As one of the world's last communist-inspired dictatorships, North Korea, impoverished and internationally isolated, has endured more than 25 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.
It will be historic if Kim Jong-un meets with Donald Trump on June 12 as planned, as the leaders of the two countries have never met before.
It was historic on Friday, April 27, 2018, when Kim Jong-un became the first person ever to cross the demarcation line that has divided the peninsula since the end of the Korean War in 1953 and meet with South Korean President Moon Jae-in. The meeting may be a tentative step towards détente and even raises long-term hopes of reunification - just as another communist country, East Germany, was united with West Germany in 1990. For most, this would have been impossible to imagine just a few years earlier.
My thoughts are drawn to the South Korean Christians who have been praying tirelessly for many years for their brothers and sisters in the North, for North Korea as a society and for reunification. The South Korean church is known for beginning the day with prayer. Many Christians meet in their churches from as early as 4:30 in the morning and pray together for perhaps an hour before going to work. During a visit to the country last year, I had the privilege of attending such a morning prayer meeting. I felt the presence of the Holy Spirit strongly in the meeting and it challenged me to think big about what can happen when God's people spend time with Him in prayer. One example is the growth in the number of Christians in South Korea, where about a third of the country's population are professing Christians, according to statistics.
Like the South Korean Christians, many Christians in Western and Eastern Europe had prayed, and the fall of communism in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union was remarkable as, with very few exceptions, the shift to a market economy and democracy took place without loss of life.
Although the meeting in the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea was historic - and the meeting with Trump could be - the North Korean dictatorship still stands and the oppression and persecution of its Christians remains extreme. It is also possible that Kim Jong-un is using his overtures to South Korea and Trump as a diversion to buy time to secretly develop nuclear weapons - and get the tough sanctions against the country eased.
It therefore seems utopian to write about reconciliation at this point, but on the other hand, we cannot rule out that this could be the first step towards a scenario where the Danish European Mission's donors no longer have to help persecuted Christians and other North Koreans in need. Just as aid to Christians in the Eastern Bloc was phased out after the collapse of communism. A future where persecuted Christians and other people in need in North Korea no longer have to smuggle medicine and vegetable seeds - and where North Koreans no longer risk their lives to escape to China - which sends them back to the country where they risk imprisonment and torture for escaping.
Whatever happens, we can continue to stand with the North Korean underground Christians. Not only through practical help, but also by praying so that they can have the power and strength to endure persecution and experience God's intervention in their daily lives.
