Faith Ventures, Spring 2000: China

Hot Tub Baptisms and Frozen River Crossings

By Don Johnson

Parts of the following were related to Don Johnson by Hugh Kim, Director of Yanji NEWSTART® Sanitarium.

As those of you who are regular readers of Faith Ventures know, articles about our work in China have been some of the most exciting. About three years ago we carried the disturbing news that Drs. Henri and Beverly Wiebe had to leave the fourth Sanitarium NEWSTART location we’d started due to a concern the government had that they were mixing too much religion with their health work. They were given twenty-four hours to leave China. Since then, as you have read in past issues, God has led the Wiebes in providential paths to the countries of Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan in Central Asia.

[One of Nine Large NEWSTART Alumni Association (NSAA) Groups, Past Graduates of Yanji Program]

I was thrilled a few weeks ago when Hugh and Polly Kim came to visit me sharing up-to-date stories of what is happening with our work in China. They were Eden Valley workers prior to going to pioneer our first Sanitarium NEWSTART Center in China thirteen years ago.

Even though the Wiebes had to leave, and we could not continue the work they were doing among the Chinese speaking population, the Kims have continued to work strongly among the Northern Chinese, many of whom speak Korean. The thrilling news is that they are increasingly reaching the North Korean people just across the border from where the Yanji Sanitarium is located.

The Kims spend six months of the year at Yanji, holding intensive seminars of many kinds. Most seminars are solidly based on the NEWSTART program, but are tailored to meet different groups of people. During a six month period they typically conduct one youth leaders’ training seminar, four seminars for Korean speaking and two for Chinese speaking participants, a leaders’ retreat, and an extension seminar in Beijing for Korean speaking Chinese.

[Growing Yanji Seventh-day Adventist Church]

As an ethnically Korean area, the Yanji government permits them to be a little freer than otherwise. Two years ago the NEWSTART Alumni Association (NSAA) was organized. It was granted status as a department of Yan Bien University retired professor’s association which is approved by the government. NSAA groups have now been organized in nine different major cities, and they meet from one to three times per month. There are literally hundreds who attend these groups with the press giving publicity. NEWSTART food is being served, and many times seating is so crowded that the overflow sit on the floor.

Mr. Choi was an orphan six years ago when the Kims met him. Through the sanitarium work he was introduced to God and adopted by his new Father in heaven. Mr. Choi has been serving as a church leader in a nearby city in one of our government approved churches. In the providence of God this fine young man has been led by the Lord in meeting a beautiful young lady in the Adventist church. Hugh Kim conducted their wedding this year.

In another beautiful story of the Lord’s providence, a Mr. Kim received help for his alcoholism, then with his wife studied with Hugh and Polly for five months. Following their baptism, Mr. and Mrs. Kim started a home church in their own home eight years ago. Three years later they received local government approval to start a regular church, and now have a beautiful church building with more than eighty people worshiping under the leadership of a theology graduate.

[Rite of Baptism Safe from Prying Eyes]

For ten years we have had a government approved church in Yanji which has steadily grown–that is, until last year when it suddenly mushroomed! One year ago members of a Presbyterian church began studying with our folks, accepted our unique message, and became Adventists. As they united with our Yanji church they realized they needed a new church, so now, one year later, they have about two hundred and fifty precious souls worshiping Sabbath by Sabbath in their brand new church.

Although growth of the Church cannot always be measured in baptisms, they do show a trend. In a nearby city being led by graduates from the NEWSTART program, eighty-three baptisms have taken place this year. In Yanji forty-five people have taken this step who are directly related to Hugh and Polly Kim’s work. One lady who was baptized is a very wealthy business person. She has a lovely modern home–especially by rural Chinese standards. After her baptism she was feeling badly about the extravagance of her home. Soon, however, her home was needed for a home church, and fit the need so perfectly. A real bonus is that her large bathroom with a hot tub (a luxury rarely seen in China) now serves perfectly as a baptistery, conveniently hidden from prying eyes.

Across on the North Korean side of the nearby border there are many problems for Adventists who have kept their faith through the long years of Communism. In winter, some have been able to slip across the frozen river that separates Yanji from North Korea and visit with their "brothers and sisters" there in Yanji. Hugh Kim has had the privilege of helping many of these folks materially and spiritually. Several have stayed six months to learn our message, been baptized, and are now back in North Korea sharing their faith.

["Dropped Off" Children with Hugh Kim]

It is a common occurrence that children will be slipped across the border because they are orphaned. You may ask, "Why are they orphaned?" Their grandparents have committed suicide in order that the family may have enough food, then the parents sometimes yield to further despair leaving their children alone. To feed these children and care for them has become a special project of our Yanji church. Several church families have moved their whole family into one room so that they can take in as many as four orphans. They don’t have the money to feed them, however, so Hugh and Polly extend financial help from sanitarium funds. It costs about $30 per month ($360/year) to feed, clothe, and provide schooling for one of these orphans. There are so many that need help that the sixteen that Kims are helping are a drop in the bucket. Hugh and Polly told me they dream of an orphanage to help these children.

[One of Many Typical Yanji NEWSTART Groups]

Often an older daughter from North Korea will be sent by her family across the border to "earn" money so she can send help back to her family. The Kims had frequently heard about this practice, but when a church member told them about a sixteen-year-old girl who was about to be sold as a wife to a man, the Kims quickly asked her selling price. They were told that the young girl was being sold for $250! They quickly came up with the money, paid her price, and brought her to the Sanitarium where during four or five months she learned about Jesus and gave her heart to Him. Her grandfather, at the risk of his life, slipped across the border from North Korea to receive his granddaughter back again. While he or the rest of her family don’t know Jesus, they may be anxious to learn of the One who could so miraculously work to return her to them–so changed and eager to share her new found faith.

[Hugh and Polly Kim at North Korean Border Crossing (note Red Star at left)]

I know you will want to have a part in helping this wonderful work to continue. Perhaps it’s the support of an orphan, or funds that will help a young person to have a meaningful life, or the lease costs for the Yanji Sanitarium. Hugh and Polly do their best to help raise funds as they speak in churches across the U.S. during the winter months when it is too cold to continue the work in North China, but they need our help too. If you would like to help this ministry or to have the Kims visit your church with stories and slides of their work, please contact me, Don Johnson at (970) 663-7865.

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