A history dedicated to helping those in need

Yoido Full Gospel Church has consistently coordinated relief and aid efforts for the underprivileged across the nation since 1982. Courtesy of Yoido Full Gospel Church

By Sah Dong-seok

Yoido Full Gospel Church is preparing to hold a variety of events under the theme of "Re-Bible, Revival" to celebrate the 120th anniversary of Hardie's mission and the 65th anniversary of its foundation.

The highlight of those events will be a prayer meeting to be held on May 17 to 21 in the church. Robert Alexander Hardie was a Canadian physician and Methodist evangelist who served as a missionary in Korea for 45 years. He is recognized as the catalyst for the Wonsan Revival in 1903 which later inspired the Great Pyongyang Revival of 1907 in North Korea.

Church officials say the prayer meeting will serve as an occasion to look back on the faith and life of Hardie who led the Korean church's spiritual revival movement and prayed for the revival of the Korean church under the themes of "repentance and blessing," "filled with Holy Spirit" and "gratitude." Senior Pastor Lee Young-hoon will start the prayer meeting, followed by other pastors. Actor Shin Hyun-joon and other celebrities will appear as witnesses.

On May 23, a theological conference will be held to mark the church's 65th anniversary under the theme of "History and Future of Revival." A concert is scheduled for May 30 at the church.

All these events are in line with Yoido Full Gospel Church's goals for this year ― creating a church filled with grace and truth that concurrently serves the world with love and kindness and moves forward into a new revival.

Representatives and congregants of Pentecostal denominations from over 150 countries around the globe gathered at Yoido Full Gospel Church from Oct. 12 to 14, 2022, for the 26th Pentecostal World Conference (PWC) held in Seoul. Courtesy of Yoido Full Gospel Church

As a matter of fact, the Church has been striving to fulfill God's call to mission and to preach the gospel to all nations. Specifically, it calls for practicing love by caring for neighbors in need and carrying out God's will and vision as His servants.

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When it comes to offering a helping hand, Yoido Full Gospel Church is there.

As Korea is rapidly transforming into a multicultural society, the church has been holding worship services and meetings in different languages. In particular, simultaneous interpretation for Sunday services is provided in 10 languages ― English, Japanese, Chinese, French, Spanish, Indonesian, Arabic, Russian, Vietnamese and Korean. In addition, the church has opened a multicultural center in Ansan, Gyeonggi Province, to conduct various programs, including Korean language education for foreign workers and multicultural families.

At a time when more neighbors are suffering from natural disasters such as earthquakes and typhoons around the world, Yoido Full Gospel Church established the Good People Emergency Relief Organization in 1999. The group not only sent search and rescue teams for disaster relief, but also provided medical services to help Kosovo refugees, flood victims in Paju, Gyeonggi Province, and Turkish earthquake victims. It also carried out water purification projects and built shelters for orphans to restore the affected regions as quickly as possible. In particular, during the 2004 Indonesian tsunami, the 2005 Pakistan earthquake and the 2011 Japanese earthquake and tsunami, the church offered emergency relief and prayed for the victims.

Yoido Full Gospel Church Senior Pastor Lee Young-hoon, left, fills boxes with basic living necessities for people in need at Dongdaemun Design Plaza in Seoul, Nov. 25, 2022. The church delivered boxes to 23,000 underprivileged families in Seoul ahead of Christmas that year. Courtesy of Yoido Full Gospel Church

Its Boxing Day originated from the medieval tradition of religious groups distributing boxes of daily necessities to neighbors in winter. Yoido Full Gospel Church and Good People, its international rescue NGO, have since 2012 delivered thousands of boxes to neighbors in need annually. These boxes turned out to be a source of comfort and great strength for the neighbors, including the elderly, the poor, single-parent families and multicultural families in financial distress.

The church's "Medical Service of Love" program began in 1998 in the form of a general hospital on wheels that travels around the country. The mobile hospital provides healthcare services for farming and fishing villages that are without doctors as well as disabled people and foreign workers. Under the program, a 45-passenger bus was transformed into a medical aid vehicle equipped with advanced medical devices to treat patients.

Yoido Full Gospel Church launched its free heart surgery project in 1984 in the wake of its provision of aid for a child with heart disease who could not receive treatment owing to poverty. The project, usually funded by proceeds from selling used paper, milk cartons and old clothes by the church members, has since 2000 expanded into such countries as China, Vietnam and Cambodia, particularly focusing on children with heart disease. More than 6,000 children have benefited from the project so far.

The project went on, leading to the construction of the "Pyongyang Cho Yong-gi Heart Hospital" in 2007, a move aimed at spreading the love of Jesus Christ to North Koreans. The hospital was also designed to help promote civilian exchanges between the two Koreas as the church was preparing for national unification.

Late Rev. Cho Yong-gi of Yoido Full Gospel Church, left, smiles next to a child patient who was the first to receive free open-heart surgery in 1984 thanks to the church's medical welfare project. Courtesy of Yoido Full Gospel Church

The church established the "Rural Community Mission" to help churches and pastors in the sparsely populated countryside. Many groups in the church visit these rural churches every Sunday to hold revival meetings, offer evangelism training and deliver pastoral materials. The mission also helps set up Sunday schools for pastors who are eager to plant churches but lack financial and human resources.

In March 2013, Rev. Lee declared that Yoido Full Gospel Church would spend one-third of its annual budget on relief and support for the underprivileged and missionary work. His declaration meant that at least 35 billion won ($26.4 million) would be set for relief and evangelism every year.

Lee's promise has been kept. In 2017, about 38.6 billion won, or 31 percent of the church's budget of 124 billion won, was spent on relief and missionary work, and things were almost the same in 2018. Despite the coronavirus pandemic, Yoido Full Gospel Church, in 2022, devoted 35.3 percent of its annual budget of 127.5 billion won, or 44.7 billion won, to relief and evangelism.