Han", is one of the biggest troublemakers we have. His caretakers say that he lies a lot. He gets into the most fights and he is the most stubborn. But despite these flaws, he is determined to be a pastor. He reads the Bible everyday because, as he was told, that’s what pastors do. And he even tithes his allowance faithfully.

It is easy to forget that before he came to our group home just four years ago Jo Han had no dreams. He would dig in garbage cans for food or steal things from kids at school to sell. He had no dreams nor did anybody – his parents or relatives – have any dreams for him. They just hoped he would survive.

Dreams come when there is stability - food in the pantry and love in the home. They rarely come to those who are trying to survive the day. And for the North Korean orphans of Second Wave, these dreams are a sign of life.

As we pray this week, let us ask God to give us the wisdom on how best to honor the dreams God Himself is planting in each child’s heart. So that all of us, those who give, those who pray and those who do both, might be silent partners in each North Korean orphan's success.

"'For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.'" -Jeremiah 29:11

Prayer for North Korean Refugees: Freedom

How do you think North Korean refugees envision freedom? Take a look at your schedule today, only two days from the 4th of July - a holiday when we celebrate our freedom as citizens of the United States.

What is it filled with? Work to complete? Errands to run? We are all so busy these days. If our jobs aren’t taking more than 40 hours a week, our social lives or families are. None of us are trapped or persecuted by authorities. But many may feel oppressed and stuck in the hectic cycle of our day-to-day lives.

On Saturday, the New York Times printed a fascinating column about this. Author Tom Kreider spells out the pitfalls of modern American busyness.

“Almost everyone I know is busy,” he said. “They feel anxious and guilty when they aren’t either working or doing something to promote their work. They schedule in time with friends the way students with 4.0 G.P.A.’s make sure to sign up for community service because it looks good on their college applications.”

And what it all adds up to, according to Kreider, is a pile of work to cover up the fact that our lives are often empty.

What does it mean, then, if even our scheduled leisure time, our rigorously organized holidays and days set aside for exciting activities add up to empty lives? If freedom is not found in barbecue or fireworks or all the leisure in the world, where do we stand as a people who are "free"?

The Word tells us quite simply in 2 Corinthians, "Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom."

As followers of God, our calling is not to only to celebrate freedom in rights or in leisure. Our calling is to celebrate having freedom in salvation. Because of the work of Christ, we live in the Spirit's satisfaction. We are made whole and overflowing. We live free of fear, of condemnation, of death.

However, we acknowledge still that North Korean refugees, and many around the world, struggle in fear. They are not only politically imprisoned, made slaves of hunger, poverty, and fear. They are not free to hear the gospel. They are not free to access the freedom God extends to them through the Spirit. It is for these reason that Crossing Borders works to reach them, beyond the borders of oppression, starvation, and pain.

So this 4th of July, please help us to thank God for the freedoms we enjoy, not only for our privileged lives and civil liberties, but for the Spirit. Most importantly, please help us to pray for and serve those who need this same freedom. Help us to provide for their material needs and most importantly, for their spiritual hunger.

Bernard Malamud, author of “The Natural” once wrote, “The purpose of freedom is to create it for others.”

The apostle Paul writes in Galatians 5, "For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another."

Today, as we pray, let us ask God that this freedom that we celebrate would not be wasted. Let's pray that the freedom of the Spirit would be delivered in the healing and empowerment to North Korean refugees in China and the oppressed around the world.

Prayer for North Korean Refugees: Harvest Workers

Crossing Borders has been fortunate to have a string of missionaries in China who have driven our work to new heights. Our current missionaries aiding the North Korean refugees and orphans in our care are fantastic people. Two years ago our staff member made a visit to our work in China and was able to spend quite a bit of time with our current missionaries. They noted on the trip, "They're twice my age but they were running circles around me as we moved from task to task. At one point I asked if we could slow down. They didn’t."

Our missionaries brought our staff to a remote farming village in Northeast China where there are many North Korean refugees in hiding. Refugee after refugee lined up to tell our missionaries their stories and their troubles. In response, each one was treated with kindness and compassion. With each North Korean refugee, our missionaries listened and ministered avidly, passionately. Tears flowed and prayers were shared.

After several years on the field, our missionaries continue to show remarkable care toward the individuals they have met time and time again, with each and every new North Korean refugee who enters our Refugee Rescue program. Missionaries in our line of work tend to get hardened and burnt out. These two got better with time.

But now their commitment is up and they are looking to move on. Though we fully support this decision, we are at a loss as to how we are going to find people to fill their shoes.

We remain hopeful and see this as an opportunity, not a setback. We pray in eager expectation to see what God has in store for us. We pray that this will make our organization grow, not shutter.

For this we ask you to join with us in prayer. This is a specific need that we need met and before we get into specifics about what we are looking for, we really want to spend time in prayer about it.

Please join with us as we pray asking God to send workers to His harvest field of North Korean refugees in China.

“When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.”

- Matthew 9:36-38

Prayer for North Korean Refugees: Isolation

One of the most striking things about North Korean refugees is how separated they have been from mass media and the rest of the world. When ministering to them, we must first address the lies they have been fed their whole lives by their government. The North Korean regime is relentless in cutting its people off from the outside world. They tell its people that other countries are terrible places to live and that North Korea is paradise on earth. With no information to refute this, the people generally believe it. It is a nation known for its mind-numbing propaganda.

But change is coming to the Hermit Kingdom. As North Korean refugees like the ones in the care of Crossing Borders travel in and out of the country, they bring with them news from the outside world. DVDs (or VCDs) are creeping past the nation's borders. People are smuggling in small USB drives with Korean dramas and international news reports that are usually only accessed by North Korea’s elite.

One booming industry in North Korea operates along the China-North Korea border as North Korean refugees and businessmen sneak cell phones into the country. These are not North Korean cell phones, which can only access other phones in the country’s tightly monitored network. They are phones that can access China’s cell phone network from inside North Korea. With these phones North Koreans can call family in South Korea.

North Korean refugees in China tell us that North Koreans are not so much interested in the things that most people from the outside world are. The plot lines of South Korean dramas can be entertaining, but most North Koreans are fascinated by the standard of living portrayed in the background of these programs. The city lights of Seoul, the plentiful food on the table, the nice apartments and new, clean clothing that people wear in these videos are what North Koreans are really drawn to.

As North Korean refugees come into our care, it is fascinating to see the transformation that takes place in them. One refugee, after spending years living in China, told us that she still thought the North Korean government is still the best in the world. The nation just needed food. But as time passed our refugee changed in her views. Eventually she told us, “North Korea just needs God.”

As we continue to chip away at the lies of the North Korean government something profound happens within the North Korean refugees we help. They begin to shift away from their worship from Kim Il Sung to recognizing and submitting to the authority and worthiness of Jesus. This is a slow and arduous process, which takes much time and many resources. But it’s why Crossing Borders exists.

Please pray for us as we continue in this work of ending deception and bringing the light of truth to the North Korean refugees and their people who have been isolated from the rest of the world.

Prayer for North Korean Refugees: Unsung Heroes (Part I)

They prefer not to be seen in our brochures or website. Each day they do their jobs knowing they might be arrested. They are Chinese citizens, which means they can go to jail for an indefinite amount of time if caught helping a North Korean refugee. They are truly heroes and they are truly human. Our local staff is comprised of about 15 Korean-Chinese workers who have given their lives to this dangerous work. We have a group of missionaries who manage the operations but our local staff does most of the dirty work.

They are there for our Second Wave orphans 24/7 with no vacation. They drive or take the bus on dark nights to get to the remote areas where our North Korean refugees hide and live. They are our eyes and ears and often warn us of impending danger from the Chinese government.

But they are also people.

They get tired. They lose their focus. They get depressed. They get scared.

There is a lot of work that we put into making sure our local staff stays on track. We have not been perfect in doing this but part of our call is to help them help North Koreans refugees. The work of saving refugees in China cannot be done without the help of these people.

Please pray for them as they brave through the Chinese night to help North Korean refugees. Please help us pray as they fight their own desires to serve faithfully in God’s kingdom.