It was May of 2001 when I lost my job as an electrical engineer in Silicon Valley. It was a huge disappointment. They did not tell me why I was laid off. I had made many friends at Chrontel. I thought that God could use me to speak about my faith to my Chinese friends at Chrontel, but the Lord took my job away. I did not understand why I lost my job. I really felt that I could do some serious engineering work at Chrontel before I was laid off. I thought it was a mistake on part of Chrontel to lay me off when they had trained me to be a competent engineer. They just told me that I worked hard, I was a nice person, and I was a good physicist.
I lost tremendous confidence in my abilities as an electrical engineer. At the time, I was having a number of interviews all over Silicon Valley. I received tons of phone calls from recruiters and human resources, and yet I was not able to land myself a job. Silicon Valley was having a recession during the middle of the year 2001. People were getting laid off left and right. I knew six brothers at KCPC (Korean Central Presbyterian Church) in San Francisco who lost their jobs. Young Adult Ministry in Silicon Valley was having enough problems just to find enough time to come to church. And then they all had to struggle further to keep their jobs. So I prayed to the Lord that all of the Young Adults at KCPC who lost their jobs would find another job. Thus, the Lord answered my prayers, and they all found new jobs. I praised the Lord when all of my friends found other jobs.
After I got rejected at a number of interviews, I started to pray to God honestly and yelled in my anger and frustration. I was dumping all of my problems and frustrations onto our Lord.
"Lord, I am sick and tired of praying to You! I am tired of praying to You for every detail of my life! Why can't You provide all of my needs so that I do not have to pray to You every time?! I am so frustrated with You, Lord! I am so tired of prayer! I felt like I have to pray to You because I know that I am weak and pitiful! Can You let me stop praying to You for every detail of my life! Why can't You leave me alone?! Why can't You save my father?! I am tired praying to You and am begging You to show mercy on me!"
It was the end of August of 2001. I was going to have an interview with Boeing in Southern California. I really did not want to leave KCPC when the Boeing job would be located in Southern California, and I dumped all of my frustrations on the Lord again. I did not want to move down to Southern California, when I was starting to make some friends at KCPC. Even though I wanted to stay at KCPC, I prayed to the Lord that He would help me get the job at Boeing. Boeing was kind enough to rent a car for me from LAX for the interview. As I drove from LAX to Irvine, I wanted to see a sister in Christ who was a good friend to me. She is not a Korean or a Korean-American. Initially, I did not want a romantic relationship with her, as I had prayed for a Korean-speaking and English-speaking Christian wife. We had coffee together, and she was a good friend. She always remembered my birthday while other brothers have forgotten my own. I have decided not to care whether anyone remembers my birthday. I really did like her as a friend. After we chatted for an hour at the coffee shop at Irvine Marketplace, I went back to my grandmother's home at Irvine. I slept for many hours before I had my interview with Boeing.
It was a 6 to 7 hour interview. I was exhausted by the end of the 6th hour. It was a long and tough process. I used up so much of my energy trying to prove to the people at Boeing that I should get the job. I wanted to do my best during the interview, as I knew Pastor Ryan Kim had prayed so hard for me. I also wanted to be a good witness to my non-Christian father and mother by acting responsibly in terms of finding a job and being able to support myself. After the interview was over, I was relieved and drove directly to LAX to come home to San Jose.
When I came back to San Jose Airport from Southern California, my non-Christian father collapsed onto his bed. His eyes were clenched shut, and sweat came down his face. I asked my father what was happening.
He said, "My chest hurts."
I asked him, "Can you squeeze my finger?"
As he grabbed my finger, I knew that he understood what I was saying.
Then I said, "Mom, I am going to call 911. I think that Dad is in serious trouble."
She said, "No, Joseph. Your father will be ok. Don't bother the people in 911. Please."
My mother grabbed my arm, but I forced my way to the phone in my room at Milpitas, California. As I dialed 911, I said, "Can you send an ambulance to my home? My father is having chest pains."
The operator said, "Is he having a heart attack?"
"I do not know," I said. I was scared.
"Don't worry. We are sending a unit to come to your home."
The paramedics came to our home. They checked my Dad's pulse on his arms and measured his blood pressure. They decided to take my father to a hospital in San Jose, California. I followed the ambulance to the hospital, but traffic was terrible. I believe it was Labor or Memorial Day, but the ambulance rode off to the hospital while I was stuck with my mother in traffic on the 680. My mother did not cry. I was not crying. We were too shocked to feel any grief over my father's chest pains. I was hoping that my non-Christian father was just having chest pains. When I arrived at the hospital, the doctor told our family that my Dad had almost died of a heart attack.
I was numbed by the news that my father had a heart attack. I did not pray. Maybe I was so angry at God that I did not want to speak to him. I was sick and tired of praying for the first time in my life. Before, I had always enjoyed praying to the Lord. I used to enjoy prayer. But at that time, I just wanted to quit praying to God. I was literally walking through the valley of death during the month of September of 2001.
As I walked further through the darkest moments of my Christian life, I called my younger brother Richard on the phone. He was at Washington, D.C. while my father was lying on the bed at the hospital. When Richard got the phone, I told him the sad news that our father and had a heart attack. Richard gasped in despair. He could not believe that our father might not live to see us get married or to be a grandfather to our future children.
"Richard, I know that you are taking the news very hard. I know it is difficult for you. It is also difficult for me. What we need to do is that we need to find a way to take care of Mom if something terrible happens to Dad. I know you want to see Dad right now, but I believe that we should do what Dad wants us to do. That is, to get a job for myself, and for you to get your Ph.D. at Georgetown University. Maybe you should find a job in California after you get your Ph.D. to stay close to Mom so that we can save money in terms of your rent."
"F--- you, Joseph," my brother said.
"Richard, you really do not mean to say that."
"F--- you. Get off the phone and let me talk to Mom."
I knew that my younger brother blamed me for my father's heart attack. I could see that my younger brother hated me when I needed him. I knew that I had to be the head of the family. I knew that I had to find a way to lead Mom, hal-mo-nee ("grandmother" in Korean) and my younger brother Richard. I asked myself, "Can I really become a leader? My non-Christian family has no respect for me. They think that I am a total idiot. They think that I am a total failure or loser." I did not pray. I was still waiting for some possible good news from my father's catheterization, and more bad news hit me. My father needed open heart surgery, or else he might die. I started to panic.
I had said to myself, "How am I going to take care of my dad and my mom." I knew that my mother would need my help, as she could not even use an ATM machine. I knew that I needed to find a job to support my family. So I prayed that I would get the job at Boeing for one minute. I really thought it was God's will for me to get the job when my family needed me to bring the beacon home when my father was ill. However, I received more bad news that I did not get the job at Boeing. I just could not believe that God had pounded me with more bad news.
A week later, the terrorists murdered 3,000 people at the World Trade Center. The whole world was turning upside down so quickly in my life. At that time, I was not concerned about the people in the World Trade Center even though I watched the news for hours. I just did not care about the people in the World Trade Center. I just cared about my father, who might never know the Lord. I was upset. I was holding all of my anger and frustrations inside. I really wanted to be a S.O.B. I was on the verge of chewing off the entire world when 3,000 people at the World Trade Center had just died. I just felt no remorse or sadness for them when my father, whom I love so dearly, was going to die without knowing God as his Lord and Savior. I was upset and troubled, and I lacked the strength to pray to God.
Maybe that is why God did not hear my prayers for the past 12 years. I just did not pray hard enough when my non-Christian father needed my prayers the most. Pastor Ryan Kim heard about the news. He told me that he would pray for my father and my family. I asked him to see my mother at the hospital while I was looking for a job on the internet and going to school. My father was having open-heart surgery. I knew what my father wanted me to do -- to help the family by getting a job. I knew that staying at the hospital would not help my father. I knew that my father wanted me to love my mother and take care of her if he were to pass away. I wanted to cry, but my father told me that whenever you cry, you are wasting time. I decided to save time by looking for a job and by going to school.
After I finished school at Mission Valley Regional Occupational Program (community college) for the day, I came to the hospital where my father had his open heart surgery. Pastor Ryan was at the hospital with my mother. My mother rebuked me for letting Pastor Ryan suffer by being with her. She rebuked me because she felt that I had wasted so much of Pastor Ryan's valuable time. She felt extremely badly that Pastor Ryan suffered many long hours waiting in the hospital while my father was having his open heart surgery.
Pastor Ryan and I went into the ICU (Intensive Care Unit) to see my father. Pastor Ryan asked my non-Christian father whether he wanted him to pray for my father. My father looked tired and sleepy. He barely uttered the word "yes" through the tubes from his mouth. I saw my father unconscious and his eyes shut. I saw his chest bandaged heavily to seal his wounds. I just could not believe that God was so cruel to me and my family. I did not understand Him. I just did not understand why God put me and my family through so much misery and stress. I was having enough pressure to find a job and to go to school. Now, I needed to lead the family as the eldest son of the Lee family. I had an obligation as a Korean to take care of my family whenever the father passes away or is ill, even though I was totally incapable to help my family. I was struggling to take care of myself. How in the world could I take care of my family?
After two weeks passed by, my father made a full recovery. He still made fun of my Christian beliefs and rejected the resurrection. He still thought that Jesus died two thousand years ago. I was going through a lot of pressure. I knew that I must lead my family, and that my family needed to follow me since I was the eldest Korean son of the family. I had an obligation to take care of my family, even though I did not have the faintest clue about how to support my family.
When I realized that I was pitifully weak and unable, I sobbed on my cell phone talking to Pastor Ryan Kim. I had faced so much pressure. I told him that I was so angry at God for what had happened to my father and my family. I blamed the Lord for not shedding any mercy on my family and myself. I just could not understand Him for letting my father go through the heart attack. I did not understand why He made me so weak, to the point that I could not pray to Him. I just could not believe that I was unable to pray when my father was dying at the hospital.
Weeks after the open heart surgery, my younger brother Richard apologized to me for insulting me. My father made a full recovery and was able to work at Honeywell without any problems or difficulties. I also started a website for my e-mail ministry called CHEMISTRY (CHristian E-mail MIniSTRY) at http://www.josephylee.org. My younger brother Richard finally got his Ph.D. with an emphasis on cancer research at Georgetown, and he finally got a post-doc job position at Georgetown University with his professor. I learned the fundamentals of verilog HDL, a software program for digital IC design.
Months after the open heart surgery, I also managed to arrange a surprise birthday party for my father during the month of March 2002. I designed my father's birthday cake with a integrated circuit design on the cake to surprise my father. I thought about designing a cross section of a PMOS transistor. I believe that I put an emitter follower with an inductor instead, because I thought it would be too difficult for the people at Albertson's to make the cake with the cross section of the PMOS transistor. Pastor Ryan Kim was at the surprise birthday party with my family, and my non-Christian father asked my pastor, who is my best friend at church, to pray for him before we ate dinner. My father had never asked anyone to pray for him before.
Last of all, I got accepted at the University of Southern California's electrical engineering graduate department, with emphasis on VLSI Design. I was so thankful to God for what He had done for me. I knew that all of my accomplishments came from the Lord. All of my prayers and all of my deeds were tainted with sin, but Jesus made all of my prayers and my deeds pleasing to God the Father through the blood of Christ. Somehow, God just wanted to love me. He probably wanted my heart instead of my prayers. He understood that I was weak and was having a hard time.
I know that God's grace is free. I know that He just wanted to love me when I was having a really hard time. He knew that I was extremely sad about my hurt and circumstances. However, I know that the Universal Christian Protestant Church is in serious trouble. The United States Court of Appeals banned the word "God" in the Pledge of Allegiance in the state of California and other states. Pakistan and India were on the verge of a nuclear war. Kim Jung Il showed no remorse over the millions of Koreans dying of starvation in North Korea. About one million Christians in China are in prison. The United States declared war on terrorism at Afghanistan, and I would not be surprised if Saddam Hussein is responsible for the anthrax used in the US.
On March of 2002, I made the decision to go to East Asia for missions in the summer of 2002. I know that God is sovereign, but I do not want to be part of the problem in the United States by doing nothing with my faith. I know that I have a job to do -- to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever. I want to worship God in the missions field. I also want the people in East Asia to know the Lord.
After I told my missions team leader that I wanted to go to East Asia for missions, my team leader embraced the idea and said that I should go with his team. So, I finally wrote my missions support letter. I gave it to everyone at KCPC at San Francisco to help me with my finances. My non-Christian father and mother made it clear that they did not want to help me with my missions trip, and I was flat broke. I did not have any money to help myself when I had so many bills to pay. My missions team leader was kind enough to let me not go to the missions training at Los Angeles for 75% of the time when I was in San Jose. I knew that I had to work harder to raise more money for my team when my team was struggling financially.
I was going through some spiritual battles. Two weeks before I got to go to my missions trip to East Asia, I questioned my faith in the Lord. I questioned whether or not I really loved God in my heart. I had some bitterness towards God for receiving some rejection letters from Stanford and Berkeley. I really wondered whether God really answered my prayers or whether my prayers were answered by accident. I needed a couple of hundred dollars before my trip, and I asked myself whether all of my efforts to go to East Asia were really worth it. I actually panicked, and I was afraid. I said to myself, "What I am afraid of? Am I afraid to die? What is the matter with me? I am the type of Christian who is not afraid to share the gospel, or even of death." So, I prayed with my lack of faith. I really wondered whether I could be of any help to my team. I wondered whether God could use me when I was so pitifully weak. One week before my missions trip started, I raised about 135% of my missions fund at the last minute. I could not believe it. I really believed that God tried to love me. I had complained to the people at my local church that they did not really care about my trip. Now, I realized that God wanted to love me even though I had a critical heart towards my friends at church. I just could not believe that God heard my prayers, especially when I had a weak faith.
I finally arrived at East Asia. All of the people in my team were with me in early July of 2002. We were learning the East Asian language for two and a half weeks from our teacher. While I was learning the East Asian language, I was able to grasp the East Asian language quicker, since I had gone to East Asia two years ago in the summer of 2000. Learning another language was especially hard for me. However, we did have a good teacher.
For security purposes, I will call our East Asian language teacher Grace (alias). Grace is not a Christian. One of our teammates tried to share the gospel with Grace by showing the "Jesus" video on TV and through a Christian tract. Grace was not convinced, and our team was really sad. We basically spent the entire missions trip trying to help Grace know the Lord. We went shopping with her. We ate dinner and lunch together almost every day. We prayed and prayed, but somehow, it was not in God's will to save Grace during our trip. Even though we had not convinced Grace to know the Lord, we were worshipping God and did our best to help Grace.
Sharing the gospel in East Asia is extremely hard. Both the language barrier and security protocol were huge problems for me. If our team were to get caught by the Communist police, our team would have been kicked out of the country. We also were not allowed to share the gospel to anyone who was a member of the Communist party. Many East Asians wanted to join the Communist party, because joining the Communist party guarantees them a good job. Many East Asians, whom I have met, identify themselves as Communists, and I had to be extremely careful what I said to them, or else they might have reported me to the police as a Christian evangelist. So, I tried to be their friend without sharing the gospel with them, but I did tell some of them that I was a Christian indirectly.
During the trip, I tried to meet some of the East Asians at the badminton courts. I met 9 East Asians for the first two days of the trip. Almost all of them did not know one word of English. It was frustrating. However, I did meet some East Asians who spoke English extremely well, but many of them wanted to join the Communist party. I told the people in my team that I had met a lot of Communists who speak English really well and many East Asians do not know a word of English. I asked them whether I could be their friend and talk about the Bible at another time, not during the trip. I got my OK from my missions team leader. So, I met them and tried to be their friend.
One Communist friend in East Asia seemed extremely friendly. He was an aerospace engineer at the university. I talked with him and met with his friends. I was invited into their dormitory, and it was ghetto. Before I entered where they slept, I saw a Communist Bible-like verse on the door and saw the picture of Karl Marx on their wall. Already, their room was screaming for trouble if I were to share the gospel with them. I decided not to preach, but talk about other topics not related to the Bible. It was extremely hard. Language barrier was a huge obstacle for me and security protocol made it even harder. I also had diarrhea problems, which started on the first day of the missions trip. Yes, I was embarrassed that I might defecate on my underwear while I was in East Asia. Bathroom conditions were terrible. As I was trying not to defecate on my underwear, I was talking to my Communist friends at the dormitory, talking about the East Asia's potential as an economic leader of progress and wealth.
As my Communist friend and I were talking, I gave all of his friends my math and physics tutoring cards. I told them if they ever visited the United States, they should give me a call, and that I could pick them from the airport in LAX or San Jose. My Communist friend identified Former President Abraham Lincoln as a person who cared for the poor. Then I said, "Abraham Lincoln is a great Christian. In fact, his favorite verse in the Bible is in the book of Psalms."
I believe that my Communist friend knew that I was a Christian. We talked and decided to play basketball together at another time. Honestly speaking, I felt very uncomfortable talking to some of the Communists at East Asia. Somehow, God was trying to tell me that not all Communists are bad. Evangelism takes risks. It may even cost my freedom or my life if I were evangelizing in North Korea. As we talked, I realized that my Communist friend was not a bad person. He was just like everyone else around the world.
My diarrhea got worse during the coming weak. I was defecating by the hour. I was weak, and I was not able to share the gospel to the people in East Asia as much as I wanted to. I just could not believe that missions to East Asia was so incredibly hard. I dreaded the missions trip. I did not enjoy it because I was so ill. My missions team leader told me that I was overweight and that my weight problem weakened the immune system of my body. I was overwhelmed by the difficulty of the trip. During the year 2000, my East Asian missions trip surpassed my most enjoyable vacation. Now, during the year 2002, my East Asian missions trip was the worst trip in my whole life. My diarrhea problem was totally unexpected. I thought I would have diarrhea for only five days. I was wrong. I had diarrhea for two weeks. I was frustrated, and I asked myself what I was doing in East Asia, to get myself sick throughout the entire missions trip. Not only had I suffered two weeks of diarrhea, but I also suffered a sore throat and a cold for another week. I was so stupid that I kept the air conditioner on while I was sleeping in the night. I told God that I wanted to come home and that I did not want to stay in East Asia. I was extremely disappointed with myself. I felt like a total failure as a part-time Christian evangelist. I wanted to serve God as much I possibly could with my strength.
I could have chosen to give up or I could have prayed. I have decided to pray for many long hours in my room as I was recovering from my diarrhea. I prayed for the church in the United States, and I prayed for my teammates. I really wanted to help the people in East Asia, including the Communists. I wanted everyone to go to heaven. I wanted everyone to realize that God loves everyone, including every non-believer on the planet. I wanted to let everyone in East Asia know that there is a God who loves people. I was praying very hard for my teammates. I prayed for their East Asian non-Christian friends. Miraculously, four non-believers in East Asia accepted Christ as their personal Lord and Savior. I could not believe that God was perfecting my faith in my weakness. (2 Corinthians 12:9) As I prayed, the Lord was with my friends who were evangelizing East Asia for me. I knew that God heard my prayers. I was so thankful to the Lord even though I dreaded the trip. I was so thankful that the Lord gave me the opportunity to worship Him in East Asia. God is so good to me, and is also good to East Asia.
Somehow, the Lord kept on trying to ask me to come back to East Asia for a whole year.
Later on, our missions organization got into trouble with the East Asian police. A number of East Asian believers, who accepted Christ through our missions organization, were arrested by the police, but miraculously, they were released. I was very sad and hurt when some difficulties happened to my East Asian Christian friends. So we basically halted our missions effort in East Asia one week before our missions trip was supposed to be over. I was extremely sad. I just could not believe that some governments in this world misunderstand the Christian church. Maybe God was trying to love us. Maybe it was my fault. I had told Him that I wanted to come back to the United States. Maybe, He wanted to kick me out of the country.
So, we basically spent more time with our teacher Grace (alias). We visited her home, her mother, and her sister, who is trying to get a scholarship to come to the United States. I realized that the Lord wanted us to spend more time with our East Asian language teacher. Again, the Lord basically tried to love us even though I questioned myself as to whether or not I loved the Lord.
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What really encouraged me throughout the trip in East Asia was that I met many believers from South Korea evangelizing in East Asia. I believe there was a total of a hundred short-term missions trainees in East Asia at a retreat in a hotel in East Asia. I saw them singing praise songs. I saw them as loved by God for who they are. I really believe that God loved the people in East Asia. I also believe that He loved the believers all over the world, especially South Korea.