Lee Chul-ho encountered Jesus Christ in 1998 after defecting from North Korea. Desperate to escape the famine that had ravaged his country for four years, he crossed the Tumen River into China, where he met a South Korean missionary who helped him and shared the gospel with him. Upon hearing the Good News, Chul-ho placed his faith in Christ. While recovering from malnutrition, Chul-ho consumed God’s Word, reading the Bible several times the first year. For the next three years, he taught other North Korean defectors about Christ and gradually broadened his ministry to include helping North Koreans at the border as they crossed into China. He also got married during that time. Then, one summer day in 2001, Chinese police arrested Chul-ho and his wife, who was seven months pregnant, as they waited for a group of North Koreans to cross into China’s autonomous Inner Mongolia region. “For the sake of my wife’s survival, I had to tell [the police] that she was not my wife,” Chul-ho said. “I told them that I did not know her.” Despite his attempt to protect his wife, both were detained for several days before being transported to Sinuiju, North Korea. When Chul-ho
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The Islamic Republic of Iran restricted all access to God’s Word. But despite great risk, Iranian believers are sharing the gospel on the street with unprecedented boldness. Two years after placing her faith in Jesus Christ, Fareena still hadn’t told a soul. Like most new Christians in Iran, she feared the backlash she would face if her family learned she had left Islam. Since doing so is illegal in the Muslim nation, new Christians are often imprisoned after going public with their faith. And many more are beaten for bringing shame to their Muslim family. Aware of these possibilities, Fareena decided to read her Bible only in secret. Then, one day she saw something that shocked her. “When I woke up and headed to the living room, my father was sitting on the floor reading a Bible thoughtfully,” she said. “I couldn’t believe my eyes.” Fareena returned to her room in a panic, thinking her father, Bilal, had discovered her Bible. After realizing the Bible he was reading was a different color, she asked him what he was doing. “I am reading an amazing book,” Bilal replied. “I found it in the mailbox today. It was wrapped in wrapping paper.”
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Distributing Bibles in Colombia’s guerrilla territory requires the mind of a chess master. Every move must be analyzed and the opponent’s countermoves anticipated. Although Bible distribution is legal in Colombia, armed rebel groups roam the country’s rural areas as a law unto themselves. Paramilitaries and guerrilla groups like the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) resent Christians because they refuse to participate in the drug trade or fight for their causes. The rebel groups also view anyone traveling through their territory, where they often grow and smuggle narcotics, as a threat. A ministry team traveled deep into the jungles of Putumayo department, along the border with Ecuador and Peru, to distribute full-color Action Bibles and minister to church workers. The Bibles, which feature colorful illustrations in the style of a graphic novel, appeal not only to children but also to adults who may have trouble reading a traditional Bible. After traveling many hours by car, the team transferred their supplies to motorcycles and rode for 20 minutes before reaching a river. They then loaded the motorcycles, Bibles and supplies onto a river ferry for a two-hour trip upriver. After leaving the ferry, they rode their packed motorcycles as far as
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When a North Korean man’s relatives invited him to read the Bible, everything changed. Years ago, Byung-woo traveled from his home in North Korea to visit relatives in China. His relatives, who were part of China’s vast underground church movement, invited him to read the Bible while he was there. When he declined, they fasted and prayed for a couple of days, hoping he would change his mind. That puzzled Byung-woo even more than the original invitation. Finally, out of curiosity and a desire to appease his family, he agreed to give the book a cursory read. But the more he read, the more questions he had for his relatives. The Bible translation used the South Korean dialect rather than the North Korean dialect. The two dialects differ roughly 40 percent of the time. Still, the parts he understood fascinated him. Seeing Byung-woo’s interest, his relatives took him to their house church, where church members explained the need for the gospel in North Korea and implored him to start an underground church there. They were prepared to provide him with food and money to sustain him, Bibles to distribute and a bicycle to help him reach more people. Byung-woo grew
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Throughout the night and morning of March 11, 2019, Pastor Timothy Umaru and several other men stood guard at an entrance to their Nigerian village. They were watching for any sign of the Fulani Islamic militants who had attacked a neighboring village days earlier. Then, as the sun rose shortly after 6 a.m., they began to hear screams and gunfire in the village behind them. Villagers were running in every direction as the air filled with smoke from burning homes. The militants had attacked the village from another entrance, and Timothy felt helpless as he thought about his family, his church and his predominantly Christian village. “In all honesty,” he said, “even though the Bible has told us that these things would happen, the first question I asked was, ‘God, where are You?’” Timothy’s wife, Rifkatu, and their 3-year-old granddaughter, Uma, had just finished praying with their lead pastor’s family at the church parsonage when the attack occurred. Rifkatu heard the gunfire and screams when she stepped out with Uma to get some fresh air. After scooping Uma up in her arms and running back inside to alert everyone, Rifkatu and the others hurriedly left the pastor’s home, which they
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