By Bailey Jacobs, freshman

In August of 2006, a 16-year-old boy from Seoul, South Korea, boarded a plane to embark on new chapter of life in the United States.

“Of course I did not want to leave,” said Jinwon Kim, now a Friends University freshman. “My family, culture, language, my home church, (it was all) that I knew for 16 years and was going to have to leave behind.”

Kim prayed for months over his departure from South Korea and questioned whether it was what God had planned for his life. Looking to his mother for wisdom, praying and waiting was all he could do.

Haesuk Kim, Jinwon’s mother, has had the largest impact on his life.

“She is my hero,” Kim said. “I still have this picture in my head of my mother in the church. I still see her praying and crying there before I left home.”

Haesuk was sure that God was ready to use her son in the United States.

“I have realized that it is my duty to be a servant of God wherever I am on the planet,” Kim said. “It does not matter what location you are in, he will use you wherever you are. God chose to use me here.”

Kim came through a student exchange program as a sophomore in high school and attended the small Word Christian School in Wichita. His junior year, he transferred to the Sunrise Christian Academy, where he received his diploma in 2009.

He has lived in Wichita for four years and does not plan to leave soon.

“He is just one of those people that you want to talk to and get to know,” Friends freshman Hannah Shuck said. “I knew he was on the football team and that he lives for the Lord. When you see him he just radiates this goodness.”

Campus activities keep life busy and surprising for Kim. He is a leader academically, socially and through Campus Ministries.

Friends freshman Angie Mitchell traveled alongside Kim and 37 other Friends students to Houston over Spring Break on a Campus Ministries mission trip.

“One thing that stood out over the mission trip to me was that he would leave our group to go talk to people and remind them that he was praying for him,” said Mitchell. “It was almost as if he put other people before his own safety. He just cares like that.”

Graduating from school with a double major in psychology and religion is at the top of Kim’s priorities, and he said that Friends has given him a comfortable home in trying to achieve those goals.

“I chose Friends after taking a tour and meeting with the football coaches. The fact that it was a small Christian school with smaller classes made my choice easy,” Kim said.

For someone who did not want to leave his home country, Kim has done an excellent job of adapting, learning and loving the American culture.

“I’m not sure if I am going to leave. This country has shaped me into who I am,” Kim said.

Through missions work, Kim hopes to lead other people to Jesus Christ. His plans are nowhere near concrete, but he would either like to become a missionary, go to seminary or move home to South Korea to serve in the military.

South Korea has mandatory military service of 21 months. There are no alternatives for service except imprisonment. Kim will have to serve in the military regardless of the time it takes for him to return home as long as he is a citizen of South Korea.

Still having his South Korean citizenship, Jinwon says that he is not sure if he will get U.S. citizenship. His destiny is in God’s hands.

“My visa expires in four years, so I have some time to decide and for God to show me what he wants,” Kim said. “All I know right now is that I am living and breathing for him.”