Yes, it is obvious for everyone who is a UBF member. The Korean missionaries have the saying that the “want to bury their bones in the mission fields” and John Jun became famous for saying (in the 1970s) that “even when Samuel Lee leaves, I will still stay in UBF”. Loyalty to God is equated with loyalty to UBF, and obedience to God is equated to obedience to UBF. The reason why people buy and follow this teaching is that it’s much easier to follow the “visible servant of God” and what he concretely tells you to do than following the invisible God and your own conscience. If you are loyal to UBF you have that immediate and pleasant feeling and confirmation of everybody around you that you are “righteous.” If you follow your own conscience, then you can have sometimes unpleasent doubts and qualms and inner struggles, you need to think much, and you often need to change your ways. Always following a fixed program and a party line is so much easier.

Thanks Charles for sharing your insight and experience. You raise important issues that should not be easily discarded and I hope they will be addressed.

I was also told by a Korean missionary that one reason a Korean missionary was chosen as the next director was so that the other Korean missionaries would listen to him because they weren’t yet ready to listen to an American director.

The exposure of the cop killings recently has me scared and I’m half white and half Filipino. For the first time I could see it’s real and ugly face; it is dangerous if you are Jon-white. Benjamin Corey on his Formerly Fundie blog wrote about it recently too because if his adopted children.

In UBF it is pretty obvious who “has privilege.” They talk, act, behave and make decisions as one with privilege. Then they might be shocked or highly offended why some are not happy with their leadership.

I’ve spoken with some whites who simply can’t see why millions of blacks are so upset with the recent “white cop killing unarmed black” situation. When I try to explain why whites have privilege they become quite offended.

Try explaining in UBF why some/certain people have privilege and see if they can understand or are even able to listen to you empathetically.

Yes. But when concerns are squashed at the local chapter level, out of Chicago, the reason is often times very far from what you’ve mentioned here though I’m sure it is related. When I asked Abraham T. Kim about addressing the concerns of Americans, he first asked me, “How many think like this?” I replied, “Many.” He then said to “wait and keep working with Korean missionaries.” He didn’t appear to say this in a dismissive manner, but practically it did nothing to honestly address my question. I don’t see why we couldn’t have had a full on honest discussion about it.

Now, locally, I was warned, “Be careful. You will sound racist.” A case of the pot calling the kettle black. There are too many stories of trying to root out racism, just in the chapter I was at.

I’d like to comment on this part. I’m thinking a lot these days about God, commitment and organizations and, frankly, I don’t understand anymore the connection between making that life long commitment to an organization simply because of an act of God facilitated through the people in that organization. I think at one time I did. I committed myself to 15 years in UBF without a thought of going elsewhere. This shaped my perspective on Christianity, discipleship, other organizations, relationships with people, Christian history, the greater body of Christ, and so on in a very narrow and unhealthy way. Now, I think I’d simply say that it’s obvious my commitment and devotion are to God and things Jesus commanded, such as loving one another as well as remembering the poor and the witness of him.

I don’t mean that we should not be committed to an organization, but I do wonder about making such a commitment a life commitment. I saw this negatively many times. For example, when people would leave the chapter or ministry, very often I heard this kind of reasoning: You were born again here. It is obvious that God’s will is for you to stay in UBF forever. I heard people apply it to themselves: I was born again here so despite all that has or may happened, I have to stay here. So, some people were labeled as rejecting God’s will for leaving. And still I heard much worse things applied to people leaving, not for any reasons against God, but simply that they felt he was leading them in new ways. The worst things I heard were usually from seniors at staff conferences, describing how people, from long time members with families to their own children, were leaving. In the chapter I was in, John 15, on the vine and the branches, was also used to teach students to remain in UBF in order to grow and bear fruit.

To me this is a huge departure from the work of the Holy Spirit and the movement of people and groups and churches that we see in the New Testament. There is mention of enough people who were not called disciples who freely moved around as the Spirit led and were very useful in the work of Paul’s preaching, for example, and the mention of welcoming traveling believers in 3 John that show me a much more flexible body with flexible members. The Macedonian call even showed Paul that he ought to be flexible with his movements and commitments for the Lord. I’ve read many great stories of believers who ended up leaving ministries and continuing to serve the Lord in very positively impacting ways.

I hope that UBF leaders would also consider and address this kind of mentality. I heard most leaders say something to the effect of, “Of course, people can leave any time.” But the truth is that it is very complicated and oftentimes difficult in negative ways for someone to actually do so. But whatever acts of God experienced while at an organization definitely do not equate to me that someone should soldier on despite bad practices, and especially since those are not openly and properly addressed. Furthermore, that those who do stay at the organization would be respected by the organization and given real opportunity to be heard and to help work through issues.

“But as I grew older, I realized that people were not rejoicing together. People were showing favor for a while, and then applying the pressure. When a person could not handle it anymore, or accept the vision for themselves, they would leave, sometimes quietly, and sometimes not so quietly. More fundamentally, people in the same chapter could not respect each other and get along. And families who had sincerely accepted the same vision and decided to join in the struggle together were leaving, angry, broken and hurt. Whatever the reason, I believe that this is not the end that God wants for us.”

But sadly, as you well know, some of the old guard seem determined to never let go of their claws in nations where they hardly understand or appreciate the cultural differences while seeking to impose their own cultural preferences on them. This has been going on for way too long already.

Abraham Nial recently shared how DK of Korea is basically calling the shots for India ubf, simply because he is the director of Korea. So he obviously sees it as his right to do so.

Interestingly the leader in Korea (DK) is known as a director, while in the US the leader (MV) is known as a coordinator. (Sorry that this thought was expressed to me from a good friend. I would not have thought of this myself.) It seems obvious that UBF wants the leader in Korea to have a higher power status and clout over the leader of the US and in all other countries.

Such power plays is simply keeping ubf in the back roads. This will not change until the old guard learns and decides to let it go. To put it bluntly (sorry that I don’t know how else to say it or am not willing to try): Get off your high horse. There is only One who deserves to be there and it’s not you.

“Our self-reliance, insecurity, sense of duty, rivalry, accusations, etc. may be stemming from the possibility that we have not fully embraced our identity as God’s sons and daughters and still remain as orphans without a real father or home.” GOD FORBID WE’VE BEEN PURPOSELY PREVENTED FROM DOING SO BY CORRUPT OPERATORS..