Facts from 2008 to 2012

Over the past 4 years:

• 27% decline in cash donations (offering)
• 59% increase in administrative costs
• 105% drop in net assets
• $42K deficit in 2012
• 17% drop in ISBC attendants *
• 50% exodus of longtime leaders in Toledo UBF

Abandoning the Heritage

UBF loves numbers. Will anyone pay attention to these numbers? UBF is indeed at a crossroads. Everyone knows why. The 12 point heritage system in UBF is being abandoned more and more. Students don’t buy into their teachings. No one these days wants to be controlled by a personal, lifelong shepherd who approves every life decision and who monitors their morality on a weekly basis. Many are no longer satisfied with shallow theology that just tells you “Feed sheep” and distorts the gospel of Jesus. Leaders are no longer tolerating excuses, half-truths and lies. People long for real friendship. They crave the grace of God. They are no longer allowing the Korean culture to suffocate their own culture. People are realizing the Confucian teachings in UBF that have kept them from connecting with the vast, rich Christian history.

Financial Decline

UBF is required to report actual numbers to the ECFA, since joining in 2007. I’ve been tracking these numbers in my own spreadsheet. [Note: The ECFA website presents the numbers in reverse years, showing the most recent year on the left. I find it more natural to show the most recent year on the right.] In any case, below is a spreadsheet capturing the 2008 to 2013 numbers. The 2014 numbers should be reported to the ECFA by June 2015.

UBF-FinancialNumbers2013

Some more thoughts:

UBF Statistics 11/2014
UBF Numbers Update 11/2012
UBF Numbers Game 7/2012
UBF 12 Million Dollars 9/2011

When will the leaders acknowledge this and address the obvious issues that are causing the decline?

Sources:
ECFA reported numbers for UBF
2008 Purdue UBF ISBC Report
2013 Pennsylvania UBF ISBC Report

* Multiple numbers were reported for the 2008 ISBC and the 2013 ISBC, so no one seems to know the exact numbers. However, all reported numbers show a decline between 15% and 20% in people who attended the UBF ISBC conferences.

* Links fixed and updated 2/8/2015

I think that these statistics reveal what people want to know about UBF and how many people are interested in finding out more information about UBF.

From September 14, 2011 to September 14, 2012…per Google Analytics.

Visitor Stats

• 10,685 visits from 4,227 people
• 2.97 average pages read per visit
• 5 minutes 52 seconds average time spent here
• Visits were from 85 different countries
• 61% of visitors were returning visitors

Top 10 Countries

1. United States
2. Hong Kong
3. Russia
4. Ukraine
5. Canada
6. Germany
7. United Kingdom
8. South Korea
9. Netherlands
10. India

Google Searches with over 6 minutes reading time

Why am I sharing statistics? Well, it is because of an email I received as I was in the process of leaving UBF. The email was from a senior Korean UBF missionary. Here are some excerpts from his email:

“It was brought to my attention that recently you also send your e-mails (with many negative remarks) to many people who are not really interested in receiving them.”

“I have received multiple complaints about your e-mails. Thus, please focus on your e-mail exchange with those who are willing and able to constructively engage one another in love and truth and thus move forward for Christian resolution and reconciliation.”

I was supposed to believe that many people are not interested in what I have to say in regard to changes and issues in UBF. I was supposed to “engage” in “love and truth”, but only with select people. This email sparked my mind to post several of the entries on this blog.

Here are the stats from Google Analytics (some have criticized Google for being too conservative and think that these stats should be higher). These stats are not 100% correct, and cannot be with the current technology. However, they give a rather good confidence level that there are many people interested in what I have to say.

From August 23, 2011 to September 23, 2011 there were 300 “aboslute unique visitors”. This actually means “computing devices”, not necessarily people. So if someone reads my blog at home and at work, that counts as 2 unique visits. Based on these facts, it is safe to say that hundreds of people are reading this blog.

This is not just a U.S. readership. People from 26 countries have visited this blog and viewed my articles thousands of times. What is more, several people have emailed me privately, wanting to remain anonymous, in order to tell me they support most of what I say through emails and through this blog.

Click the images below to see more detailed statistics. It is encouraging to see that the average time spent per visit here is over 10 minutes.

(Note: These statistics filter out the bots and spiders, for the most part)