The last of a series of blogs heading round the 32 qualifying countries in the 2022 World Cup - to see all in the series select the label 'World Cup Churches' below.
South Korea made little impression on the World Cup: but the churches of Korea have made a great deal more impression on Christianity over the past hundred years.
The real story begins in what is now North Korea and the remarkable spiritual revival in 1907 in Pyongyang. There can be little doubt that were it not for 20th century politics, some of the largest churches in the world would be in and around Pyongyang - which has only a handful of 'show' churches under its current regime.
Many of the Christians of those days were killed or fled south and/or abroad to North America as the sad and complicated Korean peninsula history unfolded, culminating in the Korean War. This people movement brought Christianity to the South where it has flourished. Unlike in Wales (which we looked at earlier click here) the evidence of Korean revival is still found in the life of churches rather than their buildings.
This brings me to Yonsei Central Baptist Church.
When England won the World Cup in 1966 this church did not exist. When I was ordained into Christian ministry this Church did not exist. Yet, of course, it can trace its history atmospherically to the Christian spirituality of the missionaries and revivals that century ago.
You could spend a long time watching the prodigious output of their media ministries but I have chosen this half hour clip for a reason. The church was born out of a group of people in a basement who where 100% committed to Christ and to prayer. And then it grew and grew. Unusually for a Korean Baptist Church it is also charismatic in doctrine.
Yet if you watch through this worship time clip, the whole half hour (on this Sunday) was songs of repentance. This is as rare on the YouTubes of churches as revival is in modern England. And that is the point.
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