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This is a synthesis from my friend who leaked them out in the early 2000s. My commentary in []<\/p>\n
Sarah Barry, co-founder and current director of UBF (\u201cUniversity Bible Fellowship\u201d), meanwhile called \u201cReverend Mother Barry\u201d by its members (and obviously enjoying it), was an American missionary of the Southern Presbyterian Church in the 1950s. Being such she was obliged to send regular reports to her mother organization. She did this for about 20\u00a0years, though it can be observed, how she dissociated more and more from her own church and built up her own organization together with Samuel Lee, until she finally completely detached from the church. Here is the complete list of her \u201cMCD letters,\u201d which were archived by the Presbyterian Church, but so far unknown to UBF members:<\/p>\n
[MCD stands for Missionary Correspondence Department<\/a>]<\/p>\nSimilar to the subsequent self representations of the UBF, Sarah Barry\u2019s reports are also very one-sided, self glorifying, glossed over, lacking any self-criticism, and characterized by concealment or falsification of essential backgrounds, events and developments in the history of the organization[as time goes by. In the early reports they are quite different]. Anyway, these historical letters probably will help to understand the history of the development of UBF far better than subsequent, even more forged versions of the \u201chistory of UBF\u201d written by Sarah Barry or Samuel Lee.<\/div>\nOne can easily recognize how Samuel (actually \u201cChang Woo\u201d) Lee, after having been employed by Sarah Barry as a co-worker for Christian student ministry under the patronage of the Presbyterian Church, very soon managed to become the actual ruler and autocrat of an independent organization \u201cUBF,\u201d demoting Sarah Barry to become his \u201csecretary.\u201d Samuel Lee even boasted publicly in the 1991 UBF\u00a0newsletter<\/a>: \u201cI [Lee] said to myself, \u2018In 10\u00a0years I am going to make you [Barry] my personal secretary.\u2019 By God\u2019s grace, it had been done exactly in 10\u00a0years. I was the leader. She was my associate.\u201d UBF was actually molded by the personality of Samuel Lee and his ideas far more than by Sarah Barry. However she has to be charged for not curbing the negative developments, though she was able to observe them at best from the beginning in her position close to Samuel Lee, instead even promoting these developments, probably overwhelmed with the honor and appreciation she received in UBF as \u201cmother\u201d of the organization.<\/div>\nInterestingly Barry already in her April 1962\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0remarks about Lee: \u201cHe is showing real ability in the art of leading from behind.\u201d It was indeed Samuel Lee who was pulling the strings in the background, playing off the chapter leaders against each other and very soon becoming the unlimited autocrat in UBF. Barry\u2019s\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0from the year 1974 reveals that without him actually no decision could be made any more. By how far they had already left leadership in the sense of the Presbyterian Church, of which Samuel Lee once had been a member, too! The mission\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0of November 1970 also very clearly describes Samuel Lee\u2019s method of effective \u201ccloning\u201d of his ideas, methods and Bible interpretation to all other members.<\/div>\nSometimes Sarah Barry tries to give the impression that the so-called \u201cNevius plan\u201d for evangelizing China<\/a>, which had taken effect particularly in Korea, was fulfilled by UBF in an ideal way, which is, however, not true at all. Among other things the Nevius plan emphasized self-responsibility of the local church, i.e. not only of church leaders, but every single member. The leaders should be elected by the local churches and not be ordered from above by the organization as it is the case in UBF. There shouldn\u2019t be any superior organization at all. Missionaries were thought of being traveling missionaries, and not church pastors, as it is the case in UBF. The practice of UBF differs from the ideas of Nevius in many other critical aspects, and his ideas were designed only for the special situation in China and Korea at that time anyway, i.e. neither for world mission in general nor for today\u2019s time. In her letters Sarah Barry also propagates the idea of every Christian being a teacher, which is rejected, however, by the New Testament in several places. [One example is 1 Corinthians 12:4-14]<\/div>\nInteresting is also the clearly visible focus on studying the book of Genesis, the calling of Abraham being interpreted as calling for co-working in UBF to the students. In the\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0of November 1970 Sarah Barry even remarks that, by one-to-one Genesis Bible study, many students \u201caccepted Jesus as Savior and Lord.\u201d How deeply can somebody accept Jesus who has only studied an Old Testament book where the name Jesus isn\u2019t even mentioned? Older UBF missionaries report that though in the beginning besides Genesis also some chapters from John\u2019s Gospel were studied, these were only chapters targeting towards calling, not the actual Gospel of the cross. The New Testament epistles also weren\u2019t read for a long time in UBF, and even now they don\u2019t read all epistles, since the interpretation and application of the Gospel by the epistles contradicts the ideas of UBF in too many aspects. It is also remarkable that neither Sarah Barry nor Samuel Lee ever mentioned their own \u201cconversion story\u201d and the playing a part and help of other people in this. There is only a kind of \u201ccalling story\u201d of Samuel Lee. These two \u201cservants of God\u201d make others believe that they have simply fallen from heaven, fully qualified, without having underwent any kind of training that other members so desperately need according to their opinion.<\/div>\nOne can also recognize some aloofness towards other Christian organizations and one sees how the occasional cooperation with the Presbyterian Church in the beginning, with other missionaries, the IFES, or the \u201cScripture Union\u201d was abandoned more and more and finally stopped completely. The Bible devotional \u201cDaily Bread\u201d which was originally obtained from Scripture Union, was later regularly written by Sarah Barry and other UBF leaders to bring the content more in line with UBF emphasis and doctrines, and merely the name was kept. [Nowadays UBF copys their daily bread from the Navigators a Christian Organization]. From a student organization under the patronage of the Presbyterian Church, UBF developed more and more towards an independent denomination, proffering a \u201ccomplete package\u201d to its members, including a \u201ctithing\u201d system towards the \u201cheadquarters,\u201d Bible study lessons, Bible conferences, Sunday worship services, up to wedding and burial ceremonies. Every kind of accountability towards members or other Christian organizations, actually a particular characteristic of Presbyterian churches, was turned down meanwhile.<\/div>\nThe missionary\u00a0letter<\/a>\u00a0of November 1962, by the way, declares that UBF was officially founded by 9 students on November 24, 1962 , whereas UBF always states 1961 to be the year of foundation. The [secret] mission letters of Sarah Barry contain many things which cannot be found in subsequent official reports any more. After Samuel Lee apparently finally had \u201ctaken over the wheel\u201d from her during her vacation year in the USA 1964\/65, some orientation crisis can be observed in her\u00a0letter<\/a>\u00a0of April 1965, too. But apparently finally she accepted her role as the \u201csecretary\u201d of Samuel Lee and the revered \u201cmother\u201d of the organization. Since that vacation year she also started to write her Christian name with an \u201ch\u201d at the end, as in the English Bible, apparently identifying herself with the biblical Sarah in Genesis. The\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0from the year 1974 mentions that still the highest decisive authority after Samuel Lee was left to her. This delegation of power, established in the very beginning, apparently was also the reason for her taking over the leading role in UBF after the death of Samuel Lee in the year 2002. [What actually happened was that their was a succession crisis from 2002-2004<\/a> until Barry became leader. Shortly afterwards Chang Sun “John” Jun took over. UBF has General Director elections every few years but it is really a facade to make UBF look like a real church when in fact it is a cult with ubfkoreans that always have the power obviously or behind the scenes.]<\/div>\n