Salt Cathedral of Zipaquirá Accessed online on 2018 February 15 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_Holy_Family-Zipaquira.JPG
Note: Although some of the images are the same as in other articles I wrote this is a different article
The original article below explains my vision for doing authentic voluntary non hierarchical discipleship and my hope for University Bible Fellowship.
Title: The mystery of the beautiful exterior of UBF
The purpose of this article is to show how there are wonderful things taught and done by the real lay-missionaries in UBF composing it’s beautiful and wonderful (but less than perfect) outside.
By the outside I do not mean the pretty walls or statues but the kindness of lay-people who compose the outside of UBF and do lay-ministry as opposed to the inner core such as the founders and those appointed by the founders and so on and so forth but I am ruining the wonder of experiencing a good surprise if I jump to far ahead with the founder yet none the less he must be mentioned to understand what I mean in this case by the outside and the inside. For I mean the outside and inside of the organization, rather than meaning the heart of man by the inside as is often meant.
My wonderful initial experience with UBF
I was invited to Bible study by someone who became a very good friend with me. I eventually concluded that even though God allowed problems in my life they were the result of sin, I changed my idea from a God who hates me by allowing me to cause problems to a God who wants to improve me and thus fix the problems that I caused. This was wonderful. I wanted to spend more and more time in prayer and Bible study and eventually started to see real improvement as a result. Testimony writing was wonderful I could express my problems and my understanding of scripture for an opportunity to improve myself and help others by sharing what I learned through contemplation on the weeks Bible passage. Bible study was also wonderful I could learn about self-improvement there to. I had opportunity to write Sunday worship service messages and if I could become a Bible teacher I could help others the way I was helped.
My experience with UBF upon coming closer to seeing the true face of the inner core
My Bible teacher had to leave town and I eventually was shepherded by someone of higher rank. He would not teach the Bible correctly, every passage in the Bible meant making disciples. Testimony writing was criticized unless poor hermeneutics were used to conclude that every passage in the Bible no matter what meant make disciples. When I wanted to have help “repenting” of something he said the reason I have that problem was I was not spending enough time raising disciples like King David who was distracted not going to war (to state the obvious killing people with physical weapons is not the same as teaching Bible study.) But what is the purpose of teaching Bible study, if the purpose is growing in relationship with God and helping people to grow in Christ’s character what he said undermined the entire purpose of discipleship, he is not really raising disciples of Christ if he does not want to help me to repent of sins but instead wants me to raise recruits who I do not help repent of sin but instead encourage to raise more recruits. Disagreeing with his interpretations of the Bible eventually got me essentially kicked out of UBF.
But before I got kicked out I learned enough to understand looking back how Samuel Lee loyalists within UBF do not do authentic Bible study, testimony writing, marriage by faith or lay ministry and that UBF is not authentically non-denominational. I also learned you can be in UBF without being loyal to Samuel Lee and try to do the authentic things I previously listed because to some degree or another I tried to authentically do them until I got kicked out for being too authentic, but much of what I did was compromised. That is how UBF can have a wonderful outer shell but a rotten inner core (which is the mystery I referred to in my title.) There are many people like me who believed in many of the principles we were initially taught in UBF and tried to live by them through personal devotion time with God we were able to love God and love our neighbor better it is God who helped us to love our neighbor not the organization through the power invested in Samuel Lee allegedly by God. Yes we might have been encouraged to grow in personal relationship with God through means of Bible study, etc. when either a non-Samuel Lee loyalist invited us to Bible study or a Samuel Lee loyalist suggested we read the Bible (even though they intended to fill out numbers on a quota form and get us to copy Samuel Lee’s interpretation of the Bible or their interpretation instead of studying it but none the less we were encouraged to open a Bible and read it), but it was our decision to read the Bible with the intent to grow in love for God that ultimately counted. It was us cooperating with God’s help not anything that Samuel Lee or any other of his loyalists should get vainglorious boasting for. Below is a graph explaining my point of view if you think that I am oversimplifying things you are correct but think about my main point.
Did I display this graph to try to destroy the work of God in UBF ministry? By no means!
I displayed this graph to try to highlight the beauty of the outer core in UBF those who are not Samuel Lee Loyalists those who are doing real lay-ministry work represented by the flat-horizontal line it might not look very beneficial because there is some corruption (I am assuming that most people are corrupt even those who have not attended UBF) but compared with those loyal to Samuel Lee on the graph they look wonderful!
Should we abolish UBF just because those who are loyal to Samuel Lee are corrupt?
By no means, we should instead encourage there to be more disloyalty to Samuel Lee within UBF and more loyalty to God. I suggest that if the secret teachings of the inner core are corrupt but some of the initial teachings we were presented were good we should simply stop following the corrupt secret teachings of Samuel Lee but keep the good exterior. If a cup is good on the outside but dirty on the inside clean the inside.
In order to help with some housekeeping I will show how to improve personal devotional time and Bible study and how to marry by faith in God’s word instead of faith in Samuel Lee’s leadership. By contrasting how I was suggested to spend my time and do these activities by Samuel Lee loyalists words and examples with more authentic methods. Below is my overall impression of how an ideal UBF Shepherd might spend their time if they really followed the advice I have been given by Samuel Lee loyalists.
Would following the advice of Samuel Lee loyalists and raising 12 one to one disciples and doing the other listed activities protect me from Satan’s voice?
If I do all the activities listed and do not spend too much time getting empty head knowledge by listening to or reading Christian material from non-UBF sources I was supposed to be better protected from Satan’s voice. In reality if I followed the advice of Samuel Lee loyalists I would spend so much time performing rituals with the outward appearance of Bible study and teaching without actually learning very much new for the amount of time I spend, this would prevent me from questioning Samuel Lee’s many incorrect teachings. Questioning Samuel Lee’s many incorrect teachings is sometimes perceived as a temptation of Satan according to many Samuel Lee loyalists who discourage reading articles critical of UBF or reading non-UBF Christian material that is full of empty head knowledge (in other words another perspective that might be coincidentally different than Samuel Lee’s in a manner irreconcilable with Samuel Lee’s perspective.) Actually they are fighting against the opportunity to love God more by avoiding Satan’s temptations of empty head knowledge and slanderous internet articles.
1 They are fighting against God’s conviction by ignoring reality and authentic repentance of something you really should repent of rather than only what Samuel Lee said to repent of in this weeks message
2 They are fighting against learning the truth about what the Bible really teaches by copying Samuel Lee’s interpretation of scripture instead of thinking about what scripture really means independently such as in authentic study of scripture. (Yes Samuel Lee is sometimes correct but he is sometimes wrong, it is not really studying if you just assume your teacher is always correct and do not think on your own.)
Now, the ignorant know not that such conviction as tend to put them in fear, are for their good, and therefore they seek to stifle them.
Hopeful: How do they seek to stifle them?
Christian: 1. They think that those fears are wrought by the devil, (though indeed they are wrought of God,) and thinking so, they resist them, as things that directly tend to their overthrow. 2. They also think that these fears tend to the spoiling of their faith; when, alas for them, poor men that they are, they have none at all; and therefore they harden their hearts against them. 3. They presume they ought not to fear, and therefore, in despite of them, wax presumptuously confident. 4. They see that those fears tend to take away from them their pitiful old self-holiness, and therefore they resist them with all their might.
Quote from Pilgrims Progress by John Bunyan
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bunyan/pilgrim.iv.x.html
End of Article
Prior to 2018 February 15, I last made changes in this article I wrote in 2015 in April 22, 2015. The only changes I made were adding a single comma. It looks to me like I never finished this article but I do not remember the ending and I am posting this as is without adding anything further. I never discuss whatever I was originally going to mention about marriage by faith in this article but have in numerous other articles here.
https://marriagebyfaith.blogspot.com
Here are my two best articles written so far on marriage by faith when it comes to refuting it as taught by Samuel Lee loyalists using the Bible, they are very advanced and meticulously detailed compared with other articles I have seen by ex members of UBF however they fall short of the level of meticulous detail I would personally have wished I did. None the less these articles have been misunderstood because people have difficulty comprehending something so detailed, so I will make a simplified version later hopefully. These articles have explicit or graphic language that may make people uncomfortable so do not exist on UBFriends forum unlike many of my other articles which I usually (but not always) post duplicate copies of on ubfriends except when they use language which they have explicit or graphic language that may not be suitable for this forum.
https://marriagebyfaith.blogspot.com/2018/02/what-is-wrong-with-ubf-private.html
https://marriagebyfaith.blogspot.com/2018/01/you-can-marry-anyone-who-consents-that.html
Here is an index outlining my other blogs some of which have material not found on UBFriends
http://improvinguniversitybiblefellowship.blogspot.com
Here is my duplicate copy of this article on my personal blog
https://discipleshipmethods.blogspot.com/2018/02/the-mystery-of-beautiful-exterior-of.html
This article is useful for correcting some logical and interpretive or hermeneutic mistakes common to Bible Study in University Bible Fellowship and is in my opinion the most important article I have written so far (as of 2018 February 15) on University Bible Fellowship, it covers how to correct flaws in the academic parts of discipleship in UBF. Anyone who wants to continue to do discipleship as part of UBF should read this article. I do not support abolishing voluntary discipleship but improving it.
https://discipleshipmethods.blogspot.com/2018/02/recovering-from-ubf-personal.html
My discipleship methods blog contains my suggestions for how to improve the quality of discipleship in University Bible Fellowship out of my love for the people in the organization and my love for the beautiful vision of trying to improve the state of mankind as originally advertised by University Bible Fellowship.
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