Is sorry puppy always supposed to be sorry?

This blog post discusses the phenomena of feeling the need to constantly apologize for one’s existence. It’s when “repentance” goes overboard.

Scenario I:”You always say, ‘I’m sorry.'”

I had only been talking to him for a couple hours and he was already psychoanalyzing me. Despite the brevity of exposure, his insight into my character was uncanny. After he made that statement I tried semi-successfully weeding out those two words from my vocabulary. Since then I have continued to make an effort to stop apologizing incessantly.

Scenario II:”If you care about what people think about you stand on the right side of the room.”

And there I was, the lone participant in the survey on the right side of the room. The next question was something along the lines of “would you do something that needed to be done, even if others didn’t like you for it?” And again I shared my overwhelming desire to be liked and accepted. When the surveyor asked me why I was on the right side I answered, ‘Maybe it’s because I’m Asian and this is the way I was brought up.’ What I meant was I was always taught to obey and concede, even when I didn’t like it. Speaking up for myself was disobedience and disobedience was a sin punishable by Hell. Therefore, I must always obey. I interpreted that in my mind as I must always do what others want. I backed it up with Bible verses such as, “deny yourself,” “take up your cross,” “consider others better than yourself,” “to give is better than to receive,” etc. Somehow in my faulty exegesis I considered offending others as one of the ultimate sins.

Scenario II: Today’s ESL Class

Fast forward to today. During class, I was sweating bullets because some of my students were whipping through the material I had prepared at lightening speed and they looked bored, while other students were taking their sweet time like tortoises on a leisurely stroll. There I was stranded because I could not please all my students. Each one of my students has a different expectation of me and the fear of not meeting their expectations is what keeps me up at night. It also makes me hate the job that I initially had valued and enjoyed so much. And this scene of struggling with multi level learners has been repeating itself for my whole teaching career. This has been the toughest aspect of teaching, learning that I cannot please everyone.

If you ever taught, you know what it’s like to have constraints. You have your directors who need good test scores. And then you have parents who also desire results (or if you teach adults like I do, you have expectations for jobs and a higher salary.) And finally you have the actual students sitting in your class who have their own preferences and learning styles. In a classroom with 20 students there are so many variables for learning; this transforms the teacher, in a sense, to a juggler attempting to find the magic elixir that once imbibed will give the student the ability to have English flow from their lips as water from a faucet. I put a lot of pressure on myself for my students to succeed and it kills me. Not only that, but the old school I taught at put the blame for any failure of the student solely on the shoulders of the teacher. In the classroom, however, my spineless posture of attempting to save everyone gets me (and my students) no where.

“Get over yourself, MJ.”

Those are the words I said to myself after class today. After the 105 minutes of teaching responsibility were up I realized my fear of letting people down is not sustainable. I cannot cater my class to what my students want. I have to decide what my objectives are, how my students will reach them and how I will assess them on it. I have to make a plan backed up by my own reasons and stick with it. Then when my students disagree, which is inevitable (someone always disagrees), I have explanations. I have a degree in education and experience. I am the expert in the classroom. Yet for some reason I had been conditioned to think that owning up to my ability to teach was pride.

Ultimately it is my class and I make the rules. I do not do this out of the desire to control and dictate, but out of practicality. Nothing can be done and no goals can be reached if I’m constantly second guessing every decision I make.

I’m going to be honest, my personality is riddled with insecurity. I have always compared myself to my classmates and siblings. Am I as accomplished as them? Am I as smart? Am I as pretty? Am I as liked? Not only that, but I have always thought that to think anything positively about myself or any personal virtues was sinful because it stemmed from pride, the number one sin. But life cannot be lived like this. I am tired of being afraid and unsure all the time.

The passive-aggressive spectrum    

I don’t know if you can tell from reading this article, but I am very passive, to the point of passive aggression. In my mind I had somehow come to the conclusion that the way to respond as a Christian and a woman in any and every situation was passively. Now, thankfully I’m learning that the passive response is not the only response. I can be assertive, which means I am direct with my expectations and needs.

I am entitled to preferences and expectations. Before I viewed my role as a teacher/victim. Meaning, I have to jump through the hoops that others have set before me, but that is false. I am a person, just as my students and directors are. I am a human being and I have a voice, and I will use it unapologetically.

What are some lessons that you have learned about disobedience or humility? Do you constantly apologize even for things that are not your fault? Have you experienced a posture of constant apology to the point that it eventually became a hindrance? Do you struggle with speaking in an assertive way, which is neither passive nor aggressive?

Chapel with David Choi

In Chapel at Moody, we had a quest speaker, David Choi, from the church of the Beloved. One point in his sermon stuck out to me. He said, “We’re all trying to find security… We’re trying desperately to find validation in our identities.” He shared all the masks that he had worn throughout his life. Growing up as a Korean, he struggled academically to please his father. He always got A’s, but it was never good enough. Then he moved to a boarding school in the Midwest where everyone was smarter than him, so he tried to be the athletic and funny class clown. Then he went to Wheaton where everyone was a spiritual leader and president of their respective Bible Clubs, so he led a youth group. Then he went to seminary in Boston where he again wanted to fit in and show off. It was a never ending game of charades.

My masks

As he was sharing, I couldn’t stop my head form nodding. I know what it’s like to wear a mask, to become a social chameleon so that others would accept me. So often my desire for validation and approval dictates how I spend my time, money and energy, what I blog about or post on facebook. It determines my job and educational degrees. To this day I am still trying to prove my worth to the middle school bullies who made fun of me and ignored me, a decade and a half ago. I put on the smart/tough/able/invincible MJ mask, but it is exhausting and ultimately the only one receiving approval is the mask. This is the conundrum of approval; the more one seeks it, the less likely one will gain it. It is a never ending vicious cycle that is apparent in some of the most beautiful and successful people of the world. There are fashion models who never accept that they are beautiful and keep trying harder and harder to gain that ever elusive sense of worth. Approval is a drug that never satisfies and continually keeps one begging for more and more.

There’s a quote that Dr. Ben shared from Anne Lamott and I thought it was an accurate depiction of humanity. “Everyone is screwed up, broken, clingy, and scared, even the people who seem to have it more or less together. They are much more like you than you would believe. So try not to compare your insides to their outsides.” No one is exempt; some are better at hiding it than others.

But how does one gain approval? By not needing it.

One characteristic I highly admire is fearlessness. When I hear the word “fearless,” one person I think of is Frida Kahlo. As an artist her style was daring and unique. No one else painted like her and no one else dressed like her, but that did not matter to her. She expressed what she felt and in the end that is what gained the approval of others.

Another example comes from business. Often business owners try to cater to every type of customer. For example, a photographer will say that he does weddings, babies, nature, animals, etc. But once he tries to cater to everyone, he actually is catering to no one. It is a better for a business owner to narrow down his customers and focus on a few. I read somewhere that the difference between an artist and a politician is that an artist focuses on the few that appreciate their work, while a politician focuses on the majority that dislikes him. Artists/Writers/Musicians express what they feel needs to be said, not necessarily that which will gain them popularity.

Ultimate Approval has already been given

Of course ultimately as Christians, we know our source of approval.

“Before the foundations of the world, He loved you. Before the fall of Eden, He loved you. Before He sent His Son splitting through the cosmos to this world, He loved you. Before He died upon the cross, He loved you. When He rose again, He loved you. And He’s coming back again because He loves you. When you took your first breath, He loved you. When you messed up bad, He loved you. When you made good grades, He loved you. When you won and when you lost, He loved you.” -Jennifer Dukes Lee

David Choi finished his sermon by sharing our true identity; it is the identity that never changes, no matter how much we mess up. We are sons and daughters of the Most High King. God did not/does not begrudginly save us. He was not there watching us saying, “Oh, I hope he doesn’t get saved.  Darn, looks like I’ll have to let that one into heaven.” Quite the contrary, God wants to be with us more than we could ever want that for ourselves. He wants his children close to him.

I love Galatians because in chapter 3:2,3 St. Paul gets sarcastic. He says,

“I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? After beginning by means of the Spirit, are you now trying to finish by means of the flesh?”

He calls them foolish. How could they be saved by faith and then all of sudden think it was their actions that could save or unsave them? That’s nonsense, but it’s something we Christians always think subconsciously. We think, “Uh oh, God’s not going to like me anymore.” However, later in chapter 5 Paul says, “It is for freedom that you have been set free.” We were not freed from sin to enter another bondage of sin management or the vicious cycle of seeking approval. God has already given us the stamp of his approval.

You are a child of the Most High King

One of the saddest thing for me to see is passion-less Christians.  I know often I personally forget my identity and let doubt and bitterness seep in.  Shame and guilt are so familiar that I go back to negative thinking and the hamster cage of trying to earn others’ approval. I also try to gain God’s approval even though it is only by Christ that I am approved, not by any works. I constantly need reminders of who I am in Christ. I constantly need to speak truth to myself and others. I constantly need to be reminded of the gospel.

I am a Princess of the Most High King and so are you (or Prince).

Do you wear masks? How do you try to gain approval from those around you? Has there ever been a time when fear dictated your actions? How do you see your identity in Christ? How do you remember your true identity?

Today I would like to share with you the most impressive example of empathy I’ve yet come across. If I am blessed with empathy, then my new friend Timothy Kurek is doubly blessed. Timothy Kurek is the author of The Cross in the Closet. Recently he did a TedTalk. Please listen to his story of empathy as it is highly applicable to our UBF situation. Can you walk in the shoes of a former member?

TedTalk: Walking in the Shoes of the Other

You simply have to listen to what Timothy says at 9:55.

Timothy shares about the commonality of humanity. We are all born oblivious to social labels and lived as babies without fear. He asks: Can we re-learn intentional empathy? Timothy thinks so. He shares his own story of intentional empathy, and his amazing experiences with social labels.

How did the Christians in Timothy’s life respond to his intentional empathy? Silence. The silence was overwhelming. The Christians in his life treated him as if he did not exist.

Former member of ubf ought to be able to relate to this. After we left, we became dead to the ministry and had to endure madding silence.

So I ask again. Can you walk in the shoes of the other?

Luke 9: 25

“What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very self?”

Desmond Tutu once said: “The church is meant to be a failing community”

“Follow me” are the most repeated words that Jesus ever said. It’s worth noting that Jesus’ most repeated command was not an imperative to a specific action (pray 5 times a day or recite a mantra) but an invitation to a relationship, “Follow me” means “come to me.” In this article my purpose is to answer the question: why would anyone ever want to be a Christian?

In order to answer that we must first define “Christian.” A Christian is a follower of Jesus Christ, someone who lives as Jesus Christ lived. How did Jesus Christ lived? He lived radically counter-culturally. My least favorite Bible verse is the one where it says, “But whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also.” And a close second is, “Forgive us as we have forgiven our debtors.” Jesus’ life was a life of tears. On his way to Jerusalem in Luke he weeps bitterly for the people saying, “If only you knew.” Jesus Christ lived a life of love that ultimately got him killed. The Beatitudes talk about the blessing of meekness and persecution. In Jesus’ economy those are valued. Jesus lived the life of a vagabond with out any earthly treasures. He often went without food or sleep and not only that, but he did not claim any ownership on His own life. He only did what his Father told him. Christianity can be summed up in 3 words: humility, humility and humility. Jesus promises a life of persecution, isolation, poverty and hunger, so I reiterate my question why would anyone ever want to be a Christian? And another question quite similar is, “why would anyone ever want to have kids?”

In order to answer this question fully we must consider the alternatives. If Jesus is not my Christ then who is? What hit me in the message by Dan Bokenfield was his question: have you ever lied? We are all liars and we are all untrustworthy. Am I a better Christ than Jesus could be?

I am not a better Christ. I cannot be my own savior. Looking back on my life I find many reasons why I am the way I am. First, when I was 14 my family and I were uprooted from the US and replanted in Ukraine, a developing country. I learned from an early age that friends forget you and are not there for you. Living as an expat, I’ve had to say goodbye to so many friends that my heart has been hardened by it. Secondly, when I was 18, I was literally shipped off to Turkey. My family took a cruise from Ukraine to Turkey and left me in a country where I only knew 4 people and not a word of the language. I remember begging them not to leave me; I was only 18. And thirdly, after that I was part of church that was not very healthy and was in a couple of abusive relationships. Basically, in my life I’ve learned that everyone lets me down, my friends and even my loving family who are limited by time and distance. Even the authors and philosophers that I read turn out to be crazy and racist. Growing up and realizing this early on has caused me to depend on myself and trust no one. This often seeps into my relationship with Christ.

Words like “submission” and “self-denial” are very unpleasant for me. I am afraid of losing my identity. I fear losing control over my plans. My plans to travel the world, spreading light and love and focusing solely on my own comfort and enjoyment. I am afraid of submitting my future into God’s hands because I don’t want my life to be boring and lackluster. So why would I ever desire to be a Christian?

The only possible answer is love. I am madly in love with Jesus Christ. I have never met anyone like him. All the other men I’ve met have been proud and arrogant and let me down, but Jesus has never let me down and never will. I love him to the point where I will reconcile myself with someone I despise because I don’t want that argument to get in the way of my relationship with Jesus. Jesus is the only one who has never let me down these past 26 years and he’s the only one that’s been by my side. He is the only one who puts up with my tears and complaints and fears and ingratitude.

This quote from Dorothy Sayers describes Jesus pretty well:

“Perhaps it is no wonder that the women were first at the Cradle and last at the Cross. They had never known a man like this Man there never has been such another. A prophet and teacher who never nagged at them, never flattered or coaxed or patronised; who never made arch jokes about them, never treated them either as “The women, God help us!” or “The ladies, God bless them!”; who rebuked without querulousness and praised without condescension; who took their questions and arguments seriously; who never mapped out their sphere for them, never urged them to be feminine or jeered at them for being female; who had no axe to grind and no uneasy male dignity to defend; who took them as he found them and was completely unselfconscious.” 

From Steve Stasinos message the examples of John Newton and Nate Saint showed that following Jesus is not a one time thing; it is iterative. Also, in this passage Luke 9, it says to pick up one’s cross daily. This means it is a life long decision for these next possible 80 or 54 years left on earth. This is really hard. The Lord knows how I struggle with anger, bitterness and unforgiveness. I constantly pray for God to give me sweetness so that instead of seeking revenge I seek to bless those who have slapped me (metaphorically).

My prayer this summer has been not to put anything on my plate that God has not put there. I am a planner and on the Martha/Mary scale I am a Martha, super type A and dictorial because I don’t want to miss out on anything in life. I feel like I have to prove that I’m smart and justify my existence (I think this stems from some bullying/insecurities in grade school).

But chasing after my own glory is tiring and consuming and ultimately futile because I am only one person and honestly my sphere of influence is so small. And as one member in our group Bible study aptly noted we are probably never ever going to be as famous as Taylor Swift. So why am I seeking world fame?

I really am coming to grips with reality that my plans for my life are so petty. This life I have is a gift and I don’t know what to do with it. They say you don’t really own something until you are willing to lose it. I love my life and that is the exact reason why I want to put it in JC’s hands because I love and trust him and know that life is too precious a thing to waste.

To conclude, after looking at the evidence and seeing that I’m only 26 and make a lot of stupid mistakes and say a lot of stupid things that hurt people. It would be best to give up any claim on my life. I don’t have any plans for my life, but JC can take dirty water and make it into sweet wine. He can take a demon-possessed man and adulterous woman and change them into his messengers. My idea to make a name for myself is so small and petty and doesn’t even benefit anyone. So in light of the argument I would ask another question: why would anyone ever not be a Christian? What is the better alternative? To hold on to my bitterness and live a life seeking revenge? Or is it to live a life to please the 5 senses? Do I want to focus on money so I can eat better food or pleasure so that my body can feel good. Or just find a nice guy and move out to suburbia and raise some kids? What else is out there?

Why are you a Christian? Why are you not a Christian? What do Jesus’ words ‘follow me’ mean to you? Do you agree with my definitions of ‘Christian’ and ‘follow me’? Did you go to MSBC 2015? If so, what did you learn?

On July 2nd, 2011 after several months of email wars with Korean missionaries and other UBF leaders, I finally had enough. I was sick of the dead dog isolation training that was supposed to be only six months but ended up being 8 years. After 8 years of “pioneering”, we were still a single family “house church”. There was no sign of any effort by any leader anywhere in ubfland to actually plant a Christian church. We were just supposed to come up with our own ambition and our own resources to build a ubf chapter.

When I attended the bizarre Toledo UBF Easter conference in April 2011 and heard the worst sermon ever on John 17, I realized I just had to get out of the ubf cult.

So when our family went to my hometown on Independence Day weekend in 2011, I decided to close our ubf “chapter” and resign from ubf. I come from a small country town in Ohio called Defiance. I sent my one sentence resignation email from my Mom’s house in Defiance with as much defiance as possible to over 200 ubfers. It felt SO very good! (Later my resignation earned me an honorable mention in the next ubf newsletter.)

The email wars escalated dramatically after closing our chapter permanently. I quickly revamped and repurposed my entire priestlynation blog.

So now instead of celebrating the glory of ubf, I stand my ground celebrate my independence from ubf. I don’t think people realized who they were messing with when they messed with a guy from Defiance. Four years later I am still on my fascinating and amazing journey of recovery. I love learning how to be a family-centered man, how to make my own decisions and how to let my emotions grow back in a healthy way.

Whether you stay or leave ubf is not the main issue. Whether you are free to speak, free to love and free to be your unique self is the main issue. What is your freedom story? Are you free to live your own life?

Do you belong to a proud or a humble church?

Fill in the blanks. I think most of them are rather self-evident. The answers are likely a lot easier than putting them into practice. (Sorry, I don’t know how to make a table, but the table and the answer key can be seen here.)

The Proud Person / Church Vs.The Humble Person / Church

Seeing ourselves as better and others as worse. Perhaps dichotomy is sometimes not often very helpful or practical. We also incline to seeing ourselves (and our churches) in a better or more positive light, and conversely incline to seeing others (and other churches) in a worse or more negative light. (I know that I did this for decades!) Nonetheless, I think this table of contrast is helpful.

What do you think? Are UBF people and UBF churches humble?

Remembering Sarah

Back in 2012, I shared my thoughts on remembering Sarah. I pray for the continued healing and  restoration of their family. I pray for grace and peace to be with them. I pray for the memory of Sarah to be a good one–a reminder that life is short and that we should live our lives in happiness. I pray that her life may remind us of the pressure people are living with.

Remembering the Others

The other suicides related to ubf people are still mostly a mystery to me. They are like unknown soldiers, people I don’t know much about. Still I remember them. Here is a quote from the past: “Then something tragical happened. A UBF shepherd from my chapter had commited suicide. I had known him a little bit and had lived for some time together with him in UBF “common life.” Therefore I went to his funeral, together with D (who had been his shepherd) and one or 2 other UBF members.” When we begin to pressure someone to make life decisions for the sake of ubf mission, might we remember the burdens people are dealing with?

The Burden Layers

In my article, “My Journey of Recovery” I shared the multiple burden layers that I had discovered in my life after leaving ubf. I suspect there are more. It is these burden layers that ubf imposes onto your life, so much so that thoughts of suicide enter your mind. It is these layers of burden that I demand ubf leaders to remove from ubf members. I demand that ubf “shepherds” no longer falsely advertise “just one hour of bible study per week!” when they have this massive lifestyle of entanglement planned for the new students.

Suicide is not the Unforgivable Sin

I also take the time each Memorial Day to share with people that suicide is not the unforgivable sin. Suicide may be the only way to find peace. You see, that is what the human soul seeks–peace and hope. When you take away peace and hope people are left with darkness and silence. I find solace in Jesus’ Gethsemane prayer. Our Messiah prayed for us. He forgives us. He longs to live inside us. He is alive today and loves us.

The Bigger Issue

For those who took their own lives, there is nothing left to discuss. My greater concern is for those who live with thoughts of suicide, depression or sadness. That is why I bring up this topic on Memorial Day, to raise awareness and courageously talk about a typically taboo subject.

So I ask: What gives you hope? How do you find peace? Why do you say we should value life?

One final thought… The movie “A Few Good Men” inspired me with courage beyond belief. I love this scene and I see myself as Tom Cruise :)

“What did Jesus really mean when He said, ‘Follow Me?’”

This pamphlet has three parts:

Part I. The great invitation (Mt 4:19; Mk 1:17).

Part II. The great cost (Lk 9:23).

Part III. The great change (Mt 28:19).

Repent, deny yourself, make disciples. Without going into detail, Platt explains in Part 1 that every person’s fundamental problem is sin and that we need to repent of our sins (Mk 1:15). In Part 2 he explains our need to realize that the great cost required in following Jesus is to deny ourselves and to give of ourselves entirely to Jesus (Mt 16:24-25; Mk 8:34-35). Finally in Part 3, he states that if one is truly following Jesus he will invest his life for making disciples (Mt 28:19). Platt’s point is to speak against being nominal Christians (which is not following Jesus), and instead be a “radical” Christian who is completely sold out for Christ. This in essence is what Platt says Jesus expects of any Christian who responds to his command, “Follow me.”

Formulaic? I do not disagree with any of Platt’s main points, for I am very much pro-repentance, pro-self-denial, pro-all in for Christ, and pro-making disciples. But I do not like the way he answered this very important and fundamental question of what it means to follow Jesus. (Platt also wrote a 246 page book with the title “Follow Me: A Call to Die, A Call to Live,” which I did not read.) Perhaps, a decade ago I would have fully embraced his answers with a high five. Perhaps it might still be a good primer for new believers and a challenge to “nominal Christians.” But today I find this rather unsatisfying or formulaic, if not a turn off. Let me try to explain why.

(1) The focus and emphasis is on YOUR PROBLEM–SIN–rather than on God’s mercy, love, grace and forgiveness. Basically, “your problem is sin and you must repent…or else…”

(2) Thus, the focus is on what is wrong and bad and sinful and horrible (YOU) rather than what is right and good and holy and wonderful (God).

(3) It primarily addresses and emphasizes what you must do (repent, deny yourself, make disciples) rather than on what Jesus has done for us through his incarnation, condescension, suffering, crucifixion, death, resurrection and ascension.

(4) While there is mention and affirmation of it, yet there does not seem to be any great proclamation or excitement regarding God’s goodness, grace and generosity, nor is there any awe and expression of how truly majestic, magnanimous, marvelous and mysterious our God is.

(5) In my opinion, such a presentation of what it means to follow Jesus makes Christians rather judgmental and critical of others (perhaps without realizing it), rather than on being loving, gracious, generous and ever forgiving and patient Christians like our God.

Judgmental Christians. I think that when following Jesus is articulated, expressed and communicated in such ways, it may be little wonder why Christians often come across as being judgmental, intolerant, angry and impatient toward those who sin (which is basically everybody …. except themselves!). We are judgmental of those who, in our opinion, do not repent, deny themselves, or are not making disciples. Some Christians even come across as being constipated and intolerant of anyone who is not a Christian like themselves; they are rather ungracious and condescending toward “other Christians” who are not living like them, making disciples like them, marrying like them, dressing like them, behaving like them, preaching like them, etc. It is for these reasons (and more) that I dislike the above answers as to what it means to follow Jesus. Perhaps, Platt does a more wholesome and comprehensive job in his book.

David Platt may be a wonderful Christian, pastor and preacher. I heard David Platt preach on missions from Revelation 5 a few years ago at a Gospel Coalition conference. He is gifted and passionate with much heartfelt unction. I loved his sermon and preaching. So this is not a criticism of Platt as a person, preacher or pastor, but simply of his pamphlet.

What does it mean to follow Jesus? I am sorry that I did not answer this question myself, but only critiqued the way Platt answered it.

Do you agree or disagree with my reasons regarding Platt’s answers to what it means to follow Jesus? Do such answers appeal to non-Christians? Christians? Are such answers good, satisfactory and adequate?

I am enjoying reading Richard Rohr’s book Everything Belongs. His point is as the title says: Everything—both sin and righteousness, bad and good, wrong and right—belongs. But this is generally not how we think.

We think the former (sin, bad, wrong) does not belong in the scheme of God. So we thrash those bad aspects in ourselves–usually by not talking about it, or being blind to it, or by pretending that we are not that bad. We also thrash those bad aspects in others often by denouncing them for being bad, as though there is no bad in ourselves.

Here’s a “bad is wrong” mindset from a recent UBF report that says, “Asia is like a spiritual wasteland and is full of idol worshipers…” Doesn’t the one who wrote the report not realize that the church can also easily become a spiritual wasteland of Pharisees and be full of those who worship their own church rather than be loving and embracing toward idol worshipers, as Jesus was? Interestingly, Jesus’ most piercing and stinging rebuke was not to the prostitute (who did “wrong”) but to the Bible experts and Bible teachers (who did “right”)!

 
This story illustrates Rohr’s point and the theme of Everything Belongs:

Alcoholics tell me, “It was the worst possible thing. I ruined my marriage and lost my job and hurt my kids. It doesn’t make a bit of sense, but it is the greatest thing that ever happened to me — that I was a drunk.” An old drunk says alcoholism was the greatest gift God ever gave him… Logically that doesn’t make any sense, but theo-logically it does. What a shame that he lost his marriage and hurt his kids. He wishes he could undo it. But because of that experience, his heart was finally broken open. Now he can go back to his wife and children with compassion and freedom. Isn’t that better than so-called “doing it right” and becoming more rigid, self-righteous, and ignorant with each passing year? I admit it is a great mystery and a profound paradox.

 

A lot of people have done it “all right.” But when you look at them you say to yourself, “If that’s salvation, I don’t know that I want to be saved.” If those are the people in heaven, I don’t want to go there! Is that what heaven is going to be like? A bunch of superior people who tell you when you’re wrong all the time? Is that the life Jesus promised? That can’t be it.

 

On the other side, you meet these little souls who have been eaten up and spit out by life. Yet their eyes shine.

Finally no longer constipated. A personal story that comes to mind is when I clearly did “wrong” by losing $1,000,000 to a con-man in 2005. I badly traumatized my entire family, especially my wife. But strangely it was also one of the greatest things that happened to me. I became “unconstipated.” I discovered in a new, fresh and real way what I already knew: God has always loved me and continues to love me (Jer 31:3)! Since then our marriage has never been better and my wife and I have never been happier, I think…

Does it make sense that “right is bad and wrong is good”? Do you have a “right is bad and wrong is good” story?

Accepted!

Today I received word that I am accepted into the next Reformation Project cohort. It felt so good–too good. I am so excited and so happy! This means I have to start going to church and reading a ton of material, but I am so ready to get going on this. So I will begin attending our family’s local Baptist church this Sunday.

I owe a huge thank you to those who sent in recommendation letters for me! Thank you so much for believing in me regardless of our doctrinal differences. This makes three cohorts in a row for me. I really enjoy this cohort style of learning and growing in faith.

Vantage Point 3 Cohort

In 2013 I attended Grace Community’s leadership cohort in Detroit, MI. This utilized the Vantage Point 3 “The Journey” material and was excellent. I had a personal encounter with the Triune God and found my authentic self narrative. Here is  a link to the program my wife and I participated in:  http://vantagepoint3.org/our-processes/the-journey/

ACT3 Cohort

In 2014 I attended John Armstrong’s ACT3 Cohort in Chicago, IL. This was an amazing learning experience, and one that changed me forever. I gained respect for theology and connected more with historic, orthodox Christianity. The reading material was very good and deeply impacted all of my own book writing. This cohort inspired me to be an author. It was so exciting to spend time with the likes of John and his friends such as George Koch. I loved speaking with James Danaher as well. I learned that accepting a person is not the same as accepting their doctrine. There is much value in relational unity and staying in the conversation. Here is a link to the ACT3 program:  http://www.act3network.com/cohorts/

Reformation Leadership Cohort

In 2015 I will be attending the Reformation Project cohort in Washington DC. I have already made new contacts and new friends through the application process. I am really excited about the next 4 months, culminating in a four day conference in our nation’s capital. Here is a link to Matthew Vine’s cohort:  http://www.reformationproject.org/conferences/apply

Final Thoughts

We know we are forgiven in Christ. Do we also know we are accepted in Christ? Do we show grace but withhold acceptance? Do you have someone in your life who accepts you completely? Do you accept other people completely? How can we better see that love resolves the paradox of accepting my self–my true, authentic, glorious, ugly, crazy, messy, wonderful self? What do the Holy Scriptures teach about acceptance?

When I first discovered about marriage by faith I was in shock. For those who are new readers marriage by faith typically works like this. Your personal mentor, usually referred to as a shepherd, decides you are ready to marry. He asks you if you are ready to marry. If you say no he waits and prays. He might ask you from time to time. But eventually once you say yes he picks someone from UBF and puts the two of you together. You are encouraged to make a choice quickly for God, and once that happens you marry in a short period of time. Your marriage from the start is all about honoring God, which means you are expected to become a missionary, pastor, or personal shepherd yourself. This is the mission of marriage as explained by most UBF people.

All of this seems tame but as I read about this topic and questioned it more it made me uneasy. It is a bad thing to feel uneasy about your marriage, since as I have mentioned it is so important. Here are the things I was uneasy about after reading nearly everything on the internet about the topic, and after speaking with dozens of people all around the world who were married by faith. I am not saying these always happen, but I read about it enough for me to become very concerned about marriage by faith.

• The pastor, director, or shepherd gets between the couple if it is seen as being in the interest of the UBF chapter.
• The pastor, director, or shepherd picks a person who is very loyal to UBF to marry someone who is not so loyal, and uses to loyal member to keep the not so loyal member in the chapter.
• Children are seen as being secondary to world mission and are treated as such. Reports of children being left in rooms alone while the parents were in a prayer meeting were common.
• Pastors, directors, shepherds not sharing to one of the to-be-married people very critical information that someone being arranged married ought to know such as mental illness, homosexual tendencies, stds, etc.
• The families of the arranged parties being very nearly the last thought. Reports of families pushed aside.
• Extremely sudden marriages after engagement.
• Cancelled marriages when one party did not show enough loyalty. In at least one case a kidnapping of one of a bride to be.
• A coercive effort to stop any dating because marriage by faith is the best way to marry.
• A contrived argument based on an Old Testament narrative that because Isaac married Rebekah in the way he did, we should also; while in truth the practice is an Asian tradition being held up with a flimsy theological backing.
• Dishonesty about what marriage by faith is, how it happens, and why it exists.

I cannot tell you how much I wanted to ignore these things. I really hated dating, and I really saw that the women who were married in UBF were Godly and loved Jesus. I really cannot impress that enough here. The women in UBF are nearly all kind, gracious, loving, and gentle. I had always deeply feared that I would not find someone. Most of my teenage years were spent praying for someone who would love me one day. Even when I was dating as a high school I had marriage on my mind. I intentionally did not date anyone my last two years of high school because I knew we could never marry if we went to different colleges. So for me I wanted to accept Marriage by Faith, but even as I tried to turn a blind eye to all the problems; the one that kept haunting me was how my bible studies kept trying to enforce it. The argument to marry by faith came up again and again where I felt like it didn’t belong. And in my heart I just could not accept such a lie masquerading as truth. At some point my questions became such that I was actually accused of jealously of my roommate. At this point I swore off the practice all together. I told people I wanted to be celibate. I was laughed at. I told people I didn’t want to marry now.  I thought I would give it more time. Better that I say “no” then “yes” than “yes” then “no” was my thought. After being held at gun point by a student I knew I couldn’t go back to my high school, but I needed a job. South Korea had been an option the summer before. I was praying for God’s direction. I knew what going to South Korea would mean and I was told that “God” would pick someone for me to marry if I went there. I was so conflicted as to what to do. I needed a job more than anything and Korea was a sure thing. But marriage? If I talked to missionaries they wouldn’t understand, if I talked to my friends they wouldn’t understand. In my heart of hearts I wanted to marry but every part of me screamed that this was just so wrong. I had nightmares about it. “You can’t be forced to do anything.” Is what I thought, but then I wondered how much self-control I could have after meeting a kind, wonderful, person who loved God. Would I really be strong enough to turn her down? It was consuming all my time. I was reading everything I could, just hoping that I could find something that would let me accept it and would ease my mind. But the more I read the worse it got. I started fearing that someone would be suddenly be introduced, and that I would be so stricken that I lost my sense of reason. I was at a cross road. It was the greatest struggle of my adult life, and it was a struggle I held in secret. I pleaded with God. If this is really your will let that be done I prayed. At the last minute I applied to graduate school last. I did not expect to get in since my grades were not good. God saves and I was accepted to graduate school. I knew in graduate school I would not be bothered by the marriage question. My chapter had had other graduate students and they were always so busy that the missionaries respected their study and did not often bring up the marriage topic. I had been in conversation with a certain Dr. Benjamin Toh, whom I met through this blog. I told him excitedly “At least they won’t talk about marriage anymore.” And his reply was something that changed my life: “Do you want to be married?…”

Next time I will discuss how God answered me.

• My marriage by faith -­ my unusual experience with ubf’s most infamous sacrament

• Missionary empathy­ – how living in another country gave me a new perspective of the missionaries in my chapter

• Filipino cults amidst a devoted people – how bad theology infects a pious people

• An unedited message­ – My sermon on 2 Corinthians 7:8­-10. See what the Holy Spirit led me to write

• The harvest is plentiful – a report of the Christmas services in the Philippines.

• What does it mean to be American? – how I learned about my identity as an American among my brothers and sisters in Christ

Let me know which ones you especially like in the comments. I plan on getting to all of them eventually.

The last day of the year

A key verse for a new year. A yearly practice I love from being in UBF for 34 years is to write and/or reflect on what has been called a “new year key verse testimony.” It should be a pleasant poetic poignant time to reflect on the past year with gratitude and a time of prayerful anticipation of what one hopes for in the coming year.

Happiness in 2015. (I am likely obsessed with happiness, having written two such articles in the past two years: A Happy UBF chapter and Happy, Healthy, Humble View of Self.) Two weeks ago, I reflected not just on the past year but on the last six years: West Loop UBF, 2008-2014. On this last day of 2014, my prayer and hope is that 2015 may be for you a year of love, joy, peace, mercy, grace and happiness on the basis of Psalm 1.

Seven practical applications. What is the secret of happiness? Psalm 1 suggests that our happiness is closely related to our life (Ps 1:1), our heart (Ps 1:2), our foundation (Ps 1:3), and observing the lives of others (Ps 1:4-6). But I also felt that one can easily become self-righteous, critical and condescending toward others who we might regard as “not blessed because of their sins.” Thus, to be happy, consider these personal practical applications:

1) Love those who are unhappy. Do not judge, criticize or condemn others for what you regard as their wickedness and sins.

2) Repent of self-righteousness and condescension toward others, just because you think that God has blessed you, your family and your church. Ultimately, it is not because of you.

3) Know the wickedness within yourself when you:

• blame others, including God.
• worry anxiously about your future rather than trusting God.
• are jealous and envious of others, especially those who have what you want.
• gossip and slander others behind their back.
• speak, act and behave in a “holy Christian way,” while your heart may hypocritically not be as holy as what you project to others.
• lie, are dishonest, and do not speak the truth.
• do not love others the way God loves you.
• are ruled by your ego that seeks value, validation and vindication from people and the church rather than from God.

4) Know that if you regard yourself as blessed, it is because of the mercy and grace of God, and not because of any righteousness of your own.

5) Know that to be happy you need to be blessed more than you need anything else in all of life.

6) Jesus is the only truly blessed and righteous person who ever lived out Psalm 1, not you!

Do you have a happy and hopeful new year key verse testimony to share? Do you find such a practice helpful or useful? Overrated? Formulaic? Whatever the case, may you be truly happy and blessed in 2015.

January-Febuary

The first few months was a dark time for me. It started out with me crashing my car and getting trapped in a blizzard in Indianpolis. Then a close friend suddendly left UBF and told me never to talk to her again. I struggled greatly with a lot of people in the ministry here and met Mark Yang who confirmed nearly every bad thing I had heard about UBF. In February I found out my work was not keeping me on for the next year and this made my future unsure. I looked to teaching English in South Korea. This brought with it the option to marry “by faith” a Korean woman. I was so scared that I would be taken by the looks of her and forget my convictions that I decided against it. In the very late part of Febuary I was accepted to graduate school. It was something I didn’t think would happen.

March-April

In March I has a student pull a gun on me and I decided that I would certainly be going to graduate school. I was invited by Rem to attened the Philippines Easter conference and I also attended that UBF conference in Missouri along with Kansas City UBF and others. In April I went to the Philippines were I saw the grace of God laid bare. So much happiness and joy it felt as though heaven itself had colonized this island. At this time I met Hope from the Philippines UBF and started corresponding with her daily. A significantly longer article would still not begin to say enough about her. I also discovered my tuition would be waived for graduate school and I would become a graduate assistant.

May-June

My school finished around the same time that my brother proposed. Unfortunately he was arrested the next day because as it turns out stealing thousands of dollars isn’t allowed. I used my rent money to bail him out but my mother refused to let me come home. Luckily my grandmother came through and I stayed with her. I also saw my roommate get married and met Dr. Ben Toh at this time. (His profile picture does a good job at making him look taller than he is.)

July-August

I gave a sermon in Springfield UBF as well as for St. Louis. The former was from Romans. It concerned the purpose of Jesus. The latter was on the woman with the Alabaster jar and the her devotion. I moved back and started graduate school.

September-October

My brother found out he would not go to jail and was married. He also failed to return a rented ladder with my debit card which became his Christmas gift. I bought a ticket to go back to the Philippines.

November-December

In Novemeber I discovered that one of my professors had been abusing his authority over me. I discovered he had also been telling the college I was not proficient in calculus. I took a special exam over calculus 1,2, and 3. The department was reduced to calling me “brilliant” and I was allowed to keep my assistantship for next year. I am currently in the Philippines learning the thankfulness of what it means to be given so much and seeing the grace of Christ daily.

I cannot be thankful enough for the grace and truth of Christ this year. May he be with me always until the end of the age.

Living with my head in the clouds. Last year I shared how West Loop (WL) UBF began in 2008. This is a follow up random, limited and selective reflection of our happy and eventful 6 year story and journey as a church. It mainly explains how my ideological perspectives changed. It is “heady” and not practical. As I’ve often told my wife, “Sorry that I live with my head in the clouds. Therefore, your feet has to be on the ground.” I hope this does not sound bad for her!

A theme for each year. For the last few years, as the primary preaching pastor, I loosely choose a particular theme for each year at WL:

• the year of the Gospel (1 Cor 15:1-4), a matter of prime importance.
• the year of Grace (Ac 20:24): Paul’s only aim was to testify to the gospel of God’s grace.
• the year of Sanctification (Phil 2:12b)–not by human effort but primarily by the grace of God (Phil 2:13);
• the year of the whole counsel of God (Ac 20:27), also translated as the whole will, plan, and purpose of God.
• the year of Remembrance (Dt 15:15a; 24:18; 8:2-3), to prompt us to love God (Dt 6:5) and to act and live accordingly (Dt 10:12-13; 30:19-20).
• For 2015: the year of Faith (Rom 1:17), knowing that it is only by grace that one comes to faith (Eph 2:8-9).

All these themes are rooted and grounded in the gospel–the only power for real authentic transformation and change that happens inside out (Rom 1:16). But Christians are often scared of grace, preferring instead to be punitive and retributive. We incline to giving and treating people as we think their sins deserve. We mistake grace for antinomianism, which was what Paul was accused of by the Bible legalists (Rom 6:1, 15). We think grace leads to lawlessness and licentiousness. This may happen. But withholding grace is never the solution. In fact, when grace is lacking, any church invariably becomes moralistic, legalistic, rigid and inflexible. Insufficient grace also inclines toward lacking the generosity, gentleness and graciousness toward others outside the church, and even in the church.

Changing how I taught Genesis. After teaching Genesis 100s of times for over a quarter of a century, I asked, What is the point of Genesis? Is it “live a life of mission”? Or “be a father of faith like Abraham”? Or “Marry by faith like Isaac and Rebekah”? I think not. It is by the grace of God that God chose our forefathers (and us), in spite of themselves. In 2011 I preached through most of Genesis by focusing on God’s limitless grace extended to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph.

What did Jesus say the Scriptures are about? When I first noticed it, I was surprised to read that Jesus said that the OT Scriptures are about him (Jn 5:39, 46; Lk 24:27, 44). In Acts, both Peter and Paul said the same thing: the OT is about Jesus (Ac 10:43; 18:28). It impressed me that the Bible is NOT primarily a book about proper morals and proper religious behavior, but primarily about Jesus. As a result, I shifted my emphasis from imperatives (commands) to indicatives (grace), from “you love others” to “God loves you” (1 Jn 4:19), from “you live a life of mission” to “Jesus fulfilled his mission for you” (Jn 19:30). Only the latter, the gospel, leads to true transformation (2 Cor 3:18; 4:6). I think I have the support from both Martin Luther and Pope Francis!

Overcoming the iron law of paternalism, patriarchy and primogeniture. Sorry for these rather unfamiliar words. (Google each word.) But they are important because every culture, society and church naturally follows the unbreakable law of these “3 P’s.” Loosely, it means that you follow the chain of command and the norms of society (or the church), whereby the older and the senior is ALWAYS favored above the younger and the junior. But interestingly God’s grace does not follow such “human rules and traditions.” In fact, God, more often than not, breaks such unbreakable human rules and laws by choosing and extending favor to the younger over the older. For instance, in every case, God chose:

• Abel the younger instead of Cain the older.
• Isaac the younger instead of Ishmael the older.
• Jacob the younger instead of Esau the older.
• Joseph the 11th of Jacob’s sons, bypassing 10 older sons.
• Ephraim the younger son of Joseph instead of Manasseh the older son.
• Moses, the youngest one in his family.
• David, the youngest of the 8 sons of Jesse.
• Young fresh disciples (Mk 1:17), rather than old tired Pharisees and boring religious leaders.
• Young Timothy (1 Tim 4:12), rather than the older elders at Ephesus.

What does this mean and how does it apply practically? I needed to unlearn and re-learn what I had previously practiced by honoring and favoring younger people as much as I had honored older people. Under Samuel Lee’s 40 year leadership, everyone in UBF honored him more than everyone else. But by understanding how God does not follow man’s ways of paternalism, patriarchy and primogeniture, I made an intentional internal decision to honor and favor younger people, just as much as I had honored Lee for the last 22 years of his life in Chicago UBF. How would I do this? I encouraged everyone at West Loop to do whatever they wished, or to take any initiative, without asking my permission or first getting approval or clearance from me. Why? Because I trusted them as my expression of trusting God. Because I wish to respect and welcome their initiatives and creative ideas that are different (and better!) than mine.

No more fear of man. A few years ago Prov 29:25 literally changed the way I viewed, perceived and responded to people in authority. Just as I feared and honored Lee, I also feared every older person and leader in UBF. The practical result of this was that I lived before the person I feared, rather than living in the fear of God (Prov 1:7; 9:10). I lived to please the person I feared (Jn 5:43-44), rather than pleasing God (Jn 8:29). This was a miserable way to live. What a tremendous freedom and liberation it was to no longer live in the fear of any man!

No one should fear me or anyone else. Practically, I prayed that WL may be a safe place, where no one would fear me (or anyone else), just because I am an older longstanding leader in the church. If anyone feared me, they will act and pretend and not speak up openly and honestly, for fear of retaliation or repercussion from me. So I chose to welcome critiques from anyone regarding my words, decisions, actions, sermons and leadership. It is sometimes jarring and humbling when some young person says to me, “How can you say such a thing in your sermon!” But I thank God that our WL community is free and unafraid to speak up. One of my catchphrases is, “Please stab me in the front!”

“What’s the game?” a student asked excitedly.

“Well it’s simple” Travis went on “You are going to flip a coin. If you get a heads you get a candy bar.” Travis revealed a selection of candy bars like Vanna White showing a prize. The boy with glasses eyes the Snickers ready to fend off a resolution rarely see outside of fights to the death and Black Friday shoppers (although to be fair that might be redundant).“Ok I will play.” The boy said as he reached to his pocket for a quarter.

“Oh one other thing. If you get a tails you have to eat this dried Asian crab I picked up from the Asian food market.” The boy turned to the two Chinese girls in the group “You guys eat that!” he cried
Both the girls had marked looks of disgust. “Must be a Filipino thing.” Another student concluded “My mom said they eat raw squid and grasshoppers over there.” Travis waited, but nobody seemed willing to try to win candy at the possibility of having to eat food from the Asian market.

Finally Travis said “A recent report showed that half of all marriages in the US fail today. Marriage is an amazing thing and a great prize, but as we saw nobody was willing to play the game because they could get stuck with a terrible outcome. What I want to say is that it does not have to be a game. It is not chance.” Travis opened his bible and proceeded to lead a bible study on marriage based on Mat 19:6. Travis went on “Marriage is not only an individual contract. It is a covenant before God, and also the community. When me and Michelle were married we signed the marriage document before the church, because we wanted to make it clear that our marriage was not just about up. We are married before God, and before the community which we are to serve.”

Marriage and divorce and the lesson of the Asian crab

I am going to pass on talking about marriage in a UBF sense here. It requires a much fuller and precise document that what I am willing to present here and now. What I want to mention is that something that many people of older generations are saying now, as Travis did is that marriage as an institution is failing. With so many failed marriages it seems like the only conclusion that can be made. With so many broken families and homes in America the point Travis makes really hit home. I can recall that Sunday service featured the same “O tempora! O mores!” message.

This lesson taught me that marriage is not just a chance, it is not just a random event. God does not play dice and neither does your marriage says the lesson of the Asian crab. As an aside, this idea that US marriage is failing as an institution is often used as a justification for the UBF marriage by faith. The problem is that it is a very biased to say increasing divorce means the institution is failing. I will leave the article to a famous statistican I follow. The basis of the argument is that income is strongly, inversely correlated to divorce rate. So if the combined income of you and your spouse is high, you are not likely to divorce, across all age groups and races. Most UBF marriage by faith couples include a doctor, or a nurse, or both and so we should expect UBF marriage by faiths to be generally lasting.

For more information the perseverance of marriage:
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/marriage-isnt-dead-yet/
For those unfamiliar with this article series here is my introduction: http://www.ubfriends.org/2014/10/03/an-introduction-to-lessons-from-travis/

After becoming a Christian in 1980 I became certain and convinced by the work of the Holy Spirit that living for Jesus is the only worthwhile reason to live (Jn 10:10b; 20:31). Only by God’s mercy and grace, this is still as true for me today as it was when I experienced my mystical conversion in 1980.

But along with this glorious, mystical, loving, gracious, mysterious certainty of Christ, I realize that I also added “other certainties,” which were basically non-negotiable to me, such as:

• One to one Bible study is the best way of discipleship.
• You must always answer the Bible study questions before meeting for Bible study…and prepare a Bible study binder.
• Writing testimonies weekly is the best way to grow as a Christian.
• Marrying by faith is the way to marry.
• Everyone should be a one to one Bible teacher and teach the Bible.
• You must never ever miss Sun worship service for any reason unless you’re dying or moribund or for four weeks for a mother after delivering a baby, but NOT for the father.
• You must never miss your weekly church meetings.
• You better never miss any church conferences, even if you have to go into debt by paying for the travel expenses and conference fee.
• You must always defer to and agree with your senior and your leader, even though they are clearly wrong.
• You must not disagree with, object to, or challenge your leader, because God appointed them and not you to be the leader.
• If your Christian leader does not bless you, God will not bless you.
• God’s blessing on your life invariably and necessarily comes through your leader and your church.
• UBF is the best church in the world.
• Caucasian Bible students are the best, while others are dispensable. Sorry for having to make such a racially offensive and disgusting statement, because it was sadly true of me then.
• Any Christian or church who does things differently from me or my church is really compromising, inferior, suboptimal, nominal, culturally contaminated, sad and pitiful.

Of course, I developed these absolute certainties because my church communicated these certainties, either implicitly or even explicitly at times. These are not necessarily all bad or wrong, though some clearly are unbiblical. I’m sure you can identify which.

The problem with these certainties other than Christ and the gospel is that I became arrogant and condescending toward anyone who did not value and treasure MY certainties. I was also known by others–such as my family–for these other certainties, as though Christ is like that, when clearly Jesus is never ever so rigid, narrow, inflexible and intolerant of anyone who is not like ME!

Today, Christ remains my single certainty. But the others are not longer certainties to me.

• I enjoy group BIble studies, which I think are far more interesting and illuminating.
• People can come for Bible studies prepared or completely unprepared.
• They can share written testimonies, or oral extemporaneous testimonies, or not share at all.
• No church meeting or church conference is mandatory.
• Come if you want to, not because you have to.
• Learn to make decisions on your own before God and not think that you need the mediator of another person, since Christ is the only mediator (1 Tim 2:5).
• Overcome unhealthy dependency on another person, as though your blessing comes primarily from a human being rather than from God.
• Sorry to blow burst anyone’s bubble, but UBF is NOT the best church in the world. Nonetheless, I love this church, because ultimately it is Christ’s bride and He is my bridegroom.

What are your certainties? Have you dispensed of any unnecessary certainties that you once held dear?

10) Gabriel explains how legalism does not work.- Constintine

“You are still trying to buy your way into heaven…how many times have I told you, that’s not the way this works…Everything you have ever done you have done- you have only done for yourself.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-828wM9lpLw&t=1m0s

In the movie Constantine the titular main character committed suicide as a teen. He went to hell for this, but was resuscitated in the ambulance. Having committed a mortal sin he knows he will go to hell, so he attempts to earn his way back by killing demons that he can now see. In this scene he meets the angle Gabriel and she explains that that isn’t going to work.

9) Neo meets the Architect.- The Matrix Reloaded

“You havn’t answered my question.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKpFFD7aX3c&t=1m17s

This scene is probably the “worst” scene from a movie on this list. It is confusing, complicated, and hard to understand after sitting for 2 hours. It is on this list for this quip: “You havn’t answered my question.” Until this time in my life I just thought anything following a question was an answer, and didn’t realize it might not address the question. When people don’t want to accept the question they will often resort to this tactic. It’s a favorite of politicians.

8) Han Solo is frozen.- Star Wars IV, the Empire Strikes Back

“I know.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sO-KR-14uXM

In this scene Princess Leia confesses her love for Han Solo and his response is not expected. Instead of saying “I love you too.” He just says “I know.” Which is like the coolest thing anyways could say right there. I am big fan of saying this after being complimented. Responses to this vary.

7) Dr. Manhattan sees a miracle. – Watchmen

“I have longed to witness such an event [miracles] and yet I neglect that in human coupling millions upon millions of cells compete to create life for generation after generation until…finally until your mother loves a man Edward Blake, the Comedian, a man she has every reason to hate and out of that contradiction against unfathomable odds- it’s you. Only you- that emerged to distill so specific a form from all that chaos. It’s like turning air into gold, a miracle.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3D7bsf5toMw

In the Watchmen Dr. Manhattan is a man who has nearly limitless power. He can do anything, with the exception of relating to mankind. In this scene he realizes that the woman is the product of a rape. Her mother loves the man who raped her. The miracle Dr. Manhattan sees is life itself. How often do we forget of that miracle?

6) Gabriel tries to make mankind worthy of repentance. – Constintine

“You just to repent and God takes you into his bosom. In all the worlds in all the universe no other creature can make such a boast. It’s not fair. You have a sweet, sweet God who loves you so. And I will make you so…”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oi1r8B5INfU

Earlier we saw Gabriel chide Constantine. While she was right about legalism, she believes that mankind will unite and find hope in our suffering and therefore seek out God. She does this by trying to bring the son of Satan into the world.

5) The God Entity explains his intervention in the lives of people. -Futurama

“When you do things right people won’t even be sure you have done anything at all.”

At 17:38 http://www.watchcartoononline.com/futurama-episode-320-godfellas

I actually cheated here. This is from a TV show Futurama. In this episode one of the shows main characters, Bender, gets stuck drifting through space. He is a robot so he is doomed to an eternity of this. A small colony of sentient creatures start growing on him and worship him as God. He tries to answer their prayers and ends up killing them. He does not answer their prayers and they war with each other and kill them. Then Bender meets God while floating through space. His answer is not new, Augustine gives the same answer.

4) Riddick refuses to bow.- The Chronicles of Riddick

“Look I’m not with everyone here.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WY7UlwMSBUw

I love this quote “Look I’m not with everyone here.” Many times I feel tempted to try to join to a group or crowd and I remember this quote. Riddick refuses to bow, and for that he is prompted to battle for that right. I think this is generally how it works in day to day life.

3) The Oracle’s conversation with Neo.- The Matrix Reloaded

“What do all men with power want? More power.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixgFi3G_HAs&t=5m30s

Another timely quote from the oracle. I remember this quote when I attempt to understand power hungry people. People want to control their lives. If you are a part of their lives they might even try to control you. Some people don’t have any other reason than greed.

2) Will Smith shows us how to take a test.- Men in Black

“Scrrrreeeeeech!”

This scene affected me early in my life. Will Smith’s character thinks outside of the box to solve a problem. I has always challenged me to do the same and to realize just because something *is* a certain way, does not mean it *has* to stay that way.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dijVbM9DpxU&t=1m52s

1) Valerie’s letter- V for Vendetta

“I shall die here. Every inch of me shall perish. Every inch, but one. An Inch, it is small and it is fragile, but it is the only thing the world worth having. We must never lose it or give it away. We must never let them take it from us. I hope that whoever you are, you escape this place. I hope that the world turns and that things get better. But what I hope most of all is that you understand what I mean when I tell you that even though I do not know you, and even though I may never meet you, laugh with you, cry with you, or kiss you. I love you. With all my heart, I love you. -Valerie”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2W0-z8EnaM

This is the most powerful scene in a movie I have even witnessed. It is heart breaking. I have often recalled that line “Every inch of me shall perish. Every inch, but one.” No matter how hard he struggle we must never let all of us die. I remember I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. I also remember that she loves a person she has never met. This is so powerful to me, to love someone I have never met. It really is a display of the love of Christ.

How have movies affected your life? What movies have powerfully moved you?

My mother Kathy adopted me in 2001. Her and her husband Norman believed they were called to caring for disadvantaged children after seeing a very poor child at the Illinois State Fair being mistreated by a parent. My brother and I were put into foster care after the state removed us from our mother’s care. At the time the state believed that our biological mother Cathy would never relinquish her parental rights. In 2001 she did and Kathy and Norman adopted us. From the start Kathy was overly protective of us. We had never had our mother advocate for us and if we complained even slightly about being mistreated Kathy our raise hell until things were fixed. She wanted to give us the very best life possible since the first decade of our lives were so miserable by comparison. She was very much a “tiger mom”. She pushed me to do the best I could and I was involved in all the activities I could be in at school. When we were younger this was great but as we got older things rapidly changed.

As I entered high school two significant things happened. First my father Norman died and nearly left us homeless. Secondly my brother began to get in all sorts of legal trouble involving drugs and suicide attempts. My mother felt as though I should become Danny’s father. Not literally, but she believed it was my place to discipline him. I was wise enough to see that such a course of action would destroy my relationship with my brother and declined. As she became more and more restrictive on Danny she refused to stop treating us as children. She became overly controlling. She tried to have me diagnosed as obsessive compulsive because I spent all day reading. She would not give me access to a car until I needed one for a job. She would not get me a cell phone until my brother opened an account on one she couldn’t close. She became controlling about my money; not allowing me access to my funds I earned from work because she felt I would spend it on ‘foolish things’. She would not allow us to grow up. In short because she loved us she was overbearing. People I spoke to could not understand. She became abusive, hitting me when I would not obey her commands. The summer before I went to college was the worst. I called the police on her multiple times. Once she took my wallet and would not return it to keep me at home. In another case she grabbed me and I pulled away and she began slapping me. She would go on to steal thousands from me in government benefits on the basis that I “did not know how to control my money wisely.”

When I went to college I was finally free. I loved my time in college and I soon realized that there was life beyond this life that had come to be so terrible. My childhood had been in poverty with absolute freedom. In my later teenage years I had money but was strictly controlled. In college I had food to eat and the freedom to come and go. Summers were the worst. Every summer she would charge me as much money as she could get away with for rent. One summer that was nearly two thousand dollars. These days I barely have a relationship with her. She has more or less disowned my brother and I and I could care less. The woman who saved me kept me in emotional and financial bondage for years. It is worse with my brother who she had labeled with a mental illness he does not have. He cannot get a drivers license. I know what slavery under the guise of help looks like. Any man, woman, or child who attempts to control me as such invites the wrath of a man who was forged in the fires of oppression.

As I start my graduate study next week I remember leaving for college and how excited I was to be free. “You… were called to be free.” I remember leaving my mother’s house to move to St. Louis and how she did not even wish me good luck or good bye. My point is this. I am sure to many of you Dr. Samuel Lee was a great man who saved you. I am sure to many of you he enslaved you. You can be both. My mother was, and I know that good intentions are the best reasons that people come under the yoke of tyranny.

Love that is conditioned on obedience is not love. For it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.

1) God has a plan, but it’s unwise to focus on it excessively.

I always find it odd when Christians place such a high taboo on fortune telling and magic, but always talk about “God’s will”. If you are always trying to discover “God’s will” for your life you are trying to divine the future. Jesus rebuked the Jews of his day various times for demanding and searching for signs. Trying to decide what God’s will is is akin to asking what you are doing tomorrow. You might have some idea but you really don’t know, and by the time you do know tomorrow is still a day away. Dwelling on God’s will is dangerous and not practical. It best it is of no consequence and at worst its fortune telling. Therefore I suggested to the man not try to concern himself with if it is God’s plan or not.

2) God’s calling is external and internal.

UBF usually presents the “Shepherd” identity as a special calling you have by virtue of UBF showing up. I once met with an admissions officer of Covenant Theological Seminary. The man asked me “Do you feel called to seminary?” I admitted that I was unsure. His next question was puzzling: “How much do you have in student loans?” I told him I had none, but was unsure why that was related to if I was called or not. As well as I can remember he said “God’s calling is both external and internal. You must have a strong desire to minister, and your conditions must allow you to. Some people come here with seventy-five thousand dollars in student loans and are newly married and want to get a masters in divinity. I always say to those people ‘Do you think that God is making your path straight for this?’” I told him as a doctor he would be in the right place to help minister to many people, but what matters is if he wants to. He must have an internal call, manifested as a desire. I suggested he pray about it, and I told him that what he wanted to do was more important than what others wanted him to do.

3) Know what you are getting into before getting into it.

One thing I emphasized was that there was absolutely nothing wrong with being a campus minister and being a UBF shepherd if you go into it knowing what that entails. I said that many people had become “shepherds” without knowing what that meant. They believed they were doing “God’s work” but really it meant marrying by faith and adhering to a lot of over bearing authority, strange cultural norms, random titles, ect. I referred him to the 6 stages of UBF training slides that UBF produced some time ago. I told him that his “calling” would entail what appeared in these slides. UBF training model

4) There is a season for every activity under the sun

I mentioned that even if he decided to do campus mission that there is a season for campus mission and there is a mission that isn’t for campus mission. Every believer is called to “evangelize” – which simply means to live and speak in such a way that people are pointed to and find out about the good news of Jesus. Not every believer will have the gift of evangelism. Those who are gifted are able to connect with unbelievers in powerful ways and are able to equip other believers who do not have the gift of evangelism to be more effective in their attempts to share their faith (Ephesians 4:11, 12). People with the gift of apostleship will likely have evangelism in the spectrum of gifts, but they are wired to start new works, break new ground, and get movements moving. Teachers may or may not have the gift of evangelism, but are able to open and teach the Word of God in clear, practical, and powerful ways… in the end giftedness simply describes the way the Spirit has empowered us to fulfill the great commission, to be disciples who order our lives in love for God and others, who make disciples (helping unbelievers become believers and helping believers to walk more fully and authentically in the power of the gospel. This is the call on every believer, though we all have different gifts that will give us strengths to carry out that call. Evangelism is not tied to an area. There is no promised land of evangelism. Campus mission is only one place. I told him that many in UBF do campus mission for a while and God calls them away.

5) Being a true Shepherd does not constrict the gospel to a script

The shepherd’s goal is to evangelize and lead others to Christ. If he plans to do this by constricting and limiting his or her efforts to a single, scripted version of Christianity while focusing his or her efforts into a tiny socioeconomic group of students from wealthy families- I feel that the shepherd has sold out his dream of evangelism for a lie. I told the man that I could never get over how I heard people repeatedly pray for raising disciples on affluent college campuses while my students were gunned down, murdered people, and drew weapons on me. I told him that simply donating 1% of your tithe once a year isn’t what the scriptures meant when they said “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” I encouraged the man, that regardless of his acceptance of the title and call for campus ministry he should help the poor and disadvantaged.

I told that if he accepted the title with all this in mind, then there would be no problem with him accepting the title.

What do you think? I know many might disagree with some of the things I said here, others might agree. What would have you have told the man?

The Golden Circle

What do Apple, Martin Luther King Jr. and the Wright brothers have in common? Simon Sinek claims that he has discovered their common pattern. According to him, it is the secret to every great and inspiring leader and organization in the world. He calls it the “golden circle.” It is quite simple. There are 3 circles on top of each other. The center circle is why, the middle circle is how and the outer circle is what. Usually we work from the outside in. But the most successful leaders and companies work from the inside out. They start with the question: why.

Every single person knows what they do and most likely how they do it, but the central question is: why. And the answer to that question is not simply “to be rich.” That is a result. The why must answer, what is your purpose, what is your cause, what is you belief? Why do you get up in the morning? Why does your organization exist? Why do you exist? Many companies have superb products and technology, but they don’t sell well. Why? Because people don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it.

Usually we go from the most concrete questions to the abstract ones, from what, to how and lastly (if ever) to why. For example, normal computer companies sell computers. Their marketing plan is: we make great computers, we use the best technology and we do this so you will be happy. But Apple sells an idea, an identity, first and foremost. Their belief is, “We challenge the status quo. We are unique and so are our clients. We use the highest technology and best design. We also happen to make great computers.” Apple does things normal computer companies don’t. Who buys an MP3 player from a computer company? Who would buy a TV from Dell? But people buy these products every day from Apple. We don’t buy what you do; we buy why you do it.

A Failure

In his talk Sinek, compared the Wright brothers to Samuel Pierpont Langley. When people are asked for the reason of their business failures, they usually answer 3 things: they were under-capitalized, they had the wrong people and bad market conditions. It’s always the same three things. But in Langley’s case he was supported in all three of these areas. He lacked nothing. He was funded with $500,000 by the war department to figure out how to create the flying machine. He was well-connected and working with the top scientists of the day. The New York Times followed him everywhere. Everybody was rooting for him.

The Wright brothers, on the other hand, were uneducated; no one on their team even had a university education. They were funded only by the proceeds of their bicycle shop. There was no media following them. But they had something Langley lacked: a purpose. They believed that if they figured out this flying thing, it would change the course of the world. Langley, however, was in pursuit of the result; he was in it for the riches. Proof of this is that he quit once the Wright brothers made their first successful flight. Langley could have improved their technology, but he gave up because he was not the first one to discover it. The Wright brothers had a team that supported their cause. As Sinek often says, “if you hire people just because they can do a job, they’ll work for your money, but if you hire people who believe what you believe, they’ll work for you with blood and sweat and tears.”

A Success

In the summer of 1963, a quarter of a million people showed up in Washington D.C. to hear Dr. King speak. There was no facebook or email back then, so how did he manage to muster all those people? Dr. King was not the only great speaker back then. But what was different about him was that he went around saying, “I believe, I believe, I believe.” He had a cause and people bought into his cause, his dream.  Those people didn’t come for him; they came for themselves.

Dr. King believed in two types of law: God-made and man-made. He believed that until those two laws were in sync this world would never be just. The Civil Rights movement was the way for him to make his cause a reality. People followed him, not for him, but for themselves.  Furthermore, his most famous speech was, “I have a dream,” not, “I have a plan.”

Today politicians make many 12-point plans, but they are not inspiring anyone. Everyone is selling a product, but few are selling an idea. While I was taking a class on curriculum leadership, we discussed the needs of teachers to explain the reason/theory behind their curriculum. Ideally, we would like teachers to post videos explaining the reasons behind their educational methods/philosophy. But it would be difficult to implement.

How about you? Are you pushing an agenda a program or plan instead of a cause/purpose? Are you a leader who inspires others? How many times do schools and churches copy movements and go through the motions without knowing why? What about in your church or community? Are people inspired?

(The scene is the wedding reception of my roommate Ben. Exactly 77 people are in the room. I know because I set up the tables. About 3/4s look like they are Korean or some kind of Asian. People are sipping on their bottled water. Two men are the front of the room. One is well dressed and incredibly handsome; he has a smile from ear to ear. He has the look a man who has been waiting for this moment for months. The other man is Ben West. The man looks raises his water bottle with a devilish grin and begins speaking in a thunderous voice.)

“I cannot imagine the lapse in good reason that allowed a captive audience and a mic to come into my hand, but seeing as I now have it, I will use this opportunity to be “a great blessing”. For those of you unaware I have been Ben’s roommate for nearly a year. I have learned a great deal from him. We both have a lot in common: we both are analytical, we both practice martial arts, we both prefer our drinks soft not hard. In short he is what we might call a man after my own heart. When I met this man I was highly confused as to who resurrected Anton LaVey, but he slowly grew on me. We have had many adventures, like the time we went to carnival and I got to see him dance. I was concerned why nobody informed me of his epilepsy. Or perhaps the time we went fishing and I won a foot race with a girl to get her email for one to one bible study.

Nothing tops my favorite moment, which came when he discovered I had slowly been transferring all his pencils from his room to my room one by one for months- for no reason whatsoever. One thing I want to share about Ben that you, Rebekah, will find interesting is he has a rather long list of baby names already made. He chose what appears to be the whole 1 Chronicles line up. I expect to shortly see Jephunneh, Pispah, and Eber West. As you all know he plans on having 7 children. He is a quiver full kinda guy. My prayer for Ben is that he names one in the middle something totally normal. Johnson West. Or better yet Kanye. I know everyone over the age of 50, which is like half the room doesn’t remotely understand that. But just know it’s funny. When little Kanye asks why he isn’t a part of any of the biblical genealogy, my suggestion is to tell him “I will tell you when you are older.” And then just to keep the suspense, don’t tell him. On your death Ben he will ask “Why am I named Kanye.” And you will say “Because God answers Michael’s prayers.” And just leave it like that. That is unless you are taken straight to heaven like Enoch because of your great obedience to Jesus’ mission command.

As for Rebekah. My interaction with Rebekah has been quite limited. She is surly a woman of God. When I think about Rebekah the first word that comes to mind is “Kind”. She has a kind heart like Jesus. She is quick to forgive and forget. She is a devoted bible teacher and I have nothing but kind wishes for her and her home. This toast is surely to you Ben and Rebekah. I hope one day you can attend my wedding. I hope you got me a wedding card as good the one I got you. It’s a secret to you. But just make sure you open it and not Rebekah.

Let me pray

God abundantly bless these two coworkers as they start their new house church. Use this Abraham and Sarah of Faith to pioneer any campus you would have them pioneer as they fulfill your world mission command to make American a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. Bless this marriage by faith and use it to your glory. I ask that you raise up many shepherds and bible teachers through one to one bible study and discipleship ministry. In all these things I pray. Amen.

Breaking the yoke of undue religious influence

Undue influence. What does that mean? Why does it become a yoke that is harmful to the human soul? How can someone break free from such a yoke? Such questions deserve much deeper thought, and will become the subject of my future books. In today’s narrative, I aim only to introduce the concept and then tell part of my life story.

Undue influence is influence by which a person is induced to act otherwise than by their own free will or without adequate attention to the consequences. The word “undue” is important in this definition. When some force is undue, that force is unwarranted or inappropriate because it is excessive or disproportionate to the object of that force. Sometimes that force is actually a weak force, like the tether on an adult elephant that had existed since the elephant was young. The power of undue religious influence may not be in its coercion but in its perception. Such influence may be carried out not by actual force, but by perceived force or imagined consequences.

Some undue influence might be easily identifiable because the influence is so over-the-top that no person would accept such influence under normal circumstances. An example of obvious undue influence would be a kidnapping of someone and taking them to a concentration camp. We can rather universally recognize this kind of undue influence as being harmful and wrong. Most undue influence in the religious realm however is more difficult to identify. The influence that one person can handle safely may in fact be undue influence on a different person who cannot handle that kind of influence at that time. Such confusion and subtlety often allows the perpetrators of undue influence to justify their abusive tactics because they can point to some examples of successful transformation due to their influence. In some cases, the influence falls into the blind spot of the perpetrators, so that they don’t even realize they are causing undue influence on someone.

My Unholy Devotion To Religion

After my father’s death, I threw myself into the UBF lifestyle. I adopted Ed and the Korean man as my spiritual fathers. The UBF community became my family. The leaders became my spiritual parents. This meant that I would submit my entire life to being trained by my UBF shepherds. That is the UBF way—every member must have a shepherd. The shepherds are self-appointed and choose the sheep they want. A chance meeting on campus meant that it was God’s divine will that you become the sheep of that person. This shepherd sheep relationship was meant to be lifelong, and would even persist into heaven we thought. So I would be eternally submissive to my UBF shepherd out of a desire to be a preacher for God. This provided me with the safety and security and protection I was looking for. I used the UBF community to replace what I lost in my father and to escape the dark reality of life around me. I hid myself in the UBF ideologies, escaping every minute I could to read the bible and avoid the real world. And so my desire to be a preacher for God was born.
Soon I wrote and shared my UBF life testimony, boldly declaring praise to God for my father who had found salvation in Jesus. And around this time I discovered the deep faith of my grandparents, especially my grandmother. She loved my life testimony. She made several paper copies and mailed them the friends and family all over the country. She also made copies of the video of my sharing and played it for all her friends at church. She told me I should be a preacher someday.

My grandparents became a foundation of Christian faith for me. I have always been encouraged by their faithful, devoted and explicit belief in Jesus and their unconditional love for people. They had opinions about politics, religions and the like, but for them, goodness reigned supreme. My grandma was therefore very concerned about UBF right from the start. She always told me that bible study is good, but too much bible study is like too much salt when you cook. God’s messages are about love. We can’t forget God’s love and we can never forget our family. Looking back I wonder how she and the rest of my family endured my 24 years of UBF life. But their goodness and their love was the buoy that always righted my ship.

New Friends, Bold Decisions, Restored Relationships

The big event of our lives happened in 2011. To make a long story short: We left UBF. This means nothing to most people. Leaving a church? Not a big deal. But leaving UBF is different. It equates to losing your salvation because UBF requires each person to be loyally submitted to a UBF shepherd, usually a Korean. But finally I had enough. I began to fear the bitterness, depression and anger in my soul more than any retribution from God or from UBF shepherds. So I resigned.

We sent shockwaves throughout the 6,000 member organization worldwide. I had not intended to leave UBF. I actually just wanted to find out some answers the problems a dozen or so of my friends in UBF had been confiding in me since moving to Detroit. But I finally had enough of pretending to be a holy soldier. So I sent a report into my shepherd telling him my honest feelings. That didn’t go over so well. Within two hours of receiving my report via email, he called me. I could tell he was angry. He told me any problems in UBF were none of my business. He further said that any spiritual deadness I had been observing was because I was the one who was spiritually dead. As soon as I hung up the phone, I experienced the Holy Spirit come alive in me like never before. I suddenly knew God had a purpose for me: expose the problematic dark side of UBF. I saw clearly that UBF suffered from the same authority-based problems that the Shepherding Movement did in the 1970’s in America. In an instant my mind was released from the bondage of guilt and all the abuses in UBF I had ignored or dismissed came to mind.

I then embarked on an amazing journey of recovery from the controlling, guilt-ridden, shame-soaked life we had lived in UBF. I was done with the holy soldier façade. This journey was not so different from the journey of Pi in the movie “Life of Pi” or Truman in the movie “The Truman Show” or the blind girl in the M. Night Shyamalan movie “The Village”. In fact I began watching many movies, especially children’s movies, because I found so many connections with the characters in the movies, such as Tangled. I felt I was Repunzel being set free from her castle tower! Finally I was at peace.

The most exciting part of this journey for me has been connecting with people at Grace Community Church in Detroit. That first lunch with pastor Bryan was an important reality check for me, one that helped me realize there are many Christians outside UBF (imagine that!). Attending the 6:00 am bible study led by pastor Wayne was eye-opening. It was his “Be Armed” series that corrected a lot of false teaching I had picked up. I realized then that for all my thousands of hours of bible study, I had never learned the basic doctrines of Christianity. Even as I continue go through a transformational paradigm-shift in my faith, those basic doctrines hold true and provide an anchor for my faith.

Pastor Wayne baptized me on April 29, 2012. I had decided to be baptized as a way to confirm that I had left UBF had given my life to be a Christ-follower. I’ll never forget pastor Wayne’s words to me just before going under: “You are now free form the teachings of one man.” Now I’m glad to be part of pastor Wayne’s intercessory prayer team, praying for Renewal Church and his new role there. Grace Community Church became a safe house for me and our family. Pastor Bryan was a God-send to my wife and I. His sermons were so full of love, goodness and humor—and so deeply drawn from the well of grace and love—that each Sunday my soul mended a little more.

My wife and I joined a bible study group with Pastor Bryan. And we were utterly shocked to discover what genuine Christian teaching was all about. We found that we had been taught a Christianized form of Eastern philosophy, which continues to be one of our biggest problems. Through Pastor Bryan’s help and the help of our newfound Christian community, our family is being healed day by day. Now my wife and I are renewing our relationship, going on dates, finding out each other’s character and making up for nearly 20 years of lost time.

I was drawn in by article after article and comment after comment. Initially I was taken aback by aggressive language and seemingly biased points of view. But as I continued to read, I have been impressed by the level of integrity and professionalism you have maintained throughout the website. The articles have not been offensive or slanderous but have been informative, honest, and real.

Due to the degree of honesty and open communication presented here, some of the emotions have been very raw, making some of the comments difficult to read at times. But we need to read and acknowledge people’s pain and hurt. I understand why some leaders may have boldly challenged people to leave if they are not happy. Maybe they wanted to show their strong confidence in themselves and UBF. Maybe it was easier to reject first before being rejected. Maybe love grew cold. But one thing is that the pain will not go away on its own. And the fact is is that no man is an island and we need each other desperately.

The questions I came away with were, “Where do we go from here?” “Is there any hope?” “Has everything that can be done already been done?” I would propose that someone who is trusted by the elders and staff, such as a fellow director who has shown outstanding ability to hold such a discussion or an outside professional, give a set of lectures educating leaders on the art of discussion. Maybe similar to lectures educating leaders on current trends of postmodernism and how it affects how people view and accept the gospel message.

I’ve been hearing in many comments the cry for open discussion, not vindictively, but earnestly. And not just privately, but in an open group fashion. I feel that a little bit of honesty and vulnerability would go a long way.

One of the fundamental problems is that as a group, UBF leadership and members have not been educated on how to moderate a discussion that touches on sensitive and painful issues, using skills such as listening without judging, being vulnerable, the language of apology, receiving criticism without taking it personally, handling conflict and pain in the discussion, handling emotions, etc. And these are not learned naturally. They are skills that need to be taught and learned. There is no blame that we were not equipped. We have to remember that UBF started as a grassroots organization dependent upon the passion and initiative of a handful of people. God used it, but we need to change and grow as do all people and all groups. I believe that the same spirit of initiative, bravery, and independence that God used to bring us here, God can use again to bring healing, restoration, and revival for Americans, Koreans, and all chapters around the world.

However, without a proper foundation, and the right tools to address difficult topics, we cannot expect to have an honest discussion at a larger scale. We need to lay the foundation first. Then, and only then, can each side meet the other from the same starting point and begin the process of sifting and picking topics for discussion without getting defensive or emotional. There would need to be an excellent moderator as well.

Let us wait on God in full expectation. “We can do as little toward the work as toward creating the world, except as God works in us to will and to do. God only asks us to yield, to consent, to wait upon Him, and He will do it all….To wait upon God, and have the heart filled with faith in His working, and in that faith to pray for His mighty power to come down, is our only wisdom.” Waiting on God, Andrew Murray

Warning: This is a random, rambling, ruminating reflection!

I trivialized feelings because I misunderstood the nature of God in that though God is One (Dt 6:4; Mk 12:29), yet He is three Persons: the Father, Son and Holy Spirit (Mt 28:19; 2 Cor 13:14; Eph 4:4-6; Rev 1:4-5). Since we are made in the image of the triune God, I schematized this as follows:

A healthy, balanced Christian life embraces all three aspects of our being: heart, mind and will. But since we are fallen, flawed and fallible beings, we invariably are unbalanced, become unbalanced, and would need frequent correctives. At the risk of oversimplification and generalization let’s arbitrarily divide the world as having three kinds of churches.

“Doing” churches. Churches like UBF strongly emphasize mission and what we do. Then there is a tendency for the mind/thinking and heart/feeling to become underdeveloped. Critical thinking and emotion may be ignored or disregarded. Often this happens unnoticed, as I did not realize for the longest time just how horrible it came across when I said, “Feelings don’t matter.” I thought I was being spiritual and holy in carrying out my duty and doing what I should as a Christian, regardless of anything and everything else. To me action and obedience was far more important than critical thinking or emotional expression.

“Feeling” churches. Charismatic churches emphasize emotion as the predominant expression of one’s faith. The fallout potentially could be that we sacrifice reflection and intellectual pursuit, and we might act based on how we feel more than based on what is good and right. In the worse case scenario it could result in expressions of emotion without substance or action.

“Thinking” churches. These may be churches that emphasize sound doctrine and Bible study as crucial and fundamental for the faith. The result may be inadequate action or a disregard for emotion, i.e., a dead orthodoxy. Being a cerebrally inclined person, I minimized feelings and emotions. Though such Christians may be confident and sure that they are living by the Book, those who know them simply want to throw the book at them.

We Christians are a mixed bag. By God’s mercy and grace, I believe we should embrace our being in totality by having:

We Christians should be generous toward those who are different from us. It is too easy to criticize someone who lives out their Christianity in ways we may not agree with. Cessationists may accuse charismatics of shallow emotionalism. Charismatics may accuse cessationists of joyless orthodoxy. Let us rather be gracious toward one another.

What is the predominant expression of your Christianity? How are you doing in balancing heart, mind and will?

The 9th Beatitude

The poverty was something I don’t think I ever got used to. There were dozens of people walking everywhere. The city was not zoned so every spot that was vacant was turned into a makeshift house. Electrical wiring hung precariously. The Philippines reminded me of that scene from Going to America; the city looked like 1980’s metro Africa. Nothing could have prepared me for the state of their bible house. Their bible house was essentially two half houses connected with a board and covered with an open roof. This meant no amount of air conditioning would cool this place. There were no washers or dryers. Coworkers slept on a sheet on the ground. I was shocked at this place, but what shocked me more was that everyone was happier than I have ever seen. It is true, “Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.” They would have seen redder roses than I would have seen, and greener grass- had there been any grass to see. All the areas that could have grass were just dirt. I was astonished at their attitude towards life. Most of the people there wore clothing that appeared to have been fashionable several years ago in America. It seemed cross training shoes were absent. Shoes there seemed to be a thin and most comparable to slippers. Despite it all I never once heard anyone complain.

More Fun

The tagline for tourism in the Philippines is the titular “It’s more fun in the Philippines.” The students there would use it sarcastically. When we arrived at the resort there was a man urinating on the side wall of the resort in board daylight with several people all walking around him. I was shocked and laughed at this, when someone said “It’s more fun in the Philippines.” A day later I was walking to my room and a lizard crawled up the wall besides me. I asked if this was normal and the girl said “It’s more fun in the Philippines.” The whole tone of the conference itself could be described in this way “It’s more fun in the Philippines.” Nothing was mandatory. The schedule was set but you could have done nothing and nobody would have mentioned it to you. Friday’s schedule included a message after breakfast, then bible study. After bible study was socialization for a few hours until lunch. After lunch was music practice and free time. After dinner there was dance night. Different groups preformed dances and skits. Some of these were Christian and others were not. I saw a traditional Filipino dance. Saturday’s schedule was dance cardio before breakfast, a message after breakfast, group bible study, socialization and free time until lunch, after lunch there was music practice until dinner, after dinner there was life testimony sharing and music. The two presiders could not in any culture be said to have taken their role seriously. They joked the whole time in introducing people and everyone loved them. When they said “God is good.” You could see them glowing. It was an abrupt change from anything I have ever seen in American UBF, and “It was very good.”

The purpose of Bible study

The bible studies were very different from my home chapter, or even the chapter of the second gen I started under. When I sat down with her to study the bible I was confused. I asked her where the questionnaire was. She said there was no questionnaire. I asked her what we were going to study. She asked me what I wanted to study. The bible study was very 1 to 1, in the sense that we were on equal grounds. Although the students there seemed shy and in some cases differential to me, in bible study they spoke confidently about the gospel that gave them life.

We jumped around the bible as I explained how Christian virtues are only virtues when held under unfavorable conditions. I said that Christ can be said to love us because he loved us when he had every reason not to. Because there was no questionnaire to steer the direction of the conversation the bible study felt more organic and more real. I was not constantly on guard against questions that desired answers out of context.

Another thing I learned from the bible study is that the Shepherdess was very unfamiliar with the Old Testament. This struck me as odd at first. Later that night I had a different student leading bible study question me about what John had meant when he called us “Children of God” in 1 John. I spoke with Dr. William Altobar regarding this. It seemed to me that unqualified students were leading bible studies. He said that “Bible studies are there to build relationships between students so they can experience God.” I realized from this that I had taken up unknowingly that the purpose of bible studies was to learn about God. But in the Philippines, it was to experience God. It is important to note, but hard to see that if we have any good about us it come from God, we are like mirrors reflecting his glory.

Students are led to Christ in the Philippines by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit though students facilitated God’s word. In some sense I wonder what is best. I think that traditional UBF chapters led by native Koreans use the bible study to pass on teaching of obedience and loyalty though bible study. Traditionally it seems American protestant bible study try to pass on knowledge of the scripture though bible study. But the bible studies with Hope seemed as though she wanted to testify about Christ. No matter what we started talking about the conversation would end talking about Christ and his work in her life. Sometimes it became irritating to me. I wanted to talk about theology and she wanted to talk about Christ. The correct choice seems obvious.

In part 3 I will discuss what I learned though the messages, and the success of UBF in the Philippines.

I went to the Philippines because I was invited by a student named Rem. I spoke with her on facebook and she invited me to “see God’s work in Phil”. At first I was unsure, due to multiple factors. First I was certain I could not afford the trip, but then I received my income tax return and suddenly found myself with an extra $1000. Secondly, I was unsure if I had enough time off from work. God provided, I had exactly enough sick days combined with a day off for Good Friday to visit. Fourth, I did not want to miss my own Easter conference for theirs, but as luck would have it our conference was a weekend before. Finally, I had told my pastor that I would attend the European conference. This plane ticket would be so expensive that I would not be able to attend both. The day after Rem invited me Paul mentioned that he would pay half of the ticket to Europe. That Saturday I bought the ticket.

God’s will

I told my pastor Paul that night that I had been invited. It is a joke that I know everyone in UBF due to the internet. Paul is consistently confused how I know so many people, and I am constantly confused how he does not understand how the internet works. When I mentioned I had been invited he smiled and said “it would be good if you attended. We should pray.” This was what I expected him to say. Many months prior Paul had suggested that I go to Brazil this summer. I was excited about this. He said he would pray, and he said he would contact Brazil UBF. He never did. I kept asking about it and he kept saying “If it’s God’s will it will happen.” About a month later he changed the story up on me. Now I ought to go to Korea as a short term missionary. I was a little confused, but realized I would be going nowhere without his blessing. That December I spoke with Mark V. He said there would be a short term missionary form that would appear online in early 2014. When this was posted I mentioned it again to Paul. He said that he would bring me to Korea and accompany me for 2 weeks. This was not what I had in mind. Then he dropped the topic and I never heard about it again. I spoke with a missionary and explained that I might spend the summer in Korea, but I explained that Paul might not want me to go. He said “He might want to catch you more.”

I then realized what had happened. Paul wanted to train me as my roommate’s replacement when he was married (Mark Yang told me this directly in February) and this meant I needed to be with him here; me going abroad was not conducive to his plan. Paul would not tell me “No.” he would just say “We will pray.” Then he would do nothing to facilitate this plan. When nothing came of it, the reasoning would be that it was not God’s plan. That Sunday he told the table at lunch that I had been invited, and I mentioned I was going. He said “If its God’s plan.” I responded “Well the plane ticket it nonrefundable, so it better be God’s plan.” He said “What?! You bought the ticket? I thought you were going to pray like Jesus.” I told him I had. All he could say for the next 45 minutes was “That is good.” As if he was trying to convince himself.

My Chapter’s reaction

My chapter’s reaction was very interesting. My roommate thought that Paul was trying to do damage control for “the ignominy of you going around him”. I had told one missionary and I explained the above story of Paul’s inconsistent response to my desire to go abroad. She said “We all learn obedience to God in time.” Other missionaries were very excited and showed only positive enthusiasm for my trip. The universal response was initially confusion “Who invited you?” They all seemed very confused that a student could invite me. Then they seemed at ease when I mentioned I had been in contact with Dr. Ben Toh and Dr. William Altobar. But they then seemed confused how I knew either of them. I mentioned that I knew them from this website and from Facebook.

Paul’s Blessing

Although Paul was initially stunned at my rashness, he became very supportive. He purchased a hotel room in Tokyo for my layover. The Monday after I bought the ticket he said at bible study he would “talk to Dr. Ben Toh” and that he would “officially send me out.” It was at this moment that I realized something very important. Paul saw me as a missionary. His definition of missionary meant anyone visiting a foreign country for some Christian purpose. I did not see myself as such; I had just been invited as a guest. Since Paul believed this to be a mission trip, this made me a missionary and missionary is a title. I realized that Paul’s reluctance to send me out before was because I had not been “trained” enough to be a missionary. This all came later, but it underscores a major issue in UBF. That with native Korean leaders there is this air of unspoken rules combined with obedience mixed with poor communication. Paul remained busy hosting our Easter conference. About 5 minutes after our Easter Conference Sunday he asked that I say a few words. He asked why I was going and I explained that I had been invited. I was going to present my life testimony and testify about the grace of God in my life. Two days later I departed from America for the first time in my life. Paul called Ben Toh that morning and then things got interesting.

In part 2 I will discuss my trip and God’s work in the Philippines.

Why am I dead to UBF?

One of the first experiences a former member of ubf has is the feeling of being divorced from people in ubf. Friendships we thought we had and relationships we thought were so strong suddenly disappear. Overnight. People who we called our spiritual mothers and fathers and people who we called brothers and sisters suddenly go silent towards us. We become dead to them.

But why? Why does this happen almost universally to former ubf members?

The answer is obvious: former members allow their ubf-given identity to die. For example, “Shepherd Brian” is indeed dead. That identity does not exist and never will exist. The person named Brian however is alive and well. But ubf people find it impossible to address “Brian”. They only know how to interact with “Shepherd Brian”.

Why do I use the cult label?

As I have said repeatedly, my experiences in ubf were mostly good. I enjoyed the love-bombing and created a relatively safe place for my family by disobeying certain orders (like the demand to sleep in the center for months right after marriage). Some may point to an inter-personal conflict with my Korean shepherd. But that is not a true assessment. I showed my Korean shepherd double honor for over two decades. I brought nothing but joy to the leaders in ubf. It is true our relationship was broken near the end of my ubf commitment. Breaking this relationship felt like a divorce.

But why? Why do I claim University Bible Fellowship is a cult?

The answer is because ubf shepherds and missionaries are identity snatchers. They spiritually abused me and thousands others by stealing our identity and persuading us to adopt their identity. That identity was called “Shepherd Brian”. But that is not who I am. That was never who I was. That is not my authentic self. The main reason I am on a recovery from my commitment to University Bible Fellowship is because I am searching to re-connect with my authentic self, my pre-cult self, the self that my family knows.

The cognitive dissonance I used to sustain this false identity requires triggers to uphold that identity, and requires a lot of energy to maintain. That energy needed to be released. The sub-identities I adopted like a facade around my soul needed to crumble.  That is why I experienced a physical trauma trigger when I happened to meet some ubf people who wanted to take a group photo last year. My body literally began to shake and I had to run out of the building without saying good bye. I drove to a highway rest stop and just sat there for 15 minutes until the shakes left me and my heart stopped racing. Steve Hassan describes this phenomena in his book. It happened because I had been conditioned through ubf heritage indoctrination to adopt a false identity, and the group photo with ubfers triggered that memory of my cult-identity.

So yes, “Shepherd Brian” is dead. You won’t be able to talk to him. And that explains so very much of what happened to me and what continues to happen to me.

After writing my 2014 key verse testimony, I realize that I hardly wrote any stories of what I personally did or experienced. So here are some ways I had fun in 2013.

Reading. My favorite book of the year is Falling Upward by Richard Rohr. It explains how every person should transition from a first half of life (foundation/identity–Rohr calls it a container) to the second half of life (discovery/freedom–content of the container). Though necessary, the first half of life enslaves you, while the second half of life liberates. Sadly most people, churches and countries remain stuck in the first half of life. My own Christian life was deeply entrenched in the first half (it felt like enslavement), until God “pushed” me (through life’s events) into freedom. Experientially, I “fell upward” into the hands of the Living God. I am now slowly reading John Frame’s Systematic Theology. Paul Tripp’s Dangerous Calling exposed the hidden idols of Pharisee-like Christian leaders (ME!). Larry Osborne’s Innovation’s Dirty Little Secret explains why churches and institutions decline. In preparation for preaching, I read several commentaries on Revelation, John’s Gospel, and now Deuteronomy. I also love the new ESV Gospel Transformation Bible, which explains how each of the 66 books of the Bible uniquely point to the gospel, such as The Gospel in Genesis.

Blogging. I wrote 60 articles for UBFriends in 2013 (62 in 2012). Blogging is an exciting and integral part of my life because I write and express myself freely, and receive feedback from others, both online and in person–sometimes passionately. My concerns about the 2013 International Conference (May) received 355 comments. I just shared my opinion. But it resulted in many UBFers being upset with me, and many exUBFers commending me. If not for UBF I would not be married (Jan), received 259 comments. I simply shared my happiest story. But many shared their painful marriage by faith stories, which I was very sorry to hear. My worst infuriation (188 comments) and Is UBF scared of grace (159 comments) made the top 10 most commented list.

Preaching. I preached 32 sermons in 2013 (38 in 2012), 16 from Revelation and 10 from John’s Gospel. This takes up most of my time each week as I read books, blogs, and sermons in my preparation to preach extemporaneously.

Enjoying life. In 2013 I have been married for 32 of the happiest years of my life. 11 West Loop couples renewed wedding vows. I enjoyed reviewing Gravity and The Hunger Games. My four children–my pride and joy–are steadfast and maturing as Christians. My three grandchildren are happy and rambunctious. Each year over the past decade, I spend time in the Philippines by preaching and teaching our leaders and college students who are thirsty for Jesus and Scripture. Gratitude, joy and thanksgiving overwhelms me almost daily as I live with awe, fear and trembling for his immeasurable and undeserved grace.

How did you have fun in 2013?

A key to having fun

Appreciation. Last Fri, West Loop (WL) held our annual appreciation dinner. Our 12 WL families attended. We had FUN. We went to an all you can eat buffet for $27 per person. You could eat as many lobsters as you wanted. I only had two! We were constantly laughing…and eating. We appreciated our six WL pastors/elders: Rhoel, Henry, Tim, Arthur, Jim, Ben. After dinner, we adjourned to Arthur’s home. We chatted, had drinks, did karaoke…and ate some more. I was “upset” the next day, because I gained 3 lbs! But I had fun.

Criticism. Some people criticized WL for only having fun. Initially, it annoyed me. But why should it? It is true! I am having fun. In fact, I am having the time of my life (Phil 4:4; 1 Th 5:16).

God. Jesus has never been more real to me (Mt 28:20). I experience his presence (Gal 2:20) and his grace often (1 Cor 15:10), and often with tears of unspeakable joy and gratitude. My thanksgiving to God overwhelms me because I know how undeserving I am and how unwarranted God’s kindness to me is (Rom 2:4).

Bible. I enjoy studying the Bible for many hours every day (Ps 119:70, 77, 174; Rom 7:22). John MacArthur says that he studies the Bible for seven hours every day. I lack his diligence in matching that many hours a day, even though I am semi-retired.

Preaching. I enjoy preaching on Sun (even though the weekly burden is often great, especially when I am not sure what I want to say, or how to say it, or how to present the theme clearly and fluidly!) I enjoy meeting people in community and serving Bible studies during the week (2 Tim 4:2).

Wife. My wife and I are on our honeymoon every day (even when we are upset and annoyed at each other over the silliest things!). We are talking and laughing every day (Prov 5:18).

Children. Our four kids are authentic Christians (I believe). They have hardly ever caused me any grief or caused me to be ashamed of them. I am so proud of them (Prov 23:24; 10:1; Ps 127:4-5). Because of God’s grace to each of them, I often say, “I’m done” (even if God is clearly not done with me!).

Friends. I have many friends that I can freely talk to honestly and openly about anything and everything (Eph 4:15; Col 4:6). This is truly a credit to them, because I often invariably upset them by my double ABC disposition (abrupt, abrasive, blunt, brutal, confrontational, confounding). Yet they freely and repeatedly overlook my highly annoying idiosyncrasies, which are usually not intentional (but sometimes they are!). I even provoke and offend some people online (as there are more “dislikes,” which is fun)! These days I thank God that many people, including young people, feel free enough to rebuke, correct, encourage or exhort me (Heb 3:13).

Peace. I have no bitterness, resentment, ill will or grievance toward anyone (Heb 12:14), not even those who upset me and others. The fact that God enables me to not be incensed or infuriated with others is surely his merciful grace to me.

Grace. I am having fun ONLY because of the love of God, the grace of Jesus and the presence of the Holy Spirit (2 Cor 13:14). This is pure gospel and pure grace to me. It is nothing I did to earn or deserve such a grace.

Are you having fun?

Grace

My dear wife who has put up with me for 32 years and counting. The fact that she still loves me in spite of me is a daily living reminder of the gospel to me. This story of a husband who was going to divorce his wife is touching and meaningful; it expresses just how much he hurt his wife of 10 years because he now loved another woman.

My four kids are not hurt or wounded by their father for not loving their mom. This is my favorite quote of a father who loves his children: “The best way for a father to love his children is to love their mother.” Tom Cruise once gave an interview in Time magazine where he expressed the angst of his parent’s divorce, saying, “I would not wish this on anyone.” All his fame, popularity and wealth could not remove the wound of his parent’s divorce. Steven Spielberg hated his father for the longest time for divorcing his mom. But when he divorced his first wife and remarried, he reconciled with his dad.

My parents who loved me unconditionally and who have never ever wounded me in any way whatsoever. My only sibling, an older brother, who is a noble man.

My original pastor, mentor and friend Samuel Lee (and Sarah Barry) who helped me to love Jesus, Scripture, discipleship and mission for the last 22 years of his life. I am sorry if this thanksgiving is offensive to some who read UBFriends.

My joy and delight in reading and studying Scripture, commentaries, Christian books and theology. Over the past six months, I had the time of my life by reading, preparing and preaching through Revelation in 16 weekly sermons. Now I am excited as I prepare to preach through Deuteronomy next year. God wired me to be a cerebral person who virtually lives with my head in the clouds most of the time…unless I’m watching movies or sports! My cerebral disposition causes me to often be clueless about reality, much to the chagrin of my wife and others.

My local church community at West Loop UBF Church, our recently formed South Side Coalition of Hyde Park UBF, IIT UBF and West Loop,  and my Christian brothers and sisters in Podil and in Philippines UBF, whom I have had the joy and privilege of visiting them yearly over the past decade.

My life of relative comfort and wealth by virtue of being a physician. Visiting the Philippines yearly is so edifying to me to help me realize that my comfortable upper middle class life in the U.S. is above that of over 95% of people in the world.

Semi-retirement. For about a decade since I became self-employed, I have not needed to work full time to support my family. This allows me to pursue whatever I want. This is surely a grace that I pray I may never abuse by wasting my time.

As a sinner and a forgetful man, I know I have forgotten countless other graces and blessings for which I should be thankful. Do remind me of what I have missed. What are you most thankful for?

Bound for life

The ubf culture encourages shepherds to become your new parents. They view young college students as their children. They intend to be bound for life. This is seen by the shepherds as more binding than mother/daughter, brother/sister or husband/wife. Your shepherd/sheep relationship is seen to be most binding.

Intense pursuit

The culture in ubf pushes shepherds to unceasingly pursue any young person who shows any kind of interest in ubf. When I was a ubf shepherd, I always longed for “the one”. I wanted to find the one student who would validate my efforts, the one student who would prove out the ubf heritage, the one student who would save me from all the rebukes for not having a disciple of my own.

Personal trainer

The shepherds in ubf are tasked with a primary purpose: train the “sheep” under you. The shepherds face a lot of pressure to control what behavior their “sheep” do. If your “sheep” strays and fails, the shepherd is in more trouble than the “sheep”. The shepherd is trained to be a trainer. The shepherd is held responsible for the moral improvement and outward conformance to the ubf heritage.

Is this what you want?
Is a personal. lifelong trainer justified?
Is there any biblical support for such a role?
Did Jesus intend His followers to be this kind of shepherd?

Why do UBF members often feel so burdened?

I have been examining my time in ubf for several years now, including time while I was a ubf Director. I have identified 8 layers of burden that are stacked onto you in ubf as the years go by. These burdens add up. The picture to the right is my visualization of the layers. My recovery from the ubf system has taken me through each of these layers. I had to navigate my way through each layer without losing my faith in Jesus and my hope in God.

What does UBF look like for a member?

When you are on the bottom of the stack, looking up, you first see your own personal challenges. You do this because the ubf system is an “incurvatus in se” set of beliefs and practices. Your problems are always in front of you weekly and daily. You may sense the other layers and you certainly feel their weight, but you never quite see them clearly. Note that the Confucian values layer is hidden from sight.

Why do some observers see a Korean Christian organization?

From the outside however, looking in, people typically see just some combination of Evangelical Christianity, Bible study and Korean culture. They can’t usually see the other layers, but often can sense the layers are there. It is easy then to attribute any “oddities” in ubf as part of the Korean culture. Korean culture might seem to be a major influence but in reality it is just a thin layer. The thick layers of ubf behavior and ideology are hidden from view until one digs deeper.

Thoughts, questions, reactions?

This article is intentionally brief. Thinking through these things has helped my recovery immensely. I am now set free through the grace of Jesus found at the cross and the living hope found at the empty tomb. The burden is gone. The gospel Jesus preached has liberated me from this system. I would love to hear your honest thoughts and questions.

Questions to ponder…

If you are skidding in a car, which way do you turn?

If you see an accident in a race car, which way do you steer?

If your ministry has conflict, who do you talk to?

If your plane engines fail and you are falling, which way do you point the plane?

How can we be the person God intended us to be while living in His kingdom?

If someone leaves your ministry, what actions should you take?

The Sermon

(source link)

The Summit

The summit was, in simplistic terms, 16 hours of sitting and listening to 13 speakers. My wife and I attended (for the first time) from our church in Detroit, which is a satellite host for the summit. However, I can’t remember even 1 minute of boredom or of wanting to fall asleep or of wishing I was somewhere else. I soaked up every speaker like a sponge. The summit was exactly where God wanted me to be for those two days.

In addition to the highlighted speakers, there were several others who made appearances in between. Comedian Michael Jr.  shared some of the funniest stories I’ve ever heard. He might just be the funniest man on planet earth right now. David Garibaldi shared an amazing painting experience, preaching the gospel with no words.  William Close played the “earth harp”, an astounding instrument set up inside the Willow Creek auditorium.

The nature of the leadership talks seemed to me to blend academia, business and religious backgrounds, with the explicit Christian gospel themes woven through each one. The official summit link is here: http://www.willowcreek.com/events/leadership/schedule.asp

It is difficult for me to express my “take-away’s” from this summit. Breathtaking. Exhilarating. Amazing. Astounding. Life-changing. Christ-centering. It will take some time to process, and I plan on ordering the DVD’s.

The Speakers

Bill Hybels. Founder and senior pastor, Willow Creek Community Church. Bill’s church has 24,000 weekly attendees. His opening talk set the tone for the summit. I was surprised by one of his opening statements: “This leadership summit will be unashamedly Christian. We will pray. We will quote from the bible. And we will sing. But this summit is not for Christians only. We welcome anyone of any faith and anyone who has not made faith part of their life story yet.” I had not expected this. And since Willow Creek has more than 24,000 weekly worshippers, I was surprised to hear Bill talk about how the leadership team overcame a time of being a toxic environment in recent years. Bill’s team reached out to an external party to gauge how they were doing. The external survey showed they scored in the toxic range of organizational health. So he sounded the alarm and they made the tough decisions to get back on track. This year they scored a rare high-mark in organization health. I learned that leaders have to sometimes say goodbye to other leaders in order to make the organization healthy. And leaders must define the core values of their organization.

General Colin Powell. Speech title: “It worked for me.” Former U.S. Secretary of State, senior level advisor to four Presidents, served U.S. Army for 35 years. Colin was surprisingly human and open. I expected an army general to be stiff and cold. He is nothing like that. One story he told was how he once complained a long time to President Reagan. Reagan said nothing until Colin was finished. Finally Reagan said “Look there’s a squirrel outside the window!”. Later Reagan taught him the lesson. You can sit there and tell me all day about your problem, but until I have a problem, don’t get me involved. I hired you to do a job. Now go solve your problem and let me know when I have a problem.”

Patrick Lencioni. Speech title: “How to lose your best people.” Founder and President of The Table Group, best-selling author. Patrick shared a high-energy, hilarious talk about a serious subject. He noticed over the years that people left jobs and churches for one or more of three primary reasons, regardless of culture: irrelevance, immeasurement or anonymity. He admitted that “immeasurement” is not a word. But it fits what he called a lack of feedback or sometimes improper feedback. People want to know how they are doing, and be able to tell for themselves. Human beings don’t want to wait around for “how their boss feels” or wait for the numbers to come in. Human beings want the gratification of knowing they did a good job. In other words, people are looking for fulfillment. And leaders want to know right away if they failed. He told of how leaders who are afraid of failure or think failure is not an option are bad leaders. For example, several successful companies actually measure how many times you fail, as a measurement for success. If you are not failing enough, you aren’t learning how to succeed. Some venture capitalists won’t fund you unless you failed at least 3 times for at least $1 million.

Liz Wiseman. Speech title: “The Multiplier Effect”. President of the Wiseman Group, best-selling author. Liz’ talk was not flashy but was perhaps the most thought-provoking. She shared with compassion and a genuine love for humanity. She talked about leaders who are multipliers and leaders who are diminishers. A diminisher is someone who gets very little effort or talent out of people around them. They are the empire builders, the tyrants, the know-it-alls, the decision makers and the micro managers. A multiplier gets double and triple effort and talent. They are the talent magnets, the liberators, the challengers, the debate-makers and the investors. Diminishers will kill off their organizations while multipliers will always eventually find their way to success.

Chris Brown. Speech title: “Right title…wrong kingdom”. Co-Senior Pastor and Teaching Pastor at North Coast Church. This was tied for my favorite talk of the conference (Andy Stanley’s being the other one). Really, Chris Brown gave a sermon, not a talk or a speech. I cried the most during his sermon because he spoke so powerfully and every word he spoke rang so true. Based on Mark 10:42-25, he obliterated the Moses or Elijah style leadership models. Jesus said “Not so with you”. Jesus turned leadership upside-down. If you model Moses, you model the world’s way of leading now that Jesus has demonstrated His style of leadership. Even a Pharaoh who didn’t know the Lord knew Jesus’ style of leadership (in dealing with Joseph) better than Saul, the anointed king of Israel. You just have to listen to this one.

Bob Goff. Speech title: “Love Takes Action”. Founder and CEO of Restore International, attorney. Bob Goff gets the prize for the most energetic and fanatical speech! He told humorous stories about his life on an island (yes he lives on an island). And he also spoke with passion and compassion about one of the most heart-wrenching events I’ve ever heard in a long while. He was the attorney for Charlie, the child attacked by the infamous Koby. Bob told of amazing acts of kindness, as well as unimaginable forgiveness. Bob’s point is that “love does stuff”. Love demands action. Love requires us to get involved in the terrible evils of the world. His talk was similar to an earlier talk he gave: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lo1jHeIn3TE

Mark Burnett. Speech title: “Unscripted Leadership”. Four-time Emmy Award winner, Executive Producer of Survivor, The Voice and The Bible TV shows. Mark’s time was not a speech but an interview with Bill Hybels. I enjoyed the dialogue-style speaking between them. This style was used several times during the Summit. Mark talked about how he courageously took his fame and fortune and poured it into the Bible series project recently.

Joseph Grenny. Speech title: “Mastering the skill of influence”. Co-founder of VitalSmarts, best-selling business author. Joseph gave a detailed talk about influence, one of the key abilities leaders need to understand. He talked about how leaders tend to focus on motivating people instead of influencing them. Motivating is important, but teaching skills is the primary influencer. He used God’s preparing of Moses in the palace and God’s preparing of Joshua learning from Moses as examples that God’s ways are about teaching skills first and then motivating people at the right time. Joseph taught from both a “heavy” example of behavior change involving changing the behavior of third-world prostitution and a “light” example of influencing the behavior of traffic laws. One amazing example he gave was about a traffic law enacted in some state in the U.S. A lot of people ignored the law until the officials posted a sign that said “Report violators, call 1-800-be-a-hero” (or something to that effect). The point was when people know other people are watching them, their behavior is influenced.

Vijay Govindarahan (“VG”). Speech title: “The Innovation Challenge: Getting it right”. Top 50 Management Thinker, Professor at Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business. Vijay gets the top award for the most complex talk. He talked a lot about ways leaders can sustain an organization. He used a “three box” model. He taught that leaders need to manage the present, selectively abandon the past, and create the future.  He talked about how organizational leaders must create separate (but loosely connected) team that plays by different rules than the “box 1” (or performance engine) part of the organization. Leaders need to create innovation teams. Leaders and organizations must re-invent themselves regularly in order to stay alive.

Dr. Brene Brown. Speech title: “Daring Greatly”. Research Professor at University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work. Brene is a ground-breaking researcher into the topics of shame, worthiness and courage. She talked about how she once was invited to speek to a group of C-Level people. At first she was comfortable with this because she thought the term was “sea-level” people, meaning ordinary, down-to-earth people. She shared how she overcame fear when she realized “C” actually meant CEO, CIO, CTO, etc. She shared how leaders are human, how vulnerability is essential for any leader and how courage is so needed among leaders. She had a life-changing moment after reading the famous quote by Theodore Roosevelt about daring greatly.

Oscar Muriu. Speech title: “Viral Leadership: Multiplying your impact exponentially”. Senior Pastor of Nairobi Chapel, Kenya. Under his leadership, Nairobi Chapel grew from a 40 person local church to a network of 30 churches with 14,000 weekly worshippers. Oscar shared based on 5 life-changing principles. They sounded very familiar to me and were based on the command to “go into all the world and preach the good news.” He talked of sending African missionaries to all parts of the world, including America and Asia. He told the story of how he would pray for leaders without telling them he was praying for them to be leaders. One by one, people would come to him saying “I feel compelled to be a missionary”. He told of one couple who asked if they could devote the next 25 years of their life to being a Christian missionary in Oscar’s church network. He talked of how their missionaries train for 1 or 2 years. They stay in a country for 5 years to plant a church and then leave to plant another church, following Apostle Paul’s example.

Dr. Henry Cloud. Speech  title: “Reversing the Death Spiral of a Leader”. Acclaimed leadership expert, best-selling author, Clinical Psychologist and Businessman.  Dr. Cloud has experience in executive coaching of CEO’s. He has been a frequent contributor to CNN and Fox News Channel. Once Henry asked a CEO about culture problems in a company. As the CEO mentioned reason after reason about why the problems existed, Henry kept asking “Why?”. Finally the CEO concluded that he was in charge of the problems, whether he created them or not. Here are some quotes from Dr. Cloud: “In the end, as a leader, you are always going to get a combination of two things: What you create and what you allow”. Leaders are “ridiculously in charge” according to Dr. Cloud, and so they are prone to being burned out and depressed. He talked about examples from Wall Street when the financial markets crashed around 2008. He talked about why the culture of an organization exists the way it is. He says it is because of the way the leaders behave. Dr.Cloud gave some behavior research examples, which I think made the audience a bit uncomfortable, because the research was from many years ago when animals were used. One example was of a monkey alone in a cage subjected to lights and sounds meant to induce stress. The monkey’s stress level was very high when he was alone. But when a second, familiar monkey was in the cage with him, their stress decreased by 50%. Dr.Clouds’ point was that people need a friend to get out of the downward spiral. He talked about principles to get out of the death spiral.

Andy Stanley. Speech title: [Andy gave a closing sermon just entitled “closing session”]. Founder and Senior Pastor at North Point Ministries. Andy pastors one of the largest churches in America, with over 33,000 worshippers each Sunday in his network of church campuses in the Atlanta area. Andy’s sermon was based on Matthew 16:18 “And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.” It was a sermon of sermons, a sermon so inspiring that I believe he just re-ignited Christianity in North America.

Here is the puzzle acted out. I’ll share more about this in comments to this article, but for now I’ll just present the puzzle for your brain-tingling enjoyment. My wife forwarded me many other brain puzzles, which I may share in future articles. I just love delving in to logic and thinking.

The Two Doors Puzzle

Two stories, both can’t be true, how do you decide?

Recently I completed my review of the 12 ubf heritage points. Some may think this is the first time I’ve done this. Granted, this is the first public posting of my thoughts, but it is hardly the first time I’ve thought about the heritage. From day 1, I could see the heritage slogans in play. The dilemma I faced for 20+ years was that the heritage looked so good and sounded so good, but I ended up feeling so bad. The conferences were often so spectacular to me, but I kept hearing all those stories about ex-members.

For me, the heritage debate (is is good or is it bad?) reached a climax in 2004. I defended the 12 points heritage profusely, both in person and on my website. After a couple years, the ex-members voices subsided (due in part to a ubf lawsuit). But the thought remained in my mind: How can I know if I’m right about the heritage being “God’s best ways”?

I decided to “Ask the other guy” sometime in 2010 or so. Actually I didn’t actually “ask” anyone, because I was too proud to admit to ex-members that I had been wrong about a number of things. Instead, I read all the ex-members testimonies. It was brutal. Because I knew that all the ubf testimonies were unanimously positive about the heritage, I expected all the ex-member testimonies to be unanimously negative about the heritage. But surprisingly to me, I found this was not the case. The ex-member testimonies were indeed spattered with emotions of all kinds, but they often would present facts as facts, with emotion yes but not with the glorification or mitigation I had always heard from pro-ubf testimonies.

So while life is not nearly as black and white as the Two Doors puzzle, the idea of “What would the other guy say?” was immensely helpful for me to come out of my fantasy world and connect with reality.

Different Kinds of Lies

Ok so maybe you found the puzzle difficult. I did! But once I found the answer clearly explained, I realized it wasn’t so difficult. And the Two Doors puzzle teaches a highly relevant logic principle that I feel we must employ in the religious realm. Here are some further principles that are easier to grasp. In any area of life, we are better off when we ask other people’s opinions, know how to identify different kinds of lies, and make our own decisions.

– Ignorance of facts (error) – Those things happened but I don’t know anything about them.

– Incompleteness of facts (omission) – Some of those things happened.

– Spinning of facts (restructuring) – Those things happened but here is what they really mean.

– Denial of facts (denial) – Those things didn’t happen.

– Dismissal of facts (mitigation) – I admit some things happened, but so what? They aren’t related to what’s happening now.

– Misrepresentation of facts (fabrication) – Those things happened, but here is the real story.

– Glorification of facts (exaggeration) – Those things happened, but were part of a grand scheme to attack and destroy.

The World outside of Thneedville

At one time the ubf heritage looked like the land in the Lorax movie [shown in the main picture above for this article], before the city of Thneedville was built. So I think, as some have said, that the ubf heritage might possibly be used for good. And I believe it is not necessarily the specific 12 points that are so destructive.

In time I realized that the heritage had been used to build a sort of Thneedville city. Attending the ubf conferences came to mind when I saw Thneedville in the Lorax movie. And I realized that there was an entire world of ex-members out there who had sacrificed in order to build the city; a world that looked like the land outside Thneedville.

After reviewing the 12 point ubf heritage, I don’t want to hear any more of the seven kinds of lies. It is no help to “go back to the bible”. What has to happen is for more and more ubf people to venture outside of Thneedville and see the reality of what was sacrificed to build that city. What ubf people need is to go visit the Once-ler (i.e. Ben and Joe). They need to listen to words like these: “Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not.” They need to see the word “Unless” written on the stone. Perhaps then the ubf heritage could be used for good rather than to build the city of Thneedville.

Here is a list of the second part of the ubf heritage. These slogans become a kind of hamster wheel for ubf members.

Section II – Behavioral slogans
the ubf lifestyle
8. House churches
9. One to one Bible study
10. Disciple-making ministry
11. Daily Bread
12. Testimony writing & sharing

House Churches

A house church is a family who has gone through the arranged marriage process (marriage by faith), left their home ubf chapter, and gone out to another campus through the process called pioneering. A house church often refers to a ubf member’s dwelling that is used for UBF activities. Many small ubf chapters meet in leaders’ houses. Leaders often make analogies between this and the practice of the early Christian church meeting in members houses. Note that “house church” can sometimes have a more specific meaning, namely it can describe the union of those who are married in ubf and have not actually “pioneered” yet.

One to One/1:1 

This is the core element of the UBF indoctrination and manipulation system. Bible study is always done in a hierarchical setting with one person acting as the Bible teacher (shepherd) and the other one as the Bible student (sheep). All initiates have to go through this one-to-one Bible study every week, often for many years, and often continuing with a senior missionary as teacher even after they have become shepherds themselves. In addition, there are also group Bible study where usually the chapter director acts as the Bible teacher. UBF Bible studies are always based on a questionnaire. UBF uses human effort (i.e prayers and repetition) instead of historical, intellectual or spiritual study of the Bible. In this way, Bible study often becomes an idol. After many years, a UBFer cannot stop Bible study even if a friend or loved one is in need.

Disciple-making ministry

“Raising up disciples” is what UBF considers to be their main task. This means parenting young converts like little children and giving them “obedience training” until they comply with how UBF expects them to behave. ubf shepherds and missionaries are taught to be the new parents of college students, often replacing the role of their natural parents.

Daily Bread

Daily Bread is the title of a UBF devotional that members are required to buy every quarter and that is used in UBF early morning prayer meetings. “To write daily bread” means writing a UBF type sogam based on a passage of the Daily Bread booklet. UBF likes to claim they have invented Daily Bread devotionals, but in fact the material was copied from the Scripture Union booklets, and even translated directly from the Scripture Union Daily Bread. Later, UBF replaced the Bible comments and prayers with their own Bible interpretations. UBF’s version of the booklets are sold to UBF members at a much higher price than the original booklets. Recently, UBF created UBF Press, a publication department, to publish and sell Daily Bread booklets and other material.

Testimony/Sogam/Reflecting writing/sharing

A sogam is a Korean term meaning one’s impressions, opinions, thoughts, feelings and sentiments about something. This term is used in UBF for the written statements based on Bible passages that UBF members are required to write and share every week (see testimony writing and sharing). The idea behind this practice is that members don’t just read a Bible passage, but interpret it in the sense of UBF and give a personal response in front of the group about how they intend to apply it to themselves. Usually this happens by repenting for not having done enough UBF activities or for not being obedient enough, and the promise to do better in the next week, often setting concrete targets. That way, members are able to indoctrinate each other, and leaders are able to closely monitor and control the spiritual growth of their members.

A self-supporting spirit

“At the beginning of UBF ministry, Koreans were accustomed to receiving something from others. After the American G.I.s came to Korea, the first English expression they learned was, “Hello, give me chocolate, give me gum.” The Korean government could decide its annual budget only after the American Congress approved of the amount of aid to Korea. In addition, Korea received aid of a large amount of food and goods. Soon we began to think that we could not survive without receiving aid from others. In this atmosphere, the UBF ancestors struggled furiously to overcome Korean fatalism, to learn the spirit of giving and to live the life of giving.”

“Then a remarkable and historical event in UBF history happened. In 1963, one day when we needed to print something, Mother Barry suggested that we collect the expenses from students. Then Dr. Samuel Lee rebuked her, saying, “How do you expect poor students to pay for it? Since you are rich, you pay for everything.” But Mother Barry insisted, “We must collect it for the sake of education.” Their argument continued until Mother Barry broke into tears.”

“That night Dr. Samuel Lee could not sleep because he made a woman cry. He began to read the Bible. He realized a great lesson that the Bible teaches. God gave his One and Only Son for sinners. Jesus also came to this world and gave everything for sinners and finally gave his own life for us. Jesus taught his disciple a giving spirit, saying, “You give them something to eat.” Apostle Paul accepted Jesus’ word, “It is more blessed to give then to receive,” and practiced a giving life and became a self-supporting missionary.”

source: ubf history

Forced giving

“In May 1966, the world mission offering work had enrolled 162 members. With this offering we could procure centers at Jeonju, Daejun, Daegu and Seoul and send out shepherds. There is a legendary event at the time of pioneering Daejun. One day Dr. Samuel Lee visited the Daejun UBF center and took out the door of the Kwangju UBF center and loaded it to a truck in order to give it to Daejun UBF. One man who saw this got angry at Dr. Samuel Lee that Dr. Lee took out the door without discussing with him.”

source: ubf history

The good, bad and ugly

Good (keep it)

– As the bible says, it is indeed better to give than to receive.

Bad (change it)

– The bible does not say “never receive”. All human beings need both giving and receiving. Leadership requires sabbatical-type periods of inactivity.

– Realize and accept that we are not living in 1960’s war-torn Korea.

– Realize that in many countries where Korean missionaries have gone for ubf, they have much more than “5 loaves and 2 fish”. Don’t break them down until they pretend to have nothing when they have much.

Ugly (stop it)

– Stop treating human beings like perpetual resources. Stop squeezing the lifeblood, the energy, the creativity, the happiness out of ubf members. Stop suffocating students.

– Stop demanding the money and other resources to flow into a headquarters chapter. HQ has a “hands off” approach to satellite chapters, expecting them to give to the central chapter. In other words, support the self-supporters.

– Stop forcing people to give and to sacrifice. People will be far more willing to give when they choose to do so of their own accord. Stop doing illegal activity in order to “bless” and “help” people.

In their own words

Again I find it helpful to simply share ubf’s own words on “manger spirit”.

The ubf mindset of “worldly=non-ubf and godly=ubf” has much to do with this slogan of “manger ministry”, imitating the actual manger instead of Jesus himself.

“Though Jesus is the Creator God, he became flesh and was born in a manger of a stable in order to save all the people of the world from their sins. Jesus gave up the glory of the heavenly kingdom, humbled himself and gave even his life as a ransom for sinners. The UBF ancestors struggled hard to imitate this Jesus and to dedicate their possessions and youth without reservation for Jesus and his gospel. Wherever they went, they were noticed as UBF people. Especially, women did not put any make-up on their faces, wearing low-hill shoes and carried large handbags. In their large handbags, they carried their Bible, Bible study notes and cookies. What distinguished them from worldly people was not just their outward appearances but also their noble inner characters, which came from a manger spirit.”

Surprisingly, much of the elitism may stem from “manger ministry” as well, and is often difficult to distinguish from another heritage point called “lay missionaries”.

“As the fruit of manger spirit, our ministry was inclined to raising up self-supporting lay shepherds and missionaries who had no religious position and power. Dr. Lee was called a shepherd as the first person in world history. The title, “shepherd” meant nothing to worldly people, and had no authority or power. Because of this title, we suffered a lot. After introducing ourselves as shepherds, we had to explain what a shepherd meant for a long time. Because of this unfamiliar title, people misunderstood us as strange people who belonged to a strange group. Some criticized us sharply, saying, “You did not graduate from a seminary. How can you dare to teach the Bible to others?” Others gave us friendly advice, saying, “Since you are eager to study the Bible and serve the work of God, why don’t you enter a seminary and be a pastor? We are willing to help you to do that.” In spite of all these difficulties, we took great pride in being called shepherds.”

source: ubf history

The good, bad and ugly

Good (keep it)

– I learned the value of sacrifice and humility.

Bad (change it)

– Instead of focusing on the “manger”, I find it far more life-giving to focus on Jesus directly.

Ugly (stop it)

– Bad financial decisions. Over the past 20 years, I’ve often made terrible financial decisions. Why? Because I was taught to have “manger spirit” which meant (in my mind) always driving a junk car on purpose, not taking care of house repairs and spending money first and foremost for ubf activities.

– As the ubf history page points out, the “manger spirit” slogan may apply more to women in ubf. Stop pretending to have a “manger” appearance.

A Reflection on Genesis 22

When my wife and I were about to face separation, our lives shook. Our marriage shook. But no one asked, “How is your marriage? Are you okay? How can you handle this event?” We had been married less than one year and were expecting a baby. As I participated in UBF ministry activities during the four months that we were separated I told myself it was okay because of Genesis 22 or similar thought control. However, deep in my heart I was torn up because it was not a comparable test of faith. I want to explain best a brief look at Abraham’s test of faith, my family’s personal struggle and the impact of ministry.

As Genesis 22 opens it had already been some time after Isaac had been weaned and Ishmael had been sent away with his mother. Verses 1-2 read, “Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, ‘Abraham!’ ‘Here I am,’ he replied. Then God said, ‘Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.’”

Typical UBF messages emphasize that Isaac was most precious to Abraham. By interpretation this means that Isaac, God’s promise and blessing to Abraham, was an obstruction (idol) to serve and follow God. (So, the natural action is to remove the idol.) But God was indeed testing Abraham and did not intend to take Isaac, but rather wanted Abraham to demonstrate his love for God. So, Abraham almost sacrificed his son – But he didn’t! Before he could bring the knife down an angel of the Lord stopped him. When Isaac was spared and a ram was to become the offering it revealed God as our provider. But we need to remember that Abraham returned having proven his faith and love for God, while his son Isaac was still under his care. This reveals that Abraham had a lasting encounter with God – a turning point in his faith. Abraham’s obedience helped him to experience God even more. God would not let anything happen to Isaac for the value of life and the promise. So, after leaving Abraham had both his faith in God and his son.

Understanding Our Separation

In my own example I had to let go of my wife – my wife had to let go of me. My wife and I married by faith, but also because we did love each other. Even though we did not know each other at all in any way, God gave us opportunities of our era – internet: fb, skype and email. During our private time no leader or chapter director could prohibit our frequent communication that helped us to later become a solid married couple after marriage. I was not desperate to marry, but was willing to do so in UBF after a lot of personal prayer. This did not happen because of my chapter director and his carrot and stick, but because I believed, trusted and loved God.

Let me explain our crisis: My wife is Korean. During a mad rush to do everything well, effectively and in a timely manner at the time of our marriage I accidently submitted the wrong application for immigration sponsorship into Canada. I will say just one thing, even though this has hurt my family in the short term, I believe that it was God’s grace and will that led us out of an abusive chapter in such a way. When we discovered our situation most of the chapter members were out of the country, leaving just my family and one other member. When I discovered our reality I arranged to meet with an immigration lawyer immediately to see exactly what our options were according to Canadian laws. Did I consult with the chapter director at that time? No, his absence did not help us at all and we also needed to be clear about the facts before we prayed.

Interference From Our Chapter Director

Our main priority was to get my wife out of the country before it could hurt her chances to be accepted as a sponsored immigrant to Canada. We messaged the director and his wife after we could explain the facts about our situation and what options were available. First, the director said we could discuss further once he returned to Canada. (There was no time for discussion, but he wanted to be in control.) Second, both he and his wife encouraged a foolish plan to go into USA and then try to reenter Canada – the theory was to extend possible visiting visa. Our problem was not my wife’s allowance time for being in Canada it was the application forms we had submitted. The Canadian government believed I was in Canada and that my wife was in Korea, but actually we were both in Canada. The government was processing everything for my wife at the embassy in Seoul. Within ten days of discovering our situation and taking the necessary steps to understand our options my wife was back in Korea.

Once everyone had returned to Canada and talked openly about the situation my family became divided property of the chapter. The director did not show concern about what this crisis was doing to my family. All he cared about was his power and authority over the members in his church. My wife became a political object so he could find favour among Korean co-workers in her chapter. He prepared gifts and a card which we were not to have anything to do with accept for delivery. He enforced a prayer meeting for the sending off of my wife the Sunday before she left without our consent or input. His prayer was not about our family – it was about his chapter and how he could maintain power over us. This was one event he could not control. He was not more powerful than immigration Canada. The following Monday my parents and I accompanied my wife to the airport early in the morning. I refused any coworkers to be in attendance.

All during this time my wife had just entered her second trimester for pregnancy. So, in addition to the stress of sponsoring a spouse into Canada, we faced four months separation during her pregnancy. The days leading up to her departure my wife cried and cried. I had gone through a breakdown several years before, so it was naturally difficult for me to do the same in times of intense sorrow and disappointment.

Life in Canada Separated From My Wife

During the four month period there were two aspects that bore heavy on me. First, inside our chapter my prayer topics were given to me. I was told that my wife had to return as soon as possible to Canada for the sake of our chapter. What!?! Nobody had any sense!! A pregnant woman well advanced should not be travelling long distances by air. My wife also had no status in Canada and would be subject to the worst environment along with the baby to be born into. Over and over again, during meetings, daily bread, bible study, Sunday worship and any event which caused us to gather I listened to the prayer that demanded my wife return to Canada. Her return was not about uniting our family, but about maintaining numbers and events in our small chapter. The second aspect that bore heavy on me was during any event which gathered several chapters together. I attended one wedding, the summer conference and also a leaders conference before the school year began. On all occasions I met with people from across Canada and explained our situation without stating the facts about chapter politics. Everyone outside of my chapter said the same thing: Go and teach English in Korea! Be united with your wife, because it is not healthy for you two to be separated like this. When I returned home I wanted to cry, but couldn’t. I asked myself (and God), “Why couldn’t the people in my own chapter think like that? How could I allow myself to get stuck in this bondage to a UBF chapter?”

Well, I took matters into my own hands one evening. After chatting with many Canadian leaders over the period of a couple months I contacted the chapter where my wife had been in USA. Through this communication I could get assistance from Chicago. My director received a call from JJ giving guidance that I go to Korea for a short term period (6 months). This was at least until the processing for immigration could be completed. However, my chapter director wanted me to go only for the delivery of the baby and support my wife in the immediate and then return. He had no choice but to accept that Chicago leaders had stepped in and given a new direction. He still tried to keep his control because a director from a chapter in Korea had just visited Canada and he wanted me to study with that director so to keep his influence over me. (That director is a neighbor to our present UBF chapter.)

When I did leave I had prepared to work as an English teacher in Korea giving me more than a one year contract to fulfill. In addition, my parents were the only ones to see me off at the airport – I threatened my director with the police if he should come near me or my parents while I was away. Since then I have had no active contact with the chapter director except for what he has emailed to me. In fact, he has well hidden that things changed radically after I left.

Our Marriage Defined and Challenged in Korea

There is one more thing that occurred after the birth of our baby. The director’s wife came to Korea without any notice and tried to visit while I was working. She almost got past my wife, but I stood my ground and a fellow co-worker had to meet and send the director’s wife away without even leaving the train station. Let me explain since it was a very difficult action I faced while I was still shaken from the chapter in Canada.

I took a leap of faith and warned my wife that if she kept contact or allowed that woman to come into our home and touch our baby I would leave her and start all over without any conscience of our marriage. While talking with my wife I had even called my mother and told my parents that I would leave my wife and baby if this event occurred. I did all of this by faith, because that family had used, manipulated and bullied us. Did I want to leave my wife and baby? No, but I handled this event as I did to demonstrate what the chapter in Canada had done. During the four months of separation my wife had been in a loving and warm chapter, but I hadn’t and I could not pretend that everything was okay and allow them to exhort power over our family anymore. Forgiveness is in my heart, but that does not mean I will allow myself or my wife and children to suffer any longer.

Closing Comments

In closing there are many co-workers in Canada, USA and Korea whose help I received and for that I am truly thankful and hope that God’s blessings can pour out to them. But there are those in the chapter that I left who still need to be called to account. There are still others who share their condolences, but will do nothing about what has been happening in that chapter or others of its kind. It has almost been two years since I came to Korea and God has taught me that his divine training can be done anywhere, anytime under his authority and by the Holy Spirit. God has also taught me great humility with every step because I had no time to prepare anything, but had to adapt beyond my sense of time and abilities. We still do not have clarity for our situation, but we are taking each day and leaving it to God. That chapter director tried to keep me in Canada without ever suggesting I go to Korea for the remainder of application processing. It is a perfect illustration of an abuse of power.

Some in UBF may ask me, “Why has this been added to the pile of negative reviews?” My answer, “I am adding this here, because if I don’t it will always be left unsaid. When I share my life testimony I must be graceful and encouraging – that means do not say anything that may discourage new comers.”

The Shepherding Movement was fraught with problems. Some of those problems, displayed in several pseudo-Christian organizations that grew out of the movement, have been discussed openly for many years. Most notable in this discussion is Ron Enroth’s book, Churches That Abuse.

The face of the failed Shepherding Movement was Bob Mumford, who became a sort of poster-boy of the movement. In 1989, Mr. Mumford offered a public apology to those hurt by the movement’s teachings and practices.

In his formal statement of repentance Mumford said:

Accountability, personal training under the guidance of another, and effective pastoral care are needed biblical concepts. True spiritual maturity will require that they be preserved. These biblical realities must also carry the limits indicated by the New Testament. However, to my personal pain and chagrin, these particular emphases very easily lent themselves to an unhealthy submission resulting in perverse and unbiblical obedience to human leaders. Many of these abuses occurred within the sphere of my own responsibility.

The movement began to disintegrate in 1986 when its magazine, New Wine, folded due to steady loss of revenue. In the latter years of the 1980s Baxter, Basham, and Mumford officially “released” their disciples from their previous pyramidal authority structure-Prince had already severed his formal ties with the others in 1983.

Yet even with Mumford’s public statement of apology-and in spite of Buckingham’s obituary of the “discipleship era”-the abuse of discipleship and spiritual authority continues unabated by other men (and women) in other churches and movements. (source)

Here are some excerpts from another blog that describe two main reasons why the original Shepherding Movement failed in the United States. One of the failed doctrines taught by the Shepherding Movement was covering theology.

“Most of the Christian church doesn’t believe in covering theology. It appeared on the scene in North America about 40 years ago through something called the shepherding movement. That movement was completely discredited and some of the leaders have publicly repented of their involvement.”

Reason 1 – They replaced Jesus as master.

“In this context, a group of older, more experienced charismatic ministers came together to bring a corrective. The occasion of their meeting was a moral failure of a ministry in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Believing themselves to be equally vulnerable to moral failure apart from better accountability they mutually submitted themselves to one another. When this happened, they described themselves as having a supernatural experience binding their ministries together for life. Initially the group was made of Derek Prince, Don Basham, Bob Mumford, and Charles Simpson. Eventually, former Branham campaign manager Ern Baxter was added to the group, and they became known as “The Fort Lauderdale Five.”

“The five very talented men immediately began to teach on authority, submission and discipleship. Although there were a number of important doctrines, the central doctrine—the one that reshaped the church—was that every person must be submitted to another person (Shepherd/Pastor/Discipler), and that all of your major life decisions should be submitted to this person. Effectively, if unintentionally, this put the individual in the position of having two masters– Jesus and a personal shepherd. With time the personal shepherd gains more power, as Jesus gets less. And in time, this creates a system where those who have unquestioning obedience to man are promoted. All kinds of ungodly things came in through these doors. Several books have been written detailing the kinds of abuse suffered as a result. The scary thing about the whole system is that it started out with the intent of promoting accountability, and eventually enslaved people.”

Reason 2 – They made their shepherd/sheep relationships permanent

“The second dangerous doctrine had to do with “Covenant” relationships or “Spiritual Family.” If being absolutely submitted to another person was an imprisonment, then the covenant relationship was the iron padlock on the door. The idea here is that when you enter into these discipleship relationships, they are permanent, and more broadly that your association with a specific group of believers is permanent. You were in a “Covenant” and if you left the relationship or the fellowship group, you were breaking a covenant. This quickly becomes a very dangerous situation: no matter how terrible your experience becomes with a group or person, you can not leave, and if you do, you believe that you’ve broken a covenant with God, so to get right with God you’d have to go back to the abuse! You slowly become enmeshed with the other members of the group and separated from the outside world. Your “spiritual family” becomes more important than your natural family or other believers you’ve had relationship with. You slowly become more and more isolated and more and more dependent upon the group or leader. At a certain point if your leaders do not check the pattern, it becomes a full fledged cult. Normally, however this pattern is held in tension with Biblical expectations so these groups rarely become true cults, while still exhibiting cult-like features. Scary.”

Result – The fruit of absolute obedience to human authority

“After a couple of years, the fruit of these doctrines became obvious to those outside of the movement such as Jack Hayford, Pat Robertson, Demos Sharkarian and others, and they confronted the “Five” in the infamous “Shootout at the Curtis Hotel,” in 1975. The result was that the Five issued an “apology” which did not really represent repentance on their part. They rejected the excesses of some who had followed their teachings to their logical conclusions, without accepting that the doctrines they were teaching had been the direct cause. Their persistence created a split in the charismatic movement between those who accepted the authority teaching, and those who did not.”

“This split is still evident today but under different names. No one dares be associated with the “Shepherding Movement” by name because it was so discredited. But many still believe in the basic principles to some degree or another, and find support in classic authors such as Watchman Nee. The “Prophetic” stream of the church became the branch of the church that did not accept authority teachings, and the “Apostolic” branch became that which did. The tragedy is that the basic observations of the Five were correct (i.e. need for discipleship, accountability) but their solution of hierarchical personal submission was not. Therefore the “prophetic” stream still tends to reflect the lack of authority that the rebellious hippies brought into the church through the Jesus Movement. Chaos in the meeting is welcomed and even praised as spiritual, and generally everyone does their own thing, hears from God totally in isolation, etc. On the other hand, those with the Shepherding heritage value “order” over all else. While they speak in tongues and claim to be charismatic, often in practice, the gifts of the Spirit, especially prophecy are not welcomed, because order is valued over the moving of the Spirit. Or prophecy can only come through an established authority in the church hierarchy.”

Jesus is Lord

“In summary, the Shepherds were right right to raise the issue of authority, but they were wrong about submission to other men. Christ is Lord of all, and each should be in submission to Him by the conviction of the Holy Spirit. Because we need order and peace, we should submit to those who lead ministries over us just like we would to our bosses at work. But this is far different from owing them allegiance in our personal or spiritual lives. And when we come to the place where following them violates our conscience, it’s time to move on.”

Questions:

Do you see or experience anything in your UBF chapter that resembles something above? Are there similarities between the Shepherding Movement and UBF ministry? What should be done about this?

Three “Not so with you” Questions

The first lesson was “Biblical Foundations”, and set the tone for the nine months with three questions. It was emphasized that these are not merely questions for new believers, but questions meant for leaders in the church, and questions Christians must continually ask along their journey. And the other emphasis was that Christ-followers have distinctive answers, approaches and questions related to these questions:

1. Who is God?
2. Who am I?
3. What does God want to do through me?

Jesus’ Words

Here is the “not so with you” text from Matthew 20:20-28.

20 Then the mother of the sons of Zebedee came up to him with her sons, and kneeling before him she asked him for something. 21 And he said to her, “What do you want?” She said to him, “Say that these two sons of mine are to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your kingdom.” 22 Jesus answered, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I am to drink?” They said to him, “We are able.” 23 He said to them, “You will drink my cup, but to sit at my right hand and at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.” 24 And when the ten heard it, they were indignant at the two brothers. 25 But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. 26 It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant,[c] 27 and whoever would be first among you must be your slave,[d] 28 even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

Impact on my life

This nine month study has deeply impacted my life. My approach to the bible, my life, my God, my community and my family has all been changed. I want the “not so with you” and other distinctive marks of being a Christ-follower to permeate my life. Here are just a few ways this study and the people in it have have impacted my life:

• I feel like a human being.
• I am no longer afraid to be myself
• I am free to explore God’s unique mission for my life
• I will pay attention to my family first
• I have a new desire for seminary
• I am free to be emotional
• I am equipped with some ways to listen to the Holy Spirit
• I know something about my strengths and my unique gifts from God

An Example: Pope Francis

When I think about the “not so with you” attitude we learned from the study, I immediately thought of Pope Francis. He is becoming known as the “pope of firsts“.  He embodies the “not so with you” attitude of Jesus quite well. I am glad to see such a refreshing ambassador of the Body of Christ.

Here are just some of the impressive actions Pope Francis has taken to spark a new, distinctive era of reform in the Catholic Church, and in my opinion, in all of Christianity.

· After his election, he came down from platform to greet the cardinal electors, rather than have them come up to his level to offer obedience.
· He appeared on the loggia without the red cape.
· In his greeting he referred to himself only as “bishop,” not as “pope.”
· He referred to Benedict as “bishop emeritus,” not “pope emeritus.”
· He appeared without the stole, only putting it on to give the blessing. He then took it off in public (!), as if he couldn’t wait to get it off.
· He asked for the people’s blessing before he blessed them.
· He doesn’t wear red shoes.
· Though he has taken possession of the apostolic palace, he continued to receive guests at St. Martha’s House rather than the palace.
· He drank Argentinian tea in public when receiving the Argentinian president – protocol is that popes are seen publicly consuming no food or drink except the Eucharist.
· His first Mass with cardinals was celebrated facing the people.
· He doesn’t chant the prayers, he recites them – but this could be because of an impaired lung or his singing ability.

(source)

Some follow-up questions:

– How can your life display the “not so with you” attitude?

– What do you think about Pope Francis?

– How might Jesus’ words “not so with you” begin to transform the fabric of ubf?

I thought, wow, what a concept! Christ-followers are happiest and most fruitful and blessed when we recognize the seasons of our life, the seasons of our community and the seasons of our family. As our pastor prayed for each one of us individually and we share our concluding thoughts he asked us: What’s next?  (He also asked us to be on the lookout for anyone who might want to take the class in the fall. I said “Do you have room for 8,000 people? :)

What’s next?

But that question, what’s next? sums up what I learned over the past nine months in this class my wife and I have been attending every Tuesday evening. I’ve learned to pay attention to the Holy Spirit’s promptings and to listen to people around me. At the beginning of the class I told everyone that I viewed myself as an empty shell, hollowed out with nothing inside and no idea of what God would have for me to do. As my wife and I shared our life narrative over the next several months, we shocked, stunned and amazed the other members in the class. But we also were shocked, stunned and amazed at hearing their stories and what their lives entailed.

What’s next for me and my wife? I don’t know exactly. But I do know we are now “filled up and being filled” with love, goodness, kindness, patience and an increased self-esteem and self-awareness. Here are some things I’ve learned that I feel compelled to share with our ubfriends community. I love each of you dearly.

Listen to the Holy Spirit. Yes, the Spirit is alive! Yes, you can listen to Him! And yes, the Spirit is God. What’s next for me? I answered that I will continue to listen and discern the promptings of the Spirit and let Him lead my journey in His way.

Gordon T. Smith articulates this well: “Christians of all traditions are appreciating more and more that the voice of Jesus is also present to the Christian community through the inner witness of the Holy Spirit… This inner witness is always grounded in the written witness of the Spirit–holy Scripture–and it is recognized by those who live in mutual submission within the community of faith. With these two anchors in place, Christians can know and live by the remarkable reality that God speaks to us through his Son, Jesus Christ, and that Jesus is present to us by his Spirit. We hear the voice of Jesus as we attend to the inner witness of the Spirit.”

Listen to your family and community. One of the more intriguing abilities I gained in our class was to begin to learn how to listen to people around me. I had to unlearn my “dictate and command” approach and start to listen to what people say and do. It was fascinating to begin to get to know my wife, and start listening to her, even though we’ve been married 19 years. What is my wife saying to me? What is my family saying? What is my community saying? I’ve learned in a whole new way that our journey of following Christ is not just an individual journey, but a communal journey. Together we go!

This collaborative approach to following Christ is expressed well in the following quotes from one of our lessons: “A collaborative approach seeks to accomplish goals through cooperative interaction and efforts of multiple people. We experience the joy of sharing challenges and victories, often facilitating a gradual move from a “me” mentality to a “we” mentality. Collaboration then puts a high priority upon the importance of building trusting relationships. Nothing can be more corrosive to a community, whether it is a family or team or organization, than distrust… In all of this, intentional communication is a key to nurturing healthy and empowering relationships.”

Listen to your self. Perhaps the most edifying part of the nine month class was for me to begin to know my “self”. I felt like finally, after decades of trying to be somebody else, I could begin to be myself.  Augustine’s prayer about knowing God and knowing self was highlighted in one of the classes, and has impacted me deeply.

This quote by Robert Greenleaf speaks volumes: “I have come to believe that every part of my life affects or influences my life with God. The world I live in, with its beauty and tragedy, with its creatiures of all forms and shapes, is constantly offering me messages about who I am and who God is. Everything and everyone teaches me about God, life, and myself…I try now to approach each person, event, creature with two questions: How are you my teacher? What am I supposed to learn?”

Questions

Yes, some things must come to an end. But every ending leads to a new season, a new beginning, and a new segment of our journey in the Kingdom. I want to conclude with the questions that ended the class. It was so refreshing to end with questions, not with answers! I would love to hear your thoughts. And I’m grateful you’ve all been on this journey with me together!

What have you learned about who God is and what God is like?

What has become clear to you about yourself?

What have you become aware of about who you are and who God is creatively shaping you to be?

What unique calling or purpose is God prompting you to follow?

In what I believe was an answer to this prayer, God led me to 1:1 Bible study in UBF. My Bible teacher helped me to confront my sin in repentance and receive forgiveness. I entered a very in-depth program of Bible study, testimony writing, evangelism, outreach, prayer, attending meetings, and so on. It kept me busy so that I had no time to sin. Testimony writing gave me opportunities to examine myself and see where I had sinned.

Bible teachers trained me in various ways to help me grow. When I exhibited pride, I was given the name “Humble.” When I struggled with lust, I was given a purity ring and encouraged to wear it as a reminder to be pure. These things are not bad necessarily, but the result was bad: I began to assess my spiritual condition according to how well-managed my sin was. Once I was told that my connection to God is like a pipe through which His love flows, and sin blocks up the pipe. I became so preoccupied with unblocking the pipe, I never stopped to realize that there was no water flowing through it anyway.

Nowadays, the Holy Spirit is leading me to realize that my Christian life is more than just overcoming my brokenness. It is about Jesus, who bore my brokenness on the cross and rose again to set me free to love him and others. All the training, repentance testimonies, and self-inspection couldn’t bring real freedom. It could only manage my sin—ensuring it didn’t get out of control. But Jesus, beautiful Jesus, and His precious holy blood transfuses my heart with a rich and eternal flow that emancipates, enlivens, empowers, enriches, and establishes me secure in His love forever! (That alliteration is for you, Ben!)

How about you? Has your focus been on managing sin or receiving real freedom in Jesus to love God and others?

It is more blessed to give than to receive.

Acts 20:35 says, “In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ” This principle was beautifully illustrated by God’s people in UBF. I was the joyful recipient of many generous gifts: gifts of people diligently praying for me; gifts of my pastor personally taking time to teach me God’s word for hours each week; gifts of delicious meals; and also thoughtful—and frequently unexpected—presents (“Underwear? Oh, um, thanks!”)

When I was struggling and in the darkest days of shame and despair, my pastor gave his home for me to live with his family for several months. When I was struggling to support my young family as a student, he and others gave generous gifts to supply our need. Through each gift, prayer, Bible study, and encouragement, this message clearly resounded: giving is a blessing. The surpassing blessedness of giving became evident. I saw the blessedness of living a life of giving. Upon leaving UBF and watching other Christians in other churches, I began to appreciate this lesson as I saw that not all Christians have so joyfully learned this lesson. I’m thankful that through the giving hearts of the generous people in UBF, God helped to learn joy and blessedness of giving.

Being regimented is different than being disciplined

In UBF, I tried my best to faithfully attend devotions and prayer at 6 am. I did my best to faithfully reflect and write a testimony on each Sunday passage, evangelize on campus, prepare and teach the Bible to my Bible students, attend the required meetings, and attend and serve the Sunday service. It seemed that I was very disciplined and devoted in my spiritual life. However, after leaving UBF—after I was no longer required to attend meetings, serve students, write testimonies, and go fishing—I almost completely stopped reading my Bible or spending time in prayer. To my surprise, I wasn’t so disciplined after all!

I have come to realize that, in actual fact, I was regimented, not disciplined. I had responded well to externally-imposed regiments like devotions, testimony-writing, and Bible study, but I had not actually become disciplined in my inner person. Indeed, perhaps it was because I was so regimented that my true undisciplined self was able to remain hidden. Were the externally-imposed things such as daily bread and Bible study wrong or bad? By all means no, and truly they helped me a great deal. But while helping me, these things also hindered me from seeing the true condition of my personal relationship with Jesus. And most dangerously, they oh-so-subtly and implicitly planted the notion that by continuing to do these things—and lo, by doing them more and more—my inner person will somehow be changed.

What truths have you learned?

1. Reflect daily on the whole counsel/will/plan/purpose of God (Acts 20:27). Give my heart daily to meditation on the Word of God.
2. Read at least one chapter of the Bible a day following D.A. Carson’s daily commentary. This was my frequent failure in 2012.
3. Rely on God’s power and working daily (1 Pet 4:11; Phil 2:12-13). Only Jesus alone can build his church (Mt 16:18).
4. Recite two verses at the beginning of each day (Ps 19:14; Col 3:23). Only God can set my heart right (Gen 6:5; Jer 17:9; Prov 4:23).
5. Repent based on the gospel, not on guilt and fear (2 Cor 7:10). My offense is primarily against God (Ps 51:4).
6. Resolve not to fear any man (Prov 29:25). The fear of man emasculates. The gospel emboldens and humbles simultaneously.
7. Reject work righteousness (Eph 2:8-9). Emphasizing works, performance and behavior promotes pride (or despair) and never justifies anyone (Gal 2:16).
8. Resist authoritarianism which is of the devil (Acts 19:16), and which denies Jesus’ humble servant leadership (Mt 20:25-28; Mk 10:42-45; 1 Pet 5:2).
9. Review my progress often (1 Tim 4:15). It is so easy to feel stuck in a rut.
10. Renew my heart only by God’s transforming mercy (Dt 30:6; Eze 11:19, 36:26; Jer 31:33).
11. Rejoice always (1 Th 5:16), and never ever tire of testifying to the gospel of the grace of God (Acts 20:24).
12. Rest (Mt 11:28).

Do you have any random reflections to share for the new year?

You struggle with the blessing of others. In 1980, three things happened: I became a Christian in UBF, and Rick Warren and John Piper began pastoring their respective churches. Today, Warren has 30,000 members, and Piper has written 50 books. What about me??? If that is not “self-glorification thinking,” what else is!

You criticize the ministry of others. For decades I looked down on mega churches, thinking that they do not disciple their members and that they mainly produce nominal Christians who do not evangelize others. But criticizing others is elevating oneself, and glorifying myself.

You highlight your own distinctive ministry. For decades I also thought that I had the corner of the market on Christian discipleship through one to one Bible study, testimony writing, message training, marriage by faith, etc. So I despised any Christian or church who did not do the “superior things” I am doing. Whether I criticize others, or highlight what I do, it does not give God the glory, but draw attention to how great I or my church or my ministry is.

You need to have control and have the final say. It is so easy for an older Christian to think that he knows better and is more experienced than younger Christians. Maybe so. But to need to feel that they are the ones in charge robs God of the glory that rightfully belongs only to Him and to no human church leader. If members think that the church is run primarily according to a leader’s direction, it only glorifies the man (his church, his methodology, his vision, his legacy), not God.

What ways do you think you or your church glorifies itself, and thus distracts from the glory of God?

But what is shepherding? I’d like to take some time to stop and think critically about this important subject.

First of all, I don’t claim to know all about shepherding. My point here is both to learn and to kick off some discussion. Currently I am being mentored in a new and exciting way. I have much to share, but here are my initial thoughts and questions.

1. Shepherding is not parenting. Mentoring becomes unhealthy when the role of a parent is replaced or assumed.

2. Shepherding is not permanent. Some mentoring relationships may indeed develop into lifelong relationships. But that is rare. Mentors have to realize they do not have a lifelong mandate to mentor.

3. Shepherding is voluntary. It is so strange to think that shepherds choose sheep. It is far more healthy to allow students to choose, change and switch mentors. I’m not convinced everyone must have a mentor.

4. Shepherding is secondary. The role of the Holy Spirit (and the person being mentored) are primary. A mentor who insists on being the primary checkpoint in a person’s life is very unhealthy, especially for highschool/college students.  A mentor’s voice should never be the loudest voice in the head of a student.

5. Shepherding is about being a confidant. Often we need a friend to listen to us, to share in safety and confidence and to aid us in finding self and God. Setting up a relationship that goes beyond friendship or breaks trust however, is prone to leading toward a loss of  “self”, and thus not being able to see “God” clearly.

Questions for discussion:

What is the difference between healthy and unhealthy shepherding?

Is every Christian called to be a shepherd for someone else?

What role does psychology play in mentoring others?

What is the value of having group mentors?

How are advising, counseling, coaching, mentoring, shepherding, pastoring, parenting, mastering, lording and dictating related? Are they all the same thing?

How might we paraphrase this? “You think you can push me around? Try me.” “Don’t mess with me. If you do, you’ll lose.” “You think, you’re tough. You haven’t met me yet.” If you can pull it off and mean it, it is downright scary, especially with a smile or a smirk.

Tough guy movie lines. Likely no other actor can pull off the line as effectively as Clint Eastwood did. Another tough guy line is from Taxi Driver, where Robert DeNiro looks in the mirror and says repeatedly, “You talkin’ to me?” Or when Arnold Schwarzenegger says in the Terminator movies, “I’ll be back,” and “Astalavista baby.”

Why are such lines so cool and appealing? It directly confronts evil. Also, it challenges anyone who uses and abuses their power to rule over, control and manipulate others. This is appealing because no one ever likes to be pushed around by anyone else. We wish to fearlessly stand up to those bullies and resist their oppression over us.

Is this biblical? I have always maintained that anything catchy and appealing is derived from the Bible–even Dirty Harry. No human is ever any match for God. Any man who resists or rebels against God already lost. Paul said, “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows” (Gal 6:7). There will always be an adverse consequence for rebelling against God. “They sow the wind and reap the whirlwind” (Hos 8:7).

Wimps and push overs. There is an impression in society that Christians are mindless wimps and push overs, because they should be humble, meek, mild, and submissive. Yes, Christians should be humble, yet there is no biblical basis for a Christian to be weak or fearful of anyone or anything. Any Christian who fears any man reveals that he does not truly fear the God above the man he fears (Prov 29:25).

Tough Christians? Jesus was the toughest man who ever lived. He feared no one, not even those who would destroy him, and not even the devil who would heap the fires of hell upon him. So, yes, Christians, remembering Jesus, should be tough and fearless. No one likes spineless whiny weak wimps or gawky goody two shoes.

Bold and humble. When we remember the grace of Jesus, God enables us to be both fearless and gentle, bold and meek, courageous and humble at the same time. When we are gentle, our sinful default is to lack courage. Or when we are bold, our sinful default is to lack humility. Such polarities distort the gospel. Only the grace of Jesus gives us a poise and a balance that is winsome and soul winning.

Are you a bold yet humble spiritual Dirty Harry for the gospel?

Here is a quote from C. S. Lewis from Mere Christianity in his chapter on Sexual Morality which may be helpful:

“We may, indeed, be sure that perfect chastity—like perfect charity—will not be attained by any merely human efforts. You must ask for God’s help. Even when you have done so, it may seem to you for a long time that no help, or less help than you need, is being given. Never mind. After each failure, ask forgiveness, pick yourself up, and try again. Very often what God first helps us towards is not the virtue itself but just this power of always trying again. For however important chastity (or courage, of truthfulness, or any other virtue) may be, this process trains us in habits of the soul which are more important still. It cures our illusions about ourselves and teaches us to depend on God. We learn, on the one hand, that we cannot trust ourselves even in our best moments, and, on the other, that we need not despair even in our worst, for our failures are forgiven. The only fatal thing is to sit down content with anything less than perfection.”

Is this helpful to you and to those you know?

I reassessed what I had been doing. I decided to stop writing testimonies, to not attend weekly meetings and yearly conferences, to regularly visit my aged mother in Malaysia, to stop “message training,” to allow responsible dating among single Christians, to resign as an elder after 20 years, and to freely and respectfully voice my objection or disagreement (agreeably and prayerfully) when I do not agree with others. This upset some people. But I was and I am free in Christ to do so with the fear of God in my heart (Prov 1:7, 9:10), and without dishonoring God or the Bible or Christianity.

For the record, I am a Christian and a fully committed UBF member. I have not counted, but I have likely offered over a million to this ministry by virtue of being a physician. This is not a bragging right, nor a credit to me, because it is purely and entirely God’s grace to me. Because of UBF’s influence I love the Bible to this day, along with preaching, Bible teaching, mentoring others, raising leaders, and church planting. My entire Christian life and experience has been shaped by UBF for 32 years and counting. I am also not against the things I stopped doing. I have never discouraged others to not write testimonies, or to not attend UBF conferences, or to not marry by faith. (But I have expressed to many that “message training” makes our UBF messengers weird, because some no longer sound like themselves when they preach.) For the sake of my own sanity, I had to rediscover the freedom that I know I have in Christ.

Freedom  attracts non-Christians. Non-Christians are not free because they are enslaved by violence, video games and voyeurism, by porno, partying and playing around. But after becoming Christians we can also quite easily become enslaved. Historically, Christians become enslaved to their own religious traditions and methodologies, as though their religious habits give them an advantage or a superior status over others. Such “Christian” enslavement causes us to become more like Pharisees than like Jesus. Why do prostitutes flock to Jesus, but not to the Pharisees? Might this be a reason why prostitutes do not flock to many of our Christian churches today?

Freedom is not easy. The first week I stopped writing testimonies, I felt as though the ground would open up and swallow me alive for sinning greatly against God. Then I asked myself, “Will God love/bless me more if I write? Am I sinning and grieving God by not writing?” The answer was obvious. Still it was terribly hard to deny myself and not write!! I have always loved to share stories and testimonies. I am just no longer doing so by writing testimonies. Instead, I blog!

Is freedom dangerous? Absolutely! Christians abusing their freedom surely happens. But does it mean that we should be afraid of freedom and no longer teach it, proclaim it, declare it, and shout it from the rooftops?

Fear of freedom? Correct me if I’m wrong, but we Christians are often afraid of teaching freedom, as we are of teaching grace. We think that if we really teach freedom and grace, then young Christians will just live as they want. They won’t come to church. They won’t go to conferences. They won’t study the Bible. They won’t evangelize others. They won’t marry by faith. Etc. I beg to strongly disagree.

Legalism or liberty? Whenever we enforce anything, even good Christian habits, we promote legalism rather than liberty. Perhaps without being aware of it, we do not really give young Christians the freedom of choice. We guilt trip them if they don’t want to come to a conference, or marry someone we recommend to them. We know we should not do this. Yet it has happened often enough. It is only when we truly proclaim freedom, including freedom not to do what we do in UBF, that the Christian life is the most attractive and appealing life in the world.

Are you truly free in Christ?

Scary

I trust God. MBF means “I trust God (by faith) for my marriage.” I do not trust myself, nor the person I am marrying, nor the one arranging it.  It means, “I trust God, and not just my hormones.” I don’t marry just based on “Something in the way she moves;” someday the song may change to “You’re lost that lovin’ feeling.”

Marry a Christian. MBF also implies that you only marry a Christian (2 Cor 6:14), and that God is the One who ordains marriage (Gen 2:24). I marry based on the Lordship of Christ, and not just my own personal choice or preference. God must be intricately and intimately involved in my marriage. This is all good, godly and biblical.

The problem. MBF has come to mean that you should marry a person who is introduced to you. If you refuse, you may be regarded as less spiritual, less mature, more physical, worldly, lustful or  proud,  “not ready,” picky, uncommitted, etc.

No dating policy. Perhaps, a reason this happened is because of an “unspoken” or implicit, (or openly expressed) NO DATING policy, unless officially sanctioned, approved, recommended, initiated by,  and blessed  by the powers that be, usually the Bible teacher, chapter director, parents.

Of course, it is absolutely crucial that if and when a young Christian couple marries, they need the blessing, approval, counseling and advice  of their parents, Bible teachers, shepherds, mentors, elders, spiritual leaders. But a “no dating policy” until initiated by the church may not be good. Why? Some implications:

1) Dating and marriage is determined/controlled by someone else.

2) A Christian who doesn’t date is better, more mature, spiritual, self-controlled than a Christian who dates.

3) A Christian who dates sins more than a Christian who doesn’t date.

4) A non-UBF Christian you choose to marry is “inferior” to a  UBF Christian who is introduced to you.

Purity. In the Bible, the problem repeatedly addressed is not whether or not one dates, but whether or not one is sexually pure, regardless of whether one is single or married (1 Cor 6:18; Eph 5:3). A “no dating” policy assumes that one who complies is purer.

Play by the rules. This may tempt a Christian to “play the game” to please the powers that be by not dating and behaving well, so that they can “get the one” they want to marry (by faith) by keeping the rules and regulations expected of them.

Rethink (the Gospel)? As a church should we re-think a “no dating policy”? Any “rule” inclines toward legalism, and does not necessarily promote gospel faith. The gospel must always be central to our life and faith (1 Cor 1:23, 2:2, 15:1-4). The gospel  gives freedom (Gal 5:1), including the freedom to date as a God-fearing, honorable Christian.  But adding a rule, law or expectation, such as “no dating” (or any other rule), implies that keeping the rule or law or pleasing certain people in the church is what brings God’s blessing. This takes away from the glory of grace that comes only from the mystery of the gospel of grace (Acts 20:24). The issue of “no dating” is complex. It needs to be individualized.

Should MBF continue? Should we have a “No Dating” policy in UBF? (This was written in Nov 2010. This is a personal reflection and NOT a generalization to all UBF chapters.)

Basically his position is that Lesbians and Gays are called to live a celibate life (not necessarily to change their orientation although he subtly acknowledges that this may be possible). He clearly stands against the church blessing homosexual marriages and ordaining practicing homosexuals as ministers. But he has no problem ordaining non-practicing ones.

Hays may not be an evangelical but he sure is a very biblical Methodist, and one that knows the Bible more than any evangelical I’ve seen. He points out that an often cited passage against homosexuality is Rom 1:21-28, which actually says that homosexuality is the product of the disorder wrought about by sin, and not sin itself as a choice. This is exactly in line with what we know from the scientists who point out that for most people sexual orientation is not really a choice. After all, Romans says “God gave them over…” (Rom 1:24,26,28). This means that the church is in no position to judge someone merely for his/her sexual orientation.

Hays also points out that if you really think about it celibacy puts the LGBT community exactly in the same position as heterosexuals who are unable to find a partner (and there are many of them).

In my view, (I’m not speaking for Hays now), the main problem and the reason why this issue is so hotly debated today is because we live in a culture that glorifies sex, romantic relationships, and marriage. We can see this not only on the pervasiveness of pornography but also on “wholesome” TV shows in which families have a good time. How is the LGBT community supposed to feel in this culture? Obviously they want a piece of it too.

The Church has also been complicit in creating this culture. In many churches, 1 Corinthians 13 is a favorite as a sermon for marriages, even though this chapter is not really talking about marital relationships. As for UBF, of course, it is not guilty of glorifying marriage as romance, but it is guilty of glorifying it as mission. What a load of lies! The fact is that one is in a much better position to serve God and the church as single rather than married (1 Cor 7:32,34-35). This is common sense. A married person has to care for his family first (1 Cor 7:33). The New Testament is full of passages that favor celibacy over marriage. {Think of the following: the Sadducees testing Jesus about the resurrection (Mt 22:30); Jesus saying that it would be better for women not to nurse children when the end is coming (Mt 24:19), the fact that Jesus himself never got married, and Paul himself explicitly says it is better to be celibate (1 Cor 7:8)}.

Yet I remember Friday meetings in Chicago where someone would share that maybe it is better to be like Mother Barry, and then you would hear uncontrolled laughing from the Koreans. I never really understood what was so funny.

As for UBF thinking that marriage is for mission, I think that it confuses a purpose versus a prerequisite. Mission is not the main purpose of marriage, but rather it is a prerequisite. If indeed mission was the sole purpose of marriage, then perhaps I should have married Joshua Jeon. (Sorry my friend for using your name.) We would have been great partners for the gospel. But obviously we didn’t because it is unnatural and we are not attracted to one another.

I could talk about the pitfalls of marriage in UBF at another time. The point is that a church that does not honor celibacy as a feasible option and really as superior to marriage according to the Scriptures is not really in a position to reach out or judge the LGBT community. This applies to UBF and many churches in America. For us to get this issue right, before we even talk about LGBT evangelism, we must renew our minds and not be conformed to the patterns of this world (Rom 12:2). First and foremost there must be a change in our culture about marriage and singleness. Singles should never be looked upon as poor loners and losers, but rather as those with the best potential to spread the Kingdom. Marriage should not be imposed or pressured upon anyone.

As for the political issue (many states supporting or disapproving, and President Obama’s stand) and the fact that the church disapproves of homosexuality, does it then mean that she should take a stand politically on this matter? This is a very complex issue that depends on one’s views about the relationship of the church and the state. I will not deal with this issue here and I myself find it very hard to find the right answers on this one.

• Chap 1 on Community states that even a noble sincere Christian (perhaps myself?) can destroy authentic Christian fellowship by trying to impose his biblical idealistic “wish dream” on his Christian community.
• Chap 4 on Christian Ministry stresses silence and listening before talking/teaching. (My wife loves to remind me that this is the most important chapter for me!)
• Chap 5 on Confession encourages all Christians to confess their sins to one another without which we will become an elite Pharisees club, a collegium pietatis, an assembly of the pious and super apostles, where real sinners are not allowed to join.

My 4th and final blog on Chap 3 is silence and solitude. (Someday I may reflect on Chap 2–The Day with Others–about how Christians spend each day from morning to night.) Silence is crucial for Christians to hear the Word: “There are 3 purposes for which the Christian needs a definite time when he can be alone during the day: Scripture meditation, prayer, and intercession.” “Silence is nothing else but waiting for God’s Word. (Silence) is something that needs to be practiced and learned, in these days when talkativeness prevails.” “Let none expect from silence anything but a direct encounter with the Word of God.”

If you cannot be alone, beware of community. Why? “You cannot escape from yourself.” “Many people seek fellowship because they are afraid to be alone. Because they cannot stand loneliness, they are driven to seek the company of other people. There are Christians, too, who cannot endure being alone…(hoping to) gain some help in association with others. They (become) disappointed. Then they blame the fellowship for what is really their own fault.”

If you are not in community, beware of being alone. “If you scorn the fellowship of the brethren, you reject the call of Christ, and your solitude can only be hurtful to you.”

Only within the fellowship can we be alone, and only he that is alone can live in the fellowship. “Only in the fellowship do we learn to be rightly alone and only in aloneness do we learn to live rightly in fellowship. Both begin at the same time, namely, with the call of Christ.”

Alone and Community: Each by itself has profound pitfalls and perils. “One who wants fellowship without solitude plunges into the void of words and feelings, and one who seeks solitude without fellowship perishes in the abyss of vanity, self-infatuation, and despair.” “Along with … fellowship together there goes the lonely day of the individual. The day together will be unfruitful without the day alone.”

Silence and Speech. “The mark of solitude is silence, as speech is the mark of community. One does not exist without the other. Right speech comes out of silence, and right silence comes out of speech.” “Silence does not mean dumbness, as speech does not mean chatter. Dumbness does not create solitude and chatter does not create fellowship.”

“Silence before the Word leads to right hearing and thus also to right speaking of the Word of God at the right time. Much that is unnecessary remains unsaid. But the essential and the helpful thing can be said in a few words.”

Meditation. “Read God’s Word as God’s Word for us. Do not ask what this text has to say to other people. For the preacher this means that he will not ask how he is going to preach or teach on this text, but what it is saying quite directly to him. Often we are so burdened and overwhelmed with other thoughts, images, and concerns that it may take a long time before God’s Word has swept all else aside and come through. God’s Word…strives to stir us, to work and operate in us, so that we shall not get away from it the whole day long. Then it will do its work in us, often without our being conscious of it. Spiritual dryness and apathy, an aversion, even an inability to meditate…must not keep us from adhering to our meditation period with great patience and fidelity. ‘Seek God, not happiness’–this is the fundamental rule of all meditation. If you seek God alone, you will gain happiness: that is its promise.”

Prayer. “The most promising method of prayer is to allow oneself to be guided by the word of the Scriptures, to pray on the basis of a word of Scripture. Prayer means nothing else but the readiness and willingness to receive and appropriate the Word, to accept it in one’s personal situation, particular tasks, decisions, (clarification of our day), (preservation from) sins, and temptations….for growth in sanctification, for faithfulness and strength in our work.”

Intercession. “A Christian fellowship lives and exists by the intercession of its members for one another, or it collapses. I can no longer condemn or hate a brother for whom I pray, no matter how much trouble he causes me. How does this happen? Intercession means no more than to bring our brother into the presence of God, to see him under the Cross of Jesus as a poor human being and sinner in need of grace. Then everything in him that repels us falls away; we see him in all his destitution and need. Intercession is a daily service we owe to God and our brother. He who denies his neighbor the service of praying for him denies him the service of a Christian. The ministry of intercession requires time of every Christian, but most of all of the pastor who has the responsibility of a whole congregation. We should train ourselves to set apart a regular hour for it. This is not ‘legalism’; it is orderliness and fidelity. For the pastor it is an indispensable duty and his whole ministry will depend on it.”

Time alone with God enhances community together with others.

“Christianity means community through Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ. No Christian community is more or less than this. Whether it be a brief, single encounter or the daily fellowship of years…” (21). “Christian brotherhood is not an ideal which we must realize; it is rather a reality created by God in Christ in which we may participate” (30). “…the human element always insinuates itself and robs the fellowship of its spiritual power and effectiveness for the Church” (37).

What is a Christian? “The Christian seeks his salvation, deliverance, justification in Christ alone. He knows that God’s Word in Christ pronounces him guilty, even when he does not feel his guilt, and God’s Word in Christ pronounces him not guilty and righteous, even when he does not feel that he is righteous at all. If somebody asks him, Where is your salvation, your righteousness? he can never point to himself. He points to the Word of God in Christ, which assures him salvation and righteousness. In himself he is destitute and dead. Help must come … daily and anew in the Word of Christ, bringing redemption, righteousness, innocence, and blessedness” (22). This is what a Christian is–what it means to be in Christ.

Christians need community. “When one person is struck by the Word, he speaks it to others. God has willed that we should seek and find His living Word in the witness of a brother, in the mouth of man. Therefore, the Christian needs another Christian who speaks God’s Word to him. The Christ in his own heart is weaker than the Christ in the word of his brother; his own heart is uncertain, his brother’s is sure” (23). True Christian community happens in Christ.

Strive, discord and ego. “Among men there is strife. Without Christ there is discord between God and man and between man and man. Without Christ we would not know our brother, nor could we come to him. The way is blocked by our own ego. Only in Jesus Christ are we one (Eph 2:14), only through him are we bound together.”

We can truly give only when we have truly received. When Jesus took on flesh in the incarnation, he truly took on, out of pure grace, our nature. This is how God relates to us, how He won our hearts by His love. “When God was merciful to us, we learned to be merciful with our brethren. When we received forgiveness instead of judgment, we, too, were made ready to forgive our brethren. What God did to us, we then owed to others. The more we received, the more we were able to give; and the more meager our brotherly love, the less were we living by God’s mercy and love (Rom 15:7; 1 Th 4:9-10). Our community with one another consists solely in what Christ has done to both of us” (25).

However, 2 things threaten true Christian community: Christian brotherhood is not an ideal, but a divine reality; Christian brotherhood is a spiritual and not a human reality.

Not an Ideal, but a Divine Reality

What Bonhoeffer writes here perfectly describes all failed Christian community exactly and precisely. It’s hard to improve on what he wrote.

Idealism does not work. Because of our own ideals and ideas about Christian life together, great disillusionment soon sets in “with others, with Christians in general, and if we are fortunate, with ourselves. Only that fellowship which faces such disillusionment, with all its unhappy and ugly aspects, begins to be what it should be in God’s sight… The sooner this shock or disillusionment comes to an individual and to a community the better for both. Every human wish dream that is injected into the Christian community is a hindrance to genuine community and must be banished if genuine community is to survive. He who loves his dream of a community more than the Christian community itself becomes a destroyer of the latter, even though his personal intentions may be ever so honest and earnest and sacrificial. God hates visionary dreaming; it makes the dreamer proud and pretentious. The man who fashions a visionary ideal of community demands that it be realized by God, by others, and by himself. He enters the community of Christians with his demands, sets up his own law, and judges the brethren… He stands adamant, a living reproach to all others in the circle of brethren. He acts as if he is the creator of the Christian community, as if his dream binds men together. When things do not go his way, he calls the effort a failure. So he becomes, first an accuser of his brethren…and finally the despairing accuser of himself” (27).

Disillusionment is good. “Even when sin and misunderstanding burden the communal life, is not the sinning brother still a brother, with whom I, too, stand under the Word of Christ? Will not his sin be a constant occasion for me to give thanks that both of us may live in the forgiving love of God in Christ? The very hour of disillusionment with my brother becomes incomparably salutary, because it so thoroughly teaches me that neither of us can ever live by our own words and deeds, but only that one Word and Deed which really binds us together. When the morning mists of dreams vanish, then dawns the bright day of Christian fellowship” (29).

To pastors: Don’t accuse your people. “This applies in a special way to the complaints often heard from pastors and zealous members about their congregations. A pastor should not complain about his congregation, certainly never to other people, but also not to God. A congregation has not been entrusted to him in order that he should become its accuser before God and men. …he had better examine himself first to see whether the trouble is not due to his wish dream that should be shattered by God; and if this be the case, let him thank God for leading him into this predicament” (29,30).

A Spiritual not a Human Reality

Even devout men cannot cultivate a spiritual community. “The community of the Spirit is the fellowship of those who are called by Christ; human community is the fellowship of devout souls. In the community of the Spirit the Word of God alone rules; in human community there rules, along with the Word, the man who is furnished with exceptional powers, experience, and magical, suggestive capacities. There God’s Word alone is binding; here, besides the Word, men bind others to themselves. There all power, honor, and dominion are surrendered to the Holy Spirit; here spheres of power and influence of a personal nature are sought and cultivated. …devout men…do this with the intention of serving the highest and the best, but in actuality the result is to dethrone the Holy Spirit, to relegate Him to remote unreality. In actuality, it is only the human that is operative here” (32).

Where a superior power rules, spirituality fails. “Here is where the humanly strong person is in his element, securing for himself the admiration, the love, or the fear of the weak. Here human ties, suggestions, and bonds are everything. …human absorption appears wherever the superior power of one person is consciously or unconsciously misused to influence profoundly and draw into his spell another individual or a whole community. Here one soul operates directly upon another soul. The weak have been overcome by the strong, the resistance of the weak has broken down under the influence of another person. He has been overpowered, but not won over…his conversion was effected, not by the Holy Spirit, but by a man, and therefore has no stability” (33).

The idolatry of human love. “Human love…makes the truth relative, since nothing, not even the truth, must come between it and the beloved person. Human love desires…it continues to desire even when it seems to be serving. Human love cannot tolerate the dissolution of a fellowship that has become false…and human love cannot love an enemy. Human love is by its very nature desire–desire for human community. Where it can no longer expect its desire to be fulfilled…it turns into hatred, contempt, and calumny. Human love creates of itself an end, an idol which it worships, to which it must subject everything. It nurses and cultivates an ideal. Spiritual love, however, comes from Jesus, it serves him alone; it knows that it has no immediate access to other persons” (35).

Spiritual love releases to Christ. “Spiritual love will not seek to move others by all too personal, direct influence, by impure interference in the life of another. It will not take pleasure in pious, human fervor and excitement. It will meet the other person with the clear Word of God and be ready to leave him alone with this Word for a long time, willing to release him again in order that Christ may deal with him. It will respect the line that has been drawn between him and us…it will find full fellowship with him in the Christ who alone binds us together. Spiritual love will speak to Christ about a brother more than to a brother about Christ. It knows that the most direct way to others is always through prayer to Christ (3 John 4)” (36,37).

The greatest danger to Christian community. “Life together under the Word will remain sound and healthy only where it does not form itself into a movement, an order, a society, a collegium pietatis, but rather where it understands itself as being a part of the one, holy, catholic, Christian Church, where it shares actively and passively in the sufferings and struggles and promise of the whole Church. Every principle of selection and every separation connected with it…is of the greatest danger to a Christian community. …the human element always insinuates itself and robs the fellowship of its spiritual power and effectiveness for the Church, drives it into sectarianism” (37)

I wanted to write an exhaustive reflection, but Bonhoeffer’s words seem “far too perfect” to add to or to subtract from.

I’m really not lovable

Ghost. The various accounts of what happened to her was all over the news and on Night Line. It caught my attention, because my wife and I loved the romantic movie “Ghost” (1990) that she starred in, and which made her famous. When she confessed her love to Patrick Swayze, he responded by saying, “Ditto.” Ever since then, it became one of our favorite lines that we say to each other. (Of course, our 4 kids think that it is totally weird when their aging parents say such awkward things to each other!)

Can’t buy me love. What is sad about Moore’s story is that her life has mirrored a similar destructive pattern of many sad celebrities (Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Charlie Sheen, etc.). Their sad lives, despite the adoration of millions, reveals the truth that fame, popularity, clout, money, and unlimited access to life’s luxuries and pleasures cannot buy any man happiness, not to mention love.

Addicted to being loved. It is true that all humans want and need to be loved, since God made us to love God (Dt 6:5), to love others (Lev 19:18), and to be loved by God (Jer 31:3; 1 Jn 4:19). But when you become a celebrity, love is constantly being heaped on you that it becomes a “drug” you cannot live without. Being adored (worshipped) by the multitudes is like a drug high, according to the confession of rock stars. The reason many literally take drugs is that after the concert, they cannot maintain the high of a concert with thousands of screaming fans. To a similar or lesser degree, this perhaps applies to all celebrities, even to all human beings.

Only God’s love satisfies our soul. Demi Moore’s life apparently unraveled because her cute and younger husband stopped loving her. Now she wonders if she is even lovable. Only God’s love satisfies our soul. Augustine wrote in his Confessions, “God, you have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in you.” The Psalmist said, “My soul finds rest in God alone” (Ps 62:1).

May God give us love and rest through his Son, and minister to others to find the same.

“I am part of the fellowship of the unashamed. I have Holy Spirit power. The die is cast. I have stepped over the line. The decision has been made. I am a disciple of Jesus. I will not look back, let up, slow down, back away or be still.

“My past is redeemed. My present makes sense. My future is secure. I am finished and done with low-living, sight-walking, small planning, smooth knees, colorless dreams, tamed visions, worldly talking, cheap giving, and dwarfed goals.

“I no longer need preeminence, prosperity, position, promotion, or popularity. I do not have to be right, first, tops, recognized, praised, regarded or rewarded. I now live by faith, lean on God’s presence, walk by patience, am uplifted by prayer, and labor by power.

“My face is set, my gait is fast, my goal is heaven. My road is narrow, my way rough, my Guide reliable, my mission clear. I cannot be bought, compromised, detoured, lured away, turned back, deluded or delayed. I will not give up, shut up or let up. I will go on until Christ comes, and work until Christ stops me. I am a disciple of Jesus.”

Is this the language of your heart?

Remember: “These are the ones I look on with favor: those who are humble and contrite in spirit, and who tremble at my word” (Isa 66:2).

Are any of you willing and interested to make the commitment to read the whole Bible in 2012? Hopefully, by God’s grace, my New Year’s resolution would not fail in Jan 2012!

YOU MUST NOT EAT (Gen 2:17). This “strange” verse was my conversion verse when I began 1:1 Bible study in 1980 with John Lee, a pediatrician who attends Lincoln Park UBF. I regard this as a “strange conversion verse” because I have not read of anyone else in history who was converted to Christ through this verse. Gen 2:17 caused me to cry tears of repentance for many hours. It convicted me of my life long sin of completely disregarding my Creator and living as though I am my own god, and yet God had not destroyed me, but loved me all my life to that day.

SEEK FIRST (Matt 6:33). After conversion I the word “first” in Matt 6:33 exposed my sin of never allowing God and the things of God to have first priority in my heart and life. “Things” always preceded God: girls, romantic/sexual fantasies, studying medicine, being a doctor, watching movies, watching sports, going jogging, hanging out, etc, was always “first.”

HOW FOOLISH! (1 Cor 15:36). 6 months after conversion, Samuel Lee, the founder of UBF, introduced me to my future bride. I was terrified of her because she seemed too domineering and powerful, and not at all the kind of woman I ever envisioned marrying. I knew she was a good, godly woman who loves Jesus, and I was foolish in my sinful sensual self for not wanting to marry such a woman. So, I married “by faith” by painfully acknowledging that my life and my marriage belong to God, not to me. After 30 years of an utterly sublime marriage, I joyfully and thankfully conclude that God knows me far better than I will ever know myself.

DENY YOURSELF (Luke 9:23). I know how sinful, worldly and selfish I was and still am. Without a doubt, I knew that I could not follow Jesus as I was. I absolutely needed to deny myself in order to follow Jesus. Though I fail daily, I always need to deny myself, especially as I get older.

HAVE FAITH (Mark 11:22). One of Samuel Lee’s great strength was his faith in God. By his faith, our gracious God used him greatly to convert Koreans to be world conquerors. Lee said and I agree that my weak point was my lack of faith. It still is. I need faith to challenge the impossible, which was my back pain and my visa status of being an illegal immigrant for 7 years. God helped me experience the victory of faith by no longer having back pain, and by becoming a US citizen after being an illegal alien for 7 years. Still, faith is my weak point and quite baffling to me.

I HAVE LOVED YOU WITH AN EVERLASTING LOVE (Jer 31:3). In 2005, I was scammed of $1,000,000 because of greed, pride and a desire to retire ASAP. By this sin I totally dishonored my God, my church, my wife, my children, myself. I hated myself. But God spoke to me tenderly through Jer 31:3. I was newly amazed at the love of God that was indeed greater than all my sins.

GOD INTENDED IT FOR GOOD (Gen 50:20; Rom 8:28). When I had conflicts with some friends in church, I felt disillusioned after 25 years in UBF. Though they are godly Christian friends and well intentioned, some of their decisions and words devastated me. Of course, this was my own sin of being affected by their actions. The only respite I found was in the absolute goodness of God (Gen 50:20; Rom 8:28) that could not be thwarted by any man, regardless of what they say, do or decide. Is there a greater verse in the Bible that can help any Christian in any situation in life?

NO MORE FEARING MAN (Prov 29:25). To fear a man is to insult God who is above the man you fear. To cause others to fear man is to play God. “Fear of man will prove to be a snare, but whoever trusts in the LORD is kept safe.”

JESUS BECAME SIN FOR ME (2 Cor 5:21). Historically, 2 Cor 5:21 is known as the Great Exchange. I never ever quoted or referenced this verse in sermons and Bible studies for 30 years. Now I do so repeatedly with gratitude for what Jesus has done for this soul of mine.

THE OLD TESTAMENT IS ABOUT JESUS (John 5:39). I had studied the Bible as though it was mainly about me and about others. But Jesus said that the OT is about him (John 5:39; Luke 24:27,44), and that Moses also wrote about Jesus (John 5:46). So I asked and answered the question in this post: What is the point of Genesis?

MY UPWARD HEAVENLY CALLING IN CHRIST (Phil 3:13-14). How comforting it is that God has called us heavenward in Christ Jesus. Regardless of the circumstances of life, good or bad, this is a constant that never changes. Only in Christ can I forget what is behind, strain toward what is ahead, and press on toward my heavenly goal.

WORK OUT YOUR SALVATION WITH FEAR AND TREMBLING (Phil 2:12-13). Practically, I pray to work out my salvation with fear and trembling and with humility and tears (Acts 20:19). I pray to know with absolute unwavering certainty that this is only the grace of Jesus that God is first working in me so as to enable me to work out my own salvation.

What are the Bible verses that have helped to transform you? To have a crystal clear direction in your life (Psalm 119:105)?

Halloween’s pagan origins are pretty much undisputed, and can be traced as far back as the time of the Celts and the festival of Samhain (pronounced “sow en”), a three-day annual event from October 31 to November 2 set aside to celebrate the harvest and the onset of winter. The Celts believed that the spirits of the dead were able to interact with the living during that time, which naturally gave rise to all kinds of various superstitions.

Some of the remnants of these superstitions are still around today. For example, the practice of dressing up in a costume came from the idea that humans could deceive evil spirits into leaving them alone if they looked like one of them. The popular jack-o-lantern arose from a similar idea. People believed that by carving a grotesque face into a pumpkin and illuminating it with a candle that the evil spirits would be frightened away and not bother them. Even the practice of trick-or-treating came from these superstitious thoughts. The Celts believed that the spirits of the deceased would be stuck on earth unless they were sent off to the afterlife in a proper manner. Thus, these spirits would be “treated” with food, money, or something else of value, and those that were not would “trick” those who had ignored them.

As Christianity spread across Europe and collided with these pagan ideas, converts often found it difficult to abandon their customs due to the influence of the culture around them. To solve this problem, the church, under Pope Gregory IV, came up with an ingenious way to directly challenge these traditions by moving a Christian holiday near a pagan one.

In this case, the holiday was All Saints Day. Originally celebrated in May as a day of remembrance for Christian martyrs, it was also known as All Hallows or even Hallowmas. The word “hallows” comes from a Greek word which means “holy,” like in the Lord’s Prayer: “Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be your name” (Mt 6:9). A closely related Greek word is often rendered as “saints,” like in Romans 1:7.

The church took All Hallows and moved it from May to November 1, its current date, right in the middle of the Samhain festival, and October 31 became known as All Hallows Eve. Over the years the phrase was shortened into what we know it as now: Halloween.

As superstition gave way to enlightenment, Halloween became a time of revelry, characterized by young people going house to house collecting food and drink for their parties and playing “tricks” on stingy homeowners who refused to give them anything. Eventually, Halloween spread to America in the late nineteenth century by immigrants from England. Despite the superstitions that surrounded it, most people were attracted to the aforementioned mischievous aspects of the holiday and began adopting customs from it without reference to its pagan origins. Thus today, Halloween is largely an American, secular holiday, and has become highly commercialized, raking in over three billion dollars a year in sales.

As a child, my parents let us participate in Halloween. For me, dressing up in a costume was the one chance out of the year that I could pretend to be somebody else and have fun doing it: One year our entire family went as the Smurfs; during the 2000 presidential election I went as George Bush while my friend went as Al Gore; and last year, my wife and I went to a small gathering with our family and dressed up as bacon and eggs. I will let you guess who was who.

Admittedly, it was also fun to go around trick-or-treating. The biggest fears we had were not from evil spirits, but from some malicious person who might poison our candy. So my parents always inspected every piece that we brought home, and they tried to limit our consumption as well.

I remember going to spook houses (haunted houses) with my dad and being scared. As I got older, I started going with my friends. Eventually I grew out of that when they ceased to frighten me and spending $10 for admission seemed like a waste of money more than anything else.

Overall, I never looked at Halloween as anything satanic, and I never saw any inherent evil in these things. However, as I have gotten older, Halloween has helped remind me that “our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against . . .  the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Eph 6:12). I can turn on the news and see that there is evil in the world, but Halloween is a visible reminder that that evil is not some impersonal force, but the active, concerted effort of the devil and his fallen angels.

Some Christians, like me, see no harm in participating in Halloween, while others will choose not to participate at all. “One person regards one day above another, another regards every day alike. Each person must be fully convinced in his own mind” (Ro 14:5). So regardless of these different feelings about Halloween, it should be a time when all believers shine the light of the gospel into the darkness around us.

Ultimately, the world is not going to know that we are Christians based on whether or not we dress up in silly costumes or pass out candy to little kids in the neighborhood. They will know we are His if we have love for one another (Jn 13:35). If we do this, then All Hallows Eve may be just what its name implies.

Every once in a while a company is so deeply impacted and shaped by a single leader that this person becomes the very identity of the entire organization. There can be no doubt that such has been the case with Apple and the recently deceased Steve Jobs. Newspaper headlines were overflowing with discussions on how Apple will continue without their charismatic genius and their most creative brain. There was one article in particular, published in the New York Times, which I found very interesting and relevant. One must not stretch analogies too far but I immediately had to wonder whether there are parallels between how to run a company and a church. The question is: can churches be (functional) one-man shows as it had been the case with Apple and Steve Jobs or Microsoft and Bill Gates? And the answer to that question is a very emphatic “yes”.

The Church account is full of charismatic leaders. It always has been so and, as it seems, it always will be. Their names are acknowledged and revered by Christians all over the world: Augustine, Luther, Calvin, Wesley, Whitefield, Moody, and the list goes on and on… At any given point of Christian history there have been leaders who possessed an extra-portion of the Holy Spirit’s anointing and who were thus used by God in a unique and remarkable way. And like Steve Jobs they often possessed the ability to hit the nerve of their culture so precisely, or better let me rephrase this, they were always years ahead of their contemporary fellows that almost everything they tackled ended up having a noticeable and sometimes even lasting impact. There is certainly nothing wrong with this. It is how God, in his infinite wisdom, has chosen to work at times. But the question is what to do if the leader passes away. Will the church continue to thrive and do well? Will the movement sustain its dynamic and power?

Unfortunately, in many cases the church did not continue well. Collin Hansen, in an excellent piece on pastoral succession, mentioned one negative example among so many. Charles Spurgeon, the gifted man of God in the 19^th century, is one of my all-time favorite preachers. He not only preached more than 3,000 different sermons and led thousands of people to Christ but he also trained young men as pastors. Several men had the privilege to learn from the “prince of preachers”. Yet, the death of this great man of God caused a gap and damage in his own church congregation that remained irreparable. When I visited London several years ago I was eager to see the great Metropolitan Tabernacle, the place, which regularly drew thousands of people Sunday after Sunday to his powerful voice. To my disappointment, only the front facade of this former mega-church seemed to have survived the two fires and the bomb drop during World War II. It was even sadder for me to see that the damage, which the loss of Spurgeon himself had caused, was even greater, as also pointed out by Hansen.

Let me come back to the news article. I think there are some very insightful and valuable lessons one can learn from this piece. Steve Jobs’ successor at Apple is Timothy Cook. Relatively soon after Job’s death was announced he wrote an email to his employees reassuring them that Apple is not going to change. As the article points out, this can certainly be good or bad. There is a very fine balance to strike. Even more intriguingly, the author speaks about the legacy of Steve Jobs becoming a trap. To illustrate his point, he talks about the Walt Disney Company. Let me cite:

“In the years after the death in 1966 of the entertainment company’s founder, the executives strived to stay true to Walt Disney’s spirit. For years, Mr. Disney’s old office was preserved like an untouched museum. Its executives often praised corporate decision-making by saying, “Walt would have liked it.” But by the late 1970s, Disney was struggling after a string of box-office flops and was the subject of a hostile takeover attempt.”

Somehow, these lines sounded too familiar in my ears; uncomfortably familiar.

What are the lessons to be learned? First, sticking to a legacy of a single person can stifle and choke the church. What is true for business, such as the above-mentioned Disney Company or Apple is also true to some extent for the church. Simply asking the question whether the deceased leader would have liked something is not enough. Even worse, it is a sure ‘recipe for problems’. This kind of attitude is very likely to kill every new initiative and idea simply by stating: “This is not how XYZ would have done it” or “We never did this under his/her leadership.” It is one of the surest ways to slowly kill a church.

Second, change is a necessary must. Walt Disney’s company had to radically change to return to success. Apple will have to change to adapt to a superfast, evolving culture. And every church has to change to keep up with God’s guidance imparted through his living, dynamic Holy Spirit.  There can be no way around it. A musician from my all-time favorite orchestra, the more than 125-year old Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, once said: “Everything that does not change is dead.” And if you think of how protective all of the orchestra members are when it comes to their own traditions and historical legacy, it is a remarkable sentence. As paradoxical as it may sound, it is by means of change and adaptation of how they are preserving and retaining and reliving their traditions. I am not saying that every change within the body of Christ is good. But change is certainly a sign that there is life in the church even after having lost a powerful, able leader.

Third, the article talks about maintaining the “heart” of Apple. And what the author means by this are the creativity and the enthusiasm of Steve Jobs. In our church we probably wouldn’t call it “heart” but rather “spirit” (small “s” as opposed to the Holy Spirit). The spirit of a leader has to continue. It is crucial to understand that the spirit is not just methodology or knowledge. It goes far beyond that. It cannot be captured accurately in a few bullet points.

What is the spirit of UBF? What is the spirit that the generation to come should inherit and take over? I am in no position to write about this. It will take the wisest people of us and the help of outside counselors to answer this question well. Most of all, it will require us to honestly re-examine our history and the life of the founder of our ministry: the many good, as well as the painfully bad. And even though I argued that this sentence should no longer count as an all-decisive argument, let me finish by saying: “I think our founder would have wanted us to do so.”

In loving memory of Dr. Lee on the occasion of Founder’s Day.

(Artwork used with kind permission from: http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/view_photog.php?photogid=809)

A Brief Overview of Philippines UBF

The ministry began in 1984 when Ron Quilaton of Chicago, a Bible student of my wife, went to Manila for medical school and invited William to Bible study. Upon completion of his medical school, Ron returned to the U.S. in 1988. I did not expect the ministry to continue. But William has faithfully led and served the ministry ever since. Thus far, they have established many godly families, and have sent out missionaries to the US (including Hawaii), Canada, Britain, UAE and Baggio, a province in the Philippines. Over the past year, they sent out Timothy Ipapo and Dr. John Talavera to plant two churches in Manila near the University of the East and Fatima University at Antipolo.

When I visited them from Feb 15-20, 2011, I was stunned that there were so many new students coming to their fellowship meetings for Bible study. I was expecting only a handful of students, but 30 new students packed a room on Thursday under Timothy and his wife Esther, and 20 new students came the following day under John and his wife Hannah, with the support of Susan San Marcos. At their main center, William meets a dozen single men for prayer and daily bread at 5 am every morning, while his wife Sarah meets a half dozen single young women at 6 am. Jonathan and Grace Reytos is the only other couple remaining in their main center besides William and Sarah. They also have a growing ministry at UP (University of the Philippines) Manila, the top university in the Philippines, which is being led by Arlene Miranda, a recent graduate of UP.

The Agony of the Plateau Phase

Personally, I have experienced a growth phase in my ministry in Chicago in the 1980s and 90s. But over the past decade or so, I am agonizing about having “flat-lined,” though my passion and enthusiasm has not waned. We have 9 families at West Loop UBF at present. But we might have only a handful of converts each year. While much of our “growth” has come from our kids growing up and participating in the ministry, student ministry has been hard, even though our main leaders are committed and faithful godly men and women.

However, Philippines UBF has been growing with many converts each year, even as they send out their families as missionaries and for church planting, as well as sending their single women to marry men from other UBF chapters. How have they been able to grow continually for a quarter of a century without having reached a plateau phase that does not seem to be coming anytime soon?

Seven Reasons for Continuing Growth

1st, a godly couple, William and Sarah. They are truly the pillars, the power source, the foundation, and the backbone of the ministry. William is like a father to everyone. In addition to his own two children, he adopted three additional children out of compassion, for they were abandoned at the clinic where he worked. Three times he called up his wife from work and said, “Honey, I’m bringing home a baby.” His youngest adopted son is named Obama, who is two years old. William is also a man of prayer and vision and compassion for his people and his country. Everyone in the ministry loves and trusts him without reservation.

Sarah is motherly and sanguine. Her laughter and joy are palpable and infectious. I have never seen her depressed, angry, moody, grumpy, dark, difficult or griping. Truly, it seems like she is always smiling warmly and genuinely from her heart. Most of all, both William and Sarah love Jesus, they love the Bible, and they love their people.

2nd, communal living. Through out their married life, William and Sarah have literally lived communally with all their Bible students from the time they come to Bible study until they marry in the church. Presently, about two dozen adults and a handful of teenagers and Obama live at the church. They eat breakfast, lunch and dinner together every day. They cook together. They do their laundry together. They wash the dishes together. They take collective stewardship to clean the church daily. Literally, they are one big happy family in Jesus. I have visited them yearly over the last few years, and their communal living is like a slice of heaven on earth.

On Saturday evenings, they prepare for the Sun worship service. In the main hall of the worship service, there are individual people practicing the piano, guitar, violin, flute and cello scattered throughout the room. There are also some practicing singing. The remarkable thing is that they are all practicing their own individual parts simultaneously! Just imagine the amount of noise that is created. It is really, really loud and noisy, including babies playing and crying. Yet the spirit and joy of the people strangely makes this collective disjointed loud noise sound like a chorus of angels. I am still pondering how or why this loud mass of noise is not irritating or gyrating, but rather really exhilarating. Surely it is the Spirit of God in our midst.

3rd, contextualization of the Bible in their own vernacular. Philippines UBF is not a cross-cultural mission. It is what Peter Wagner has termed E1 evangelism, which is the most effective form of evangelism, as previously written and explained by Joe. They do not have any cultural misunderstanding or miscommunication, since they are all Filipinos.

4th, unity in the Spirit. Nothing destroys a church or ministry faster than conflicts, politics, gossip, slander, accusation, one-upmanship and divisions. I am sure that on occasion they have disagreements among themselves. But they have such a degree of love, trust, humility and respect for each other, that human conflicts and politics have always been subdued and overcome, not by human authority, but by the Spirit of God.

5th, joy. The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace (Gal 5:22). One can fake or force a smile that could even look quite attractive, but no one can fake joy, which comes from the heart only by the work of the Holy Spirit. Where there is true spontaneous authentic unabashed joy, people are always attracted.

6th, informality. They have Sunday worship services, 1 to 1 Bible studies, weekly fellowship meetings, several Bible conferences during the year, testimony writing and sharing, fishing, etc, like most UBF chapters throughout the world. But they have a degree of informality that is quite refreshing. I think that what they learn informally when they eat together, or do chores, or walk, or play sports, or live their daily life together may be more influential than all the rest of their formal church activities and Bible study put together. There is very little difference, if any, in their formal Bible study and their informal chatting. They see and feel and experience the Christian life lived out daily.

7th, friendship. People want to hang out with their friends. No one wants to hang out with someone who irks them, or irritates them, or angers them. Though William and Sarah are the oldest, as well as their spiritual parents, yet they are truly warm open-hearted friends with all their Bible students. There is no sense of any gap or superiority or seniority in all their friendships or relationships.

Some Application from Philippines Ministry

This is in no particular order:

1) Regard Bible students as friends, or even as peers and as trusted colleagues and partners and equals, rather than as “sheep.” It is sad when some Bible students have felt as though their shepherds and Bible teachers treated them like sheep, even after they have been in the ministry for years. We remember Jesus’ words of genuine affirmation when he said to his disciples who would soon abandon him in a few days, “I no longer call you servants… Instead, I have called you friends” (John 15:15).

2) Let learning occur out of the rich informality of life, and not just in formal Bible study settings. This is in keeping with Deut 6:7-9.

3) Let indigenous leaders lead as soon as possible. William was thrust into a position of leadership when his shepherd and Bible teacher returned to the U.S. after just a few years of Bible study. Paul also established indigenous leaders quite rapidly whenever he planted churches (Acts 14:22,23).

4) Be honest, open, and transparent (HOT) in all our interactions. If we are not, others will speculate and think of all kinds of hidden agendas, real or imagined.

5) Overcome the natural paternalism, patriarchy and hierarchy inherently present in all of us. If we don’t, it will seem as though we favor some, not on the basis of grace, but on the basis of tenure, seniority, or some arbitrary partiality, which will inevitably communicate favoritism, control and manipulation.

Final Thoughts

1) How does your church life and Christian experience compare with Philippines UBF?

2) If you have the financial means, do visit them, and your room and food would be provided, or you could make an occasional offering to them, since they are all quite poor. For example, a manual laborer working a 8 hour day gets paid $10/day.

Reading makes a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man.

Bacon adds that if a man writes little, he needs to be really smart, and if he reads little, he will need to “have much cunning to seem to know (that) which he does not.”

Does “knowledge puffs up” mean that we should not increase in knowledge?

Paul says, “Knowledge puffs up while love builds up” (1 Cor 8:1). As a result, some Christians think that we should focus on love rather than on knowledge. But in context, this verse does not mean, suggest, or imply that a Christian should not increase in knowledge. This verse should definitely not become an excuse for not increasing in knowledge. Knowledge is needed if we are to be good stewards of God’s world. On the contrary, increasing in knowledge should deeply humble us to realize at least these three things:

1. how little we know,
2. how limited we are, and
3. how much we need to dependon God.

Does increasing in knowledge help us to be better Bible teachers?

I thought I knew certain parts of the Bible quite well. Especially Genesis, because I have taught Genesis to hundreds of times since 1981. But as I began to read books by godly Christian scholars and pastors over the last few years, I have become “trembling and scared” to teach Genesis, realizing how limited and perhaps rudimentary or inadequate my limited knowledge is. If you care to be confused and confounded, see part 1 and part 2 of Henoch’s series “The Difficulty of Genesis 1.”

Recently I wrote about the account of Abraham offering Isaac to God (Gen 22:1-19). When I had taught this, I had always emphasized the need for a Christian to offer his Isaac (his heart’s desire) to God, just as Abraham did. But is this passage really about us and what we are supposed to do? Or does it point to Jesus, as Jesus himself said it should? (John 5:39; Luke 24:27,44) Who is the primary subject of this passage, us or God? Does our way of understanding and teaching this passage make it seem that salvation is our work (I should offer my Isaac) rather than to God’s saving grace to me? Aren’t there other ways to teach Genesis 22 that perhaps point to Jesus rather than to Abraham? See if you might consider teaching it this way.

Reading, Discussing, Writing

Now let’s get back to the quote by Francis Bacon:

1. Reading makes a full man.
2. Conference makes a ready man.
3. Writing makes an exact man.

READING

Sadly, many today, including Christians, spend countless and excessive hours reading comics, gossip magazines, sports, entertainment and celebrity news, romance novels, fiction, etc. Also, common daily activities are watching TV and movies, playing video games, cruising the internet, using social media, etc. What then happens to our minds? Paul said, “For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace” (Rom 8:6). Here “the flesh” is our fallen sinful human nature, or our natural selves. When our mind is set on ourselves, we easily become angry, upset, worried, fearful, anxious, bitter, resentful, jealous, envious, etc.

When we read and watch things that do not edify our minds, we likely will think and feel and talk no differently than non-Christians. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “We are what we think about all day long.”

The psalmist knew the crucial importance of what occupies our thoughts. He spoke of the righteous person “whose delight is in the law of the LORD, and who meditates on his law day and night” (Ps 1:2). We need to read the Bible daily, and think about it through out the day. We also need to read books. The apostle Paul wrote a quarter of the New Testament. But when he was imprisoned and about to be executed, he asked Timothy to bring “my scrolls, especially the parchments” (2 Tim 4:13), which were his books.

My final quote is from a former seminary professor at Trinity: “You are not what you think you are, but what you think, you are.”

The more we read useful material, the more we are able to think upon God, which enables us to be full, not empty.

CONFERENCE (DISCUSSION)

To refine what we read and think about, we need to conference. This is to discuss freely with others in order to be challenged, so that our own thoughts and ideas may be clarified and solidified. The more we discuss and sharpen one another, the more God enables us to be ready to seize opportunities when they arise. Proverbs 27:17 says, “As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.” The sheer brilliance of CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien came not just from their extensive reading, but also from their frequent weekly discussions to push each other to a degree of excellence that was out of this world.

If we want to preach the gospel well, we must always be ready. We should always be “prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect” (1 Pet 3:15).

But if we do not make reading and frequent challenging discussions a part of our lives, our “readiness” would likely be inadequate or suboptimal, reductionistic or just too pushy.

WRITING

No one can write anything meaningful or beautiful if their thoughts are not clear and precise. Writing makes a man exact.

As a practical application, I suggest that you read, read, read (not comics) and love the Lord your God “with all your mind” (Matt 22:37, Mark 12:30; Luke 10:27).

Is reading a regular part of your Christian life? Are your thoughts and ideas being challenged regularly? Are you precise and exact in what you write?

Some of you may think I might be talking about my husband. Uh, actually, I’m referring to the roommate who has lived with us for the last five months.

For the sake of anonymity, let’s call him “‘Bob.” Bob graduated in August and decided that he wanted to serve God as a short-term missionary. He needed a place to stay while preparing for his journey. When Bob moved in, there weren’t any set dates or exact plans on where and when he would go, but he thought those details would be worked out. In fact, I know Bob believed God would fine-tune those details in due time. What I didn’t know was that allowing him to live with me and my husband for the next five months would be one of the most interesting and challenging events of my life.

Bob asked us if he could live with us temporarily after his graduation. All the other married couples in our ministry had multiple children or newborn babies, so it was clear that we would be the best option. We had an empty guest bedroom and no kids. Bob and my hubby were friends, so I thought it would provide an opportunity for their friendship to grow. My hope was not for it to grow into a shepherd/sheep relationship, but a “we’re-going-to-live-together-so-let’s-be-good-friends” relationship.

The first big issue we encountered was privacy, or the lack thereof. It’s no secret that my husband and I have been trying to start a family. I’ve undergone hormonal treatments to help the process along, but to no avail. I don’t know the exact reason or cause, but it seems that God’s time for us has not yet come. Or at least that’s what I’m telling myself. But c’mon: How were we supposed to start a family with Bob sleeping right next door? Awkward! My apologies if that’s TMI (Too Much Information).

Next, I don’t cook. Okay, I cook enough to feed my husband so he doesn’t starve to death, but I just don’t enjoy cooking. Baking I love, but not cooking. So knowing that Bob would live with us presented another challenge. I didn’t try to prove to him that I wasn’t a great housewife or ‘coworker’ by having a hot meal on the table every night. But I had to make sure there was at least some food readily available for my hubby and Bob almost every night. My irregular work schedule made that a bit difficult. All I can say is: Thank God for RAMEN! Bob and my hubby ate ramen for dinner once or twice a week. And for lunch. And, um, sometimes for breakfast? (That may have been just once.)

I also was intimidated by Bob living with us because I wasn’t sure if people from our ministry expected us to ‘train’ or ‘feed’ him spiritually by holding daily bread meetings, testimony writing, prayer time etc. At the beginning, we did have weekly prayer meetings together. And my hubby and Bob would occasionally meet in the morning to discuss a Bible passage. They played basketball together and drove to church together on Sunday. But there was a moment when I felt burdened — really burdened. Granted, my emotions were skewed at the time by the excess hormones in my body. I lashed out inappropiately at church members for not supporting me or helping me in this “common life” situation, and tried to put the responsibility on them. Fortunately, my friends at church are understanding and forgiving, and they didn’t take offense at my behavior.

One of the surprising things was how open Bob was to eating Korean food. I may not be a great cook, but I’d often make Korean-style dishes that he would eat without any complaint. I felt bad because he doesn’t like the smell of kimchee, the quintessential ingredient in Korean soups, rice dishes and main meals. I wasn’t broken hearted about not stocking up my fridge with kimchee. I’m sure if you asked my hubby, he might feel differently. But he’s not emaciated, so I guess I he survived.

A couple of months passed, but the plans for his mission trip hadn’t taken shape. We weren’t exactly sure how long Bob would be staying. Then I began to stress out. Not because I was unhappy with our living situation, but because I was scared that one day he would wake up and think that this period of his life had been a waste of time. I was worried that he would blame us and UBF people for not making the situation easier, and conclude that my life/our lives were not a representation of Jesus. You see, my life has always been about how to keep up appearances. About pretending that it revolves around Christ when really it doesn’t. My career in broadcasting glorifies vanity and image. Knowing that someone could potentially thwart that image by actually living with me and seeing what I actually do in my day-to-day life was truly frightening. But Bob didn’t judge me. He accepted me as I am.

The last five months have taught me a great deal about myself. In fact, I can even say that the whole experience was good. My hubby and I didn’t fight at all during the five months, which is something new. I think we even grew closer.

This experience has made me rethink our ministry’s practice of “common life.” When I was in college, I saw a lot of growing student disciples living with their shepherds or Bible teachers. In some cases, it seemed a necessity because the student needed a place to stay. Sometimes it was because they wanted to live in a more ‘spiritual’ environment, away from temptations of a college dorm or post-college apartment. And sometimes it was an opportunity to give them ‘training.’ In our ministry, common life has been used as a rite of passage and a sign of commitment. When I stayed in Korea before I got married, ministry leaders insisted that I live in common life with other Korean shepherdess as a form of spiritual training.

I’ve had roommates in college and, to be honest, it wasn’t easy. It’s never easy living with someone who is different from you. After my husband and I got married and began to live together, there was a lot that I had to overcome. My husband and Bob and I don’t have much in common, but somehow we made it work. Although we didn’t see eye to eye on lots of things, one thing we did share was a common identity in Christ. My husband loves Jesus. Bob loves Jesus. And I love Jesus. In the grand scheme of things, I guess that’s what’s really important.

Amy Chua, a professor at Yale University and mother of two daughters, ignited a firestorm with her opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal, “Why Chinese Mothers are Superior.” Chua uses the term “Chinese mothers” to describe an ultra-strict parenting style which is prevalent among Asian-American immigrants. She described how she never allows her daughters to attend sleepovers, have playdates with other children, watch TV or play computer games. She does not allow them to get any grade less than an A. She expects them to be the number 1 student in every class, except gym and drama. She forces them — using physical restraint if necessary — to put in long hours of practicing piano and violin. Any sign of disrespect toward their parents is met with swift and severe punishment. She described how her own father once became angry at her and called her “garbage” in his Chinese dialect, and she has done this to her own daughters as well. While western parents are horrified by this, thinking that it damages the child’s self-esteem, she believes that it can be healthy, productive and useful. She regards this parenting style as superior because it leads to achievement and success, ultimately allowing the children to experience the joys of accomplishment. She defends her practices as an expression of motherly love.

As I was reading Chua’s essay, this is what went through my head.

1. She’s got to be joking. This piece is tongue-in-cheek.
2. No, she’s serious.
3. She believes what she’s saying, but only to a degree; the piece is full of comic exaggeration.
4. No, she’s completely serious. Lord have mercy!

Later I discovered that the truth is closer to #3. It seems that Chua was exaggerating. It wasn’t really comic exaggeration, because she appears to have little or no sense of humor. But she intentionally crafted the piece to be controversial, because she was hoping to generate publicity for her new book, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, which was going to be released a few days later. Her plan worked. The internet lit up with chatter about Chua’s piece, and heated discussions are continuing today.

Here is my own take on it. I think Chua is being disingenuous when she claims that this parenting style is motivated by pure, selfless love for her daughters. Surely it has something to do with the her desire to avoid shame and bring honor to the family. And I didn’t buy her view of what a successful person is. One doesn’t need to be a doctor, a professor, or a famous concert pianist to live a happy and fruitful life. Achievement is good, but at what cost? It will be very hard to convince me that this kind of parenting does not do psychological damage and impair the children’s ability to have loving relationships with other people and with God.

Sharon and I have four children — two of whom have significant learning disabilities — and we do not apply these kinds of practices in our home. Our parenting style is much, much looser. Undisciplined and chaotic, some would say. And we can’t help but wonder. “Are we doing something wrong? Shouldn’t we be getting tough and pushing our kids more?” We live in a university town that is full of high-achieving youngsters. We serve in a ministry filled with high-achieving second gens. It’s impossible not to compare our children to them and agonize over whether we are doing a good job.

Later I ran across a wonderful series of articles on this by a Christian blogger named Tim Dalrymple. He seems to know what he is talking about, because he married into an Asian family and has for many years been deeply involved with Asian-American Christian ministries. (And, I found out, he has a small UBF connection: He was a college friend of Dr. John Yoon of University of Chicago.) Tim unpacks and analyzes Chua’s article from many different angles. He talks about what western and Asian parents can learn from one another. He makes many valuable observations, too many to mention here. But after reading his posts, I felt much better about what has gone on in the Schafer household. I received much comfort and food for thought. And I learned something about how parenting style can help children experience the gospel of grace.

I’m sure that many of you have encountered this debate over Tiger Moms and the alleged superiority/inferiority of that strict parenting style. What were your reactions? What are you thinking now?

Supporting people with exceptional needs has been a tremendous blessing to me, because they are teaching me invaluable lessons about life. Because of them, I feel my life as a Christian is becoming more balanced. Before encountering these people, my relationships were limited and not quite healthy. When I interacted only with university students, I developed a kind of elitism that is uncharacteristic of Jesus Christ. Jesus reached out to people of all kinds. Even though he raised disciples, he did not limit the scope of his social interaction only to those we might consider to be good discipleship material. Jesus also mingled with the less fortunate and disadvantaged and regarded them as having immense value.

Through supporting people with developmental disabilities, God has taught me one precious lesson: People know who truly loves them. At our facility, we try to keep them engaged in many kinds of meaningful and fun activities. But do you know what makes them happiest? Seeing mom or dad.

One individual whom I support is in his twenties. His profile says that he has the mental capabilities of a two year-old toddler. But that is not quite correct. He is not like a little child in every way. He is a genius in remembering things. He can sing all kinds of songs even though he does not know how to read. After hearing a song a couple of times, the next time he can sing it.

The most striking experience I had with this man was how he reacted to his mother’s death. One day we sat down in the living room holding each other’s hands. When one staff member told him that his mother passed away and went to heaven, his eyes welled up with tears and he cried loudly. I had never seen him crying like this. This made my eyes wet. He knew that his loving mother was gone. Losing his mom who loved him so dearly was a saddest and most traumatic experience of his life.

A mother is a very special person. She is especially so for people with extraordinary needs, because their circle of friendships is unusually small. Even people who seem to know nothing understand who loves them.

One thing I know is that our Lord Jesus Christ loved me so much that he gave up his life for me on the cross. It is my heart’s desire to learn how to love someone genuinely with the love of Christ, whether that person is a university student or a person with developmental disabilities or even my own child.

As a practical matter, for most of my life as a Christian, “the Sabbath” has equaled Sunday worship service. As a UBF chapter director, there was never enough time on Sunday to engage in activities other than those directly related to the worship service, such as message preparation, prayer, worship service program rehearsals, driving students to and from the service, visiting those in need, and so forth. I often tried to squeeze in one or two one-to-one Bible studies before dinner. My Sabbath was as, if not more, hectic than any other day of the week.

The two Bible passages that have long shaped my view on Sabbath are both about Jesus’ response to the legalistic Jews who had accused him of breaking the Sabbath Law by healing the sick on the Sabbath day. Jesus countered their legalism head-on, saying: “[m]y Father is always at his work to this very day, and I too, am working” (Jn 5:17), and “[t]he Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath” (Mk 2:27,28). The legalistic Jews were preoccupied with the dos and don’ts of the Sabbath Law and lost sight of God, the Law Giver, and his original intent that they rest in him. The result back then was disastrous; the Sabbath Law was reduced to a political tool to maintain authority over people who were harassed, and true rest was not had on the Sabbath. Reading these and other relevant Bible passages led me to focus on avoiding legalism as I considered such Sabbath questions as doing homework on Sunday, playing basketball with Bible students after the worship service, or going grocery shopping for Sunday night dinner. After all, I reasoned, Jesus healed the sick on the Sabbath, and the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. I believed that as long as I tried to keep Jesus at the center of my activities on Sunday I was set, and since I never missed a Sunday worship service, I was being faithful to the Sabbath. Or so I thought.

It wasn’t until May of this year, when I attended the Emotionally Healthy Leadership Conference at New Life Church in New York, that my view of Sabbath faced a serious challenge. I realized that while I was trying to avoid legalism and to keep Jesus and his mission as the focus of my Sunday activities, I did not pay a close attention to the more basic question of why the Sabbath exists in the first place. What a pleasant shock it was to learn that the Sabbath was God’s precious gift to me! Revisiting Genesis 1 & 2, Exodus 16 & 20 and Deuteronomy 5 not only confirmed that wonderful truth but also exposed the imbalance between work and rest in my life as a Christian. I was engrossed in what and how much I do for God, but largely neglected being with God. As a pastor and a missionary, this was an embarrassing and painful discovery about myself. Diligent personal Bible studies, prayers, fellowship meetings, and many, many missionary activities should keep me close to God, right? Not necessarily. Visible activities for God can and often do disguise the invisible world within where God is crowded out. Being with God does not come naturally. Left alone in my sinful nature, I choose to stay as far away from God as I possibly can so that I can be my own god. I have mastered a fair amount of skills to shun God while being engaged in “God’s work.” It is the great mercy and infinite wisdom of God that he gave his people the Sabbath so that they might cultivate the appetite for the pleasure of being with him. As Pastor John Piper of the Desiring God Ministry has succinctly put it, “God is most glorified when we are most satisfied in him.”

Sabbath is God’s gift to me so that I may experience the truth that I am loved by God without any accomplishments on my part to gain his favor. I cannot speak for anyone else, but I know that I have not been a good receiver of God’s gift of the Sabbath, and I have paid dearly for the neglect. I have found that I am almost bankrupt in my emotional content. Now I know that I have been running on an empty tank for too long. The creative energy for my work as a pastor in the American campus ministry is the outflow of the powerful experience of my being with God. In practice, this takes a serious level of discipline and spiritual formation. I am amazed to realize how much I must work to learn how to rest!

The Sabbath reflects the beautiful rhythm that God has placed in human life. Every seventh day, we are called to stop our toil so that our minds, hearts and bodies can be poured into experiencing the presence of God. When God first instituted the Sabbath during the wilderness wandering of the Israelites, he provided them two days’ portion of manna on the sixth day so they wouldn’t have to gather it on the seventh day. The Israelites continued this reliance for forty years. My wife, Grace, and I recently began practicing resting on the Sabbath for twenty-four hours, from Saturday, around dinnertime to Sunday dinnertime. We have found it a difficult practice to keep. Life’s habits are hard to break. Yet we remain hopeful that we will grow to be better receivers of the gift of the Sabbath. We will keep trying to practice the four basic principles for the Sabbath that Peter Scazzero, the pastor of New Life Church in New York, suggested: stop; rest; delight; and contemplate. I am beginning to catch on to the rhythm of life – a rhythm in which Sunday is no longer for the sake of good weekdays; rather, weekdays are for the sake of a good Sabbath. The Sabbath is God’s precious gift during my remaining journey, after which an eternal Sabbath awaits. Jesus’ words resonate in my soul: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”