Excerpts from the Penguin Narratives
[Drawing of penguins by my daughter, Anna] At one point in my life, I thought I had Christianity all figured out. I felt the twinge of pride as I “kept the faith” while people around me seemed to abandon their mission from God. I did everything I could to “present myself to God as one approved”. I went to Russia as a short-term missionary. I amassed over fifteen thousand hours of bible reading. I missed only three Sunday services in twenty four years. And then it all fell apart. The fabric of my faith unraveled. The spirit of my mission decomposed. And the walls of our community collapsed.
Narrative 1: Unexpected Faith
“Bullshit! It’s all bullshit!” The frustration on my friend’s face was as real, like the smell of the dark roast coffee I was sipping. How could this be? What would cause my Christian friend to be so exasperated? We met a few more times and as we did, my interest grew. I had to find out what was causing such grief to my friend and his wife. They had, along with other friends from the same faith community in Toledo, expressed similar frustration to me privately in prior years. Why were they sharing such things with me? As my friend shared his struggles, my mind wandered.
My blog, priestlynation.com, became my way of venting my frustration. Some kept asking me, “Are you in UBF or not?” and “What is your problem?” One problem was that my conscience was bothering me on a daily basis. I wanted answers about what we did to James and Rebekah back in 1990. But almost no one wanted to discuss this issue. Most UBF leaders just wanted me to be quiet and let them get back to their ministry. Some who were present with me back in 1990 suddenly had amnesia, and couldn’t recall what happened. Why stir up trouble over an issue that has been dead for nearly 20 years? I was told “The past is the past. You did not do anything wrong.” But my conscience said otherwise. I had to expose this event publicly if no one in my faith community would talk about it. I had no intention of leaving UBF ministry, but I knew that my days were numbered. I decided to make the most of them.
Narrative 2: Unexpected Hope
The sun set. The train left the station. And I abandoned my ambitious attempt to define an ultimate objective reality.
My search for an ultimate, universal, objective truth that would define the world and all people in it, both living and dead, encompassed more than twenty years. I called myself a bible teacher. My identity was that of a chosen servant of God. But the more I sought an outward, objective reality, the more I withdrew into my self and disconnected my life from the reality immediately near me. I had made a grand, ambitious attempt to be a savior-figure, a source of blessing for the world. But in the end, my ambition fell apart faster than a train wreck. And that was a good thing, it turns out. It was the stench of my own decomposing ambition that woke me up from my self-aggrandized fantasy. Something smelled horribly wrong with the mission-from-God life I had been living in. And I was now willing to do whatever it took to find out why.
Narrative 3: Unexpected Love
Like water crashing over a waterfall, time marches forward. Change happens. As the water of change crashed into our faith community, some very unexpected things happened. Navigating such collapse of community often felt like walking on water. Both prudence and risk-taking are needed when your faith community collapses.
Although I use the term “faith community”, our community looked more like an army brigade. And that brigade fell apart in remarkable fashion soon after my resignation.
Many leaders in our faith community blamed me for creating division. What I found though was just the opposite. I connected with amazing people in amazing ways, and listened to their stories. We all found out that we shared much in common. We wondered why we had not talked so openly, honestly or transparently before. Most of these friends ended up leaving UBF ministry as well, over the course of two years. But we found such unity among us—we had similar concerns about the ministry, similar questions about the gospel and similar ideas about how to build a Christian community.
In total, from our faith community, 7 families made up of 38 people and representing 282 years of commitment resigned from Toledo UBF ministry. This represents about half of the ministry lost in a matter of months. After that exodus, other families left. Among these families were leaders—leading everything from children’s ministry to Sunday service to offering administration. These were Sunday messengers, Treasurers and Fellowship Leaders. They had done everything they could to “make it work” for several years. Several of them had been there when Toledo UBF was first pioneered.
Belief systems and mission and community are good things. But if we have not love, what do we have? Following Him who loves is primary.
We often begin our journey with an epic attempt to obey God’s law. We want to please God and so we strive for obedience. Yet even if we get really good at keeping God’s Law, we quickly find that we may in fact be far from God and find ourselves still in need of repentance, radical faith, and a deeper communion with God, who not only loves us, but also is love.
We then are need of an epic surrender. At some point, we throw our hands up and surrender to grace. Love wins. God is love. Love is the ultimate standard. And it is love that leads. An epic life journey is a life surrendered to the purpose of love—love for self, for friends, for family, for enemies, for neighbors, for the marginalized of society and for all humanity. Such love shows that we love God.
As we rest in the grace of God, we find that humanity is both good and bad, and that there is much badness in us and around us. So we embark on an epic search for goodness. We begin to long for what is good. No longer are we satisfied by the appearance of goodness. We want genuine friendships. We seek to discover our authentic self.
Still our life may seem empty or void of purpose. We begin to long for something more, something meaningful to commit our lives to, something lasting. We want to see the effervescent joy of life! We want to build something. So we embark on a journey filled with an epic vision of glory.
And in the end, we realize the epic life is an epic pursuit of unity. Our own ambition to build something is not lasting. What lasts are the relationships that have been united.
The epic life of love then is an epic striving to obey, an epic surrender to grace, an epic search for goodness, an epic vision of glory and an epic pursuit of unity.
[Excerpts from “Unexpected Christianity: The Penguin Narratives”, by Brian John Karcher]
“Some who were present with me back in 1990 suddenly had amnesia, and couldn’t recall what happened.” – See more at: http://www.ubfriends.org/2015/02/27/excerpts-from-the-penguin-narratives/#sthash.XJrktm29.dpuf
Ive found that saying, “I don’t remember” is one of the most wonderful and excellent ways to shut down a conversation, or to change the subject, or to refuse to discuss something you don’t want addressed. Human beings are just so darn smart, since God created us in the image of God!
So, like it or not, there’s going to be lots of amnesia in the church.
“there’s going to be lots of amnesia in the church”
Yes Ben, that is what I found. When I spoke with the ubf echelon about the past events in Toledo ubf, they acted as if they never even heard of Toledo ubf. On the phone I heard things like: “Ohh wow I never knew such things!” “I had no idea!”
That is why ubf leaders are so afraid of the internet. You can no longer hide. All things will come to light in due time. I just wouldn’t want to be at a ubf conference when it does…
“The past is the past.” Hmm, I’ve heard that one before. And, sadly, I’ve used it myself a few times.
If the past is the past, then why are they so concerned about guarding the ubf heritage?
I can say that to some degree, I’ve experienced many of the things that you’ve written here. Thanks for continuing to tell your story, Brian. I’m listening.
Thank you for listening David!
Recently IK accused me of being unethical because I share links to my books when I comment in various places. So I just want to state that I have no interest in making money from my books. If anyone asks me (without condemning me to hell) I will give all 3 of my ubf narrative books away for free.
I have no interest in self-promotion, but I do care about sharing the stories of the dark side of ubf far and wide. In no sense is that unethical.
What is unethical is the re-writing of a self-aggrandized history that cuts out people who sacrificed everything for the cause of ubf. I donated well over 10,000 hours of my time and many thousands of dollars to the ubf organization. And so did my friends who left ubf. Our stories deserve to be told.
And for some, like bigbear, they deserve monetary compensation for the abuse heaped upon them. Others, like those in New York ubf, deserve to be reported to the police.
Brian, I can personally vouch for the fact that you have offered your books for free on several instances. And I find it ironic that you’re accused of being unethical for sharing your narratives when there are several UBF publications that share the ideas and history of the ministry. I suppose it’s only ethical when the one side whose history really matters is being offered. At any rate, there are people who are listening to alternative narratives like yours and many more will need these narratives as they become increasingly disillusioned with the one that their organizations sells to them on a regular basis.
IK should file a complaint with the Ethics Committee. We’ll see how long it takes for them to respond.
I hope I’m not being scathing, sarcastic, snarky and cynical by stating the obvious that this will NEVER ever be reported to anyone. Why? Because to not do so would show how wonderfully gracious and forgiving one is. Also, by reporting this as an ethical violation opens the can of worms of countless other ethical violations!!!
I predict IK and BK are going to have a grudge match some day, hopefully as public as possible.
Awesome artwork by Anna.
Thanks Joe! My 3 books feature artwork contributed by my mother, my step-father and my daughter.
Brian, all I can say is that this excerpt is beautifully written. In particular I could relate when you said:
“We often begin our journey with an epic attempt to obey God’s law. We want to please God and so we strive for obedience. Yet even if we get really good at keeping God’s Law, we quickly find that we may in fact be far from God and find ourselves still in need of repentance, radical faith, and a deeper communion with God, who not only loves us, but also is love. We then are need of an epic surrender. At some point, we throw our hands up and surrender to grace. Love wins. God is love. Love is the ultimate standard. And it is love that leads. An epic life journey is a life surrendered to the purpose of love—love for self, for friends, for family, for enemies, for neighbors, for the marginalized of society and for all humanity. Such love shows that we love God.”
See more at: http://www.ubfriends.org/2015/02/27/excerpts-from-the-penguin-narratives/#sthash.BL0F7I9F.dpuf
UBF provided a way for me to live in obedience. But it wasn’t enough. I needed, as you stated, “repentance, radical faith, and deep communion with God who not only loves us, but also is love.” These things do not come from following the protocols of UBF. It comes when we “surrender to grace”.
Thank you, Brian, for giving me the words.
Thank you for reading Jennifer. It was liberating and exciting to discover the joy of being an author these past few years. Now that I no longer have the demon of ubf authority ruling my life I am so free! I love finding my own voice, telling my authentic self narrative and most of all– learning to navigate Scripture with the Holy Spirit’s guidance.