I opened my computer and began to scan the news when a title jumped out at me:  Kim Jung-un calls For execution of 33 Christians . I read it and wept.

Their crime? receiving funds to help build about 500 underground churches.

According to David Curry of Open Doors, “North Korea has been the No. 1 persecutor of Christians on the Open Doors World Watch List for 12 years in a row. And for good reasons. Usually when persecution increases in a country, the heart of the gospel of Jesus Christ is rapidly spreading. Join me in prayer today.”

This quote, which is from an article posted only two days ago, urges believers everywhere to pray, among other things, for those sentenced to death for their faith.

Scripture admonishes us to “Remember the prisoners as if chained with them—those who are mistreated—since you yourselves are in the body also” (Hebrews 13:3). It can be easy when we are in our warm homes, children thriving, food and clothing to spare, birds chirping out the window – to forget them.

But to forget these brothers and sisters around the world who are being persecuted for their faith is to act in direct disobedience to God’s Word.  I can’t walk away from their cries when God tells me I should remember them “as if chained to them.” I should carry them with me in my heart, upon my lips in prayers to God often.

It is not easy to think about the persecuted. To imagine their sufferings and enter into their pain through prayer. But it is necessary because “we are in the body also” – these persecuted believers are subject to the same temptations we are such as fear, doubt, or unbelief and have the same needs that we do such as food and clothing.

I have had the honor and privilege of meeting persecuted believers in China and India in particular. One pastor I met  in 2005 was Samuel Lamb, who is now in Heaven.

Samuel Lamb was a Chinese House Church leader who spent over 20 years in prison because he refused to merge his church with the Three Self Patriotic movement, the State-regulated Protestant Church, which had many restrictions on what could be preached and taught. Pastor Lamb told me and a few of my friends in an interview in 2005, “Persecution is good! Church grows!” with a huge smile on his face.

I saw the light of Christ shining through this man who had endured so much for the sake of the Gospel. He had an eternal perspective and saw that all of his suffering was worth it for the sake of those who would come to know Jesus through his ministry and beyond his lifetime.

We can learn much from these humble saints who have been tried in the furnaces of affliction and found genuine. And we must remember them.

33 believers from North Korea have likely passed from Earth to Heaven now – they may have been sitting alone in cells, waiting for execution. But they’ve never been alone. The Lord who said, “I will never leave or forsake you” is not ashamed to call them His own and He has prepared a great reception for them in Heaven, no doubt.

We also know that, because of them,  there are 500 churches now spreading like wildfire through a nation hostile to its message. We must pray for those churches. For the families of those who have lost and are losing loved ones. For those imprisoned and suffering for their faith right now.

We must force ourselves to remember, lest we forget. Because they are our spiritual family and they are counting on us to carry them in prayer. And because when we are cut, we bleed just as they do.

In a culture that throws cheap and worthless advertisements and entertainment to occupy our minds all day long, let’s make a choice to focus in on what is of real worth and lasting value.

And these believers are the real deal. They are genuine gold.

In the words of Christian martyr Jim Elliott, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”

Image of hands credit: http://www.bible-reflections.net/news/praying-for-north-korean-christians/2798/

Image of Samuel Lamb credit: Jesusblogger