Here's something that was sent to me by Seoul USA, a ministry that is reaching North Koreans wherever they live. It is an explanation as to why Korea's church is so Bible-based. May it ever be. And may those north of the DMZ (38th parallel) get more and more a taste of the solid Rock upon which many South Koreans have been established. This was written and translated by Koreans, with just a little English assistance from yours truly...

The Korean church grew rapidly after the Sino-Japanese War and the Russo-Japanese War. In 1894, missionaries from the American Northern Presbyterian church had 235 baptized believers and the Methodist church had 221 registered and "probationers" in the church. But by 1905 the number of Christians increased to 30,386 and 7,796 each. This was partly due to the Russo-Japanese War but perhaps moreso due to the growth of faith resulting from the distribution of the Korean Bible.

The believers were aware of the evangelical power of the Bible from their experience and they put all their heart into distributing it. This was influenced by Ross and Nevius who emphasized Korean independence.

The Korean aggression in Bible distribution is brought out in this article by the British Bible Society, reported in 1899:

"The Bible society has not employed as many Bible men in some areas as we should have. This is because the Korean people are doing it themselves. In Pyoung-An province the local churches are taking this responsibility so seriously that within three years there will not be any more villages or cities left that needs to be reached with the Bible."

The Bible society withdrew their "Bible men" from the areas where local churches were eagerly distributing the bibles. At Eun-Yul church which was under the supervision of missionary C. E. Sharp, the Bibles were stored in the church building so that believers could take them along to a market place or neighboring villages to evangelize.

In addition, Korean churches employed the Bible men independently and supported them. "Won-San Southern Methodist church and Mok-Po Southern Presbyterian church each supported one Bible man per year." And the Korean Christians had huge interest in their report when they came back from their trip. "Bible men's ministry continued with a great interest and passionate prayer from our church. When the Bible men return to their home at the end of each month, the saints gather in their houses to hear the joyful news."

In the year 1899, Korean churches even chose one Sunday in May as "Bible Sunday" in order to spread the Bible, and by 1902, almost every church in Korea celebrated this special day.