Pastor tells firsthand account of captivity in North Korea at Liberty University’s Unify Korea Summit

In conjunction with this year’s Unify Korea Summit, Liberty University welcomed South Korean-born Canadian Pastor Hyeon Soo Lim to the Convocation stage on Friday morning to highlight the incredible need for the Gospel in North Korea.

Speaking in his native Korean tongue as an English translation was shown on the videoboard, Lim spoke about the 949 days he was imprisoned in North Korea while serving a life sentence of hard labor before his eventual release in 2017. While imprisoned, he was subjected to verbal abuse and given very little food, leading to him losing almost 50 pounds in two months. He was also prohibited from watching television, listening to the radio, or reading books, but was allowed one copy of the Bible. He described this blessing as “the joy of finding living water in the desert.”

Throughout the day, Lim contented himself with praying and memorizing Scripture and reading his Bible during work breaks. Meanwhile, his captors began investigating additional ways to incriminate him, but all they could find online about him were his sermons. Through listening to these sermons, the prison guards’ hearts began to soften. Eventually they started bringing him more food and showing him more care, and some even came to him for family counseling.

“Seeing this change, I realized more clearly that faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the Word of Christ,” Lim said. “Seeing such a transformation in the core leaders of the Communist Party, I became certain that one day when North Korea opens up and the Gospel is spread, North Korea will soon be transformed into the army of the Lord. When the people who will spread the Gospel in North Korea are ready, God will open the doors of North Korea. If Korea is the end of the earth for world evangelization, we must go to the ends of the earth to preach the Gospel.”

Since his release, Lim has continued to share the Gospel as well as train additional missionaries who will go into the country. He said God has given him many visions about North Korea’s future prosperity.

Noting the numerous needs afflicting the country, including a lack of medical practitioners, English teachers, farmers, theology professors, evangelists in businesses, and church planters, he welcomed anyone who feels called to join in serving the North Korean Church.

“Anyone who is prepared to love and serve others is welcome,” he said. “The evangelization of North Korea is the shortcut to world evangelization. North Korea is the most fertile ground for spreading the Gospel. We need the strength of America. Who will go? When He asks, may you and I be able to respond, ‘Here I am.’”

Lim’s message was part of Liberty’s second annual Unify Korea Summit, hosted by the John W. Rawlings School of Divinity, the Global Studies Department, and the Unify Korea student club. Students, faculty and staff, and Korean pastors took part in the two-day summit.

On Thursday night, Caleb Mission founder and human rights activist Pastor Seungeun Kim shared about his efforts in rescuing North Korean defectors during a roundtable event in the Montview Alumni Ballroom. Caleb Mission, founded in 2000, works to rescue defectors and train them as missionaries. So far, the organization has rescued 1,026 individuals from the North Korean regime.

Kim was born in 1965 into a Christian family and from a young age learned to be content, despite having very little money.

“Even though we had nothing, we had the Gospel and we had faith in Jesus Christ, so our family always had gratitude and freedom in Jesus,” he said through a translator.

At the age of 13, he began working as a cook on a fishing boat and when he was unsuccessful, he began praying for God’s guidance. Although he did not hear an immediate response, he later met a missionary who asked him to serve alongside him. He then traveled to the border between North Korea and China and witnessed the incredible hardship of those who attempted to flee North Korea. Praying again that God would use him, he felt called to rescue future defectors.

Since that day, Kim has worked alongside his wife, a former North Korean defector herself, to lead people out of danger and into a life of freedom. Their work has taken them on dangerous journeys of 7,500 miles through desert, jungle, and stormy ocean. He was once able to save defectors traveling by ocean because of his previous work experiences on a fishing boat.

Through his time of ministry, Kim has been subjected to numerous hardships, including a broken neck, three back surgeries, and the death of his son at the age of 7. Yet, despite these trials, he has continued the work set out for him understanding the love that God has for His children in North Korea.

“Based on my own experience, I believe that if you put your hope in Jesus, God will use your suffering for the productive work to build his kingdom. … Despite appearing to have nothing, God made me have everything through faith.”

Caleb Mission faced additional roadblocks during the COVID-19 pandemic, when China instituted heavy restrictions to slow the spread of the virus. Although Kim could no longer rescue defectors at the same rate as in the past, he and his team decided to use that time to build their community in South Korea. Once they finished construction, the pandemic ended and Caleb Mission could once again rescue defectors, however, now at 10 times the previous cost.

Facing yet another obstacle, Kim began to feel discouraged, but his fears were relieved with the release of a new documentary, “Beyond Utopia,” which provides an inside look into the daring covert rescues, with raw, harrowing footage from actual escapes and interviews with North Korean defectors. Kim and his heroic work with Caleb Mission played a prominent role in the film. The documentary led to an increase of support, offsetting the rising costs of the rescue operations.

Following the discussion, Kim participated in a brief Q&A session with roundtable attendees. Thursday’s event also included a time of prayer for North Korea, led by Global Studies Professor Dr. Tim Chang.

Liberty University hosted a screening of “Beyond Utopia” on Friday afternoon in the Towns Auditorium in the School of Business. The award-winning documentary has been viewed over 1 million times on PBS alone.

Senior James Gengero, president of the Unify Korea student club at Liberty, said it is important for American Christians to remain informed on the situation in North Korea and to do everything possible to assist in the transformation of North Korea for the Gospel.

“We want to raise awareness about the current events in North and South Korea,” he said. “We also want people to raise money and pray. The main thing is to advocate for a unification not just politically but spiritually — that we would have a unified Korea for Jesus. Not for one president or another, not for one political nation or another, but that all would cry the name of Jesus and they would see Him as the heavenly Father instead of anyone else.”