“Please, just let me speak with SoonKi a little longer,” missionary YungSok pleaded when he called GongBan back.
“No, that won’t do. It’s too dangerous.” GongBan paused, then added, “Wait… what is this?” A photograph followed.
At first glance, it looked like nothing more than scribbles across a newspaper, tiny letters crammed into the margins. But as YungSok looked closer, faint pencil marks emerged from the clutter. Kim OO. Park OO. Lee OO. Name after name, written in dense, careful rows. A code? he wondered, turning the image over in his mind, but he couldn’t make sense of it.
“When SoonKi gave this to me, she said something strange,” GongBan continued. “She said, ‘There are more of your descendants than you thought.'”
The words hit YungSok like a blow. The photograph wasn’t a code at all. It was a list of believers. Eleven names in total.
Two years ago, when they had first made contact, SoonKi had said nothing about anyone keeping the faith. Yet here, in these eleven names, was proof: an underground church had taken root. And there was more. By sharing this news, that “there are many descendants of your Father, your Father’s descendants have increased,” SoonKi revealed something extraordinary.
With nothing more than a handful of Bible verses heard in China, she had planted those words in others, and a community of faith had begun to grow.
WAYS TO PRAY: