Far from home,
welcome
home.

Rev. Dr. Inho BAIK spent twenty-nine years teaching history at Sogang University. But in 2002, while still a lay deacon, he began leading BEE seminars for believers in Vietnam - and was so moved by Christians who kept their faith under persecution that the teacher came home changed. He enrolled in seminary during a sabbatical, was ordained in 2011, and spent every vacation for two decades teaching the Word across Vietnam, China, Indonesia, Nepal, Kenya, and Côte d'Ivoire.

Retirement came in February 2022, and with it, closed doors - paths to Côte d'Ivoire and Senegal both blocked. Then in June 2023, on the very day he returned from a mission trip to Vietnam, the phone rang: would he start an international church for the foreign students of Sogang? He took it as God's call. Three fellow Christian professors - colleagues in the faculty fellowship since 1995 - pledged themselves alongside him, and on 13 August 2023 ISC-Sogang held its founding worship service, without a single student in the room.

"It is not a church I started; it is a church begun because God sovereignly called - and so God Himself will be responsible for it."

Within three weeks the first two students had found their way in - one from Kenya, one from Japan. The family has been growing, nation by nation, ever since. The debt once owed to the missionaries who carried the gospel to Korea as foreigners, he says, is now being repaid - to the foreign students who have come to this land.

Caleb Jules is a gospel singer and songwriter who desires to glorify God and serve people through music and gospel sharing. Originally from Rwanda, he studied Christian Community Leadership with Business at African Bible University in Uganda before earning his M.Div. at Chongshin Theological Seminary here in Korea.

Along the way he has served wherever the church needed him - children's ministry, worship ministry, evangelism, and discipleship - across three countries and two continents. Through his music and his ministry, Caleb seeks to honor God, proclaim the gospel, and encourage people to know and follow Jesus Christ.

Through music and ministry - to honor God, proclaim the gospel, and help people follow Jesus.

Woonsup Shin joined Sogang University in 1995, where he has taught students and carried out research across many areas of electrochemistry. More recently he developed and commercialized an electro-osmotic pump able to control very small volumes of fluid with precision - work that led him to found CareMedi, a company developing and manufacturing insulin patch pumps built on that technology.

Throughout his professional career he has greatly enjoyed attending academic conferences, exchanging ideas and building relationships with fellow researchers, and that led naturally into service. He served as President of the Korean Electrochemical Society and as a Division Chair of the International Society of Electrochemistry, among other roles. For him these positions have been less about titles and more about the joy of contributing to and serving the communities to which he belongs.

During his years at Sogang University he has been actively involved in the Christian Faculty Fellowship, sharing faith and fellowship with fellow professors, and for the past ten years he has served as President of the Sogang Christian Faculty Fellowship. In 2023 he had the joy of taking part in the founding of ISC-Sogang together with Professors Inho Baik, Jaewoong Kim, and other Christian faculty members with whom he had shared many years of fellowship in faith.

His home church is God's Will Kwangsung Church, where he currently serves as the leader of the Galilee Choir. His love for choir ministry began in middle school, when a choir was first formed at the church he attended. Since then, whenever he has had the opportunity, he has enjoyed being part of a choir and experiencing the joy of praising God together through music.

He grew up in the church, and was blessed to marry a childhood friend with whom he had shared his faith and church life from an early age. They have three sons, two of whom are now married, and are blessed with a grandson and a granddaughter. He continually prays that their family will grow together in faith, love, and harmony.

In his daily life, he seeks to live with integrity before God and others, and to embrace each day with joy and gratitude.

Jae-Woong Kim came to Sogang University in September 2001 and taught and researched there for twenty-two years, retiring in August 2023. His work has centered on educational policy and administration, the politics of education, and the lives of teachers themselves. Before Sogang he was a senior researcher at the Korean Educational Development Institute and a professor at Korea National Open University.

He has written and co-written several books, among them Exploring the Politics of Education, An Introduction to Education, Understanding Educational Administration and School Management, and Educational Policy Studies: Theory and Cases. Two of his works - The Politics of Homeschooling and Rethinking the History of Public Education in the United States - were named Outstanding Academic Books by the National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Korea.

At Sogang he taught undergraduates in the teacher education program, students preparing to become teachers themselves, and mentored those in the Graduate School of Education - many of them already working in schools and companies. He was also part of the Christian Faculty Association, meeting weekly for prayer and studying the Bible alongside other Christian professors.

He grew up in a Christian family, where going to church was simply part of life. His own meeting with Jesus Christ came more particularly in his second year of high school, at the EXPLO ’74 gathering, and the verse he was given then has stayed with him ever since.

Very truly I tell you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be judged but has crossed over from death to life. - John 5 : 24

Since those school years he has worshipped and sung in the choir at every church he has belonged to. Through daily Quiet Time he seeks to meet the Lord, to understand what He is asking, and to live accordingly.

He now attends Yedam Church in Seongbuk-gu, Seoul, and serves here at ISC-Sogang with real gladness. He would be delighted, he says, to meet you and worship together.

While living in the United States, God led me to Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, where I majored in Christian Education. Beginning in the late 1980s, He led me to facilitate small groups of every kind - QT meetings, prayer meetings, Bible studies, and discipleship seminars - and in 1993 my husband and I began serving together in a house-church ministry.

After returning to Korea, I began attending Onnuri Church in 1998, where I was introduced to BEE Korea, trained, and established as a group facilitator. In 2003 I had the opportunity to join Pastor Baik on my first overseas ministry trip, to Vietnam - and since then I have led seminars in Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Ghana, Kenya, and other countries.

One day I told the Lord that I missed being part of a small church that feels like family. He answered that simple request: two years ago, at Pastor Baik's invitation, I began attending this church.

Today I serve with joy and gratitude - enjoying warm, close fellowship in a church that feels like family, and equipping the students I cherish so dearly with the Word of God.

After encountering Jesus passionately at the age of 27, I have experienced His faithful guidance throughout my life. I retired after serving as a professor in the Department of Fashion Industry at Incheon National University for 32 years. During my years there, I felt called to share the gospel with international students and help them become disciples of Jesus Christ. Together with Christian professors, I organized various activities and Bible studies, and six Chinese graduate students were eventually baptized.

After they returned to China and became professors, however, I was saddened to learn that most of them could no longer continue their Christian lives because of their changed environment. This led me to pray about how international students could return home and continue living as Christian professors and disciples on their campuses.

Through the example of the International Student Church at Sungkyunkwan University, I realized how important a church for international students can be. Although my earlier attempt to start one at Incheon National University did not work out, God opened another door.

In the summer of 2023, Pastor Baik invited me to help start the International Student Church at Sogang University. I felt that God had opened this door, and I wanted to offer whatever small contribution I could.

Students from many countries come to Sogang University. I pray that through this church, many international students will encounter Jesus Christ, become His disciples, and eventually become Christian leaders on their own campuses.

I truly enjoy spending time with the students, worshiping with them, and sharing Korean culture and food. Each student God has sent to us is precious, and it is a great joy to see them grow as leaders. I hope to continue serving them as a faithful intercessor, praying for each one of them.

Prof. Changhwan Lee, of the Department of Psychology at Sogang University, is one of the four professors who founded ISC-Sogang in 2023. After about two years of service with our church, he is now devoting himself once again to his work of teaching and research. We offer our gratitude and our blessing.

His prayers, his dedication, and the love he has long held for international students were present at the very place where this church was first established. That is part of the history of our community that we remember and give thanks for together.

We are deeply grateful for the ministry he carried out among us, and we pray that God's grace will always be with him in every step that lies ahead.