Preface

In 2014 Joshua Lee contributed this article and prepared some photos.

Contents

Introduction

1. God’s Initial Encouraging Work (1987-1991)
2. God’s Refining and Laying Foundation (1992-2007)
3. The Period of Rebounding 1:1 and Discipleship Ministry (2008-present)

Introduction

Key Verse: Genesis 12:2 “You will be a blessing.”

On December 10, 1986 God sent M. Joshua Lee and M. James Lee to Toronto from Winnipeg UBF for the pioneering of University of Toronto. Soon after that, on Christmas day M. Sarah Lee and M. Susanna Lee along with four missionary families joined them. Our first message was “You will be a blessing” on Genesis 12: 1-9. Based on this promise of God, we prayed to be a blessing to U of T students. Since then, there have been many events with many ups and downs. But God was so faithful despite all our weaknesses, helping us to keep our faith in him patiently. He is the God of world history and also the God of Toronto UBF history. The history of Toronto UBF can be divided in 3 stages.

I. God’s Initial Encouraging Work (1987-1991)

As soon as we arrived in Toronto we began 1:1 ministry and worship service at a rented house (304 Harbord St.), about 20 minutes walking distance from the University of Toronto. One year later, we moved to another rented house (193 Brunswick Avenue) about 5 minutes walking distance from the campus, to serve students more efficiently. The monthly rent for that Bible House was $2,400. It was an extremely high rent at that time. But all coworkers were willing to serve God sacrificially. 3 families lived in the Bible House together, each living in a single room in order to bear the high rent. It was possible because no family among us had children yet. We all worked minimum wage jobs at the bottom of the society, but we were full of zeal for the Lord and pioneering spirit without worrying about parenting or school studies. Each morning we had a Daily Bread Prayer meeting together at the Bible House, and after work each evening we went out to the campus to invite students to Bible study. Each Sunday, we remained at the Bible House after worship service, eating Big Macs together, and writing Bible testimonies based on the Sunday message. Each went home only after finishing the writing; some stayed until late at night. God blessed us, sending many Canadian students to Bible study and Sunday worship service. After two and half years of diligent 1:1 ministry, we could have our own 3-night, 4-day Summer Bible Conference in 1989, raising up 7 Canadian student-messengers. Until 1991, God continued to bless our Sunday worship services and discipleship ministry with about 10 growing Bible students. It was indeed the work of the Holy Spirit among us who had just moved from the small icy city Winnipeg to the great University in the biggest city of Canada. God encouraged us and gave us his vision for pioneering U of T through such encouraging work of the Holy Spirit.

II. God’s Refining and Laying Foundation (1992-2007)

In June, 1991, we purchased a house through coworkers’ sacrificial offerings and a bank loan, and moved to the new Bible House (205 Cedric Ave), located about 20 minute driving distance from the campus. It was because we could no longer bear the high rent as each family grew in number, and the expenses and needs of each family increased. After moving, for about 6 months all the men coworkers worked hard to remodel the house, while the women coworkers took care of little children. However, after completing the renovations, and though the worship place was nicely prepared, it turned out that most of our growing disciples left us. It was very discouraging to all the coworkers who were very exhausted after the prolonged, difficult, and exhausting remodeling work. We had to start pioneering work all over again. Time and again, several Canadian students came to Bible study and worship service, seemingly growing in faith for several years, but then went away, breaking our hearts. Through our broken hearts, Satan tried to crush us and destroy the vessel of the Holy Spirit among us. However, in fact through long years of hardships God has remodeled ourselves, refining each one in faith and hope in him, and laying a foundation for his work. God has faithfully worked in and among us in four distinctive ways.

First, God helped us to lay a foundation for the ministry of God’s word. When discipleship ministry shrank to the point that no growing leader attended Friday students’ meeting, instead of despairing and giving up, we replaced it with missionaries’ Genesis Group Bible Study. At a most difficult time we studied the whole book of Genesis, making Bible notes anew, sharing testimonies and praying together every Friday. Through that, we could continue to hold onto God’s promise “You will be a blessing.” It was God’s mercy on us that we could not only survive those hard times, but also be better prepared as Genesis Bible teachers. As for me, these long years were the time to grow as an independent servant of God’s words. Humanly speaking I was the last person to be a servant of God’s word--even though that was what I really wanted-because I had very poor foundation in reading, writing, speaking, listening and meditating. But God provided me with a wife, my suitable helper, who was well trained in all of my lacking parts. I was slow in learning, but I think she deeply learned the meaning of the word: “Love is patient…” through bearing all my weaknesses. For many years, my message preparation was repeatedly reading and meditating on the message manuscript of Late Dr. Lee. Then I delivered the message almost exactly as it was after much rehearsals. In my helplessness, I cried out, “How long, Oh Lord!” Then, God led me to receive one-year training in Chicago under Dr. Lee in 2001, his last year on earth. During that time, I was raised as a messenger at Easter Conference of Dr. Charles Kim’s Fellowship. God helped me to deliver the message on John 21 with power and spirit without looking at the manuscript after several days of intensive practice. I could experience the power of God’s word working in and through me. And while in Chicago I attended all the Bible testimony sharing meeting, hearing more than 50 testimonies on the same weekly passage each week. Through this I could see the powerful ministry of God’s word. Most of all, through Chicago training, Dr. Lee gave me one direction, “study the Bible deeply.” It became the most important spiritual direction for me, because I had been anxious about how to grow as a servant of God’s word due to my poor reading and many human weakness. Since then, I began focusing on the Bible study as the first priority, reading the whole Bible and, memorizing the passage and meditating on it. Also, for the last many years God sent his servants to Toronto to help/build up my Bible study and gave me opportunities to come to Chicago one or two days at a time to learn from his servants. Thus, God has enabled me to prepare Bible study questionnaires and notes, and write messages independently. Especially for the last 5 years I have been tasting both pains and joy of preparing Sunday message and delivering it freely. It took a long time, but it became an important spiritual foundation for the ministry of God’s word.

Second, God helped us to lay a firm foundation as self-supporting missionaries during this period. While serving ministry and rearing young children, each missionary coworker began to study again in the colleges/universities, and entered into the main stream of Canadian society as professionals such as a chemist, engineer, computer-programmer, nurse, accountant and social worker. For example, my wife started her MBA study at the age of 40 while raising 2 little children. God enabled her to complete the study in spite of her poor health, and promoted her to a senior manager position at TD Bank, one of the biggest Canadian chartered banks. It was possible only by God’s help. I also started studying computer science at U of T. At that time I didn’t even know what a floppy disk was. It was not easy to bear the tough study with a full-time student wife and little children, also with burden of weekly message preparation. But God helped me to finish it and graduate from the U of T. It took me 10 years. And while I was a student at the U of T, God helped our ministry to register as a campus club.

Third, during this period, God helped us to lay a foundation of 2nd gen ministry. We began CBF with about 10 little children. Later they grew and formed HBF. Since 2005, God helped HBF to share Bible reflection at 6:00 AM every Monday morning, faithfully for 4 years. This was really a good direction for the formation of spiritual life among our 2nd gens. By the time they entered the U of T, it was natural for them to attend Friday students meeting. Sara especially wrote a sincere reflection on each Sunday passage, faithfully for 7 years. It helped her to take root in the word of God. On that base, God also helped her to receive internship training in Chicago under M. Little Sarah Kim and P. Ron Ward, and to grow as a 1:1 Bible teacher, disciple and disciple-maker. God also raised Rebekah, Paulina and Abraham as stewards and gospel coworkers among the U of T students.

Fourth, God helped us to lay a foundation of coworking with a solid vessel of the Holy Spirit. During this period, some missionaries families were sent out to pioneer other campuses in GTA and some went away for other reasons. But M. James and Susanna Lee’s family remained as faithful coworkers, sharing the sufferings and hardships together from the first day till now. God also sent young missionaries, M. Peter & Mary Moon, Moses and Hannah Jung from Sung-dong UBF. Also, Esther Oak-Inh Lee, a Korean ESL student, started 1:1 bible study. Later, she became as a missionary and established a mission family with M. David Kim, who later got Ph.D. in Canada. In this way, God formed a new vessel of the Holy Spirit among the five missionary families, for the future work of God.

III. The Period of Rebounding 1:1 and Discipleship Ministry (2008-present)

In July, 2008, we sold the Bible House on 205 Cedric Avenue, and moved to a small leased space on 720 Spadina Avenue, just across the U of T campus. As we moved back near U of T, we had one clear direction to focus on serving U of T students through 1:1 Bible study. We also prayed for each Sunday worship to be Spirit-filled so that students may be willing to join our worship service and worship God wholeheartedly. We see that God has been blessing this prayer topic for the last 4 years:

God began to send 1:1 bible students one after another, and restored Friday student meeting. Especially, God has raised Jemmie as a disciple through M. Susanna’s patient 1:1 shepherding for many years. In 2010, she accepted Jesus’ calling based on Luke 5:4 and Mark 1:17. Since then she has been growing in personal relationship with God’s words, writing Bible reflection sincerely, and serving 1 sheep, Marcus with 1:1 Bible study. She also prays to establish a mission family with a man of God’s choice. God has also raised Allen as a growing disciple through M. James’s shepherding for the last 3 years. He was saved from his game-addicted life and was baptized on January 1, 2013 with personal decision to be a committed disciple of Jesus. He has volunteered to receive disciple training in 2013. God also enabled Sara, Rebekah, Paulina and Abraham to be stewards of student ministry in addition to serving music servants and presiding at Sunday worship service. God enabled us to begin weekly student Group Bible studies through our growing disciples.

During the fall semester of 2012, God sent many new 1:1 Bible students and enabled us to accomplish over 30 1:1 Bible studies which has been our long prayer topic for the last 25 years. God restored in us his burning shepherd heart to go out to the campus diligently. Everyday M. Mary went out to the campus directly from her work. M. Esther also diligent went out to preach the gospel and invite students even together with her baby in a carriage. When more and more new sheep came to study the Bible, our centre was too small to accommodate all 1:1 studies. For a few months, we had a joyful agony due to lack of 1:1 Bible study space. Then, we cried out, “Lord, give us a new centre!” God gladly and hurriedly answered our prayers and provided a very spacious new place in the same building. The new centre has so many 1:1 rooms that accommodate many more 1:1 studies concurrently. We were all so much encouraged by God’s leading and accepted it as a sign of God’s blessing in 1:1 ministry and discipleship ministry. On December 16, 2012, we had Christmas worship service at the new centre with 46 worshipers (36 students and 10 missionaries). We prayed for 40 worshipers, but God blessed us beyond what we asked for! Most of the students were those who have kept 1:1 Bible study. God showed us new thing which we have never seen for the last 25 years! Thank and praise God for his mercy and faithfulness upon us!

From 2011 we began New Year Conference, realizing its importance that we should start each New Year with a clear direction and prayer. In the beginning of the new decade, at the 2011 New Year Conference we held to Acts 1:8 ministry annual key verse, and prayed to have the power of Spirit to live as witnesses of Jesus. There God gave us a 10 year prayer topic and vision to establish 12 shepherds’ families among U of T students by 2020. The underlying reason for this prayer topic is that we may do the work of faith to please God and really be a blessing to U of T students based on his promise. By faith in his promise, we may see the vision that Toronto may be a holy city and Canada, a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. Thus, may God’s kingdom come and his will be done on earth as it is in heaven. May God continue to be with us and use us as fruitful 1:1 Bible teachers and disciple makers until 12 shepherds’ families are established among U of T students!

One Word: You will be a blessing to U of T students!