Korean American missionaries transform lives in home country

As the sun goes down over South Korea, another life ends in suicide.

The sad statistics in the country called the Land of the Morning Calm still affect International Mission Board missionaries Hun and Eunjoo Sol. 

Suicide is one of the leading causes of death in South Korea among those in their teens, 20s, and 30s. Combine these sobering statistics with fewer young people involved in church or wanting anything to do with faith and the Sols have reason to ask God for a big vision. Their vision includes a church plant on all 48 university campuses by the end of 2028. 

When they consider how often Koreans are dying without Christ, they have no time to waste. 

Hun and Eunjoo are thankful for a second-floor space in a building of a busy Seoul neighborhood. Their missionary team uses the rooms to host two church plants, English-conversation groups, and trauma-healing ministries. The space, strategic to their ministry, is provided by the generosity of Southern Baptists. The small location serves a big mission field. 

Hun and Eunjoo lead a team of IMB missionaries serving in Seoul. Specifically, this team focuses their ministry on college students and young adults living in and among Seoul’s 48 universities. 

Hun and Eunjoo are dedicated to bringing an authentic and loving gospel into people’s lives, often through non-traditional ways. They are seeing significant response to trauma-healing ministry. They call it THinK — Trauma Healing in Korea. Through this ministry, young people can receive a listening ear and non-medical counseling, while also pointing people to the hope of the gospel. 

Hun said they see their ministry as two-fold. 

“We want to help Korean churches train missionaries and start churches, and we want to reach students with the gospel and connect them to a Christian community.”

The Sols met on a praise team of their Korean church when they were in college. They moved to California to lead a church and start their family. After 18 years of Hun pastoring in San Jose, California, the Sols felt God call them to another international mission field. Forced to leave the first country where they served with the IMB, they considered a need for Korean Americans to help strengthen IMB’s relationship with Korean Baptists. 

“I didn’t expect to be back in my home country, but I knew God could use me here,” Hun said. 

The Sols have an important perspective on how Christianity has faded in Korea. Once thriving churches are now very small and aging. Young people show little interest in healthy churches in a country where the influence of cults is very strong.