News > North America

St. Louis UBF, USA
July 25, 2014

The St. Louis UBF had a Summer Bible Retreat at the beautiful Lake Williamson Christian Center in Carlinville, IL from July 11-13. Despite a short period of preparation, God blessed our conference abundantly with gospel messages, special lectures, movies, special music, and so on. The main aim for the Bible retreat was to remember God’s grace of salvation and to renew God’s call for campus mission. Someone said that we are now in a post-Christian era. In order to accept college students and help them with the gospel, we need to renew our calling and adjust to this new era. Missionary Isaiah Lim (WU Ph D) started the retreat with Mk 2:1-22. Through his message, we all renewed our love relationships with Jesus through his forgiving love. After M. Hannah Park’s heart-moving life testimony, we had praise & prayer night. We repented of our laziness and complacency in doing the work of God. The next day, after group Bible studies, M. Luke Yang delivered the message “You Give Them Something to Eat,” based on Mk 6:30-44. Through his message, we were encouraged to give our own five loaves and two fish to Jesus by faith. Hanna Park (SLU 1) followed with her message “Do the Will of God” based on Jn 4:27-38. She accepted God’s will for her to be sanctified daily and to grow in the image of Jesus. On Saturday afternoon, some parents had volley ball matches with their children and spent quality time with them. In the evening, Peter Pei (WU 3) delivered his testimonial message based on Mt 6:33. He showed his struggles to seek God’s kingdom first more than his career. M. Paul Choi gave a special lecture based on Stephen Lutz’ book, College Ministry in a Post-Christian Culture. Through his book report, we learned why college ministry is urgent and important in our generation. Stephen compared young people to tumbleweed, which is tossed and blown by the wind. They need to take deep root in Jesus, and they need compassionate Bible teachers and spiritual mentors. After the lecture, we watched a documentary about the Messianic Jews, provided by M. Abraham Park. We thank God who restores the Israelites, his chosen people, through the gospel of Jesus Christ, despite severe persecutions and oppositions by the Jews.

For morning devotion message on Sunday, Michael Lanier (SIUE Grad1) served the words based on Mk 14:1-11. He taught us that Jesus values our devotion as a beautiful thing when we pour out our hearts for him. After testimony sharing, we had our worship service with Springfield UBF, which offered beautiful special music before the message. We really thank Dr. John and Rebekah Lee’s family and all Springfield UBF co-workers who joined us and encouraged us with music. Dr. Joseph Park delivered the Sunday message based Jn 12:20-36, titled “Jesus, A Kernel of Wheat.” Through his message, we thanked Jesus who came to this world and died for our sins and brought eternal life. M. James Lee concluded the retreat with his closing message based on Jn 21:15-19. He made his love confession to Jesus with tears and renewed his love and trust relationship with Jesus. We made a new decision to take care of college students not only because we are called, but also because we love Jesus. This Bible conference was the first conference without Ben West, who recently married and joined Minneapolis UBF. Despite a short period of preparation, God gave mercy and grace upon all our members, and we had a wonderful family trip in Christ near St. Louis. We felt sorry that we did not have more time to prepare for a better conference, but we believe that God will bless our ministry all the more when we give our hearts to Jesus.