Mentor Pastor
I
was furious at the youth pastor but
held my tongue, lest I derail
Kristin being ministered by his esteemed mentor pastor. He let me know several days
later that he had gotten hold of his mentor pastor, who had consented to minister
to Kristin at his church on the day of its Christmas celebration. That date was
twelve days away and casting out demons amidst Christmas celebration seemed
odd, but she at
least had a date, and perhaps casting out demons
is as easy for the mentor pastor as the youth pastor claimed, so Kristin and I continued to pray together via
skype calls, and waited.
Kristin called after meeting with the mentor pastor. She said the mentor pastor had her - the only white person - sit next to him at the center of the front row in a sea of Koreans as they watched his church's Christmas performance. She said some of the performances were very fleshly, almost sexualized, and included girls doing pelvic thrusts while on the floor as they danced in front of her and the mentor pastor.
After the performance, the mentor pastor led Kristin, the youth pastor, his wife, and a few others into his office, and after sitting down, asked Kristin what she thought of the performance. Kristin replied honestly that she thought some of the dances, like the girls doing pelvic thrusts while on the floor, were not appropriate for a church performance.
The mentor pastor took offense at her reply and his countenance changed. He told her that she had demons because she has a bad personaltiy, said he will not cast demons out of her, but will listen while she prays for herself. So she prayed for herself in front of them, after which the mentor pastor walked her and the others to his door, and bid everyone goodbye. Kristin was disappointed. I was livid, told her how sorry and angry I was, and told her to put the youth pastor on the phone.
The youth pastor said that in Korea, pastors, especially of a big church like his mentor pastor's, are revered. Kristin's answer had caused his mentor pastor to lose face, hence his reaction.
I told him that if girls were dancing in a sexual manner at a church, what Kristin said was right. But even if she had been wrong, how dare a so-called "mentor" pastor who claims to be a servant of Jesus and gifted by Him to cast all demons out of a suffering missionary refuse to do so because his ego was bruised!
The youth pastor replied that he and his wife are also disappointed that their mentor pastor had refused to cast the demons out of Kristin, but there was nothing more that they can do.
So what were their plans for Kristin now?
He replied that he and his wife had been approved for the full time position from their missions board and will be starting a training seminar in a couple of weeks, so he was thinking of sending Kristin back to me. In a nutshell, Kristin had served his purpose in taking her to Korea, so he now wanted to be done with her. I was floored but again held my tongue and tried to be constructive.
He had boasted to me in the past about how strong Christianity is in Korea; it had the second largest number of Christians in the world and fielded more missionaries per capita than even USA. Surely, Kristin is better off in a Christian country like Korea than returning to the Buddhist southeast Asia. If he couldn't take care of her anymore, there must be someone else in his network in Korea who could.
He said he didn't know of anyone, so I told him that I will spend the next week contacting every English ministry in Korea that I can find online and asked him to spend the week contacting Korean ministries that do deliverance ministry and could take Kristin. He reluctantly agreed to do so.