This is the DMZ and is the world’s only demilitarized zone. It is a strip of land running across the Korean Peninsula, and despite its name is actually the most militarized zone in all the world. It was established as a neutral sector between South Korea and North Korea at the 38th parallel, after the armistice agreement.

While there has been a ceasefire since July 1953, the two countries are still technically at war. The DMZ has been called the most volatile place in the world. It’s also the world’s most hostile border, and one of the most heavily monitored areas of the world.

An obscure farming village called Panmumjom straddles the border and hosts the Joint Security Area. This is the only portion of the DMZ where North and South Korean soldiers stand face-to-face. All that separates the rival Koreans are some blue-roofed huts, a raised slab of concrete and the border line. 

On 13 November 2017, the peace and silence along the DMZ was shattered when Oh Chong-song, a North Korean soldier, raced his jeep towards the border line inside Panmumjom. The jeep became stuck in a ditch. Oh jumped out and started frantically running towards the border line.

The world watched in horror when the American-led UN Command disclosed security footage of the defection of the 24-year-old North Korean soldier. His four North Korean comrades fired over 40 rounds at him.

Oh was struck five times as he staggered across the border line and took cover near a building on the southern side of the Joint Security Area. He lay wounded in a pile of leaves until three South Korean soldiers crawled out and dragged him to safety.

Rescued by the South Korean soldiers, Oh was flown by a US army helicopter to Ajou University Hospital, where he received medical treatment and a number of surgeries to repair the gunshot wounds. 

But Oh is not the only person to make a dash across the border. Thousands of North Koreans have fled to South Korea since the end of the Korean War.

So, join me here at the DMZ in Korea as we take a closer look at the events that took centre stage in the fight for freedom.   And as we do so, we’ll be reminded that freedom is a universal value, one that is wanted by all people in all times, and that true freedom is worth everything.

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IDEOLOGY AND POLITICS

After Japan’s surrender at the end of WWII, Korea was liberated from Japanese colonial rule, but not for long. The Soviet Union became interested in drawing Korea into its sphere of influence and supporting a Communist government.

So, in July 1945, at the Potsdam Conference in Berlin, the US military planners proposed the dividing of the Korean peninsula at the 38th parallel into two occupation zones – the Soviets in the North and the Americans in the South. Ultimately, two separate systems of government were created, with both Korean regimes claiming the entire country.  

World War II had transformed both the United States and the USSR into formidable world powers. An ideological and political rivalry between the two superpowers gave way to the start of the Cold War. Sadly, the Korean peninsula became an unexpected casualty of the escalating Cold War.

Rejecting the UN idea of a free election for a new national government, Korean troops from both sides would often skirmish near the border from 1948 to 1950. The North Koreans, with the help of the Soviets made a plan to invade.

OUTBREAK OF WAR

On 25 June 1950, North Korea began a surprise attack on Seoul in a bid to control all of Korea. Some 90,000 troops stormed south past the 38th parallel. The attack was codenamed ‘Storm 244’.  The soldiers came on foot, by train and even driving Soviet tanks to take over the American supported capital of South Korea. This attack on Seoul started the Korean War.

In just three days, the North Korean troops seized Seoul. In response, South Korea then put its army under the jurisdiction of the American led United Nations force with the commander in chief, U.S. Army General Douglas MacArthur. 

The UN forces invaded North Korea in early October 1950. Then, on 19 October 1950, some 260,000 Chinese forces, the People’s volunteer Army, crossed the Yalu River border and entered the conflict.

After three years of hard combat fighting, the war ended in a stalemate with the border between North and South Korea near where it had been at the war’s beginning.

Eventually, an armistice signed in July 1953 brought the Korean War to an end, but families were still separated by the DMZ, or Demilitarized Zone. 

DEMILITARIZED ZONE CREATED

So, when the guns fell silent, the DMZ was created. It was meant to be a temporary buffer zone to prevent the war starting again. But the tragedy is that it still stands today as an almost impenetrable barrier to keep the two nations of Korea apart.

The DMZ looks like a gigantic geographical wound with continuous wire fences snaking up the hills and down the valleys from coast to coast. It is 4kms, or 2.5m wide and is nearly 260kms, or about 160 miles long.

An estimated two million land mines are strewn inside the 4km or 2.5-mile-wide zone. Its northern and southern perimeters are sealed by layers of razor-wire fences​ reinforced with booby traps or electronic sensors. Armed guards monitor the fences at every 30-60m, or 50 to 100 yards.

So despite its name, the DMZ or Demilitarized Zone and its vicinity are armed to the teeth. It is a conflict flashpoint. It’s an active war zone just 48kms or 30 miles north of the south Korean capital, Seoul. Millions of troops on either side stand ready to plunge into battle at a moment’s notice.

Over the last seven decades, there have been attempts to breach the divide created by the DMZ, re-linking roads and railways across the border, allowing cross-border trade and investment and organizing reunions of separated families.

Such efforts have all eventually failed, crumbling in the face of an unresolved conflict, and so the dreams of reconciliation and peace are slowly fading. 

TUNNELING FOR WAR

Despite the armistice agreement, North Korea began building underground tunnels below the demarcation line, with a plan to use them to invade South Korea. On 15 November 1974, the first tunnel was discovered 1.2km, or about ¾ mile south of the demarcation line.

On 24 March 1975, a second tunnel was discovered. And then on 17 October 1978, the third tunnel was found. It was 435m or about ¼ mile south of the demarcation line. This third tunnel is 73m, or about 240feet underground. That’s the equivalent height of a 25-storey building, inverted underground. 

This third tunnel is big enough for 30,000 soldiers and artillery to pass through in one hour. There was evidence that the tunnel was being planned for an invasion. It is suggested that there could be as many as 20 more similar tunnels under the DMZ.

The third tunnel was discovered when a civil engineer from North Korea who had been working on the tunnel defected to South Korea. He was able to give the exact location of the tunnel so that bores could be drilled to find it.

ESCAPING TO FREEDOM

North Korea blames South Korea for enticing its citizens to defect. The number of defectors in the postwar decades is more than 30,000. Nearly all of them have travelled across the border to China, and then through Southeast Asia to get to South Korea.

But the number who have escaped North Korea across the heavily fortified demilitarized zone (DMZ) is very few, with only 20 defectors, mostly soldiers, since 1996. But it is a rare event and very little is usually known about these people due to the fear of reprisals.

Remember Oh, the soldier in November 2017, whose escape across the border was captured on CCTV and broadcast on media around the world? Well, his daring attempt got him across the border, even though four North Korean soldiers were shooting at him.

Oh was wounded, but still managed to make it across the border line, and South Korean soldiers crawled to him and dragged Oh to safety. 

Ten years earlier in 2007, another young North Korean soldier also managed to successfully cross the DMZ at the Joint Security Area. But it is a very rare event.

Five years later, on 6 October 2012, an 18-year-old Korean People’s Army soldier was not detected as he crossed the DMZ in a place well away from the Joint Security Area. He was able to walk to a South Korean army barracks.

And then in 2015, another teenage soldier from North Korea walked across the DMZ at a South Korean guard post in the northeast part of South Korea. 

[And] one night, a 27-year-old North Korean soldier, Kim Gang-yu​, was able to sneak across the DMZ in 2016. The North Korean side was in darkness due to a lack of electricity, but the blazing electric lights lit up the South Korean border fences. 

Kim​ approached some South Korean soldiers and it is reported that the soldiers let him take a hot shower, which he said was his first hot-water shower for many years.

But crossing the DMZ is very dangerous, and so some chose to leave North Korea by sea. In October 2023, a fishing boat reported four suspected North Koreans defectors in a small boat south of the sea border. The South Korean coast guard rescued a family of one man and three women.

ACTIVISTS FOR FREEDOM

But the most popular way to escape North Korea is across the land border to China. In 2007, when Yeonmi Park was only 13, she and her mother fled from North Korea to China, and then to South Korea and finally to America. 

Yeonmi Park is described as being one of the most famous North Korean defectors in the world. Park wrote a memoir called In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl’s Journey to Freedom, that was published in September 2015. As of 2023, her book has sold over 100,000 copies.

Another North Korean defector who became a freedom activist, was Ji Seong-ho. He was born in 1982 and grew up during North Korea’s great famine in the mid-1990s. In 1995, his grandmother died of starvation and his family survived by eating the ground-up cores of corn husks and the roots of cabbages. 

Ji tells that at harvest time, the rats in the fields would stash seeds down their burrows. Ji would search for the burrows and then dig up the seeds for food. Often the rats would attack him, but he would club some of them to death and “that would give us a real feast.” 

Every few days, Ji would go out and steal coal from trains and try to exchange it in the markets for food. In 1996, when Ji was 14, he went with his mother and sister to steal coal. While jumping from one train car to another, he lost consciousness from hunger and fell through a gap between the cars.

When he regained consciousness, he saw the rear of the train receding down the track and then realised it had run over his body. The train wheels had almost severed his left leg and three of his fingers on his left hand. 

Ji recalls how he underwent a four and a half four operation without any anaesthetic.  The doctors amputated his left leg and left hand even though he still had two good working fingers. Ji’s recovery took 10 months, and he was now only able to move around using crutches.

At one time, Ji crossed the border into China in search of food. On his return, he was arrested and tortured. The North Korean police told him that cripples bring shame and should die. So, Ji Seong-ho resolved to escape. 

In 2004, Ji’s mother and sister managed to cross the border, but when his father tried to defect, he was caught and killed. In 2006, Ji managed to escape North Korea with his brother. They crossed into China via the Tumen River. Ji struggled to swim and nearly drowned crossing the river. Once on land, Ji urged his brother to leave him, fearing his disability would get them both captured.

With the help of brokers and religious groups, Ji trekked thousands of harrowing kilometres across China on his crutches and was eventually reunited with his brother in South Korea. Today he is an activist to improve human rights in North Korea, broadcasting free radio and helping defectors escape and resettle in South Korea.

GENERATIONAL RISK

Then in 1979, Ahn Chan-il, slipped through a North Korean border fence while its high-voltage electricity was turned off. But because of what he did, his family ​in the North ​was sent to a prison camp and is now presumed dead. 

Unfortunately, it is reported that families who have members that defect are often expelled from their neighbourhood and have their cash, valuable household items and electronics confiscated. Sometimes they are banished to the poorer remote Ryanggang province in the northern part of Korea. 

The North Korean government practices three-generation punishment. If anyone in North Korea commits a crime, not only will they be punished, but also their parents, grandparents and children will be penalised too.

North Korea is classified as the world’s most isolated state and one of Asia’s poorest countries. The WHO estimates that 60% of the population lives below the poverty line. Kim Jong Un is the third generation of his family to rule. The Kim dynasty has lasted for nearly 75-years and Kim Jong Un rules the country with a totalitarian government.

The government authorities impose tight restrictions on communication with the outside world, restrict basic liberties including freedom of expression, and there is a ban on independent media.

North Korea is a very difficult country to leave. On average about 1000 people from the North risk their lives to flee for the south each year. The interesting thing is that North Korea tries to kill its people who are fleeing. 

HUMAN HEART DESIRES FREEDOM

The desire for freedom is so strong, that despite the danger, many are willing to risk their lives to cross the border. Hundreds of others have died seeking the kind of freedoms that we often take for granted. 

You see, there is a basic longing in the human heart for freedom. We all want to be free.  

And yet, if history has taught us anything, it’s that freedom isn’t easy to come by. Freedom is not free. When people think about freedom, they often think about political or religious freedoms. But there is a freedom that goes far deeper: your spiritual freedom.

Let’s look at what the Bible says about freedom. 

“If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”  (John 8:36) 

So, who is the Son mentioned in this text? Well, this text is talking about Jesus saying, If I set you free, then you are going to be really free.

Now, Jesus is talking about a different kind of freedom, a freedom independent of politics, a freedom that no government, whether a liberal western democracy, or a communist regime, can give to anyone.  And, even more importantly, it’s a freedom that no-one can take away either.

You see, freedom is a big deal to God.  God made us to be free. He doesn’t want us enslaved to guilt, or resentment, or the pain of our past, or anything else.  He wants us to live a life that is free. 

The biggest prison is not in a repressive and isolated country.  The biggest prisons in life aren’t physical.  They’re the mental prisons in your mind.  Maybe it’s a relationship you feel trapped in.  Maybe it’s debt that you can’t escape. Maybe it’s a regret you have.

Maybe it’s a habit you can’t seem to shake, or an addiction you can’t break.  Maybe it’s a painful memory you can’t forget.  No matter what kind of prison you’re in, you need a way out.  And Jesus is our only doorway to freedom and eternal life. 

Most people are all bound up inside. We’ve got stress, worry, fatigue, boredom, bitterness, guilt, regret, fear, and anxiety. We may live in a free country, but we’re not spiritually free.

TRUE FREEDOM A GIFT

But what is truly amazing is that we can have that freedom right now. Jesus has opened the door to real freedom, where we can find release from fear, condemnation, the bitterness, anger, loneliness, grief, addictions, hurts and habits that hold us back in life. 

Jesus wants you to put your trust in Him. He wants to give you a clear conscience. He wants to give you peace of mind. He wants to renew our flagging spirits. That’s what happens when God forgives all our sins and wipes away all our guilt. 

One of the most destructive emotions we all face is guilt. It will burden you and weigh you down. The reason so many people are worn out is because they’re carrying a heavy load of guilt on their shoulders.

So, should we ever feel guilty? Well, yes, if we have done something wrong, then we should. But the good news is that we can confess it to Jesus and then we don’t feel guilty about it anymore. 

But when you hold on to guilt, it’s actually like saying, “Jesus, what you did on the cross wasn’t enough. I need to punish myself too.”

But the good news is that we can have freedom and the assurance of eternal life through what Jesus has done for us.  Remember Jesus paid the penalty for all our sins and mistakes. And so, when we accept Him as our Saviour, we walk away, free from guilt, free from condemnation, free from the fear of eternal death.

Many people today are seeking freedom.  Jesus is the only way to find freedom and the only way to find forgiveness, grace, peace, and the abundant life. Freedom is not free. Freedom is worth everything and Jesus was willing to give everything for you!  He was willing to give everything so that you can be free for eternity. 

Jesus loved us so much that our freedom was worth His sacrifice on the cross. Jesus made it possible for us to be free. Jesus has purchased your freedom with his own life. The Bible tells us:

“[God] purchased our freedom and forgave our sins” (Colossians 1:14) 

Jesus wants us to enjoy and experience a life of freedom from sin and its many problems. He wants us to have an abundant life. In the Gospel book of John, it says, 

“I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly” (John 10:10)

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It’s the booklet, Freedom Worth the Sacrifice. This booklet is our gift to you and is absolutely free. I guarantee there are no costs or obligations whatsoever. So, make the most of this wonderful opportunity to receive your free gift today.

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If you have enjoyed our journey to the Demilitarized Zone – the DMZ – the flashpoint of conflict in Korea;  and our reflections on the human longing for freedom that only Jesus can provide, then be sure to join us again next week, when we will share another of life’s journeys together. Until then, let’s pray to the only one who can give us true freedom.

Dear Heavenly Father, we want to thank you for the freedom you give us to choose life. We all want to be free, but freedom isn’t always easy.  We want to claim your promise that You can, indeed, make us free. Help us now to choose You, to choose that freedom that You so graciously offer us.  I ask this in Jesus’ name. Amen. 

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