Duhi Park Schneider is a friend and college classmate. Over the years, we got to know her mom, Hannah Park. This past weekend, at 95 years-old, she passed on. But her story of faith and the power of prayer lives on.

After the Korean War, Hannah and her husband Peter saw that the new communist nation of North Korea was determined to eliminate Christianity among its people. They killed pastors and burned Bibles. Persecution was severe. And in the shadow of that persecution, the world's fastest growing prayer movement began.

How prayer and women changed a nation

David Yonggi Cho was a catalyst, starting his church in a ragged tent on the edge of Seoul. He didn’t have money, influence, or a plan. He had a handful of poor women like Hannah and a deep conviction that God answers prayer.

Those early meetings were simple. Cho preached, and his mother-in-law, Choi Ja-shil, led the people to pray—sometimes for hours. They prayed for food, for healing, for neighbors. They prayed because they had nothing else to rely on. Cho would later say, “Prayer is not part of the work. Prayer is the work.”

When the Tent Collapsed

One Sunday, a heavy rainstorm hit during worship. The old tent tore open, and the people were drenched. Instead of running home, they kept singing in the rain. Cho looked around and realized, This church doesn’t belong to me. It belongs to God.

That soggy service marked the beginning of something supernatural.

Learning to Let Go

As the church grew into the thousands, Cho tried to carry the whole load himself—visiting the sick, counseling the broken, leading every meeting. The pressure crushed him. Exhausted and near collapse, he cried out to God: “I can’t do this anymore.”

In prayer, he sensed the Spirit whisper, “Let the women do it.”

That was unthinkable in 1960s Korea. Women didn’t teach or lead men. But Cho obeyed. He began training ordinary women to shepherd small groups in their homes. They studied Scripture, prayed, and cared for their neighbors.

Before long, these “cell groups” began multiplying across the city. The church doubled, then tripled, not because of programs or preaching, but because women full of faith started pastoring their neighborhoods.

Cho later admitted, “The secret of my success is prayer and the women.”

Prayer Mountain

As numbers swelled, Cho built a retreat center outside Seoul called Prayer Mountain. He wanted a place where people could fast, pray, and encounter God. Soon thousands came every week.

They prayed in small caves carved into the hillside—mothers crying out for wayward sons, businessmen seeking wisdom, pastors desperate for renewal. Cho said that walking between those caves before dawn sounded like “waves of the ocean.”

From those waves of prayer, revival spread across Korea. Churches exploded in growth. Missionaries were sent. A nation once known for poverty and despair became one of the great centers of world Christianity.

Daily Partnership

Every morning Cho would begin his day with a simple prayer:

“Good morning, Holy Spirit. What shall we do together today?”

He refused to make big decisions without peace. When God gave him a vision to build a 12,000-seat sanctuary on Yeouido Island, he waited and prayed until that inner assurance came. It took years, but the building rose—and filled many times over each Sunday.

Hannah Park, Prayer Warrior

Hannah Park became a prayer warrior in a nation torn apart by civil war. She experienced persecution that drove her, and thousands like her, to her knees. And there she learned the power of prayer. Praying women formed the backbone of that church. Together, they changed a nation, turning it into a powerhouse sending missionaries to proclaim the gospel to the nations.

They learned a simple formula for changing the world.

• Pray first.

• Empower ordinary people.

• Let the Holy Spirit lead.

They proved that revival doesn’t begin with wealth or talent. It begins when people humble themselves and pray—really pray—until heaven breaks through.

As Cho once said, “When you build your church on prayer and small groups, you don’t have to chase revival. Revival will chase you.”

Maybe that’s what our churches need again—not another strategy, but another upper room. Not better marketing, but deeper prayer.

Hannah Park has passed on to glory. But the Spirit that filled a tent in Seoul is still moving, still looking for men and women who will make room for Him.