thus true authority must be like an author, source of meaningful words to inspire others rightly how to follow something good/worth following

Sin is sin, and abuse is abuse, no matter whether you’re a Korean or an American. The Korean senior shepherds of 1976 recognized and described the abuse very clearly, not so much different than an American of 2013. And I still haven’t heared one word of UBF to rehabilitate the people of 1976 and excuse for the abuse and evil teachings and inaccountability of Samuel Lee. We shouldn’t allow them to play stupid with us.

Yet, I was not allowed to be culturally different. Can you imagine the response from most Korean directors when American students reject Korean leadership and tell Korean leadership to deal with it because it is simply a cultural difference?

For me personally, the cultural difference argument is infuriating. It is often used to justify sin, unhealthy relationships, abuse, etc. and to resist changing any of these things.

What really needs to change is the culture of UBF. It has an unhealthy culture of its own that I believe is separate from either Korean or American culture. I think the reason that tension between Korean and American culture is cited as a source of problems is because in UBF culture American culture is denigrated constantly and Korean culture is glorified constantly.

blind “faith” (trust) is all the problem…

This is something needs to be untwisted. This is how the ubf director mind usually works:

1. Make some statement or reference from a source that the audience might know or respect.

2. Don’t make any concrete statement about what you (the director) really believes. The statement does include the director’s opinion, but it is given in a generic way that would allow for multiple conclusions. This allows for some experimentation, to see who agrees with your point and who does not agree. This gives the director his much valued sense of who would be loyal to him and who would be considered enemies.

3. When someone shares a contrary opinion to the director’s hidden meaning, the response is silence.

4. When someone shares an opinion that matches the director’s real intention, then emphasize that and bind that thought to ubf ideology as a justification.

This is a sick and maddening form of control. I see it so clearly almost all of James’ interactions here. As I said before, I hope he is different and starts to answer the questions honestly which are directed to him– without quoting anybody and without referencing any bible verses.

Such “lording over” and “exercising authority over” juniors and sheep in the name of “shepherding sheep” has been accepted and embraced as “God’s chosen way” of conquering the world with the gospel through UBF. Such a 50 year mentality and paradigm has produced very sincere and very abusive leadership. It has also produced the ugliest traits of Christianity, such as elitism, exclusivity, unaccountability, and unfounded superiority, which is really being “groundlessly proud.”

Because they are very sincere, many became Christians or adopted a more serious or disciplined approach to Christian life and toward the Bible. But because they are also abusive, many become wounded, they feel violated and used, and eventually leave UBF.

Perhaps such authoritarian and abusive unhealthy leadership is being addressed gradually–but too slow in my opinion, since this has already been ongoing in a bad direction for 50 years. But as many say, this should be addressed forefront, foremost and of utmost importance, rather than doing so only AFTER doing the “more important work” of evangelism and discipleship.

Yes, +1, ditto, Amen!

“Otherwise, UBF will primarily consist of older brother sinners, who are the “worst” kind of sinners in the entire Bible”

Indeed. But I am exacerbated by ubf directors who keep saying “I am the WORST of sinners!” but keep doing the same abusive sins, saying “Just FORGIVE me!”. I heard that line over and over and over during my leaving process.

At one point I told a ubf director: “Get off your high horse. You are NOT the worst of sinners. You just need to repent and step down.”

When I talked to ubf leaders I saw that their idea is like, “Well, your director abused, that was bad, now he is trying to change his directorship style. So come back and see that your director is changing”. They don’t understand that the director’s existence itself is the main abuse. Korean leadership outside Korea is another great abuse. All those “inter cultural” issues don’t matter at all. They would matter if the church is in a neutral inter cultural space. But such space doesn’t exist on this planet. And whatever you try to understand the host culture being Korean you will never become native and your leadership will be abusive anyway. Maybe US is somewhat a multi-cultural country, I don’t know. Still there is American culture and it is a West culture, not an East one. Maybe second gens can become American. Nevertheless I would never agree that it is normal for an American church to have 50+% Korean members and 100% Korean leadership. It is an abuse. It is ok if it is a Korean church for Koreans living in the US. So to change ubf for some good the change of the directorship style is not enough. As far as I understand ubf is going to remain a Korean corporation (not native and not a church) with Korean branches abroad which Korean leaders are very proud of. (And personally I see no place for me and my family in a Korean corporation with abusive leadership. And it is bad that we spent and even wasted so much time there being non-Korean Christians)

And on the personal level I really don’t need a mediator and a shepherd but Jesus, I don’t need a director but the Holy Spirit, I don’t need a king of kings and a lord of lords but Jesus (Jesus made us kings and priests), I don’t need a spiritual father but the Heavenly Farther and what I need less of all is a Korean abusive director who wants to lord over me in every possible sphere of my life and who always tries to shadow Jesus and God’s kingdom and wants me to do many strange things: strange for me as a Christian and as a Russian.

I received a 17 year abuse and I can’t imagine the directors apologizing the next 17 years and I don’t want them to. I just want the good intentional missionaries to leave, “run away” in the good sense and try to do something healthy before the Lord. My opinion is an opinion of a native. ubf leaders, if you want to hear a native and if you have ears, please hear: 1. Understand he gospel and serve with it (what you are doing now is abusive even for Koreans). 2. Serve Koreans (your best intentions toward natives will never make a good thing out of an abuse).

I feel most sorry for those UBF leaders and their defenders who primarily think that “I (they) suffered so much for sheep. I sacrificed for sheep. I gave my whole life for sheep.” I believe they truly believe so. They may also believe in Jesus. Yet, they do not understand their own “older brother” sins, and are always constantly rebuking juniors and the world for “younger brother” sins.

In the Bible “older brother” (i.e. UBF leader’s) sins are ALWAYS worse than “younger brother” (i.e. sheep’s) sins. I hope that someday UBF begins to teach and address “older brother sins” clearly, loudly, and consistently. Otherwise, UBF will primarily consist of older brother sinners, who are the “worst” kind of sinners in the entire Bible.

Thanks for pointing this out. Yes there is much dualism in the ubf mindset. ubfers need to see the Trinity and accept that the Holy Spirit is not just a spirit or force, but God, and that the Holy Spirit is our Director, so no need for chapter directors who “direct” the lives of “sheep”. We belong to God, not to a ubf director.

“They attempted to reconcile Greek thought with Christianity.”

Perhaps this helped lead to the right-wing, zionist form of Christianity in America that is also a layer you have to fight through when leaving ubf.

By the way, would you explain why ubf has a website called Zion UBF? http://zionubf.org/

So what do we have here? We just had a snapshot of stories from the 80s, 90s, 00s, and 10s (four decades) and from Germany, Russia, India, Canada and America (five countries)– all with identical stories of abuse of power and the spiritual abuse of demanding conformance to ubf heritage using ubf ideology.

“Change” in ubf means “rearranging the chairs on the Titanic”.

When I went fishing I also felt strange.
1. Because I was “strictly ordered” to go fishing, but while fishing I was supposed to share love of Jesus and of our church. If you receive love and share it it is normal. But if you receive orders what love are you going to share?
2. Because I could believe and believed that Jesus’ gospel may attract people and bring them to the church. But I knew also that people wouldn’t want to stay in the church which is not attractive with its many meetings and strange activities. Who on earth would wish to live in the obedience I lived in?! So again there was dissonance inside me: I wanted to share the gospel but I couldn’t believe that people would come to ubf if they knew what its reality is. And there had always been a great pressure to increase the “number”. Nobody cared whether you shared the gospel or not, and in the weekly report you have to put your 1:1 number and that is by what you are judged and (dis)honoured every week and even every day in ubf.

And if you try to explain anything, then like in the army academy no one will hear you. Instead you will hear, “Don’t think, just keep shooting!”. ubf methods just don’t work and are not blessed by God. As Joshua said, revival is done by the Holy Spirit, not through our labour or methods. So methods are not important, there is no Holy Spirit blessing on ubf efforts. And this is important. And it is because the motives, the prossess and the results are not approved by God. And our souls feel that even through this dissonance which is I believe in every ubfer except the leaders. It seems very difficult for the ubf leaders to understand many things many ubf problems because they have never tried to obey their own orders, their own “God’s word”. They just “serve” so much with their commands and orders and then curse those ungrateful proud “satans” and wonder why they left the “true” way of obedience to them. And there is no former ubfers’ blessing on ubf. And that is also important because the former ubfers are Christians and they don’t approve ubf before God and according to their conscience.

“—Sherman and Hendricks make an excellent assessment here of how many Western societies have been affected by the philosophies and culture of the Greek influence. We in the United States may speak English, but we think Greek. Our focus on competition, segmentation of life from the secular to sacred, rationalism and reasoning all move us to a goal of a more intellectual position in our faith instead of a simple, trusting faith. The root of this is the Greek/Hellenistic civilization. It has been so much a part of our thinking and way of viewing life that we have lost our ability to understand God and relate to Him as the early church did.

As the church grew and extended its borders outside Jerusalem, believers became influenced by a wide array of philosophies. The purity and power of the message were affected by the dominant culture, which became the Greek culture. The time following the two major Jewish revolts of A.D. 70 and A.D. 135 saw a Greek, man-centered view of the world reshape the church. Early Greek scholars, like Plato, introduced dualism, which says life is divided into two compartments: the spiritual or eternal, and the temporal realm of the physical. Plato’s dualism entered the church through many of the church fathers who were Greek philosophers who converted to Christianity. They attempted to reconcile Greek thought with Christianity.”

I believe that if UBF’s leaders are able to clarify our spiritual heritage as Jesus Christ alone, God will be pleased, and many of our members will be deeply comforted.

@Joe, Amen! Thanks for clear voices like yours in the Church today not minimizing the truth, not exaggerating either.

Regarding our historic root, yes we need to reconnect ourselves to the apostles on the day of Pentecost. Some crazy person planted a fancy word “mother Church” referring to ubf, to someone very close to me, and I had to counsel almost two hour this morning.

My Korean Bible teacher told me her experience is that you must invite 100 people to find 1 sheep. This is the way UBF has always operated. Finding the one person who is just in a existencial crisis or identity crsis or utterly lonely or having examn nerves, and can easily be manipulated. Then making that person believe it is a heavenly intervention into his or her life and becoming the personal savior for that person and making him or her eternally thankful for what you and UBF have done and make him or her a lifetime member of UBF based on that. It’s actually taking advantage of the spiritually or socially helpless situation of people. I would consider this all legit if there were not these hidden goals of getting honor and increasing the organization by “raising shepherds” that way, but just the wish to help people and then let them choose to join whatever church they like. This would be facilitate if UBF would not pretend to be a church in the first place.

Just read the mission report mentioned by Brian to see how much honor UBF leaders draw from that: “God established a 36 house-churches, 120 adults and 120 children through him.” Whatever that means that somebody “established 120 children”.

Yes, I too am glad to be here on ubfriends though my wife thinks that it is a wastage of time. My former director’s wife who returned from Chicago recently is seemingly annoyed by my comments here on ubfriends and advises me to concentrate on Jesus! Thanks to the grapevine.

I shared already that once the director asked my sheep, “What must you DO to find many sheep?” The sheep (who was a shepherd of course) answered, “I should seek deep relationship with Jesus so that He would work through me and attract people to Himself”. The director was furious and shouted, “What are you talking about?! What relationship?! You must not think you must just go and fish the new sheep. It is that simple: the more you go fishing the more sheep you will have!” And it was not in 1976, it was in 2011.

Recently, one of the young people in my church shared a testimony about a great work of the Holy Spirit in one of the local universities. A fire of the gospel was ignited among many Christian freshman and they began to boldly share the good news of Jesus to their friends in the dormitories, and dozens of students have come to believe in Christ in the past few months. When I heard such a wonderful testimony, I realized that all the man-made efforts I had expended for 10 years to artificially change people through my own efforts in shepherding them was just like kicking against the goads. I saw that the Holy Spirit is pleased to work as he wants, and I rejoiced.

I remember that I once attended a European directors conference and someone gave a lecture about Jonathan Edwards’ view of revival. His point is that revival is caused by the Holy Spirit and cannot be brought about through human efforts. After the lecture, the director said (paraphrase): “Thank you for teaching us that revival comes from the Holy Spirit and not through our efforts. Now, let’s pray that we may work extra hard to fish students so that a revival may come to Europe.” His words were literally that contradictory!

Most amusing, in 2003, my father visited during the Easter conference, and he was asked if he could share his personal testimony. And he was coached to share it the same way as you describe, asked to write it down, and critiqued before he had shared it to make it more praising UBF and thankful for how God has wonderfully blessed my son through UBF, and encouraged to “release” and “bless” his son to be committed fully to UBF. My dad was several years older than the fellow coaching him, had served for years as a church-planter and evangelist, and was a guest. He was pretty good-humored about it, but it definitely struck him as being very unnatural and controlling.

I said, “I thought…”
The officer interupted, “You should not think here. if you try, you’ll feel headache soon” He meant that I would be beaten if I don’t just be silent and listening and obedient.

And speaking about conferences, in such chapters like ours you were supposed to do everything: the message (writing 4+ times and then reading), taekwondo show, special songs, world mission night songs and dances, etc. During conferences preparation time (4-5 weeks 3 times a year) and during “Bible school” preparation time (about 4 weeks not less than 3 times a year) the usual meetings and sogams and daily bread remained as a normal obligation.

“The fact is that I was a Christian long before I met him, and I will remain a Christian no matter what becomes of my relationship to UBF.”

Now there is the same kind of formula for former ubfers. “Part 1. He/she was a good Christian, loyal and obedient, a future leader in ubf. Part 2. Something made him unthankful, disobedient, demon-possessed and he ran away and became worldly; be careful, satan is working through him/her”.

Finally, the young man gave up and said, “Fine, I’ll do it your way” and wrote a testimony that followed the standard formula. That formula is, “Part 1: I was a lost person living in darkness who didn’t know God at all. Part 2: I met Jesus through ubf 1:1 Bible study and now I’m going to become a 1:1 Bible teacher.”

Good point, Mark. UBF is full of such contradictions. The biggest contradiction in my view is that they claim you can only grow spiritually if you are supervised and trained by a personal shepherd, to whom you must submit and whom you must obey, yet the founder and leader – who was considered the most spiritually mature person in the ministry – never had and never accepted any human shepherd above him. I never even heared that he gave credit to any person for his conversion or spiritual growth.

James 2 comes to mind: Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in filthy old clothes also comes in. If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, “Here’s a good seat for you,” but say to the poor man, “You stand there” or “Sit on the floor by my feet,” have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?

I think you can as well replace “wearing a gold ring” with “wearing a PhD title” in this passage.

By the way, James 2 also says But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers. For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.

total secrecy about money use is deplorable: natives slave to offer/support family/etc (thinking that others are doing the same); but who knows who is favored & blessed from the common fund?

$ is an absolutely critical issue to clarify: normally general accounting would be sufficient, but in cases of abuse where there has been no accounting (just like in elder financial abuse) perhaps there should be “penny by penny” accounting until those minding the mint can be trusted..

just one of many contradictions gleaned from religious life

also isn’t marriage really always by faith if you really think about it? (how well do dating people know each other?)

proclaimed goal is many going out at missionaries, but not many have managed to do so (especially the most spiritually “able”)

Strangely, when I shared my testimony in private without an audience, I had freedom to be genuine and write from what I had experienced. But when it was to be shared in a conference, it had to be highly polished to publicize the great work of UBF in changing me “from a spoiled prince to a shepherd for Canada” (which was literally the title I was given for one of my testimonies I shared in a big conference). Did anyone realize how utter demoralizing and demeaning it was to identify my life before UBF as nothing more than being “a spoiled prince”? As if I only became a valuable human being after joining UBF.

After I got my degree, ubf members invariably began to call me “Dr.” I know that they meant it as a sign of respect. But to constantly include that title in my name was and is strange, because I never have and never want to define myself by my degree status.

My mother never attended college. She married shortly after high school and raised 13 children. One of the valuable life lessons that she taught me was to show respect to all people and judge them by their character regardless of their education or social status. Indeed, that is one of the characteristics of the kingdom of God — that all people are valued because God values them. That lesson has always stayed with me. I have a 20 year-old son with mental disabilities who will never even earn a high school diploma. It is challenging to build a relationship with him. It is not easy to value his contributions to my family and society and church. But value him I must, because God values him.

This is part of the reason why I think ubf needs to dispense with honorific titles ASAP. It is not a matter of eastern versus western values. It is a matter of gospel values. The church needs to go the extra mile to value everyone not for what they have accomplished but because of what Jesus has accomplished. The constant use of titles reinforces hierarchical thinking and role-playing that makes it nearly impossible to reveal who we are and to relate as friends and human beings.

In the summer of 2010, I delivered a conference message about the church based on Acts chapter 2. Here is part of what I said.

Are we willing to become part of a community where our standing and honor in that community is not determined by how old we are or how we look and dress, or where we went to school, or by our own human standards or rules or anything that we have accomplished, but only by what Jesus Christ has done for us? Are we willing to welcome anyone into our community and give them standing not based on what they have done but on what Jesus Christ has done for them? If the answer is yes, then I say to you: Welcome to the family. Welcome to the real church. Welcome to the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.

That message was not received very well.

Last year I visited a museum devoted to the Russian history before the communist revolution. The last Russian tsar was killed along with his family in my home city. Communists also tried to remake Russian history. I learnt a lot in the museum about the tsar. And you know I would submit and obey him as the authority from God and I would fight for him and for my country. He was a very good tsar and in a sense a good shepherd for the people.

Jesus’ Resurrection was testified by appearance witnesses, but Jews who didn’t feel like believing made up some cockamamie story that his body was stolen

..from an institution that no one had ever heard of…they were stunned at its quality and immediately granted him a doctorate…I personally don’t give a hoot…If it was a mail-order deal (pay a few bucks, get a diploma)..

suddenly even I have hope to obtain an honorary PhD:)))))

Proverbs 17:22
A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.

I feel happily healed: that’s what we need, a “Good Humor” healing ministry

The director told us a story about SL many times. Here it goes. “The missionaries put a pulpit in the Chicago center. They worked hard and it took time and labour. After they finished SL looked at it carefully and said, “You must make it 1 centimeter shorter!” Everybody said to each other, “How?! Why?!” But they silently obeyed. And what was the result? After obeying the God’s servant’s command they understood that the pulpit became perfect when 1 cm shorter. And they understood why the God’s servant gave such a command. You see, you must just obey me and later you will understand that the result is perfect”.

“It is our hope and prayer that we may continue to do this kind of work of reconciliation one at a time in God honoring way. Through these processes of healing, apologizing, reconciliation, I believe God will be honored among us.”

But don’t you see that this approach does nothing to end the abuse that is still going on? This is hidden work. Do people in house church and satellite chapters even know about this?

What is needed is a corporate repentance statement and mass, open communication. Otherwise you are supporting the cult label. Clearly ubf used to be a personality cult around SL. But after his death, ubf became a different kind of cult, more of a control cult where member’s lives are controlled by the shepherd/sheep paradigmn.

What is being done to address the private, closed, permanent, controlling shepherd/sheep issues?

I saw that all the US missionaries went back to Korea recently for a World Mission Report. The report is horridly self-praising and suggests no change whatsoever. Basically, the US missionaries were “re-charged” and fired up cheerleader style to stay focused on the ubf ideology and ubf heritage.

What do you think about this? I know that many of those US missionaries in attendance should be disciplined and removed from office. But of course instead they continue to be flattered and shown favoritism, flown to Korea, probably on the ubf sheep’s donations.

“Everybody knows everybody even after it grew to be a big international organization.”

This is misleading. In ubf, everybody knows about everybody. This is something MarkY and I discussed in our 3 hour coffee shop visit a year or so ago. We knew each other’s names. We knew each other’s faces. And we knew the ubf stats: chapter, rank, length of service. But did we know each other as brother in Christ? No! We admitted that we knew nothing of substance about each other.

It is the same with many others. I became much better friends with MarkO/MarthaO during and after leaving. I have a real friendship with JoeS/SharonS/BenT/ChristyT after leaving. Friendship and fellowship in ubf is much more shallow than even beer buddy fellowship. This is the reality all ubers know. Would we be kind and flattering toward each other? Yes. But were we friends?

I love being away from ubf! I got to meet ATK in person and have dinner with him and rebuke his message! I got to spend several hours with you James, the president of ubf! I get to speak freely and be myself and rebuke and repent!

“EAST says WEST says”

While that video gives some insight, it is a shallow representation of both sides. Both are far richer and deeper and more complex. I am a human being, and I fall into East sometimes and West sometimes; we all do. I am sick of the shallow ubf judgments of entire nationalities! Let’s be real and just be ourselves, whatever that may look like!

A common dialogue I find among more Koreans (by chance) in UBF deals with role models. It seems that when one has a deeper personal conversation the concern for ‘Do you have a role model?’ or ‘Who is your role model?’ always enters more familiar conversations. My answer as an adult is always the same ‘I don’t have one.’ There are people I read about and take an interest in, but I never ‘model’ myself after that person. I often wonder ‘Is it really important?’ I also consider the consequence of such a fascination on the importance of a role model. I think it has been trained so well into people to role model after SL that they can easily forget the image of Jesus.

Moreover, I will say one personal comment. My people (of heritage) have been divided by controversy over what one man did to protect and preserve the people he was responsible for. It impacted the cultural and religious identity so severely that many are divided to this day. Many review the history and see it plainly. Others mystify the man and his decision at that moment in time.

Likewise, we must see SL and SB as founders of UBF and nothing more. If they had an impact personally on people it must not be taken out of the context of Christ. Regardless of inner motives of the servant, if we can receive grace from God that is the most important. But, we must not let such people supersede Jesus. When applying this in life testimony writing, belief in Jesus must come from the facts and not the first moment in UBF, because of your human shepherd.

When I asked before on the ‘God blessed UBF’ article about people’s faith only Brian answered and shared that his before/after life testimony had been adjusted accordingly – as always. People must be allowed to speak clearly how Jesus entered their lives and through whom which should include anyone without exception.

Like Chris said, you can’t blame the imitators/responsibility lies with leader. Reform movements starting in ’76 were not trying to usurp SL’s power, they were questioning ungodly leadership acts. They were willing to follow him if he changed tyrannical ways. However, they could not in conscience continue to be silent/comply, becoming unintended accomplices

bad to be a rebel without a cause, but good to be a reformer with a cause:)

Joe (Luther:), thanks for your courage to nail theses to the church door; some disregard theses, but boldness of Spirit is “contagious” generating wave of holy reform that can’t be stopped

(Luther Thesis 86 of 95: “Why does the pope, whose wealth today is greater than the wealth of the richest Crassus, build the basilica of Saint Peter with the money of poor believers rather than with his own money?”)

Those are also called *witnesses*, and there are more than a few who have testified.

In November 2010, I attended a meeting of the North American senior staff. There was no open discussion at this event. But near the end, each of us present was allowed to make some brief remarks. I thought about my remarks very carefully and wrote them down. This is what I said, which I still stand by today. (Except that now I would think twice before calling him “Dr.”)

When people talk about the spiritual heritage of UBF, I hear them using terms like fishing, one-to-one Bible study, manger ministry, soldier spirit, self-support, marriage by faith, etc. These are essentially the principles and methods developed by Dr. Lee. Many feel attached to Dr. Lee. He was an influential figure in our lives. But he was not the only Christian who influenced me.

I believe that if UBF’s leaders are able to clarify our spiritual heritage as Jesus Christ alone, God will be pleased, and many of our members will be deeply comforted.

This morning I read an article by Roger Olson that describes the phenomenon pretty well. Olson wrote:

“Many years ago I was visiting some friends of my family. The husband’s grandfather was a spiritual mentor of many members of my own family. When he found out about my interest in theology as a scholarly pursuit and discipline he scoffed and pointed me to some books (booklets, really) written by his grandfather—a patriarch of our faith community. I had heard his grandfather’s name all my life—from my parents and relatives. So I sat down and began reading the books. The first one I opened argued that all the divisions of Christianity came about as a result of the Constantinian takeover of Christianity. Before Constantine, the author argued, Christians were united around the gospel and there were no major or serious divisions. They were all in one accord and of one mind and faith. Well, after reading just a few pages I knew the man had no knowledge of the history of Christianity and was not qualified to do theology. I silently put the books back on my new friend’s shelf and said nothing to him about it. I knew he would not be able to handle the truth about his grandfather.”

The full article is here:

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/rogereolson/2013/05/what-is-theology-and-who-does-it-part-3-final/

MT 23:8 “But you are not to be called `Rabbi,’ for you have only one Master and you are all brothers. [9] And do not call anyone on earth `father,’ for you have one Father, and he is in heaven. [10] Nor are you to be called `teacher,’ for you have one Teacher, the Christ. [11] The greatest among you will be your servant. [12] For whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.

I think, against the revealed will of Jesus, when we make a fellow Christian our “father” or “mother”, this leads to serious problems such as spiritual abuses. The role of a father or mother in the life of a Christian is reserved for God and no one should take that place, so that the child of God listens to and follows his/her Father in heaven.

I am surprised by how UBF directors try to become “father” to their members by deciding everything on behalf of those they are suppose to help hear the heavenly Father’s voice for their life decisions. They also get upset if someone tries to hear and follow God’s leading apart from the usual director’s channel. It upsets me when some people are even decorated with title such as “Father” and “Mother” in UBF. By giving them such positions, don’t we also inherit their spiritual DNAs?

I never met SL personally, but saw him several times at conferences. I rmember his bad pronounciation in his “announcements” and stupid remarks like that the Germans lost the war because they thought too much instead of shooting (with which he wanted to imply that we should simply obey UBF and be busy without thinking). I also remember how I though that it sounded like he was mocking God when he was singing the Lord’s Prayer. (Even though at that time I did not yet know any negative things about SL.)

So people have mixed experiences with SL. To some he was friendly, to some he was rude, some he ignored completely, and some he offended and humilitated in extreme ways, even publicly. Sometimes he did all to the same person at different times. So, if he was friendly to you, or seemed to tell spiritual things or do good things at times, what does it matter?

What do you say about these things?

* He preached from the pulpit that people who do not obey his commands will suffer a bad fate, get ill or even die a horrible death. I can quote suche passages from his sermons again, if you don’t believe. They even have been published by UBF in the 1990s.

* He refused to be held accountable even when severe allegations were brought forward against him in 1976 and 2000. His answer to the reformers concerning accountability was “God will punish me if I did anything wrong.”

These are behaviors which are typical for cult leaders, and they are not diminished by whatever personal account you have with Samuel Lee. Please address these problems instead of telling us that you “knew SL better than we do”. We heared this stupid defense so many times. To me it sounds like if Eva Braun defended Hitler by pointing out the sweet and nice things he told to her and how friendly he was when they were alone.

As far as I know, SL had even 2 Dr. titles, one “Litt. D” a “honorary” tile granted by his former college in Korea after he gave them a donation (from our offering moneys) and the second from “Bethany Bible college” in the US which is run by a Korean. The book book “Name It and Frame It” wrote about them: “… they show many signs of being a degree mill. Sources of faculty credentials are not listed, the chancellor and president appear to be father and son, and their degree requirements are far short of those at accredited institutions.” The dr. title that Samuel Lee and all UBF is so proud of is worth nothing except for blinding people for the obvious fact that Samuel Lee was illiteral in theology. By the way, his lectures also showed clearly that he was illiteral in history and that he had no rational and scientific mindset. Therefore I refuse to call him “Dr.”.

And yes, I was told the same story that people in some university were so amazed by his Roman bible study and his “invention” of the “inductive Bible study method” that they spontaneuously gave him a Ph.D. Reminds me of the stories told about Kim Jong Il like that he was the world’s best golfer.

To me, his emphasis of his “Ph.D. Litt.D.” only tells me that he was an impostor. He claimed to have both authority (from God) and recognition (from the scientific community) which in reality he both did not have.

In the Russian version of Pinocchio, Pinocchio (when spiders were trying to teach him obedience) says something like this, “Spiders! you better teach your own little spiders!”

It sounds well, “Поучайте лучше ваших паучат!”

UBF is like a close knit family. Everybody knows everybody even after it grew to be a big international organization. SL was like a father figure, dearly loved and respected by many of his children especially by most of loyal Koreans in UBF both in America and Korea. In fact many people met Jesus very personally through his labor of love and prayer. I also agree with Alan that he made some mistakes and crossed boundaries. It is fair to say that he is good and bad and ugly like everybody else.

Recently we elders met a former missionary in Chicago and heard a painful story of SL’s mistreatment toward him. We sincerely apologized him on SL’s behalf and even invited him to give us a lecture in the process of healing and reconciliation. It is our hope and prayer that we may continue to do this kind of work of reconciliation one at a time in God honoring way. Through these processes of healing, apologizing, reconciliation, I believe God will be honored among us.

One of the reasons why many older Korean missionaries are silent was because the huge differences between the East and the West.

EAST says WEST says

Be contemplative // Be diligent
Accept what is // Seek change
Freedom of silence // Freedom of speech
Meditation is important // Articulation is important
Marry first then love // Love first then marry
Love is silent // Love is vocal
Focus on other’s feelings // Focus on self and needs
Cherish wisdom of years // Cherish vitality of young
Search inside of yourself // Search outside yourself
For truth: meditation and ethics // For truth: Data and analysis
The truth is given, it does not have to be proved // The truth needs to be proven by all costs.

Today, however, I believe that according to the Bible I should fear God only and fear nothing else and no one else (Prov 29:25; Lk 12:4-5; Ac 4:19).

I wonder if there is any independent verification of that. As you know, many of the stories in circulation about SL were originally told by him and then accepted by everyone as true.

I personally don’t give a hoot whether he had a real earned doctorate or not. If it was a mail-order deal (pay a few bucks, get a diploma) I don’t mind. But for our own sake, we do need to be as truthful and objective as possible about him and his achievements and the achievements of UBF. For so many years, I was told over and over that his lectures and Bible study materials were the best, that they were so awesome, and so on. It was a huge source of pride for us. But strangely, no one else in the world outside of UBF seemed to think so. There were no hordes of people out there clamoring to learn from us. And when I honestly thought that SL’s lectures weren’t so good, I quickly learned to keep those opinions to myself and say that they were wonderful as everyone else did. Gradually it dawned on me that this was a real-life manifestation of The Emperor’s New Clothes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor%27s_New_Clothes

Ditto. And I must say that was the single hardest thing I’ve ever done. It was so painful. I melted as I took of my mask and saw my self as I was, as in a mirror. It was truly like death, like a kernel of wheat falling to the ground, like dying to my self.

Thank God for people like Chris and the others who left who challenged my mask!!

“I knew SL for many years and have a generally favorable perspective towards him.”

I only met SL 4 times, for a total of about 2 hours combined. One time I prayed with him in private for about 30 minutes, before I went to Russia. Another time he stopped by breakfast with SB and me and a few friends.

In those 4 hours, SL gave me numerous imperatives for my life. One was: “Marry a woman 1 inch taller than you so you will be a man of vision” (that came true and I have a vision :) So I too have a favorable opinion of SL as a person.

But in regard to his teaching that enslaved me I have utter disgust. When I was baptised by full immmersion in 2012 at our new Baptist church, the pastor told me just before I went under “You are free from the teachings of one man.” It was most liberating. So now I can remember the good memory of SL and also say that I don’t give a rat’s patookie (do rats have patookies?) about SL or his teaching in regard to how I live my life. I am no longer bound to such teaching.

“I’m glad James and Wesley are commenting and posting here even though many who come to this site may not agree with them 100%. It makes for interesting and useful dialogue. It would be wonderful to hear from more of our Korean missionaries to continue to advance the discussion.”

Ditto. Why in the world did I ever think Christ-following was about gathering around those who appeared to agree with me 100%? Out of 7 billion people only I agree with me, and that not 100% of the time :)

However, for all of the good that I experienced, there were also elements that were uncomfortable at best. We need to prayerfully and humbly deal those issues, acknowledging and apologizing for any sins committed while binding the wounds of those adversely affected.

The most important matter is that our faith must rest in Christ alone based on the Bible. And our deepest gratitude is to God for his amazing grace to us in Jesus Christ. No loyalty to any human being even approaches that since all of us are sinners and in desperate need of his mercy.

I’m glad James and Wesley are commenting and posting here even though many who come to this site may not agree with them 100%. It makes for interesting and useful dialogue. It would be wonderful to hear from more of our Korean missionaries to continue to advance the discussion.

When I read “Emotionally Healthy Spirituality” by Peter Scazzero (which James Kim just reviewed) I was struck by the author’s description of the false religious self, the religious mask, that people wear to hide their true selves. I realized that my faith had become very superficial because I was not coming to God as the sinner that I was. Rather, I was trying to play the fantasy role that ubf gave me. Not only had my relationship with God had become superficial, but my relationships with essentially everyone else were superficial. I was wearing a very thick mask. Defensiveness about UBF was a huge part of that mask. It was only when I dropped my defensiveness and became more honest about what I had actually seen and experienced in ubf that my mask finally came off and I could begin to relate to God and others as the person I really am. I could experience the love of God as I never had before. And I could experience fellowship and friendship with people as I never had before.

1 John teaches that there is no fellowship without light. There are still many leaders who want to bury all these things about ubf and SL. Their refusal to come out into the light of open, honest admission about what really happened is stunting our fellowship in profound ways.

@Sharon. Sorry that I “cheat” by reading a review of “Roger Williams and the Creation of the American Soul”: http://www.christiancentury.org/reviews/2012-10/original-separationist

In Massachusetts Williams “opposed government-mandated church attendance and loyalty oaths because he believed that these practices improperly mixed church and state. Williams’s views were not helping him to make friends with his fellow Massachusetts ministers. By 1635, Winthrop, with support from the clergy, had successfully banned him from the colony. There were some in the Massachusetts leadership who wanted to execute him.”

“Anyone who reads Roger Williams and the Creation of the American Soul will need to come to grips with the fact that it is Williams, not Winthrop, who best represents the historical roots of the religious liberties that citizens of the United States enjoy today.”

It seems that throughout church history, what church leaders were most afraid of is FREEDOM, which is the most wonderful doctrine in the Bible. Yes, freedom can be abused. But trying to control people from abusing their freedom removes the unique distinctiveness of Christianity.

I believe that if UBF leaders begin to truly give freedom to all her members, UBF will become a far more loving, healthy, gracious church with freedom in Christ and freedom in the Spirit as the foundation of our church, rather than trying to enforce “UBF core values” on the next generation of UBFers.

That was exactly my experience. My conscience bothered me the whole 24 years in ubf. Instead of learning, I suppressed and denied reality, fabricating my own personal KOPHN narrative, leaving my “self” behind.

So in the old Voy forum discussions, my heart would race and my mind would nervously scour the forum for some shred of support and justification of my ubf ideology. I had seen the living Word of God and heard Him speaking through the bible, but I desperately searched high and low to find justification for my ubf lifestyle. That sparked my fearful and fervent “Tom Cruise” days of online defending of ubf.

In the end, I found that my defenses were a farce. I could no longer keep integrity between my fantasy image of my life and the reality all around me. The explosive forum discussions caused me to reconsider my ideology and drove me to godly sorrow.

Now I can calmly and peacefully express myself and share my honest reactions without fear.

Ben, I remember someone telling you, “Why do you hurt us so much by talking about the things you learned from Rick Warren? Why don’t you talk about the things you learned from Samuel Lee?”

In a strange way, learning directly from non-ubf sources was considered to be showing disrespect to SL.

For many years, I could not learn from Christian books. On the rare occasions that I read them, I could not hear what the author was trying to say. Rather, I mostly scoured them for evidence to prove that ubf was in the right. My defensiveness about SL made it very difficult for me to grow in my faith. But when I dropped that defensive posture, everything changed. It was as though a whole universe of possibility suddenly opened up.

I did not start out talking about SL. As you may recall, several years ago I began to urge ubf leaders to discuss why so many longtime ubf members were unhappy and ready to leave the ministry. Many of them did leave. The problems were never addressed, never even discussed. No one ever wanted to do any serious evaluation of ubf’s culture and methods. Gradually it dawned on me why they were so reluctant to discuss things that were so vital to the future of the ministry. It was because, even without mentioning SL’s name, anything unflattering that was ever said about ubf was instinctively taken as a criticism of him, and criticism of him was strictly forbidden. SL was the 500 pound gorilla in the room. Everyone felt his presence but no one would acknowledge it. The fear of talking honestly about the things he did was (and is) keeping ubf frozen in time.

And the refusal to talk honestly about SL has made it impossible to create a culture of ethics and accountability. When chapter directors treat their members in an abusive manner, it has proven very difficult to impose discipline on them in any real way, because many of the things that those chapter directors do are things that they learned by example from SL. How can we discipline people for wrongdoing while we continue to heap praise on the legacy of SL who did the same things?

I have no personal vendetta against SL. But like it or not, an honest evaluation of his legacy and practices are the linchpin to meaningful change and growth. The longer we refuse to talk about him in an honest fashion, the longer this organization will stagnate and decline.