On February 21st, 2014, Pastor Yonggi Cho was convicted of embezzling over $12M from his large Korean mega-church over a period of years. Now, the Korean authorities are set to audit the world’s largest church, the Yoido Full Gospel Church, based on suspicion that over $60 million dollars were embezzled by Pastor Cho and his associates. General account funds and money given for overseas missions were diverted as severance pay without approval from the church. Read more about this from the Korea Times, here.
When Cho was convicted 2 and 1/2 year ago, journalist Lee Grady offered these important suggestions for church members and church leadership:
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- 1. Never build a cult of personality.
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- 2. Develop a culture of openness.
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- 3. Insist on financial transparency.
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- 4. Don’t build a family dynasty.
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- 5. Beware of creating a greed monster.
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- 6. Never tolerate a spirit of entitlement.”