The Ambush
December 19, 1989 (Tuesday)
“Tell me more about this guy we’re meeting,” said Elder Benjamin as we sat at the back of the bus.
I answered, “He’s a student: Lee Han-bin (이한빈). I met him last week downtown.” This was before Elder Benjamin had joined with me in Taegu. “A really smart guy. He was intrigued by our street boards, and wouldn’t stop asking us questions. I’m telling you: he’s a Golden Investigator. But I’ll warn you in advance, he’s going to analyze everything we say.”
“Sounds exciting. This Keimyung University is out of our area, though.”
“Yeah, but he lives off campus, in our area — just barely. So, we’re okay.”
We got off the bus at 7PM—already dark outside, and we found our way to the library. We arrived at 7:15, just in time for our appointment and sat down in the lobby. At 7:30, he had not yet shown up.
“Interesting,” I said. “Where is he?”
“Well,” said Elder Benjamin, “we’re at a university, so let’s find out where he is.” And he went around asking other people in the lobby if they knew Lee Han-bin.
After five minutes of searching, someone finally told us, “Oh — he went to the movie. That’s where he is right now.”
“Dang,” I said in English to my companion. “I guess we won’t be seeing him today after all. The movie was more important to him.”
The student said in English, “I’m sure he’ll talk to you if you go find him. Here’s how you get to the cinema …” And off we went.
When we got there, the movie had already started, and we stood outside the theater doors.
“Well,” I said, “it looks like we’re too late. Any thoughts?”
“We’re already here, and we did have an appointment. He might come out if we ask. Maybe we could send someone in?”
I looked around. There was no one outside the theater but us. There wasn’t a concession stand nor a ticket booth.
One thing to understand: we weren’t supposed to go in because we missionaries weren’t allowed to watch movies. They were considered to be distractions. For one, a movie could be a couple of hours where we could be studying or proselytizing. Also, a movie could be full of tantalizing scenes, tempting us with thoughts of action and women. Yeah — when missionaries return home, it’s common to catch up with all they missed. But during the mission, we had to stay away.
“Who can we send in?” I asked.
“We’re going to have to go in,” he said.
“What?” Was this the infamous uber-spiritual Elder Benjamin suggesting we go into a movie theater? A muffled explosion sounded from inside the theater. “Are you sure about this?”
“The ox is in the mire,” said Elder Benjamin as he pulled the door open.
And then we entered. On the screen was a rainbow-colored depiction of someone traipsing through a forest — some kind of heat map. The music played tensely. The theater was packed. We stood in a small, thin lobby that opened up into the theater itself. Someone noticed us and approached.
“Can I help you?” he asked quietly.
Elder Benjamin said, “Yes. We’re looking for Lee Han-bin. We had an appointment. Do you know if he’s in here?”
“I can go check.”
As the Korean student went deeper in the theater, we couldn’t help but look at the screen. An alien decked out in dreadlocks, holding a large weapon, appeared to be combing the forest. Hunting something — it looked like.
We kept watching until the student returned. “Yes, he’s in here. He can meet you after the movie is over.”
We thanked him, and he sat back down.
“So, Elder Benjamin. What do you think?”
“We don’t have any other appointments tonight. Right? It’s worth waiting another hour.”
“I guess we can wait outside?” I said.
At that moment, the screen went rainbow-colored again, a human shining brightly in red-orange. A white triangle honed into the person’s image and then something shot him. From the point of view of the human, a laser blast came and killed him instantly.
Elder Benjamin said distractedly, “If we leave, he might not know where we are.”
“Yeah,” I said. “The ox is in the mire.”
And we continued watching. We stayed standing in the small lobby hall, as there wasn’t anywhere to sit. The movie went on. There wasn’t much talking onscreen, but when there was, it was dubbed into Korean. The alien appeared to be hunting a team of humans, and doing very well.
“Hey,” I said. “Isn’t that the Terminator guy?”
“I don’t know. Never saw that,” he answered.
A Korean voice-over badly imitated the Arnold.
And I looked over at Elder Benjamin, the one who had never seen any rated–R movies, deeply engrossed in watching the movie. Was this a good thing we were doing? Should I have at least convinced him to wait together outside until the movie ended? It was worth meeting this smart investigator — worth saving his soul, but did we have to be inside the theater?
I also felt a little strange standing there in the back, where anyone could turn around and see us staring. In a way, I felt that we were lying in waiting — an ambush — ready to pounce once the prey walked by. Common sense told me that it would be infinitely better to wait outside.
But I’ll be honest. I just had to see how the movie ended.
So we kept watching as the Arnold kicked major alien butt. And then the movie ended.
Because of the narrow hallway, we had no choice but to retreat outside of the theater doors — again reminding me that we could have waited outside the doors the whole time.
I watched the students walk past us, many of whom glanced at us quickly with curiosity. And as the crowd began to thin out, I had not yet seen Lee Han-bin. When it had thinned out sufficiently, I peeked into the theater, and Lee Han-bin wasn’t in there.
Elder Benjamin asked a student, “Have you seen Lee Han-bin?”
“Yes,” he said. “He went with his friends out the side door over there.”
Another exit? Dang. We had missed him again.
“He’s gone,” I said to Elder Benjamin. “He faked us … big time.”
“Looks like it,” he said. “Should we continue to pursue him?”
“No, I don’t think he wants to meet.” Again came that fear that we would come across as stalking him. “Let’s go home.”
Elder Benjamin agreed, and we headed back. As we walked, he backslid into his own fear that we would be separated. “We’re going to get in trouble” and “We shouldn’t have done that.” We ultimately agreed that we would never tell anyone we had watched the movie — one that we would later learn was indeed a rated-R movie.
But at least the whole night wasn’t entirely in vain. Elder Benjamin and I each handed out a Mormon Kyeong on the bus ride home.
December 20, 1989 (Wednesday)
The next morning, Han-bin called us. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “I was with my friends and I got caught up in all the fun. You know how college can be, right?”
I had to admit: I certainly did understand, thinking of the couple of times during my freshman year at BYU when I had ditched friends as impromptu plans were made.
“That’s okay,” I said. “Would you like to set up another appointment?”
“Sure,” he said. “How about 7PM this Friday?”
I pulled out the yellow weekly planner from my shirt pocket. “Works for me.”
“And is it okay if I bring some friends? That way, it will be harder for me to ditch you again.”
“Sure. The more the merrier.”
As the phone call came to an end, Elder Benjamin jumped at me and gave me a high five.
December 22, 1989 (Friday)
The next two days passed by slowly, and also quickly, as we approached the highlight of the week. The Golden Discussion. We had the perfect investigator, and he was bringing friends. We knew this was going to be easy. All we had to do was give the first discussion, and Han-bin would latch on quickly. Perhaps he would convince his friends, too. And at the end, we would set a date for baptism. How many of them would we bring into the fold?
We arrived at his apartment on the third floor, and knocked on his door at exactly 7PM. We heard nothing but silence, and for a moment we wondered if Han-bin had faked us at his own place this time. But our fears faded when he opened the door, smiling. “Come on in,” he said. And we found ourselves surrounded by at least 10 other men — all middle-aged. They each shook our hands, but not with smiles. Rather they all maintained the aura of authority, experience, wisdom, and seriousness.
I whispered to Elder Benjamin in English. “Why does a student have so many older friends? I’m not so sure about this.”
“Have faith,” he responded. “Remember Sidney Rigdon who converted whole congregations. When the knowledgeable hear truth, they have no choice but to accept it.”
Han-bin then introduced all of his friends by name. They were all religious professors at the university. The last to be introduced was the dean himself. He said, “We are all looking forward to your presentation. When Han-bin notified us about the foreigner Mormon missionaries, we had to come and see it for ourselves.”
I looked over at Elder Benjamin thinking, “This is not going to go the way we planned.”
He smiled back at me reassuringly as if to say, “Have faith. Stick with the first discussion, and we’ll be fine. Six simple principles, and we’re done.”
The dean then said, “Well, shall we begin? Let’s hear what you have to say.”
So much for smalltalk. These guys wanted to get down to business.
One thing to understand about Korea in the late 1980’s: the predominant Christian religion was Presbyterian, (장로교), pronounced “Chahng-no Kyo,” which translates into “Elder Church.” If a Korean wasn’t Buddhist or agnostic, they were very likely to be Presbyterian, and its name alone demanded respect and confidence. No one messed with the Elder Church.
So, I began the discussion with 1.1: Our Heavenly Father. The group all nodded with affirmation as we described the traits of God, the Father.
Elder Benjamin took 1.2: Jesus Christ. Again the group seemed to approve. Though one of the professors seemed fit to remind us that Jesus Christ and the Father were one and the same. Elder Benjamin answered about how they appear as distinct members of the Trinity to us, and this allowed us to continue the discussion.
I took Part 1.3 on the Prophets. This centered around the scripture Amos 3:7. “Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets.” And here we received more comments along the lines of: “how do we know if a prophet is true?” It was as if they knew what was coming next. I wondered: did they have a class that focused on the six missionary discussions and how to debunk them?
And then the real fun started with Part 1.4 on Joseph Smith. Elder Benjamin tried to explain the First Vision, but didn’t get very far. The professors each took turns about how Joseph Smith was a charlatan, a gold digger, a polygamist, a felon, and so on. Since this was Elder Benjamin’s section, he took on most of the questions, but a few times, I stepped in to defend our first prophet. We had to correct the falsehoods: about how he was never convicted, hearsay, circumstantial evidence, and so on. And several times we had to remind them that we worshipped God and not Joseph Smith, as we had just covered in the first two principles.
Ultimately, Elder Benjamin said, “I thought you all wanted to hear what we had to say, but you don’t seem to be listening. We have yet to finish our presentation.”
“Oh,” said the dean. “What comes next?”
Elder Benjamin gestured for me to continue, and so I took Part 1.5 on the Book of Mormon. They listened for a few minutes as I related the story of Lehi and his family, and Mormon, who compiled the writings, and his son Moroni who buried the plates for Joseph Smith to receive later. And I should have known what would come next.
“Can we see these gold plates?” asked one professor.
“No,” I said. “Joseph Smith gave the plates back to the angel Moroni after he had finished translating them.”
Another professor said, “Isn’t that a little convenient? So, there’s nothing to corroborate Joseph Smith’s story?”
I laughed. “Isn’t that one of the biggest complaints against God and the Bible? No proof? When has God ever left proof of any of those stories? How else does He test our faith?”
And the battle continued on: me against the professors. This whole time, Han-bin had been silent. So, I tried something differently. “So, Han-bin. What do you think about all this?”
He sheepishly eyed the rest of the room, and said, “I don’t know.” I recognized what was going on. Korean culture dictated that those with authority did all the speaking, and novices listened while they learned. This whole spectacle seemed to make him nervous: a couple of teenagers taking on elders in his own home.
So I turned to the professors. “Why did you all come here tonight? You are all busy, so why spend a Friday night doing this? What exactly do you hope to accomplish? We’re two young boys serving the Lord, bringing people closer to Christ.”
There was silence for half a minute, and then one of them spoke up. “We think you are misguided, and we are losing members of our congregation. You and others are converting them. If we can show you the error of your ways, as the angel appeared to Saul, then we can help stop this.”
Again silence. I wasn’t expecting the truth, but I had to respond. I said, “Perhaps we’re providing answers that you don’t have?” In hindsight, that probably wasn’t the best thing to say. We went right back into the battle. For some reason it even devolved into an argument over faith vs. works.
And then I noticed someone else who was completely silent. Elder Benjamin. This spiritual workhorse had stopped helping me. Surely he could say something spiritual to turn everything around. We had one section left. 1.6. The most important section, which was on the Holy Spirit. How could we know that any of this was true? The Holy Spirit was the one answer to that question. And that’s all I had to do: segue the conversation to the Holy Spirit, and then it would be Elder Benjamin taking over, and he would close the deal, overpowering everyone with the Spirit, and converting them all — just like Sidney Rigdon had done.
As I tried steering the discussion, Elder Benjamin suddenly said, “It’s time for us to leave.” Immediate silence and puzzled faces stared throughout the room. “We have another appointment.” I looked at my watch. 8:30. Wow — the time had flown. But we didn’t have another appointment. Why was he giving up?
He stood up and walked over to the exit, proceeding to put on his shoes. I had no choice but to follow him. But I wasn’t finished. Not even a closing prayer? We still had plenty of time to finish the discussion.
I’m sure the others saw the puzzlement in my face. They all smiled back, even Han-bin. They had won. But I wasn’t done. There was so much more to explain. Why, Elder Benjamin? Why give up on these people? What happened to the spiritual workhorse? We couldn’t let them win.
I reluctantly put on my shoes, said a weak “Goodbye,” and we left, closing the door behind us.
“Well,” I said. “That was interesting.”
Elder Benjamin said, “Yeah. It was time to leave.”
“But we weren’t done. We still had the Holy Spirit.”
“But we didn’t. The Holy Spirit left a long time ago, so it wouldn’t have done any good. Why throw pearls to the swine? And you were getting quite angry in there.”
“Me, angry? They never wanted to listen to us. They only wanted to tell us why we’re wrong. They’d rather believe their own lies rather than hear the truth. Of course I’m angry.”
“Exactly,” said Elder Benjamin.
I reached down to wipe the dust from my shoes, but then Elder Benjamin grabbed my arm. “No! Don’t do that. You can’t curse them, because they know not. And they didn’t cast us out. We left on our own.”
“Maybe. But have you ever seen so much pride? Nothing they said could be wrong. And what about Han-bin? We can’t let him get away with how he’s treated us. Why feign interest only to fake us and then set up this ambush meeting? Isn’t that worse than casting us out?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
Elder Benjamin walked away, and I scurried to follow. “But doesn’t it?” I asked. “This could have been a golden opportunity. If we had gotten through to them, it would have led to many conversions. Can you imagine what kind of breakthrough that would have been — how many souls we could have saved? But it seems like you gave up at the end.”
“I was listening.”
Now on the second floor, Elder Benjamin left the staircase and walked across a mezzanine. I asked, “Um, … where are we going now?”
“I’m following.”
“What? The Spirit? The exit is downstairs. I could have told you that.”
Elder Benjamin said, “I’m listening and following … this way.” We reached the staircase on the other side, and he went up.
“I don’t think this is the way out,” I said.
“Shhh,” said Elder Benjamin. One floor up, he exited on to the third floor and said, “Here it is. Three doors.” I looked, and sure enough, there were three doors in front of us.
Then it hit me. “Wait, you want to knock these doors out? It’s 8:35. We’ve already done enough. It’s time to go home.”
“Aren’t you listening?” he said. “I’ll take the first one.” He knocked, and after a minute someone opened the door, which was chained.
“Hello, who is it?” said a woman.
Elder Benjamin said, “We’re foreign missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and we have a message …”
The door slammed loudly in our faces, echoing through the hall, which was an achievement considering the door had been chained and not opened that far. We were used to it, and quickly brushed it off.
“Okay,” said Elder Benjamin. “Your turn.”
I took the middle door. I knocked, and no answer. At least not yet. I heard noises inside — someone watching TV. So I tried it again. And still no answer.
“What are we doing?” I asked. “Wasn’t it enough to be tortured by professors? Are we looking to give out one last Mormon Kyeong so we end on a high note?”
“You still don’t hear it?” said Elder Benjamin.
“Hear what?” What I heard was no one coming to the door.
“The real reason why we’re here. Think about it. Meeting Han-bin, being faked at the movie, his wasting our time tonight, trying to make us stop doing what we’re doing. None of that was important. It all leads up to this moment here — why we’re really here. Had we not gone through all that torture, we would have never gotten here.”
“What? Right here in this hall?”
“Yes. About thirty minutes ago, the Spirit came upon me suddenly. It told me someone was calling out for help. I ignored it for a few minutes, but it hit even stronger. It said: all you have to do is leave and I will guide you. But you all kept on going. And then after another few minutes, it hit the strongest, saying: it’s now or never. You need to leave now.
“You see,” he said, “This is how God delivered us. It was His plan this whole entire time. Behind one of these three doors, there is someone ready to hear our message, and we need to find out which one it is. So, I’ll take this last door, and if they don’t answer, we can come back and try this one again.”
And then the Spirit confirmed the truth of what he was saying. God had been guiding us this whole time. In my desire to convert the unconvertible — to grab the incredible story I could tell all my friends — the glory of being the best missionaries in the mission, I had forgotten that it was our calling to find the ones ready to hear our message among all the unconvertible. In my anger, I had missed the calling entirely.
“I see you finally hear it,” said Elder Benjamin. “Let’s knock this last door.”
He knocked and after half a minute, someone opened the door, his face down. He said, “Hello?”
Elder Benjamin said, “We’re foreign missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints …”
“You came,” he said, looking up. “I was just praying for answers, and here you are. Come on in.” He opened the door wider.
Elder Benjamin looked over at me, eyes wide, as if somewhat surprised, himself, how well the Spirit’s promptings had worked.
As we sat down on the floor of his living area, our host said, “I’m Kim Bo-yeon (김보연), and I’m so happy you came.”
