NERC: Reflect in sincerity. Pray With purpose. Move with intent.

Greetings everyone! I can hardly believe it, but it has been nearly two months since our return from our amazing Korean adventure. As I mentioned in my previous blogs, I had contracted a very bad respiratory illness while in Korea. I coughed and struggled for four full weeks, and then I contracted another respiratory infection here in the U.S. that took me out for another three weeks, which brings us to today. I am still coughing a bit, but am finally recovering. 

While this sounds like the pitts, and it sort of was, it has allowed me to sit, reflect on our time, look through our photographs, communicate with my friends via our messenger app, and to really lean on the Lord and ask what the next chapter will hold for myself and my family.

Let me start by saying that Korea is amazing. It is a beautiful country, with beautiful people, a rich history, astounding technological developments, and a very high degree of education. It has a culture that is built on respect for one another, honor for elders, growth, advancement, and peace. There is an astounding balance between technology, population density, traffic, and the natural harmony of the landscape and the people living within it. Strangers nod and greet each other, and there is an overall sense of genuine kindness and respect, even when you are truly an outsider.

Korean churches are a truly AMAZING thing. If you've never had the opportunity to worship with another culture within their church dynamic, you must do this. Koreans are passionate, engaged, animated, loud, alive, and 100% in. They pray aloud, shout, dance, cry out, weep, wave hands, lay hands on one another, and live in the spirit in the moment. The experience really cannot be explained. It can only be experienced. (I have attached a video at the end of this blog for you all to see) And while I LOVE the peace, quiet, reverence, and serenity of my church here in the northern Midwest region of America, I miss that strong, overwhelming spiritual flow that we experienced in South Korea.

And while Korea is beautiful, amazing, culturally rich, and unlike any place I have every visited, I do not mean to infer that it is absolutely perfect.

Right now, Korea is at a pivotal crossroads. Aside from the obvious divide of North and South Korea, there is also a heavy Western influence that is creating a divide between generational cultures. Divorce is on the rise, alcoholism is real, human and sex trafficking and the normalization of pornography continues to grow, atheism and animism (the native religion) have a strong foothold... For my kids from North Korea, there is a widespread sense of purposelessness, and for many of my kids from South Korea there is very little knowledge of the North, compassion for its people, the existence of God, and a greater, purpose filled life outside of their technology. In the middle of all that is truly amazing in this beautiful country, there is a swelling rip current of changing culture that has a sad, destructive quality.

It is, of course, easy to apply that generalized response of "let us fix this" and "Pray for them". However, let us not forget that we in the West cannot fix anything, that here in America we are already deeply steeped in this cultural current and are in deep need of prayer. Don't get me wrong, prayer is a vitally important part of our walk, our growth, and our journey with God. But we cannot allow it to be a shallow, weak bandage over a deep wound. Rather, reflect with sincerity. Pray with intent. Move with purpose.

THIS is where things get really real and I find myself at a personal pausing point in this journey asking what my next step is.

Korea changed me. There is no question about that. My heart longs to return and be among her people. HOWEVER, I do not want to return on my terms, carrying with me this false sense of pride that I am in any way going to "fix" things. Furthermore, I cannot "fix" anything. God is the creator, "knower", healer, and beacon to life everlasting. I am a small fraction of total creation acting simply as his hands and feet in action. I don't know what the purpose of my longing is, or its outcome, but I know it is a sincere call vs. a simple "want".

So as we move forward, as a family, a community, and the family of God, I ask the following:

  • Pray for the Korean peninsula. 
  • Pray for the people of North Korea that their hearts would be encouraged. (http://pray4nk.org/)

  • Pray for Kim Jong Un that his heart and mind would be touched, transformed, and that he would repent.
  • Pray for the hearts and minds of people of South Korea, that they would have an increasing sense of compassion and purpose for themselves and their brothers and sisters oppressed in the North. 
  • Pray for us as a collective people that we would lead with love and not in judgement or presumption rooted in a lack of knowledge or experience. 
  • Pray for us as a family, directionally.
  • Pray for us to wait patiently and not grow weary on the journey.
  • Pray for my process of formally learning the Korean language. This is a difficult undertaking for me that is riddled with "failure", often times frustrates me and makes me feel like I will never be able to be able to properly learn. 
Ultimately, I have no idea where this journey is leading. However, I continue to be committed to the idea that if it is to be, that God would Send Me.

Here are some examples of the culture, worship and work that is happening on the peninsula...

YWAM East Asian Conference 2018 in Thailand Conference:
One Voice - Korea performing (We worshipped with them at camp),
prayer and worship (last portion of video)

One Voice Korea:


Nehemiah Global Initiative: 












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