With the theme “Great Passion, Great Nation”, the 2007 Leadership Conference hosted by Korea Onnuri Church concluded successfully from Nov. 15-17. The main speakers were Reverend Yong-Jo Ha, Reverend Hong Han, and Reverend Dave Ferguson from Chicago Community Christian Church in United States.

Coming from Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, even as far as South America, ministers received encouragements and their passion were reignited during the three day gathering.

Rev. Yong-Jo Ha, senior pastor of Onnuri Church, stated, “A leader that is equipped with quality and character is the strength to build an exceptional nation.” The purpose of the conference was to revive the Christian leaders in Asia in becoming the strength to change the nation and the society.

A total of 107 Taiwanese ministers and staff workers participated.

The participants included Reverend Ningya Yang, Reverend Shenzhu Zhou, Reverend Zhenhua Zhang, Good TV’s CEO, Mr. Guosheng Zeng, CBMC’s executive director, Mr. Dingchuan Chen, etc.,.

Both Reverend Yang and Reverend Zhou were invited as the conference’s main speakers and participated in the program titled “Blessing Taiwan”, hosted by the conference, to share the situation of churches in Taiwan to brothers and sisters in Korea.

In the program, “Blessing Taiwan”, not only did the Taiwanese ministers shared how God has blessed the Taiwan churches, but also discussed about future ways to do mission in China, the world’s largest mission field.

While sharing the methods of cooperation between Korean churches and Taiwanese churches to fulfill the duty of missions, Reverend Yang reminded the Korean missionaries to be patient and recommended that while they don’t yet know Chinese they should first adapt to Chinese culture in Taiwan before entering China.

Taiwan needs to learn the speed and impulse, and Koreans should also learn Taiwan’s slow and deep considerations.

Reverend Yang stated his biggest gain from this conference was that his coworkers were able to expand their vision and thoughts after seeing how a strong church operates

Reverend Zhang expressed that the theme of the conference, “Great Nation, Great Passion”, left a very deep impression in him.

“I was originally apathetic towards the theme’s topic, because this issue of country is a very complicated and sensitive problem….no matter what you say; tags can be easily added on. I don’t remember when did speaking about loving the nation and having a dream for the country became a forbidden topic in conversations.” Zhang commented on his personal blog.

“Seeing the dreams and passion that the Korean churches have towards Korea at Onnuri Church, we were often times in tears, especially when we were waving our country’s flag and praying for Taiwan, and the passion for our country that has been long-oppressed once again burst out. After returning, I started to pray for the country once again, pray for next year’s presidential election. Even though I am sicken tired of the word fights among the Taiwanese politicians, but in my heart, I still long that Taiwan can one day have a leadership figure that can shout out “Great Nation, Great Passion!”

During the conference, the Onnuri Church worship and praise left a deep impression upon the participants; the attendants were astounded by the complete equipment coordination and performances of professional qualities, wealthy contents, and they hoped that the fire of revival in Korea can also be ignited in Taiwan.

[Editor's note: reporter Ian Huang from Taiwan contributed to this article.]