Questions about Daystar

[Freedom]

Originally Posted by Nell

I was a Daystar investor. At the time, it seemed like the best way to show the elders that you were absolute. I was small potatoes, so I didn't lose much. I signed a document forgiving the debt because it seemed like the best way to show the elders that I was absolute.

There were quite a large number of saints in the "release of debt" meeting, We were told that WL was distraught over the failure of Daystar and the loss of the saints money. I remember one who had invested the money their parents had given them to pay for their college education. They could not sign the "release of debt" document and reportedly did recieve their money back. So there was some money to repay the saints who could not lose their investment. This begs the question, where did it come from? I have thought that if I were the one who took money from the saints and later I lost their money for whatever reason, I would repay them if it was the last thing I did on this earth. If I had a successful publishing company, proceeds from that operation would go first to repaying the debt I owed the saints. Ironically, in that scenario, the saints who lost money in Daystar would be the same ones buying books from LSM...in effect, paying themselves back.

As I said, my "investment" was totally self-serving. When it went down, we were told that the reason was the "oil crisis" when the price of gasoline went through the roof. I questioned this...to myself of course. It seemed to me that anyone who could afford to pay $70K for a motorhome could also afford to put gas in it...regardless of the price.

Because of the hype, failure was not an option. They certainly couldn't admit "we were wrong", so it was handy to blame the "oil crisis".

Nell

Daystar was an opportunity for a lesson to be learned, and sadly that never happened. I don't blame Lee for being concerned for the financial needs of the LC. Being that he was so dedicated to his ministry, running a side business is something that he should have never done, and even more importantly, he failed to utilize the proper avenues in terms of finding business loans and investors. In other words, he was wrong to use LC members as a easy way to drum up investments for his business.

You made a good point about the oil crisis. That was probably only a minor part of what cause the business to fail. It sounds to me like they just couldn't sell the motorhomes to people. I'm sure plenty people were buying other motorhomes at the time.

I've always found it a bit troubling that some were repaid the debt, others were asked to forgive the debt. That indicates there was enough money lying around to appease those who wouldn't be happy with their losses. LSM should have done their best to pay back everyone at a later point in time (it's not like they didn't have the money after they began charging training "donations").

In more recent years, there hasn't been a Daystar type venture, but I've seen the same pattern of wasting saints time and money. The Harvest House litigation comes to mind. I wonder how many millions of dollars were wasted on that? I wonder how many donated? Maybe it was a bigger waste than Daystar for all we know.

I just found out recently that the LC's in Southern California are planning on purchasing a well-known camp in the area. Here's the kicker, the decision has been made, they need something like $10 million for the purchase, so they are calling a gathering in a month or so to have some "fellowship" about this purchase. Do you know what that gathering will be? It will be a call for $$$$. If the decision has been made, there isn't anything to "fellowship" about. They will simply tell everyone how it's going to be and how they can "participate". What irks me is that in the event they sold the acquired real estate, who gets the money? I'm fairly certain that it won't be redistributed to the churches who invested. So Daystar is long over, but the pattern continues to this day.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by Freedom

LSM should have done their best to pay back everyone at a later point in time (it's not like they didn't have the money after they began charging training "donations").

Pay back everyone? With who's money? They would take the money from the very ones they owe, to pay them back. If you ask me Daystar was a ponzi pyramid scheme ... and those at the top walked with the money. I'll bet Tim Lee didn't lose any money.

What irks me is that in the event they sold the acquired real estate, who gets the money?

I've been there. I was told "It's God's money." I was taken aback. I had already crossed the elder so I didn't kick a fuss. I figured I wasn't gettin the money back anyway. But my thought was, 'Yeah it's God's money but He wants me to hold it, not you.'

Nell,

I've read that Tim Lee walked with a million from Daystar. You know anything about that?

[Freedom]

Originally Posted by awareness

Pay back everyone? With who's money? They would take the money from the very ones they owe, to pay them back. If you ask me Daystar was a ponzi pyramid scheme ... and those at the top walked with the money. I'll bet Tim Lee didn't lose any money.

It isn't clear to me the time-frame in which the reimbursements happened. Unless it happened over an extended period, I would suspect that the funds came from Daystar accounts instead of LSM funds (if those two entities can even be distinguished).

My theory is that those running Daystar realized that the motorhomes weren't selling long before there were any significant losses, so they closed up shop. In other words, there was probably some money floating around. Lee was forced with the decision of how best to salvage the situation, and I presume he repaid those most likely to raise a fuss.

From a broader perspective, yes I would agree with you that it was basically a ponzi scheme. That's not to say that it was planned out purposely in that way, but it could have never survived as a normal business in America. There were too many entities involved, too much moving money around. I suppose they thought that they didn't need to worry about if it was an ill-advised venture, God was going to bless them no matter what.

[aron]

Originally Posted by Freedom

...it was basically a ponzi scheme. That's not to say that it was planned out purposely in that way, but it could have never survived as a normal business in America. There were too many entities involved, too much moving money around

Suppose, just for the sake of consideration, that Tim Lee was an astute businessman. Suppose that OPEC didn't rear its ugly head and gas didn't zoom upward in price. Suppose that these were actually well constructed vehicles, not the "wildebeasts" one former salesman called them. Hot, heavy, clunky, smoky pieces of junk.

Suppose this thing had actually made a profit. I would still ask, what the hell (and I use this word deliberately) was Witness Lee doing, using the podium to extract money from church members for business ventures? What the hell was going on here? What kind of glassy-eyed idiots did we have to be (and I was one) to think that moving ourselves into collective money-making enterprises was church... I don't even have words here...

We had all this hifalutin verbiage of the glorious church, the bride of Christ, and accompanying vilification of "fallen Christianity" which missed the Divine Mandate, then suddenly we were getting excited about building MOTOR HOMES? What the hell?

At the very best, this thing was going to be a snare, a trap, and a stumbling. At the very best.

[Freedom]

Originally Posted by aron

Suppose, just for the sake of consideration, that Tim Lee was an astute businessman. Suppose that OPEC didn't rear its ugly head and gas didn't zoom upward in price. Suppose that these were actually well constructed vehicles, not the "wildebeasts" one former salesman called them. Hot, heavy, clunky, smoky pieces of junk.

Suppose this thing had actually made a profit. I would still ask, what the hell (and I use this word deliberately) was Witness Lee doing, using the podium to extract money from church members for business ventures? What the hell was going on here? What kind of glassy-eyed idiots did we have to be (and I was one) to think that moving ourselves into collective money-making enterprises was church... I don't even have words here...

We had all this hifalutin verbiage of the glorious church, the bride of Christ, and accompanying vilification of "fallen Christianity" which missed the Divine Mandate, then suddenly we were getting excited about building MOTOR HOMES? What the hell?

At the very best, this thing was going to be a snare, a trap, and a stumbling. At the very best.

I couldn't agree more. Maybe Lee thought that Ponzi schemes couldn't fail in the LC because "there is no hierarchy in the church life". Think about that one for a minute.

On a more serious note, there are absolutely no excuses whatsoever for Lee to have used his ministry as a platform for business ventures. What I find particularly disgusting is the that he knew very well that the saints would be willing to go along with whatever he wanted to do. If there's anything thing I've learned from my time in the LC, it's that LCers love to give. They love to give time, money, and energy to the LC. To put it simply, anyone who donated to Daystar had their "willingness" taken advantage of.

Maybe most LCers couldn't see beyond the "giving" aspect (as they conditioned to), but did it ever occur to anyone that the business was not guaranteed to be profitable? Apparently not. Business involves an inherent risk, and this is exactly what everyone was oblivious to. I'm sure everyone thought God's blessing had been upon Lee from day 1, so maybe they felt invincible to anything but success.

In a best case scenario, it would have taken the business years to grow, and a good amount of time for it to become significantly profitable. That is assuming the books are 100% legit and there are no underhanded dealings going on. The formula for success just wasn't there and it just seems so far-fetched that anyone could have believed in it succeeding. Even if it was successful I'm sure the Overseas Christian Stealers nonsense would have caught up to Lee before long.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by Freedom

That is assuming the books are 100% legit and there are no underhanded dealings going on.

A brother intimately involved in Daystar told me he was made to leave the LC for saying he knew for a fact that Witness Lee committed crimes with Daystar.

[UntoHim]

Artice from the website Coachbuilt.Com about longtime auto/truck/coach designer W.E. Miller

The following is an excerpt from this article and can be found towards the end of the article. Also there is a picture of a completed (maybe restored?) Daystar motorhome at the bottom right of the article.

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"In 1972 he (W.E. Miller) gave up editing the Gazette and took a full-time position as chief engineer/designer with Daystar Motor Homes, Inc., 1414 West Artesia Blvd., Compton, California. The firm's $70,000 26ft luxury motor home was built on a Dodge 440 commercial truck chassis by a third party in Taiwan named Phosphorous, a Chinese-American firm connected with Witness Lee's Southern Californian 'Local Church'.

Miller even travelled to Phosphorous' Kaohsiung, Taiwan (Republic of China) factory to make arrangements for the construction of the Cor-Ten steel body and teak interior.

Only 16 Daystars are known to have been constructed before the firm closed down in 1975, the victim of an alleged money-laundering scheme initiated by Phosphorous' directors Timothy Lee, Samuel Chang and K.H. Weigh."

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[Nell]

Originally Posted by awareness

Pay back everyone? With who's money? They would take the money from the very ones they owe, to pay them back. If you ask me Daystar was a ponzi pyramid scheme ... and those at the top walked with the money. I'll bet Tim Lee didn't lose any money.


I've been there. I was told "It's God's money." I was taken aback. I had already crossed the elder so I didn't kick a fuss. I figured I wasn't gettin the money back anyway. But my thought was, 'Yeah it's God's money but He wants me to hold it, not you.'

Nell,

I've read that Tim Lee walked with a million from Daystar. You know anything about that?

I don't. Sorry I didn't see your quesiton sooner.
Nell

[UntoHim]

Does anybody have any information regarding the other Witness Lee/LSM financial boondoggles, such as Linko (sp.?) or the Tennis Racket deal? Wasn't Linko the company that produced those ugly goldish colored chairs. I know that most of the Local Churches in Orange County had to buy those for their meeting halls. My butt STILL hurts from sitting on those for 30 Training meetings twice a year.

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[Ohio]

Originally Posted by UntoHim

Does anybody have any information regarding the other Witness Lee/LSM financial boondoggles, such as Linko (sp.?) or the Tennis Racket deal? Wasn't Linko the company that produced those ugly goldish colored chairs. I know that most of the Local Churches in Orange County had to buy those for their meeting halls. My butt STILL hurts from sitting on those for 30 Training meetings twice a year.

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LinKo was a piece of land outside Taipei where LSM wanted to build a stadium for conferences and trainings with W Lee.

Some one forgot to check zoning regulations, and the thing was never built.

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One day Titus Chu got a call from Lee that he just bought 1,000 goldish chairs.

One day our elder got a call from Chu that he just bought 100 goldish chairs.

One day I got a call from our elder to go to Cleveland and pickup 100 goldish chairs.

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And we called it the fellowship of the Spirit in the one body.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by Ohio

One day Titus Chu got a call from Lee that he just bought 1,000 goldish chairs.

One day our elder got a call from Chu that he just bought 100 goldish chairs.

One day I got a call from our elder to go to Cleveland and pickup 100 goldish chairs.

And neither Chu nor Ohio had sense enough to drive as far away from the LRM as far and fast as possible.

Why?

[aron]

Originally Posted by Ohio

And we called it the fellowship of the Spirit in the one body.

You got to experience not just the universality, but the practicality of the oneness.

"Thank you sir, may I please have another"