The Family of Nations: The Peoples in Conflicts We See and Serve for Peace

Today’s reading concludes Section VI: The Family of Nations – The Peoples in Conflict We See and Serve for Peace. Read here.

We commit to pray and serve peoples in conflict in the world so that the gospel of Jesus Christ might bring true peace to all peoples.

Having gathered for the Fourth Lausanne Congress in Incheon, South Korea, we commit to pray for the peace and light of Christ to reign over the Korean peninsula and its people, who were forcibly divided into the politically separated countries of North Korea and South Korea. This wrongful separation and the death and trauma of millions of civilians is known as the Forgotten War. Despite the ceasefire of 1953, the conflict remains unresolved and instability continues to this day in a vicious cycle of rapprochement followed by escalating tensions. Nonetheless, we continue to pray that one day Korea and the Korean people will be one. We remember the great Pyongyang Revival of 1907 that took place among Koreans in the north and call for an end to the persecution of our Christian brothers and sisters by the government of North Korea. We call the global church to pray that God may open a door for the restoration of long-separated families, communities, and churches, and for the gospel of Jesus Christ to be boldly proclaimed and displayed without hindrance or fear in North Korea once more so that the whole peninsula might know the Lord.

We call all Christians everywhere to intercede on behalf of those who face the horrors of war and conflict, to pray for the persecuted church, and to labour for peace among the peoples and nations of the world. As Christ’s peacemakers, we must build Christian communities that exemplify the peace of Christ and promote a culture of peace as a crucial outworking of our faith in and proclamation of the gospel. In this way, we declare and display Christ together in a world deeply wounded by conflicts.