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Faith and Spirit of Early Pioneers |
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Faith and Spirit of Early Pioneers |
At that time Koreans were accustomed to receiving. Since American soldiers came to Korea, Koreans learned several English words such as "Hello! Give me a chocolate or give me a gum." Korea received all kinds of aid from America and began to think that we cannot survive without receiving help from other countries. In order to overcome this kind of national problem, UBF struggled hard to learn a giving spirit and practice a giving lifestyle.
In 1963, one day we need to print something. Mother Barry suggested that we collect the expense from students. Then Dr. Samuel Lee rebuked her, saying, “How do you expect poor students pay for it? Since you are rich, you pay 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. While he was reading the Bible, he realized that he and the Korean church were wrong. He found an important principle in the Bible. God gave his One and Only Son for sinner. 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.
Upon reading these things, Dr. Samuel Lee realized that including himself, all Korean church members were full of a receiving spirit. We received the gospel, received missionaries, received all kinds of aid, received love and comfort, and were full of a beggar’s mentality. Our hands shrank towards us like that of a leper, and knew only how to receive, but did not know how to give. Therefore, the tide of God’s blessings was flowing all towards America.
In the middle of the night Dr. Samuel Lee went up to Mt. Mudeung, pulled the grass from its root all night and repented with tears. Upon descending from the mountain, he began to preach the words of God he had read the night before and shouted, “Let us stretch out our leper-like, shrunken hand and give to others, so that the tide of God’s blessing may turn to Korea.” From that day on, the movement of giving began. When one eats a cookie, he must give it to others and let them eat first, instead of eating it all by himself. “Let’s be a giving person. It is more blessed to give than to receive” became the daily greeting.
Beginning from that historical night, UBF members began to offer world mission offering in order to be financially self-supporting. In order to teach students to have a Biblical view of money, we encouraged even newcomers to participate in the world mission offering. The students were so poor that some saved bus fare, one person gave his watch to a pawn shop, others worked part-time and still another person sold his blood, got the money and gave the offering. Chung-Pyung Kim of the College of Education was notorious for his drinking. He used up all his money for drinking. But even he offered a 20-won bill and six 5-won coins. Kyu-hae Chung sold his blood to offer world mission offering. In this way, students gave their hearts in learning a life of sacrificial giving.
In March, 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, took out the door of the Kwangju UBF center and loaded it to a truck in order to give it to Daejun UBF. Kwang-ok Koh saw this and got angry at Dr. Samuel Lee because Dr. Lee took out the door without discussing it with him.
We did not give just the door. Dr. Samuel Lee gave his organ to Daejun UBF. At that time, an organ was very rare and expensive. This organ was his No. 1 property along with his bookcase. To Dr. Samuel Lee and Missionary Grace A. Lee who liked music, playing the organ and singing hymns was their favorite pastime. But Dr. Samuel Lee gave that precious organ away to Daejun UBF. Missionary Grace A. Lee did not know this for she was out. Later she felt so sorry for losing the organ. But Missionary Grace A. Lee bore this kind of pain for the last 40 years as the ancestor of all UBF women.
The door and the organ are still preserved well at Daejun UBF. Anyway, we wanted to help other centers even by giving them our own center door and our most precious properties. Today each chapter is financially independent and serves the world mission work. This was possible because the giving spirit and faith of the UBF pioneers became the foundation of each chapter.
We also practiced a giving spirit through relief work. Every Christmas we visited nursing homes and orphanages, and made contribution to them. During that time, there were many homeless people. So we prepared dinner and invited them to eat and have a party. Later we collected relief money for Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Mexico, Somalia and North Korea. Our joy was especially great when we sent out missionaries to America, from whom we had previously only received aid, and even made an offering to purchase a center for American students. In order to purchase Toledo UBF center, we made offerings and students participated in this offering with great joy knowing that they were helping America.
This became the beginning point of the great work that turned the tide of God’s blessings to Korea. This became a turning point of our history from an aid-receiving country to a giving country, and from a Korean ministry into an international ministry which prays for the whole world. God blessed us abundantly accepting our time, heart's devotion and sending missionaries as our five loaves and two fish. God blessed our ancestors’ giving spirit, and enabled us to send out 1,600 missionaries to 86 nations and now is using us as a kingdom of priests and a holy nation towards the world.