The Christians in North Korea face a most difficult situation. They face prison, torture, and even death for their faith. Conditions are so severe that: “Most of North Korea’s Christians do not engage in the extremely dangerous work of proselytizing. . .Instead, they largely keep their beliefs to themselves or within their immediate families.” [1] Our hearts go out to them and I do hope that we regularly include them in our prayers.
While we sympathize with the Christians of North Korea, I would like to discuss those in North Korea who are not Christians. As mentioned above, even hearing of Christ in North Korea is difficult because of a government which does all it can to stamp out Christianity. So if our doctrine of salvation is true, those North Koreans who have experienced the hell of living in North Korea will, after they die, have the opportunity to experience the real hell. Is this fair? Yes, they, like all of us, are sinful creatures and we all deserve the punishment of hell but God has provided a way that we can avoid this fate. So why does God make this way so readily available to some and so difficult to find for others?
The non-Christians of North Korea, who are no different from others throughout the world, demonstrate to me we need to rethink our doctrine of salvation.
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[1] Hyung-Jin Kim, “N. Korean Christians keep faith underground”, Tulsa World, February 3, 2019, p. A15.
