I was born on 27th July 1953. Not a particularly significant date in Britain but in South Korea, where I have been this week, it is hugely significant. The Korean war which began in June 1950 saw the Republic of Korea (South Korea), supported by the United Nations and British Commonwealth, defend its borders against a surprise attack by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea), at one time supported by China and the Soviet Union. Over three years the battle lines moved up and down the country leading to over 1.2 million deaths, at least half of whom were civilian non-combatants. The armistice was signed on July 27, 1953.
It was designed to “insure a complete cessation of hostilities and of all acts of armed force in Korea until a final peaceful settlement is achieved.” But no “final peaceful settlement” has been achieved yet. So while the Cold War in Europe ended when the Berlin Wall was torn down in 1989, North and South Korea have remained in a perpetual state of war. How have the two nations responded?
North Korea has made repeated attempts to invade the South. On Tuesday I entered one of the tunnels dug by the North, deep underneath the DMZ using slave labour and dynamite. Only 44 km (27 miles) from Seoul, the tunnel was discovered in 1978. It is 1.7 km (1.1 miles) long, 2 m high and 2 m wide. It runs through bedrock at a depth of about 73 m (240 ft) below ground. It was designed for a surprise attack on Seoul, and could easily accommodate 30,000 men per hour along with light weaponry. A total of four tunnels have been discovered so far, but there are believed to be up to twenty more. Furthermore, North Korea has 9,495,000 active, reserve, and paramilitary personnel, which makes it the largest military organization on earth, even without its nuclear weapon programme. How has South Korea responded?
Through its ‘Sunshine policy’ it has been giving millions of pounds each year to provide vaccines, medical care and food for North Korean children. It has built a railway to bring the two countries together and opened factories in the north to further economic ties. But most significantly of all, while the North has built the largest army in the world, the South has sent more Christian peacemakers into the world, as a proportion of its population, than any other country in the world. The first evangelical missionary to Korea was a Welshman, Robert Thomas. Aged 24, he landed in Shanghai with his wife Caroline in 1863. She died of an endemic disease just a year later, and Robert himself, became a martyr on the shores of the Daedong River in 1866. But a church was born. Even though the Evangelical church in Korea is just 150 years old, numerically, after the USA, there are more South Korean missionaries in the world than any other country.
Two nations – North and South – two very different responses – one fuelled by hate, the other fuelled by love. Today we rightly remember and honour those from our community who made the supreme sacrifice to defend our freedoms and values. It is one thing to risk your life to save a friend or even to put your life on the line for your neighbours. It is quite another to give your life to fight a formidable enemy to defend your country. But at best, all we can hope for is an Armistice – a cessation of conflict. In our gospel reading today from Matthew 5, Jesus wants us to take one step further, to realise that, whether in war or peacetime, God wants to enable us to transform our enemies into family. This is the kind of radical motivation that characterizes an authentic follower of Jesus Christ. Let’s make three observations.
