News > Latin America

 

January 6, 2013

The Latin American Directors’ Conference started one day before the European Conference on Dec. 26 with the opening message by M. Moses Chang of Belize UBF with the title “Come and Have Breakfast” (Jn 21:1-25). He was sent as a silver missionary from Washington DC UBF and this year he obtained permanent residency of Belize.  His message, depicting very well Jesus’ love inviting his failed disciples, moved our hearts. After dinner, we heard three mission reports from Ecuador, Chile and Uruguay.

 

M. Andre Kim of Ecuador lost his job but by faith he could serve the work of God more actively and even supported the Colombian conference. He is praying to find a way to establish a secure self-supporting missionary life in Guayaquil. M. Josue Chun of Chile UBF was diagnosed with angina and had surgery and rested for one year. Now he is serving 4 students with faithful 1:1 Bible study in Chile. The family of M. Jose Park of Uruguay is sharing common life with Brother Marcos and is praying to establish 12 house churches.  M. Jose has a few health problems, glaucoma, anemia and dental and is praying for treatment.

 

Afterwards, the current Korean ambassador and Ph.D in Political Science, M. Pablo Star Oh, gave an explicit lecture on “The Impact of Spain on Latin America.” Through this we learned about the inseparable history, influence and relationship between Spain and Latin America. We found a prayer topic to raise and send missionaries to Spain from Latin America.

On the second day, there were group Bible studies led by Dr. Mark Yang, Dr. Jose Ahn, Sh. Moses Kim and M. Sarah Kim, followed by a powerful and gracious message by Pastor Abraham Kim, the General Director of worldwide UBF, from Ephesians 3:1-21 with the title “The Servant of the Mystery of Christ.” The message taught us how precious our mission is, how abundant the gospel is, and admonished us to be strong in our inner man and be filled with the love of Christ.

After lunch, we had a useful question-answer session with Pastor Abraham Kim and Dr. Jose Ahn about spiritual restoration of women missionaries, expense for the international conferences, spiritual recharge of missionaries, relationship with local churches, sicknesses of missionaries, and regional directors’ term.

 

In the evening, Latin American native missionaries, M. Isidro of El Salvador, M Jorge Antonio of Dominican Republic, and M. Efrain of Peru shared their mission reports. M. Edith, the coworker of Isidro served 1:1 ministry faithfully and had a wonderful Easter Conference.  They are praying to raise one Abraham and Sarah of faith in El Salvador.

 

M. Jorge Antonio struggled a lot serving the ministry alone in Dominican Republic. But in 2007 the Lord blessed him to establish a wonderful house church. Since then his house church is serving Bible study and Sunday worship service faithfully with a prayer topic to raise 12 disciples of Jesus by 2015.

 

M. Efrain of Peru UBF has been translating the messages of Dr. Samuel Lee, Mother Barry and P. Ron Ward into Spanish to receive God’s word. Several disciples are growing and 36 people attended their Christmas worship service. 

 

Finally, M. Juan Kim of Nicaragua shared the growing work of God in Nicaragua about growing disciples and 20 attendants in their Sunday worship services.

 

Afterward, we listened to the special lecture by Mother Sarah Barry on “Unite Us to Be One.” She said that Jesus’ two commands are: “Go and make disciples of all nations” and “Love one another,” and urged us to be one in Jesus’ love. Through this word, we prayed that Latin American missionaries and European missionaries may love one another all the more and become one in Christ.

On the third day, the Latin America UBF coordinator, M. Timothy Rhee, delivered a deep and graceful message from Ephesians 4 on “Make Every Effort to Be One.” We learned that we must become one in the Holy Spirit and grow in maturity in our inner man.  Afterward, we had time to write testimonies and enjoyed soccer fellowship with European directors.

Before the evening meeting, five regional coordinators were anointed with prayer. They are M. Esteban Cho for Southern South America, M. Elias Park for Brazil, M. Josue Ham for Central America, M. Barnabas Choi for Mexico and M. Juan Seo for Northern South America. We decided to have meetings by regions, and the regional coordinators and M. Timothy Rhee will work together closely.

 

After that, we had a discussion session after listening to a brief lecture by Sh. Moses Kim of Korea on “Reformational Confession of Faith.” The themes were sexual immorality, homosexuality, establishing house churches, sending and supporting native missionaries and their pioneering chapters, 2^nd gen missionary education, sharing information and materials, and networking among self-supporting missionaries. The discussion was deep and very meaningful because we could share our personal agonies, discuss and find answers for them.

 

On the last day, we had testimony sharing by group. All of the attendants shared deep and graceful testimonies. Finally, M. Pablo Park of Costa Rica delivered the closing message based on Philippians 3:12-14 with the title, “To Win the Prize of God’s Calling.” We prayed that forgetting what was behind, we may press on to win the prize of God’s calling in the New Year.  By taking a group photo together with the European coordinators we finished the wonderful conference. In the afternoon, we had a chance to listen to Dr. Mark Yang’s informal, but deep lecture on Bible study material development methods and message preparation. For the Sunday worship service, Sh. Paul Kim from Choon Chun UBF, Korea delivered a message, “Have Faith in God.”

 

The Latin American-European Directors’ Conference held in Spain made us one in Christ, gave us rest both in spirit and body and recharged us through the powerful messages and special lectures. It also was meaningful because we could pray for pioneering Spain.  I thank God for his overflowing blessings upon this conference. I pray that remembering the grace we received through this conference, we may serve fruitful 1:1 Bible teaching ministry and disciple-making ministry in the New Year, 2013.

 

M. Juan Seo, Venezuela UBF