Invisible Kingdom

On the flight to Tennessee I sat next to a Korean businessman in his middle age. Since we have no idea or much choice about who we sit next to, it’s always a slightly awkward social situation we get into on an airplane. I felt somewhat relieved when I saw him taking out the Bible from his bag, and didn’t feel weird when he started talking to me.

Our conversation went from the usual “what do you do” and “how long you have been in the U.S” to our spiritual lives. His church is deeply involved with a ministry in China, and he shared with me the experience of his first mission trip.

Last year a group of people from his church visited a leper village in a very remote area of China. According to the Chinese government, leprosy has been eradicated from the country. So the leprosy patients, who were denied of their existence, support themselves in small villages in the deep mountains with no medical care or any other form of public service. The leader of the mission team was a physician and they were bringing medications to treat the leprosy and other necessities to the villages.

The team had to go over many mountain ridges to get to the village, and the businessman I sat next to on the plane happened to be the first one to arrive there. As he approached the entrance of the village, two men came out to greet them. Though he knew leprosy is not easily transmitted, the businessman hesitated when the first guy extended his had for the handshake. Then he remembered what he heard earlier. A celebrity pastor from the biggest church in Korea visited a leper village in a small island in Korea. Many of the residents on the island are cured, but most of them continue to live there because of the social stigma of having been affected by the disease once. When the village mayor offered his hand for the handshake, the celebrity pastor refused it. Later when the mission team leader from the businessman’s church went there, the mayor smiled and said, “Don’t worry about shaking my hand. Not even that pastor from the big church didn’t shake my hand. I understand”…

When that story came to the businessman’s mind, something else also came to him and drove him to take the offered hand. After the first handshake, he got bold and became the first one to offer his hand to the second man, whose right side of the body was blackened from head to his arm with the hand missing a few fingers.

Later he found out that the first guy was a Chinese minister the businessman’s church is supporting, and did not have leprosy.

I think you did a very good thing, I said to the businessman. Human touch is powerful. Jesus, who raised the dead with just a word, chose to touch the leper against the Jewish law. Rejected even by his own family and friends, how long had it been since the leper was touched last. How healing the touch must have been to his soul as well as to his body. What better way to show Jesus’ love, even if you were scared inside?

The businessman also told me that there are over three thousand ministers registered with the Korean government for China. According to the Chinese government, there are no ministers in the country. So the Korean ministers, who were denied of their existence, go in to the country as a teacher, a doctor, or a businessman.

The invisible messengers bringing good news to the invisible people. The government won’t even know what’s invading their country.