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North
Korea Investigative Mission Trip 2001
Prayer/Support
Letter
God
has given me a special love for the people of North Korea.
It started several years ago when I began to hear reports
of starvation and suffering.
I first read of people in North Korea eating porridge made
of tree bark and getting sick because there was no food.
Later I read that there were no more pets in North Korea…
since they had all been eaten.
Most of the statistics I came across estimated that about
3 million people have died due to starvation and starvation-related
causes over the past several years.
I realized that this was one of the great catastrophes of
this century. Three
or four years ago I began to hear rumors of people eating people
in North Korea. It
was difficult to imagine the situation there had became that desperate.
However, an AP article confirmed the rumors.
The Associated Press (John Leicester, "HUNGRY
NORTH KOREANS FLEE TO CHINA," Yanji, 03/30/99) reported that
a former DPRK soldier who fled into the PRC said that people in
his village near Chongjin were dying every day from hunger, cold,
or accidentally eating poisonous mushrooms when scavenging for food.
He added that he saw three
people executed by gunshot last year for killing vagrant children
and selling their flesh at a market.
A
few years ago, my heart broke when I heard of North Korea children
losing their eyesight and becoming blind because of malnutrition.
During graduate school God laid on my heart to do a project
for North Korea that involved a year of research.
The more I found out, the more I realized how uninformed
the general public was and also how unprepared the Church was for
mission work to North Korea.
While working on my North Korea project, one night I woke
up in the middle of the night (around 2 a.m.).
Immediately I was completely alert and awake, and I saw in
my head a comprehensive plan to prepare the Church for North Korea
missions. I went downstairs
and started to type out this plan on the computer.
The vision I had received was so clear and so sudden I knew
that it wasn’t from myself.
I typed non-stop until 6 o’clock in the morning.
This plan became a crucial part of my North Korea project.
After finishing the project, I started to feel God calling
me to start a new work preparing the Church for North Korea missions.
For two years I gave God excuses and tried to ignore God’s
tugging. However, this
past year I could wait no longer and I decided to follow through
with what God has put on my heart.
This summer’s North Korea Investigative Mission Trip is the
launch of a movement to prepare the Church for North Korea missions.
Our goal for this summer’s trip is to spread awareness for
what's going on in North Korea and also set up the infrastructure
to mobilize, network and train people for North orea missions.
Please pray for our team and let us keep you informed by
signing up for prayer updates at www.nkmissions.com.
I’m excited to see what God will do.
in
Christ,
NK
Dave
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