Pray
for Kenneth Bae. It is urgent. Each day that passes, marks another day that
this 44-year-old man is separated from his children and family. He also goes by his Korean name, Pae Jun
Ho. Whether Bae or Ho, God knows who you
mean. Pray for this man, a Christian
whose heart breaks for orphans.
Bae is a U.S. citizen from the state
of Washington, but has been living in China serving with the highly acclaimed
and thoroughly reputable organization Youth With a Mission, YWAM. YWAM wants to bring the Gospel of Jesus
Christ to the lost in the world. Bae is
ethnically Korean. He takes people from
China on tours into North Korea.
On November 12, 2012, in the country
legally, Bae was arrested and has been in a N. Korean prison since. It has been 188 days, and counting. Our brother in Christ who values evangelism
and salvation as we do is now imprisoned for carrying out the Great
Commission. He has received the longest
sentence ever imposed on a U.S. citizen in North Korea: 15 years.
Revelation 14:12 says, “Here is a
call for endurance of the saints, those who keep the commandments of God and
hold fast to the faith of Jesus.”
Indeed. Jesus sends us out with
the good news that He is offering salvation from sin and death to all
people. Bae, sent out by Jesus, is now
in prison in a dark place. Imagine being
separated from your family for 188 days; for 15 years. Pray
for him.
And listen to God’s word. Mr. Bae would understand the Christian who
wrote Revelation, John of Ephesus. John
was imprisoned for refusing to bow to the Roman emperor. He was sentenced for life to the prison
compound on Patmos Island. John could
empathize with Kenneth Bae. His word to
all who suffer for Jesus is “endure.”
While John passed the time of his
internment he met with the risen Christ and was taken to Heaven in a
vision. He writes, “I saw another angel
flying in midheaven” (14:6a). I don’t
know exactly what John means by ‘midheaven.’
He does not elaborate. Rather he
emphasizes the angel’s activity.
The angel carried an “eternal
gospel,” which was to be preached to “those who live on earth – to every nation
and tribe and language and people” (14:6b-d).
Because of Christians like Kenneth Bae, that gospel is preached in
places like North Korea. North Korea has
been described by Christians who have escaped as being openly hostile to God
and to faith. These believers
acknowledge there are some Christians in the country. However, the large Churches in the bigger
cities are facades.
These buildings are actually
controlled by the government and are in place to give the impression to the
world that North Korea is a place of religious freedom. In actuality though, these buildings are
occupied by people who actively oppose Christian faith. This information comes from a report of Max
Fisher of the Washington Post. He interviewed a defector who reported on the
conditions in Pyongyang and other cities in that country.[i]
Thank God that Kenneth Bae is
carrying the word of God to people in a place where there is a terrible cost
for committing one’s life to Christ.
Will an American diplomat travel there and negotiate his freedom? Will he serve out 15 years? After a decade and a half, will he even be
freed then?
Last week, I mentioned Christians in
Syria. They made up 10-15% of the
population before the violence began.
Now, the numbers dwindle as they flee to Lebanon. God bless those who stay and maintain a
church in that war-torn land. They know
the Assad regime is immoral, abusive and must fall. However, they fear it will be replaced by the
rule of Muslim extremists who have no tolerance for the presence of Jesus
worshipers.
How can the eternal gospel
Revelation says is to be proclaimed make it into these places of war and
persecution? We might find comfort
reading that it is an angel carrying this gospel not men and women. But Jesus gave the command to his disciples,
and the first ones to “go and tell” the Jesus story were the women who followed
him. Before the angel of Revelation does
his work of worldwide gospel proclamation, the church is to go and tell, and to
do so in all places, even hard places.
These extreme examples make for good
stories, but if we leave it there, then the good stories end up being really
bad preaching. Why? Because it is so easy to leave it there. I am completely serious in telling the church
to pray for Kenneth Bae and for the crumbling Christian presence in Syria. We could add to our prayer list Nigeria. Always on the brink of war, Muslim-Christian
tensions are boiling over right now. When
we answer the call to prayer, it changes us and makes a difference for good in the
world.
However, it is so easy to leave
it. We hear a word a church and the
truth might compel us … a little bit. So
we pray and wipe our hands and our brows and say, “Well, I prayed!” Is there more? Both the angel and the church are to be about
some very specific activities as they pray.
Does this mean I think we are all to go sit in prison with Kenneth
Bae? Maybe.
Maybe God is calling someone here to that
ministry. We want to open ourselves to
do whatever God sets out for us and by “whatever,” we truly mean we will answer
God’s call without thought to how difficult it seems. I met a doctoer early in 2012 who is an
American citizen and is ethnically. She
is, by now, in North Korea, there to teach in a medical school. Also, she will secretly work with Christians
to encourage them and grow the church.
She knows full well she could have 15 years of hard labor. Yet she goes with Heavenly joy in her
heart.
Maybe one of us is to join her and Mr. Bae. Or one here might be called to Syria or
Nigeria or other hard places. We are all
called and God’s church is called to every nation. In our nation there won’t be arrests and
imprisonments. There is not the threat
that the government will soon be dominated by a hate-filled religion that has
no conscience or hesitation in killing believers. What threatens our witness?
Many things in American culture erode, water
down, suppress, and relativize the Christian’s message that Jesus is Lord. It all boils down to compromise. We aren’t going to suffer bodily harm for our
testimony, but our culture tells us to mute the Gospel and only allow it to
speak in its proper place – in church buildings on Sunday morning; before meals
and bed; and in a word of thanks for secular successes. Oscar winners and athletes who win the
championship are allowed to emphatically thank God. In those moments of triumph unrelated to
anything we see in scripture we see the victors declaring “God has a
plan.”
Yes, a
major component of God’s plan was for you to win the title and for the seven
Christians on the other team to lose.
Our separation-of-church-and-state nation
celebrates our announcement that Jesus is Lord as long as we make that
announcement conform to the values that reign currently: tolerance; freedom;
excess; affluence; and, our infatuation with all things young, all things thin,
and all things cool. If Jesus fits in
with all that, then He can be Lord in the hearts of American Christians. If he does not, then Christians need to bend
a little and compromise their statement of faith or at least minimize it so
that it does not offend anyone else.
This “eternal gospel” is defined in Revelation
14:7. “Fear God and give him glory … and
worship him.” Fear God does not mean
fear Him like we would fear a bully or fear an intruder or fear an impending
storm. This is not fear of heights or
fear of snakes. Fear God means to hold
God in such reverence, to afford God such authority, and to recognize God’s
absolute holiness that we see that sin nauseates God. We know our lives are under God’s watch. Every instance of rebellion is seen by God,
so we fear God’s judgment and we also fear hurting God’s heart. Both are true. Appropriate God-fear leads us to see God as
the exalted one whom we cannot approach casually. We exist to serve Him.
Fear is a condition that leads us to the second
command in the eternal gospel – glory.
Give God glory. This happens in
our worship. It also comes about in our
living. When we relate to other humans
in love, God is glorified. When we get
the most out of our abilities, God is glorified. Relationships and work are to be done with
God constantly in mind. We are ever
seeking God as we go about life, submitting ourselves to Him and conforming to
His ways. We live to lift God up.
Worship is an activity and it is a posture. We have talked about worship in recent
weeks. We know it happens in worship
services and also in private moments.
These commands of the eternal Gospel which apply
to all people – fear God, exalt God, worship God – contradict our culture’s
unwritten rules. In our culture, we are
to fear peer disapproval. If our peers
don’t like how we’re living, we must change.
We exalt ourselves. And we
worship things that make us feel good and do
it right now.
To abandon fear of God, glory of God, and
worship of God, for fear of peer disapproval, glory of self, and worship of
immediate gratification is compromise.
Revelation calls this fornication (14:8) and drunkenness. Verse 9 says, “Those who worship the beast
and its image, and receive a mark on their foreheads … will also drink the wine
of God’ wrath” (14:9-1).
God has no place for us reducing our faith and
making it fit. Faith in Jesus and the
life lived in his name ignites fire within.
We fear nothing but God and face the world determined to tell about
Jesus, knowing He will bring healing, joy, and life. This is no time for wishy-washy faith. In Revelation 3:16, Jesus declares he will
spit out of his mouth those with lukewarm faith. We are either with Jesus all the way or not
at all. In our times, where we live, the
Bible calls us to live out our witness for Jesus as if doing so would get us
killed. That is the commitment the Lord
expects. God wants all of us – every bit
of each one of us. We won’t be
persecuted for testifying that Jesus is Lord.
But we must be as committed as if that were to happen.
Anything less disgusts the Lord to the point
that God is unhappy. God’s love never
fails so our strongest alliance is with him.
The world around us, the world demanding we compromise, will have no
influence. Rather we stand firm.
Revelation 14:13, “Here is a call for the
endurance of the saints, those who keep the commandments of God and hold fast
to the faith of Jesus” (14:13). Whether
a believer is fighting false doctrine like many 2nd century
Christians, a believer sees his life on the line like John on Patmos and
Kenneth Bae in Korea, or a believer is tempted to relegate her faith like the
affluent 21st century American Christian, we are called to stand and
endure.
Robert Wall points out two implications for the
disciple who demonstrates this lasting faith.
First, we will sacrifice. Some
sacrifice social standing or friendships or popularity or even jobs. Others even sacrifice their freedom or their
lives. An enduring faith is not
recognizable in easy times, but rather when it is severely tested. If we with stick Jesus and don’t yield, we
will be tested.
Second, there is good news for the enduring
disciple. “Blessed are those who die in
the Lord.” This could even be translated
“Happy are those who die in the Lord.”
Paradoxical? Ask Kenneth Bae.
After months in prison, he was permitted some
phone calls. His sister said he sounded
calm and not discouraged. Did he know he
would be locked up for trying to help North Korean orphans and for doing it in
Jesus’ name? I am sure he was not surprised. Calm and not discouraged.
I knew friends in seminary whose wives left them
because they did not want to go into ministry.
Calm and not discouraged.
High school and young adult believers grow to
the point that they as Christ followers have to decide. Will I continue in the party life of my
friends knowing that God is not pleased?
Or, will I cease the me-first, party hard, ignore-the-rules life and
begin living for Jesus even if doing so means some of my friends will ditch
me? They opt for the Jesus way. Calm and not discouraged.
Where in your life is the decision point? Fear God, glorify him, and worship him, no
matter the cost. Pray like life depends
on it because it does for Kenneth Bae and for Christians in North Korea, Syria,
Nigeria, and other places. And in your
own walk, develop lasting faith. Don’t
wilt under the hot lights of temptation.
Stand strong in Jesus’ name. Tell
the world about him. Some will mock you. Others will hear Jesus through you and turn
to Him because of your witness.
AMEN
[i]
Arthur Bright, Christian Science Moniter online, May 10, 2013 - http://www.csmonitor.com/World/terrorism-security/2013/0510/North-Korea-explains-why-it-sentenced-American-Kenneth-Bae-to-hard-labor
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