Have You Met Padina?

I had the privilege of sharing Padina’s story on IDOP and it’s a very beautiful and moving testimony. Brings tears to my eyes everytime I watch it. Maybe you could spare 5 minutes to view it and then pray for Padina and her mom? Pray for their strength as they minister to others and share their faith in Jesus at the possible expense of their lives.

You Have No Idea

How good God is to me.

I read an amazing blog post today that I want to share with you. Incredibly enough, my fellow blog sister mentions Jeremiah 9 in the post and happens to be the same verses my pastor preached on just this morning! God ministers to me through people so often and so wonderfully, it brings tears to my eyes.

I greatly feel led to deviate just a bit and share this post because it involves knowing GOD. How do we know Him? Through the Bible? Yes. Creation? Yes. Through prayer and communion with Him? Yes. Walking in His steps? Yes. Some would argue that those are the wrong ways, some wouldn’t. Some would say that I’ve got it all wrong… I don’t know- I don’t think I do. I’m God’s daughter through faith in Christ. My hope is built on nothing less than upon His righteousness, the cleansing from His blood.

I have nothing else.

I am the spiritual begger of Matt. 5:6 and I desperately need HIM and need to know Him. I need these things as only a poor, middle-aged Gentile wife and mother can; I have nothing else to offer but a prayer of Phil. 3:20. That I might KNOW:

1. Him: Christ,
2. the power of His resurrection,
3. what fellowshipping with Him in sufferings is, and
4. that I am being made conformable (just like) to His death (hopefully a martyr’s crown).

This verse is my 2nd life verse. I pray these four things often. Maybe one day I will join the fellowship of suffering with my beloved persecuted brethen as well… for we know that the Lamb is worthy.

Anyways… (got to get down to it, ’cause y’all know I can go on for DAYS about the Lord) the following post really ministered to me today. I pray it will do the same for  you.

Today I ran across a post on facebook and learned of Knowing Me Ministries in Portland, Oregon.  It caught my eye because…

Continue reading HERE.

Taken from the 8thDayForLife blog.

God bless you all,

In Christ,

Joy

Really Amazed

I find that God amazes me a lot.

Like right now, as I realize that it was not in His timing for me to share my experience with IDOP until now and not beforehand like I wanted to. My plan was to share here on this blog with you all as to what I wanted to speak about at WLMC before actually doing it.

But it was not the Lord’s timing. I never did feel compelled to do that (so I didn’t, obviously). Because at that time, I was asking a lot of questions on certains issues myself, and I thought it would be wise to present these questions to you and then leave it up to prayer. However, I am learning more and more to simply rely on God’s wisdom and timing and not man’s!

I have to mentally slap myself when I daydream about who I can ask about any particular subject. I’ve discovered that I have a bad habit of hashing issues and concerns all out in my mind first, and then wondering who I can ask about it. And this shouldn’t be so; GOD should be my first go-to Person, right? Shouldn’t He be for us all?! For those in Christ, we have His Spirit who will lead us into ALL truth. We have this annointing so that we have no need of asking anyone anything (1 John 2:27).

Interjection alert! Please don’t misunderstand, I’m not saying that the counsel of Godly people such as pastors, teachers and parents are not important! But when we have questions with no plausible answer in sight, either through the Word or other believers (who can many times be varied, or going in different directions), we can only do what Scripture commands, and this is to ask of God who gives wisdom to all men liberally (James 1:5).

Okay, back on topic- My plan when speaking on behalf of VOM for the persecuted on IDOP was to 1.) establish how VOM ministers to the persecuted, and 2.) speak about my own idea of Jesus’ words in the verse of Matt. 11:12 (I’ll get to the purpose behind this shortly), and the verse says this,

And from the days of John the Baptist until now the Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.

Well… those two goals of speaking on those topics got a little muddied! I didn’t even touch on the second one at all because any and all compulsion to do so was gone. I was pressed in Spirit more than I can say to simply talk about VOM and all the programs they had available to help our persecuted brethren- that’s it.

And that was totally okay! I had prayed fervently for the past week that anything I said would be God’s words anyway, so I was content with what was said. Besides, WLMC had asked me back on Sunday night to share my testimony along with any further information I might have had on VOM, and it was there that I was able to (in a more intimate setting, which was nice!) talk about what I had wanted to. So God, in His Sovereignty, worked all this in accordance with His will and I’m thrilled about that.

But this is what amazes me: God’s timing in regards to Matt. 11:12. I was going to share here prior to IDOP on this verse, but didn’t; and I was going to share IDOP morning about this verse, but didn’t. Why? Because I believe the Lord wanted to teach me more about this verse before saying anything about it and what’s so cool about it all is that I believe He is using the avenue of VOM to answer my questions about it. Would you be surprised to know that it was VOM who originally posted this verse on Facebook to begin with? It’s really come full circle in a sense. Let me explain, and I’ll do my best to keep it simple and to the point (not my best qualities, though! )

It comes about in a four-fold set of events I believe were orchestrated by the Lord (Who is constantly teaching me and I love that!). The first was when VOM had posted the Mt. 11:12 verse on Facebook a month or two ago asking for thoughts, and at that time I didn’t think much of it. I’m sure it was mainly due to ignorance on my part, and I ended up dismissing it (but God didn’t!). Fast forward about a month into the second event: I was reading my Jonathan Edwards sermon book and became captivated by a quote in his sermon, “The Example Of The Apostle Paul”. It was there that I was immediately placed front and center into facing Matt. 11:12. The quote says,

Probably there never was a soldier, when he bore his part in storming a city, that acted with greater resolution and violence, as it were forcing his way through all that opposed him, than the apostle Paul in seeking the kingdom of Heaven.

I found that absolutely fascinating! If I can get this straighted out in my head, it means that in Jonathan Edwards words, there was never another man who acted with greater resolution and violence than the Apostle Paul in seeking the Kingdom of Heaven! Call me a hopeless romantic, but that sounds exciting!

So that got me asking some questions. What does this look like? Do we even know? And it was then that God reminded me of the third event.

The third event was the time I visited my dearly loved friend from church who happens to be my partner in the Woman-To-Woman program there (also within this same time period). She brought up an interesting little tidbit that she had heard about the gates of Hell- the relevance being in the “gates” and meditating on the fact that gates don’t move. Now that may sound elementary to some, but this was a new revelation to me! We always seem to think that the gates of Hell are prevailing against us somehow, or that in building Christ’s church they are some kind of menacing force chasing us around. I know that sounds silly because we know they won’t prevail against us, but we’ve (well, I can’t speak for everyone, but at least for me) got this idea that they are something to be feared somehow and that’s not the case at all. The idea is that in the building of Christ’s Body (the church), we storm the enemy camp to set the captive’s free, thus building His church and guess what? The gates of Hell will not stop us from going into enemy territory to rescue the perishing!! They will be pushed and trampled down- they will NOT prevail!

I don’t know about you, but I find this THRILLING. And it completely correlates with my study of North Korea, in the way that VOM helps minister to North Korean defectors. It seems to me, to be a perfect picture of a person who would escape the horrific condition of NK, learn the Gospel, which in turn gives birth to a great burden for souls, and by following Christ to storm the enemy camp to set the captives free, they go back to North Korea. They go back knowing they face suffering, torture and most likely, death. Could this be an accurate parallel to Matt. 11:12?

Then, the last event comes that ties all this together; the most astounding part that gave me a great amount of confirmation that I’m walking exactly where Jesus is leading me. And it is this: when I had prayed fervently, like I mentioned, about what to speak on for IDOP I really sought the Lord’s face on a message that He would want me to give. And I was content to wait for it until I got it and lo and behold, I did get it! The Lord was faithful (He always is) and He knew that I didn’t want to do my standard speech, He knew that I wanted it to be special (even though this message didn’t get delivered till evening, and even then it wasn’t this in-depth ;) so one afternoon during prayer time, I got the message (and no, it wasn’t in audible voice! ). It came along the lines of a question… that question being what we would do should a close family member such as a child, sibling, parent, etc. were to be put in prison for being a Christian. In other words, if your son or daughter was on a missions trip and they were arrested and imprisoned for sharing Jesus Christ, what lengths would you go to to get them freed? I’m sure most of us would go to *great* lengths, even if that meant going all the way across the globe to do it! And although I went along this track but deviated just a bit on Sunday evening, the sentiment was still the same. If we care this much about our blood relatives, how much more should we care about our spiritual relatives? That was the crux of the matter!

Now go back to storming the the gates of Hell to set the captives free. Let’s go back also to Matt. 11:12 in taking the Kingdom of Heaven by violent force. What does all this mean? Well, here is how the Lord graciously lead me into fulfillment on these truths. We’ll briefly go back even further to July 2010, when I had the priviledge of being part of a teleconference prayer call for the country of North Korea. I remember it so well because the power went out in our neighborhood, and all I could do was sit in the pitch blackness and listen to the other callers and their prayers, it was very intense, but spiritually powerful. During that call I also listened to Eric Foley as he informed us on how we could better pray for the believers in North Korea and it was then that I was really educated on the terrible conditions of the Hermit Kingdom, and my heart was broken.

Fast forward to now… After remembering the conference call and remembering Rev. Foley, I was compelled to do a little google search and to my happiness, found his blog. Would you be surprised to know that he is currently writing a series of articles on, “Ransoming the Captive”? Can I give you a mental image of eye’s popping out of a head? Yah, that would be MY head.

I have been incredibly blessed to read this series. It goes hand in hand with many of the concerns and issues I’ve been rolling around in my head and speaking on to others. I really do believe that this is an answer to prayer. How else could I explain it?

I encourage you to take the time to read each part in this series. I firmly believe that God walked me along this path in order that I share it with you all and encourage you to walk it too.

Here is the hyperlink to Part 1 titled, Jesus’ First Sermon (And Why It Matters) and if you can follow it along to completion, I know you will be blessed. As of today, there are seven parts. I unfortunately don’t know how many there will be in total, but I was so encouraged to read the parts that I did. Can’t wait to read more! I’ll post a little snippet to whet your appetite . Something that I learned through Rev. Foley’s blog,

If the early church had a website, it would have talked a lot about that kind of ransoming. We know this, because it’s a subject that pops up in many letters and stories and reports by and about the early church.

It was one of the things that amazed people about Christians.

You can see it in Clement’s letter to the church in Corinth, sent around the start of the second century AD. Clement wrote:

We know that many have given themselves up to imprisonment in order to ransom others; many too have delivered themselves into slavery and have fed others with the sale price

(1 Clement 55:2)

Did you catch that? Many. As in, “Many Christians have ransomed others by delivering themselves into slavery.”

And it was hardly a one-time thing: On through the Middle Ages, Christians continued to deliver themselves into slavery in Jesus’ name in order to set others free.

(From Part 2 of the series)

Wow. Hardly a one-time thing. Christians delivering themselves into slavery in order to set others free… Wrap your brain around that for a while. And although we don’t personally know actually Christians held hostage in America, they are held hostage to someone and something that only Jesus Christ can set them free from:

• Satan (Acts 26:18)
• Sin (Romans 6:16-18)

But for those who live in hostile/restricted nations, there are more Christians literally held captive today than there have ever been.

As I’ve said before, I’ll say it again, there are no coincidences in a life of servitude to the Most High God! He has graciously lead me on this wonderful journey of truth and I praise Him for that. Remember: Only slaves to Jesus Christ are truly free men!

If you also get a chance after reading Rev. Foley’s series take a peak around his site and absorb all the wonderful work he is doing with the Underground University (I hope to blog on this sometime in the future, so stay tuned!).  Thank you for reading!

SDG!

The Rejected Become the Cornerstones

There are 7 images in this post that are quite large. Please wait for them to load as they contain the entire blog post. Thank you for your patience!!

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Please pray for the believers in North Korea, and thank you for reading. If you are interested in purchasing VOM’s book on NK, please click HERE (its only $7!).

God bless you!

In Christ,

Joy

A Weak-Hearted Christian

I have been told that Christians in themselves were never meant to change or save the world. At first I was a bit offended at this, but after some reflection realized this to be true.

Christians know that true peace will never come on this earth until its Creator, Jesus Christ physically comes back to reign and rule on it in accordance with Biblical prophecy. His return is our living hope.When there is an injustice so vile that it sweeps across entire nations, Christians should be the FIRST ones to stand up and say,

This. Is. Wrong.

Why? Because Christians, who follow in the footsteps of Jesus, always work to do the will of the Father! In an abundance of scripture passages we can be confident that God’s heart is *for* the poor, the needy, the oppressed, the widow and the orphan.

Psalms 82

¹ God stands in the congregation of the mighty;
He judges among the gods.
² How long will you judge unjustly,
And show partiality to the wicked?  Selah
³ Defend the poor and fatherless;
Do justice to the afflicted and needy.
⁴ Deliver the poor and needy;
Free them from the hand of the wicked.
⁵ They do not know, nor do they understand;
They walk about in darkness;
All the foundations of the earth are unstable.
⁶ I said, “You are gods,
And all of you are children of the Most High.
⁷ But you shall die like men,
And fall like one of the princes.”
⁸ Arise, O God, judge the earth;
For You shall inherit all nations.

So what does this have to do with saving the world? Well, in my studies on North Korea, I’m finding myself very discouraged and in a place of low hope. I don’t like to be in that place because oftentimes I take my eyes off of God and His majestic power. Unfortunately, when a whole nation is held hostage, what can a single person do? How do we defend the helpless, or right injustices when we seem so small? Even though we know peace will not come until Jesus does, what can we do now?

In the midst of asking these questions during prayer this morning, it was then that I was reminded of Moses. With God’s power, the children of Israel were released from Pharoah’s grip, and if there was ever a time when all seemed hopeless, it was then, when Israel had been slaves in Egypt for over 400 years. Things weren’t as hopeless as it seemed after all when God stepped in and said, “Enough. It is time to let my people go.”

After that realization, all I could do was simply pray that God would raise up another Moses. Only this time, a Moses for the North Korean people. As I read and soak up the information on NK, it seems as if the whole world is turning a blind eye to the unspeakable horrors that go on behind the borders there. Its so bad that whole generations (up to 3) of families are being slaughtered for the pettiest of crimes. Where is the world? When I ask this, I’m reminded of the young lady, Alicia in the “180 Movie” who commented about the extermination of the Jews during the Holocaust. She asked a very poignant question:

Where was the world?

Indeed. Where is the world now? Where are those who will stand up for the North Korean people that are literally starving to death, or committing suicide to avoid painful torture and executions. If you are not familiar with the conditions in the Hermit Kingdom, I can’t recommend highly enough National Geographic’s documentary, “Inside North Korea”. It is hosted by Lisa Ling, who does an excellent job and it can be viewed on YouTube HERE for free (it’s only 46 minutes long and well worth it).

Back in July of last year, I was priviledged to participate in a teleconference call praying for the people of North Korea. Its kind of what stoked a fire in my heart for this country. It was at this time that I first heard about a single missionary man crossing over the border into NK illegally and was quickly caught and imprisoned. It was sort of “hush hush” at the time due to legal issues, so I didn’t have a lot of information. Either way, I was intrigued.

It is just now that I am finding interview’s of this man and his name is Robert Park. The best interview I’ve found was on CBN, posted below:

Robert Park is a man on a mission. He says he’s called to continue to “speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves.” (Proverbs 31:8-9)

Nearly a year has passed since the Korean American missionary crossed the frozen Tumen River and walked from China into North Korea. Attentive border guards immediately arrested Park and took him to a North Korean prison where he suffered sexual abuse and torture.

Many of Park’s friends are North Korean defectors–they told him how Christians and others are sent to concentration camps, tortured and left to die. Park knew what he was up against before crossing the border, yet he was willing to pay the price.

Whether or not you agree with his conduct (crossing borders without permission is illegal), one cannot help but admire his passion, advocacy, and commitment to Christ. Tired of Christians “talking the talk” but not “walking the walk,” Park decided to do something to draw attention to the plight of Christians in North Korea. As a result, he suffered excruciating pain and suffering at the hands of the brutal totalitarian regime. He doesn’t like to talk about it or give much detail of the torture he experienced, but he reportedly told one reporter that he would “never be able to have a marriage or any kind of relationship.”

How are Christians faring in North Korea today and what does he think about those who are evangelized in China or South Korea and then sent back to the North? He responds to those questions in clip[s] one of our CBN News interview.

In clip two, Park explains what he did when he first crossed the border into North Korea.

In clip three, he discusses how he was treated by his North Korea interrogators and what he said to them.

In our fourth and final interview clip, Park explains what Christians can do to make a difference for our North Korean brothers and sisters in Christ.

Please take the time to view all four clips and then pray. Few Christians suffer worse than those in North Korea.”

The video clips can be found HERE please watch them when you can so that you can pray more effectively for the church in NK.

My heart goes out to Mr. Park. Nobody seems to want to listen to him. He has suffered terrible permanent injuries for doing what he did. I have no doubt of his love for the North Korean people and I praise God for that. I also praise God for his bravery and attempt to help. But apart from this, we look over to Lisa Ling who does an indepth documentary with the world reknown National Geographic and still, nothing seems to change. So, what can I do? Just sit back and criticize? No, I don’t want to do that, I don’t want to do nothing. And most of all,

I don’t want to be a weak-hearted Christian.

I want to help and I want you to help too. If you don’t feel that its necessary or appropriate for you, here are some bullet point facts as reported through VOM:

• It is nearly impossible to overstate the desperation of NK’s people during the famine years of 1995-2000 (up to 21% of the population perished).
• Refugees leaving the country testified that each morning during the famine, they would wake up to check on all their neighbors to see who was still alive.
• Cannabalism is/was rapant and if caught, punishable by immediate execution (shot on the spot- this includes children).
• Cholera outbreaks/deaths are epidemic.
• Entire families have been known to eat poison in order to die quickly to avoid starving to death.
• Two-thirds of the children suffer from stunted growth. An entire generation of children will never develop to their full physical or mental capabilities due to malnutrition.
• The entire population was (I don’t know about now) dependant upon a precarious government rationing system for food (get it? Not allowed to grow or acquire any other food source. Sentence for this crime? Work camp, or death camp).
• The government has advocated the making of “substitute food” which includes, tree bark, leaves or even sawdust.
• Thousands risk death and torture to flee across the border into China. However, China has not been accomodating to these refugees and are offered rewards by the NK government for their return. When they are dragged back into NK, it is often iron wire run through their noses or under their collar bones.
• For those who successfully defect, often their left-behind families are put in prison camps or executed up to the 3rd generation (“The regime believes that to eradicate the opposition they must deal with three generations”).

Truly, this is just a taste of the horror that goes on. I haven’t even mentioned what happens if you speak unfavorably of their “Dear Leader”, Kim Jong Il. For instance, every citizen must wear a pin bearing his image, and you cannot photograph or video tape any image of him unfavorably, or have it cut off at certain points (for instance a photo of half his face). He is taught to the people from the cradle to the grave that he is, “divine, immortal, and worthy of all prayer, worship, honor, power, and glory.” I truly believe that NONE of us can fully fathom what its like to live so oppressed. Lord Jesus, let us never lose our humanity.

In closing, I want to share how to become better educated regarding North Korea, or how to pray more effectively, I highly recommend VOM’s book, “North Korea” found HERE. Its only $7 and contains lots of useful information including statistics and how you can help. You can also contact the NK government directly HERE.

But above all, please ask God how He would want you to help, including asking for His heart for the persecuted. Ask Him to show you which restricted/hostile nation He would want you to pray for if NK isn’t the one (there are over 50 others!).

For those believers still on the inside of the closed borders, their message to us is TELL THE WORLD. Thank you for allowing me to share my burden. I’m working on telling the world the best way I can.

Yours forever in Christ,

Joy

Getting this ready.

…to be a bigger voice.  A loud one, if God so wills! I’ve been wrestling with a lot of issues as of late, but I always come back to this: being a voice for the persecuted. No matter what pulls at me, I somehow find my way back. Whether that be my husband’s illness, the inclinations of adoption, homeschooling, evangelizing the lost through the Gospel wagon or tracts, running my online shops, etc., all these things work to distract me at times, or just plain wear me out so that I can’t do anything else! It does take determination and focus to stay on this track, to do the will of the Father. I am confident that He has brought me into this ministry for His purposes and pleasure and I’m thrilled about that (and I strive not to deviate!).

I am priviledged in all of this to share in their sufferings even if that is a very, very small role. I will never forget that Jesus identifies so closely with the persecuted, that all persecutors are persecuting HIM. So any work I, or anyone else does, is for HIM. And that makes me happier than I can say to serve my first love.

So without further ado, I just wanted to post real quick that Afflicted4Christ has its own Facebook page. I never intended to have one, but it kind of just… happened. Now its here and I share it with you all HERE. Maybe it could be a meeting place for those who DO suffer and where they can share their stories and we pray for one another. Maybe even pray for more laborers in this ministry? Want to serve Jesus Christ through the persecuted with me?

May Jesus Christ bless you all with more of Himself,

Joy

IDOP is this Sunday! Nov. 13th

Reporting from Persecution Blog on 11/7:

There is still time to get your church involved for this years International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church, which is this Sunday, November 13th.

The Voice of the Martyrs, as well as other ministries dedicated to helping the persecuted church, will be joining together with thousands of Christians on Sunday to pray and remember the suffering of our beloved family in Christ.

Please join us and please tell your friends.  May the Lord bless you as you remember those who are in chains.

Click HERE to view blog source.