St Timothy Presbyterian Church in Toronto: Sermons

1 Thessalonians 5:16-24

The first day I visited Sunnybrook hospital was because Paul Kang’s father had a stroke. The doctors said he didn’t have many days left and this morning at six o’clock, he just passed away. When I entered the room, he was kind of breathing, but I didn’t know that he was conscious and when I said Jangdonim , he opened his eyes. He couldn’t talk but had a big smile on his face. I could see that he was very glad to see me. To remember what I said last week, always put a smile on your face. He did that even in his last moments. Joo-song, Joo-yong, Julie and Paul, all of Paul’s siblings were there. We go a long way back and we talked a lot about what we did when we were young. We laughed a lot. There was one Korean woman and she probably found us very strange.

His father’s dying soon, but we are laughing. Even in their father’s last moment. They were able to have a good laugh because they didn’t focus on his death, but on the good life that he lived. I could see their sadness, but also I could see their deep appreciation for the good life he lived. On the way out of the hospital. Paul followed me and said, Mokssanim, he lived a good life. Even in deep sadness, we can have joy and we can have thankfulness. Paul called me so I went there and we prayed together. They were so thankful. I was probably there for about 30 minutes, but there was prayer, thankfulness and lots of laughter. That’s what life is. Prayer, laughter and thankfulness. That’s what life is, that is the will of God for us. He said, rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. Give in all circumstances for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus. For you, that’s a very strong word, the will of God. This is what you got to do in your life.

Life is not about making tons of money. Life is not about winning every game we play. Life is not about getting ahead of everyone else. Life is about enjoying it, living it prayerfully and always being thankful. That is what the most important thing in life is. If you can do that, you have life. If you don’t do that, I don’t know what that life is. But if you can do these three things, you have life. This is how we should live. A good life is not just about what we do. A good life is about how we live. What defines us is not just what we do. What defines us is how we do things.

You should live joyfully, prayerfully, and thankfully and we should do that always without seizing and in all circumstances. But what does that mean? Always without seizing and in all circumstances. That means, that it should be your lifestyle, not just doing it once in a while, but doing that all the time. That means that is your lifestyle, that it should be your lifestyle. It should be the rhythm of our life. It should be a good flow of life, don’t block that good flow of life. Saint Paul said in verse 19, do not quench the spirit here. The word quench is not like quenching your thirst. It’s not like satisfying yourself. Quenching meaning extinguishing, do not extinguish the Holy Spirit, the fire of the spirit. The spirit creates this beautiful rhythm of living joyfully, prayerfully, and thankfully. It is what the spirit does within us. Do not quench the spirit, do not block the good flow the spirit creates within you.

Rejoicing, praying and giving things are not three separate things that you do. They’re all deeply connected. It is one gigantic flow that comes from one source and that one source is the spirit. When we are in God’s spirit, rejoicing, praying and giving thanks flow out of our existence naturally. Not that you do it reluctantly, but it just comes out, oozing out of you, out of your existence. It is something that you should be just aware of. For example, if you’re not thankful, you just need to be aware of it. If you don’t pray, you just need to be aware of it and get back to the spirit and spirit will create the rhythm of life within you. The spirit will help you overcome your sadness, your gloominess, your critical spirit. With the help of the spirit, you will soon come back to your natural rhythm of life.

Yes, sometimes we get frustrated. Sometimes we experience life’s tragedies, whether we like it or not. Even when you’re young, you experience life’s tragedies. We become worried about our unknown future and we get disappointed, and you get really, really tired too. Not only physically, but emotionally and spiritually. Elon Musk, the creator of Tesla had an interview with the New York Times and he said how difficult his life was this year. He said this past year has been the most difficult and painful year of his career. He said it was excruciating. He choked up several times during the interview and noted that he almost missed his brother’s wedding when he was the best man. He flew over just two hours before and did the wedding and then went back to the factory again, and he said he worked seventy to one-hundred and twenty hours a week.

He works continuously. One-hundred and twenty hours a week, divided into seven days is almost seventeen hours every day. He works every day, even on Saturdays and Sundays. Yes, sometimes life can be very difficult to bear. You can easily lose balance and break the rhythm of life. I’m not saying that you should never not be joyful. I’m not saying that you should never not be thankful. Sometimes we are not joyful. Sometimes we are thankful, but are you going to make that your rhythm of life? Always complaining, always critical. Are you going to make that your rhythm of life or do you go back to the rhythm of life which is joyful, thankful and prayerful? That should be the rhythm of life. Sometimes we lose it. Sometimes we lose balance, but eventually, we have to go back to the natural spiritual rhythm of life that is joyful, thankful, and prayerful.

When you’re overly critical, when you’re constantly critical, that is a time when you need to pray. That’s when you need to be in God’s spirit. That’s when we should exercise our spirituality. Then we can find joy and thankfulness again. We’ll find peace and stability. Just remind yourself, rejoice. Be thankful and pray. Just remind yourself that you’ll be alright. Things will work out for good. Don’t fall apart. Keep yourself intact. You’ll find strength again, and most of all, you’ll find your spiritual rhythm again. I hope that all of you live with a good flow of life, a good rhythm of life. 

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Ephesians 4:29-32

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Today I want to talk about kindness. Why do we need to be kind? There’s no reason to be kind. You’re kind because that is what we do. You’re kind because that is what it means to be human. There was a man who went to the river to pray – you know, Asian people, they used to go to a river and pray a lot. I don’t know, something about a river… there’s a spirituality – so he went to pray near the river and he saw a spider struggling, almost drowned. So the man kind of saved the spider, and the spider stung. But he was okay. The next day he went out to pray again, and saw the same spider struggling in the river. So he saved the spider again, and he stung again. And then the spider spoke, “Why do you keep saving me? Why are you so kind? You know, I sting. That’s what I do.” And the man said, “This is what I do. Saving. Being kind to the people in need.”

Why are we kind? Because that is what we do. That is what we are supposed to do. Being kind should be our lifestyle. Whether you’re Christians or not, especially Christians, we have no choice and we have no excuse not to be kind. We are called to be kind. Our lifestyle has to be a lifestyle of being kind. That makes us feel good, but also lifts up the spirit of other people. By just being kind to others, we can do so much good, not only to ourselves but to others. Somebody said, “If we choose the path of kindness, we choose the path that leads to God.” I think that is so true.

St. Paul said, “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.” As you live a lifestyle of being kind, I think we should always do that, especially with your mouth; in what you say with your words, we should be kind. The Bible talks about tongue a lot, especially the book of James. It talks a lot about taming our tongue. He said, “We all stumble in many ways. Anyone who is never at fault in what they say is perfect, able to keep their whole body in check. When we put bits into the mouth of the horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal. Or take the ships as an example; although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go. Likewise, the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue is also a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.” I mean, how much more strongly we could say about what we say from our tongue. That’s what St. Paul said into today’s scripture passage. “Let no evil talk come out of our mouth, but only what is useful for building up as there is need, so your words may give grace to those who hear.”

Our lips have to be sanctified. Our mouth has sanctified. We have to find most edifying words and expressions. Before we speak, we have to think about how what we say affects other people. But often when we’re angry, instead of finding edifying words we are finding the most hurting words. The words that can hurt the most. I mean, that’s not right. Even when you’re angry and upset, we should use edifying words as much as possible. St. Paul said to put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slender together with all malice. It’s so important about what you say. Being kind to each other in what you say is very important, but it is very unfortunate to hear these harsh words from a world leader, constantly. These days, I don’t even want to read the newspaper anymore. We often hear publicly the words we should not even say in private. Meanness, harsh words, nastiness, swearing, foul language, bullying, racist slur, sexual innuendo, and intolerance. These are the words we often hear from the so called world leader. I wonder whether that is a reason for impeachment. I hope that it is. But we hear that so regularly, it’s almost like daily language. We shouldn’t do that. The words should not allow that to happen around us. We should be careful about what we say because we can save a person or destroy a person by what we say.

I believe that there is a magical word that we should always keep on our tongue. You know what that is? To me, that is: thank you. Thank you is a magical word. We should always put the word thank you on our lips. Daily, we should say this phrase. Thank you. Thank you for being there. Spouses to each other, “Thank you.” Why don’t you look around and say thank you. Just say thank you. I mean, thank you is something that we should always say. Not only when people do a favor for us, but generally we should always keep that on our lips. There’s also magical facial expression that you should wear, and it is better than any expensive makeup, Chanel or whatever. That is, to me, a smile. When you put on a smile on your face, all of a sudden you become the most handsome, most beautiful person. Some time, you go and try to stand in front of mirror and smile, and see how good looking you are. When you smile, you become good looking all of a sudden, but when you look at yourself frowning, it’s so ugly. So, standing in front of mirror, practice and see how you look. When you smile, all of a sudden you become so beautiful. So, on your face, you have to put a smile. On your lips, you should always have, “Thank you.” If that is not what it means to be spiritual, I don’t know what it means to be spiritual. That is being spiritual. But our thank you and our smile have to come from our heart. Empty words don’t have that magical power, but when they come from your heart, our smile and our thank you will do wonders in our lives. We need to see them more.

You know, this is one thing that I realize about people. When you focus on yourself, your life shrinks. You become smaller and smaller. But as you put your focus on other people, your life expands. You become bigger and bigger. You become a bigger person. As you constantly focus on yourself, you become smaller, but as you really put focus on other people, being considerate of others, then your life becomes bigger and you become a bigger person. There is no discrimination in kindness. We should be kind to all people. Doesn’t matter who they are, we should not ever lose our kindness to other people. We can never say rude words. We can never treat other people in a rude manner, doesn’t matter who they are. Kindness is pure. It has no ulterior motive. We have no right to treat other people in a rude way.

Also, being kind is not something that you do once in a while. That’s not being kind. Kindness has to be ingrained within us. Always you have to be kind, or you’re not kind at all. When you feel good, you’re kind but when you feel bad, you treat other people in a rude way… That’s not being kind. Being kind is not just an action that you put on, it is what is ingrained in you. So either you’re constantly, consistently kind or you’re not kind at all. That’s why we need spiritual discipline to be kind, not only when you feel good, even when you feel bad. You should not ever lose that attitude of being kind to other people. Kindness is our choice. It is something that we choose every time. So you have to discipline yourself so that you don’t act and you don’t say things according to your emotion as you feel like it. Even if you feel like it you always have to choose to be kind to other people. That’s why we need spiritual discipline. It is your choice…

In any situation, I hope that we can put ourselves in the position of being kind. Sometimes, we can show that by holding a door open for someone. You know, living in a condo, sometimes I get annoyed and frustrated. In a condo, there is a garbage chute and when you go there, there are three sections; organic recycling and garbage. The door doesn’t open once you push the button, so I take this organic stuff and garbage and I pushed the button and a door opens and there is a garbage bag. I don’t know whether it’s organic or garbage or recycle, so I have to take it out, and I don’t know why they don’t push that inside if they know what to do. So I take it out and I put my garbage. And also sometimes in the elevator they don’t wait for you, and when they see you coming they close it. I don’t know why they’re in such a hurry, they could just wait and hold the door for each other. If you are one of those, don’t say that you’re from St. Timothy.

I mean, just being kind is a basic human thing to do to each other, to live pleasantly. Sometimes, you know, when you are in a group, there are people who feel kind of left out or isolated. Approach them. Let them feel included. That is being kind. Sometimes you hear the stories of the people, sad stories, sometimes stories of sorrow, or pain. You sit down and listen to them. That is being kind. When we have the heart to be kind, I believe that God will give us creative ways to be kind. Think about it, “How can I be kind to other people in any situation?” When you think about it, when you have a heart to do it, God will give you creative ways to do it. Look around, there are many people who need your kindness.

My father passed away when he was 60. As soon as he turned 60, soon he passed away. He died of stomach cancer. The doctor said he has six months to live, and those six months were very difficult for me. I don’t know how many times I ran out of his room crying. Once he went to the mirror he was shocked at seeing himself because he was so thin. He lost so much weight, and those last six months were very difficult times. But there was one couple. They visited us almost every day, and the kind of kindness that they showed, I can never forget. You know, what we say or what we do, people forget. But how we feel at the moment, we never forget. Whether it’s a good feeling or bad feeling. What they did to us, to our family, was wonderful. Just a simple, kind act had a tremendous impact and helped us go through that difficult time.

Kindness creates warmth. Kindness makes life beautiful. We can remember the kindness for a long time. I pray that our community may create beautiful stories of kindness living together, and I think we can do it. Let us be kind. And that’s what we human beings do all the time. Let us sing together.

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Ephesians 4:1-6

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I’d like to talk about oneness. Oneness is very important. St. Paul emphasized oneness very much. Oneness is kind of a harmony being together… it is in perfect harmony, that’s what oneness is. We don’t see oneness very much around us in this world. We are living in a fractured, very divided world. But this unity, harmony, peace, oneness… this is an essential quality for humanity to survive, and for any human beings to live meaningfully and joyfully. And this oneness, harmony, peace, and reconciliation… it all comes from who God is, and God is one.

You may think that God is three – Jesus Christ, God the Father, and God the Holy Spirit – but they are in perfect harmony and they are one. There is one God. Unity is not possible in uniformity. When everybody’s the same, unity is not possible, but unity is possible only in diversity and in God. Even though they are diverse, God is one in perfect harmony and that’s what St. Paul realized about who God is. And that’s why he said, “There is one body, one spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of your calling. One Lord, one faith, one baptism and one God.” And this is what Paul realized about who God is. God is one. We often say, “United we stand. Divided we fall.” That’s so true. United we stand, divided we fall. And Paul tells us to try our best to keep that unity,

To St. Paul, unity was important. You see, the letter to Ephesians is different from the letter to Corinthians or Galatians or other letters because in the other letters, Paul responded to concrete problems in a particular community. But in Ephesians, it is written generally to all churches, not just one particular community. So Paul is not talking about issues of division necessarily, but Paul is talking about the universal principle of being one, the universal principle of oneness. He realized that Jesus Christ came to this world to bring that unity, to bring that harmony. God saw how broken the world was, God saw how fractured the world was, so Jesus Christ was sent by God to bring about that unity and harmony. And Paul realized that that was the purpose of Jesus coming into this world, and then that that is the purpose of our lives. We are the peacemakers. We are the ones who have to work hard to bring about the unity, harmony, and peace. That is a calling that we have. That is what it means to lead a life worthy of calling.

I see so much brokenness all around… families, communities, parents, and children. They fight spouses. They struggle. One nation is against another nation. Whenever I see news, whenever I look around, all I see is brokenness, divisiveness, fracturedness – not peace, unity and harmony. The relationship between God and human beings are broken. The relationships between people to people is broken. We see so much brokenness around us, and we need the message of unity. And unity is not sociological or a social phenomenon. Unity is a spiritual reality. It is a gift of God. God gives human beings the gift of unity, the gift a peace, so that we may be able to live together in harmony, enjoying each other.

When you’re divided, you cannot enjoy your life. When families are all divided, you cannot enjoy being there. When the community is so broken and divided, you don’t want to be here. It is a gift of God to humanity, to live together in peace and harmony. But I see so much of brokenness, and the brokenness comes from the hostility. This is what St. Paul said – it is the same book in the second chapter, you probably have it in your slide – “For He is our peace.” The ‘He’ is Jesus Christ. “He is our peace in his flesh. He has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall.” And that dividing wall is the hostility. The dividing wall, that is the hostility between us. In other words, Jesus came and took out their hostility so that two groups may become one. That was the dividing wall. The hostility was a dividing wall, and Jesus Christ took away that hostility, that dividing wall, so that they could become one. That’s what Jesus Christ did.

Two Sundays ago, or three Sundays ago, I preached about letting us turn hostility into hospitality, and that is so much needed. We need to turn hostility into hospitality. Within us, we have hostility, tremendous hostility. If you have anger within you, if you leave it in your heart and let it brew or let it breed, then that anger becomes hostility. There are things that you can hold in your heart for a long time and is okay, but there are things that you cannot – you should not hold too long within you because it will poison you… and one of them is anger. If you have anger within you for a long time, that anger turns into hostility, and that hostility divides people. When there is that hostility, the reconciliation, peace and harmony is not possible. You can get angry – we all get angry sometimes – but you cannot let anger stay within you for long time. As soon as you have that anger, you have to learn how to let go of that anger. In the same chapter, in the same letter, St. Paul said this, “Be angry but do not sin.” Paul said, “You can be angry. That itself is not sin.” You can be angry, be angry, but do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger. Why? Because it becomes hostility.

Verse one and two are very crucial in our reading today. St. Paul said, “I beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love.” It’s very interesting. Paul said, “I beg you.” He didn’t say, “I recommend you” or “I advise you.” He said, “I beg you,” because it’s so important. I beg you to work out, work together to bring about peace and unity. It’s the same feeling that I have. I beg you, all of you, to be peacemakers. To bring about unity in your family, with friends because we see so much of hurt, pain, division, anger, and hostility. I beg you to lead a life worthy of calling to which you have been called with all humility, gentleness, patience, and love. Bear with one another in love. No one is perfect. Hi-C students, your parents are not perfect. Parents, your children are not perfect. Friends, your friends are not perfect. Because they are not perfect, sometimes they hurt us. Because they are not perfect, they hurt us. When you get hurt, do not reject them, do not shy away from them.

Embrace them. Bear with one another in love. Otherwise we cannot survive. If we reject everyone who hurts us, we have no friends left. We have no person that we can live with left. Bear with one another in love. Paul said, “Humility, gentleness, and patience… they’re all fruit of spirit.” It’s not personality. Only spirit can give you that. Only through the spirit we can bring about the unity. Peace and unity are God’s gift for all of you to live joyfully, meaningfully, and happily. That gift, I believe is much more precious than money or luxury or houses or cars. That gift of peace is the greatest gift that God can give to us. The gift of unity. Enjoy it, cherish it, but when your heart is not ready, you cannot receive that gift. It’s not like Loteria, you just take it. No, we have to work, we have to be ready spiritually to receive that gift.

People who hurt you, don’t hate them. Hate the evil that they do, but don’t hate the people. Embrace them. Martin Luther King said, “Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence, but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him.” I’ve been reading Martin Luther King’s sermons, articles and whatever he wrote. There’s a compilation of what he wrote. I was reading the kind of extreme racism he experienced in his community, and he said, “I do not hate white people, but I hate the evil that enslaves them,” and this is what he said. “We don’t hate people. We should not hate anyone. Of course we hate evil that enslaves them.”

Bear with one another in love. Deep wound within us cannot be well kept within us. It will come out somehow, so when we have a deep wound within us, it will hurt other people. But I pray that that wound that you have within you may turn into wounded love, painful love, which is compassion. Come together. Passion meaning suffering, suffer together. That’s what compassion, compassionate love is all about. I hope that our wound within us may turn into that wounded love, that painful love, so the you may suffer with others. Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Peace cannot be achieved through violence. It can only be attained through understanding.” Roman peace, you may be able to achieve with violence, with force, but Christian peace or the peace that Christ gave, you can never achieve it through violence, only through understanding. When you have a deeper understanding of each other, you will be able to be peacemakers. Let us sing together.

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Matthew 11:16-19

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Empathy is a very important aspect of our lives. God gave human beings special intelligence, more intelligence than animals, but also God gave us another kind of intelligence – to be able to control and govern our intelligence, and that is a empathy. Without empathy, the intelligence becomes very dangerous. God gave us that empathy so that we may be able to use that intelligence appropriately. Empathy is the ability, kind of a special intelligence, with some people being more developed than others with that special kind of intelligence. And I appreciate it. I value that very much, but the world does not really appreciate and value it that much. They value something that’s a different kind of intelligence, but they don’t really focus on the value of the intelligence of empathy. But I believe that empathy is a special kind of intelligence. Through the empathy, you understand another person, you understand how other people feel. That is a kind of intelligence. Through empathy, you can feel what other people feel and you can understand what other people are going through. In other words, you can understand other people at a deeper level. That is what empathy is. And so empathy is very much important. Empathy should be the focus, and intelligence is just the way you use to really work out your empathy.

The city of Toronto was shocked again by the terrible incident in Greektown. It was not too long ago that we had to deal with our sadness and sorrow by what happened in North York. The tragedy happened again last Sunday. I mean, compared to the United States we are much better, but still we never heard of these things before. Here in Toronto, 69 instances like that in 2017, but in Chicago, 600. It’s a much lower rate, but still, in Canada we never heard of these things. But we are often hearing of these things around us. Two people were killed and thirteen other others were injured by a 29-year old man shooting randomly to the people in the street and in restaurants. I mean, I was thinking about the parents of the 10-year old, the 18-year old… their future. I mean, there are 18-year olds here and 10-year olds downstairs. I mean, think of the parents, that for the rest of their lives will deal with this burden, darkness, sadness, anger. We have two families living around that area, so I called them both as soon as that happened. Actually, the son of one of the families, he came to our mission dinner, Danny, the violinist. He played for us at the mission dinner. He just had a dinner and he lives in Greek town, and I saw his house in the news. He just had a dinner and came back home, he was about to go out again to walk the dog and then he saw the news and he didn’t go out. The men who did this shooting suffered incredible darkness and lost the ability to have empathy with others. He completely lost the empathy to feel what other people feel. Lack of empathy can result in tragic consequences.

Jesus well put it out, the condition of his people in his time. This summarizes their condition, it says, “To what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another. We played the flute for you and you did not dance. We wailed and you did not mourn.” Complete lack of empathy. Jesus saw this complete lack of empathy. He saw apathy, not empathy, around him. They lost the ability to be able to laugh with those who laugh, and to cry with those who cry. They lived in numbness. There were so blinded in their own world and feeling that they could not feel what others felt. What they did was exactly the opposite of what St. Paul advised us to do. St. Paul said, “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.” Instead of having empathy, they were full of hatred, criticism, and judgment. You know, when you don’t have an empathy, these things come into your heart. Hatred, anger, criticism. John The Baptist, he was a noble man. He did not have much. He lived in the wilderness. He ate wild honey and locusts. He had basic clothes from the camel hair. And then they called him, “a demon possessed man.” And Jesus was exactly the opposite. He enjoyed his life. He often spent time with sinners. People who were low class. He ate with them and drank with them. I mean, he was totally opposite of John The Baptist. They called him “drunkard” or “glutton.” It doesn’t matter who they are. They were just busy criticizing other people. They were completely blinded. They saw the Prophet as a demon possessed man, and they saw the Messiah as a drunkard. They could not even see who they were really like, so their intelligence was stupid. They were lacking something tremendously. They cannot really see things properly.

Empathy is a beautiful human quality. A lot of people don’t have it unfortunately, but it’s a beautiful human quality and it is what makes human beings human beings. It is what makes human beings beautiful. Not your face, not your body, but it is that empathy that makes a person attractive. Beautiful. What makes our life beautiful, enjoyable and viable is empathy. People gathered up together after both incidents, North York and then Danforth, people just had to come out. They couldn’t just stay home. Some of our Congress members also went out, just to be part of that, just to be with them. They raised money for the family, they did the walk together and some people ran together. They gathered to worship, sing songs, and comfort each other. They cried together when they sang, Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah”. They heard the words of comfort from clergies. And then they sang this song that we are going to sing later after the sermon. But as they sang that song, and as they walked together, they sang this song and they embraced each other.

That is empathy. They just wanted to feel what the victim felt. Not everyone was there, but numerous, thousands of people watching news, they shared that sorrow with them. They were together in spirit. Empathy makes our community stronger. Empathy has a magical power to heal us and empower us. It is sad that we don’t have that empathy. We don’t experience the healing and the freedom that we experience that from comes from empathy. When you feel that somebody understands your hurt and pain and feeling, you get empowered. Even though you suffer so much, if somebody else understands your hurt and pain and suffering, you feel so empowered that you can handle your hurt and wound better.

Bob and Irene shared their suffering at the retreat with tears. We all shared our tears together. That made our community stronger. It is the magical power of empathy. In the family, you’ve got to have empathy. In church, you gotta have empathy. In society and community, you’ve got to have that empathy. Otherwise we as a human community can not survive. Jesus met with the Samaritan woman. She never met him, but immediately she sensed that there is somebody who understands me. There is somebody who understands my pain of loneliness. After a few minutes of this conversation, she was totally liberated and empowered. She was healed from that pain of loneliness. She was able to go out and meet the people she has avoided all that time because she was healed. Jesus came to Lazarus when Lazarus died and it’s the shortest verse in the Bible, and that’s when Jesus wept. Jesus cried from that empathy. That was a power of resurrection. Through that empathy, Jesus raised the dead Lazarus from death. That is a magical power of empathy.

Christian theology of salvation. What is that? Soteriology. Christian theology of salvation, that is basically God’s empathy. We’ve committed sins, but God did not focus on our sins. Rather God focused on the suffering that we suffer from our sins. If God focused on our sins, we have no salvation. But somehow God focused on suffering that we receive from that sin, and from that empathy, salvation was possible for all of us. That’s Christian theology of salvation. It is God’s empathy that saves us.

I do believe that empathy is not a natural talent that you’re born with. Like, “Some people have empathy, some people don’t…” I don’t believe so. Empathy is something that we all can cultivate. We can learn. We can be trained. It is your lifestyle. When you look at other people, instead of being focused on yourself, you focus on other people’s suffering. “Is there anything that I can do for them? How do they feel when they lost some loved ones? How do they feel when they’re angry? How do they feel?” You know, it’s your attitude towards life, and and through that attitude, empathy is being cultivated, train and learned. If you don’t do that at all, then you become like stupid. You will never understand what other people feel. To me, that is being stupid. Not the ones who can do a calculus well – the one who cannot even understand basic human emotion of other people, that’s being stupid to me. Empathy is something that you can learn and you can cultivate. Anybody can have empathy, but as you get hardened in this cold, competitive world, we lose the ability to empathize with others’ suffering. My friends, don’t teach your children to be successful. Teach your children to be empathetic. That’s what makes human beings. Don’t focus on success of your children. Focus on their ability to be able to feel what other people feel. That will make our future world a much better world. That will make our human community a much more intimate community. What is happening right now is a result of this very cold competitive society. More people will be produced like that. We need special kind of leadership – that is leadership of empathy. We don’t need a narcissistic leader who cares only about himself. We don’t need that kind of role model. We need a caring leader who deeply understands the deep human suffering. How much money do you need? You don’t need that much. How much empathy do you need? We need a lot. To make your life beautiful and meaningful. I’d like to invite you to sing with me, the song that they sang together as they marched. “Live In Charity”.

Let us have a moment of meditation, silence and prayer. Let us remember the family of the 10 year old, the 18 year old. I just cannot imagine the pain and suffering of the parents. Let us pray for that family. So many people were affected… their siblings, their friends… Let us pray for those families who were hurt in this instance.

Let us pray for ourselves. I see so much lack of empathy even around us trying to survive in this cold and competitive world. Our hearts have become hardened. We cannot anymore feel what others feel. We just become so self centered. Cellphone absorbed. We just cannot even imagine what others are going through. We have lost to be human being. Let us pray for ourselves, for our own healing.

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The first session we talked about the need to cultivate desire because without cultivating the desire, what we are doing is we are just letting the change impose on us. Instead of us taking charge of the change, we just let the circumstances or people around us to influence our changes. So by cultivating desire, you know what you want in your life. And you know what change you want to make. So by cultivating desire, you actually get to know yourself very clearly and that is very important. And that’s the first thing that we talked about.

In the second session we talked about that physical change is one time event. When you go through immigration process, you come from Korea to Canada, just one time event. When you change jobs, you just move. It is a one time event, but in that one time event, underneath the heart for heart, it is never just a one time event. The heart is going through a tremendous process of change and that begins from ending to beginning. When you start a new job, you end the old job and you start a new job. But the heart doesn’t move directly from ending to beginning. There’s in-between stage and in this, in this, in between stage, I called it “wilderness” and “wilderness” is “mid-bar” and it’s from the same root word. It is called “wilderness,” but also it is a “sanctuary.” The holy place, the word of God. So in the in this “wilderness,” we go through temptations, hardships and waiting, uncertainty, darkness, all kinds of things we experience in this “wilderness”. But at the same time, at the wilderness, we experience God’s presence. We experience God. We meet God. We learn God.

Moses lived a 120 years and the first 40 years he lived in a palace. The second 40 years, he lived in a nice pastoral place. So he really enjoyed his life peacefully. But last 40 years, God took him to the “wilderness” and Moses in that “wilderness,” he met God most intimately. In the first 80 years, he didn’t really meet God in a true sense, but in the wilderness, he met God in a very, very intimate way. In the same way in the “wilderness,” we experience God. We meet God in an intimate way. When you go through changes, you will go through in-between stage. Your heart will go through in-between stage in that, in between stage, learn to meet God and ask God for guidance and ask to be lead in that wilderness.

Now, third lecture, we are going to talk about, we live in tension between who I am and who I want to be. This is always within us and if we always live in the tension between who I am and who I want to be. There are two forces within us and the first one is the force to push me forward, but second one is the force to pull me down. So we are living in this tension. There is a force that wants to go forward, but there’s also the force that pulls you down so that you don’t go anywhere. So we are struggling in these two forces and Saint Paul’s confession is very clear about this tension. “I do not understand my own actions for I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.” I mean this is the Saint Paul. He doesn’t understand his own actions. “I do not do what I want, but I do the evil that I hate to do,” and that is our confession.

There’s certain things that I want to do, but sometimes we don’t do that. We do exactly opposite of what we don’t want to do. Saint Paul was real person. He was not just religious fanatic. He was a real person and he experienced this struggle after meeting Christ. Before meeting Christ, he didn’t have this kind of struggle. Only after meeting Christ, he became true to himself. When he was true to himself, then he recognized this power, this struggle, and this tension that exists within us. When you don’t meet Christ in a true sense, you are not honest with yourself, but when you meet Christ in a true sense, then you can have confidence to be honest with yourself. When you’re honest with yourself, you see these kinds of things and Saint Paul saw this kind of paradox within himself.

I am strange. Within me, I see a paradoxical self. I see a battle within me. Not harmony, but struggle. Not coherence, but incoherence. That’s what is in me, not just one nice image, but very many conflicting images are lying within us. It has taken a long time for this eye to be shaped. So now the eye that you have, was not shaped overnight. It had gone through so many things and as a result of that, that eye has been shaped. So many experiences. So many failures. So many of joys and so many learnings. All these things that this eye is experiencing, and then at the end finally eye has been shaped and formed. We are not fully aware of how this eye was shaped within me. We don’t know exactly because a lot of times we did things that we were unaware of, but somehow this eye was shaped and unfortunately because we are not perfect human beings, because we are sinful human beings, according to the scripture, we are sinners because we are sinners, some undesirable ugly parts. Undesirable parts were also formed in who I am, the part that I’m not satisfied with, the part that I don’t want to accept, admit.

And that part is also within me because we are sinful human beings. We have this yearning to be what I want to be. We don’t want to be stuck in who I am as I am. As I told you, God accepts me as I am, but God never leaves me where I am. God always takes me to the next level of life. That’s who God is. So I don’t want to be stuck in who I am. We want to be free to become who I want to be. There is no such thing as the saying, “Who I am.” There’s only, “Who I am being.” Do you understand what I’m saying? “Who I am,” is already the finished product. “Who I am being” is continuous product. Only God is “Who I am.” When Moses met God, what did God say to Moses? “What is your name?” Moses asked. So what did God say?

God said. “I am who I am.” So God is “Who I am,” but we are never “who I am.” We are always “who I am being.” The kind of movement we want to create in us is the positive movement, spiritual flow. I mean this movement. The word movement is very important to me, that you have to create this movement within you. The spiritual flow. We have to create in us a spiritual flow where our soul can freely move towards what I want to be. Then movement has to be there instead of soul being stuck. That movement flows. Russian poet, Rumi said, “When you do something from your soul, you feel a river moving in you.” You feel a river moving in you. When you truly do something from your soul, that’s amazing. That’s a river moving in you and Jesus said the same thing, “For those who believe that river of living water will flow.” The river of living water will flow. Do you know what that means? The river flowing within you. So that movement, that energy, that flow, that’s what we need. If anger is so strong in us, so if we are stuck in that anger, then we need to create a spiritual flow where our soul becomes free from the anger and experiences the freedom to love. You have to create that path so that your soul, instead of being stuck and bound by the anger, but moves beyond the anger and towards the freedom to love. Same with pain, same with insecurity. Our soul needs to be free to see change. In change, what is really important is your soul being free. Instead of your soul being stuck in where you are, your soul becoming free. That’s what we need to experience.

Like the song “Hide Me Now” by Hillsong Worship. Hide me now, that we want to go above the storm. We don’t want to be stuck in the storm. We want to go above and fly above the storm. And this soul needs to be free. Otherwise, the real change cannot happen. When our soul is stuck, real change cannot happen. Then for our souls to be truly free, then there has to be room for our soul to move. When your heart is so small and your soul is kept locked, then you cannot be free. There has to be space where our soul can move.

There’s a famous photographer in Korea, a Bae Byung-Woo and then he only takes a pictures of pine trees. His pictures were in London. He did exhibition that got several hundreds of thousands of dollars for a one picture. He’s a very famous guy. I was reading his interview with a reporter and in that interview he said that he always takes pictures only in the morning and the reporter asked, “Why do you only take pictures in the morning?” From what he said it hit me. I thought what he said was so true. Dae Byung-Woo response was, “When the light crawls over the Earth, the space is opened up and the world is opened up.” Wow, yes, that’s true. When the light comes, light does not just come and shows things, but it opens up the space. And I realized when the light of Jesus Christ comes upon our soul, our heart, then it creates space for our soul to move. And that’s what Jesus said, you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free and the truth and life is the same thing. When the light or truth moment comes and then our heart creates a space and then our soul moves. And then we experience the freedom of the soul. When you have the truth moment, you’re no longer bound to your old self. And my friends, change takes a long time. Real change. For example, small boat, they can move around and maneuver very easily, but a big ship, they cannot move as easily, just to change in one direction, they go very, very slowly and turn.

And the real change happens. This kind of change is not change. Today, you do this and next day you do something else and the day after you do something new. That is not really change. What is that? That is (back eun neun go), that is just (back eun neun go), just changing the scenery. It’s not (pyeon ah neun go) its (back eun neun go). That kind of change is not a what we call change. The real change happens so slowly. You don’t even feel that you’re moving in different directions. That is kind of change that we are talking about. A big ship. That’s how they changed direction. There are two kinds of behaviours that are within us. One, the behaviour that you are aware of and the other, the behaviour that you are not aware of. The behaviour you’re aware of is doing things intentionally, but the behaviour that you are not aware of is that you automatically do it. Whether you like it or not, it becomes very automatic and that you do it. Having the light and knowing the truth will open up a space for the soul to freely move, but you should not end there. You need to shape the path, to truly change yourself. In your life, you need to shape the path after you realize that about yourself. You need to adopt a new habit. New spiritual habit, and that is spiritual discipline.

Dae Byung-Woo, famous photographer, his pictures are worth hundreds of thousands dollars, and you know what he said? “I take a picture every day as though I write a diary.” I mean he knows all about pictures, he knows all about a camera, but he takes a picture every day just to create that creative path so that he doesn’t lose that sense. In the same way, we need to create that creative path or spiritual path within us. Doing things habitually and mindlessly is bad, but doing good things and making it as a habit of your life is very good thing. You need to do that.

Immanuel Kant, very famous philosopher, he’s known for his regular habit. Every morning he walked at the exactly the same time, so people in Konisberg, they know what time is is by seeing Immanuel Kant passing by. “Oh, it must be 8:00 or 7:00 now.” Because his routine was so regular, so we need spiritual discipline. If you want to change. Making a habit is very important in spiritual change. Once you make a habit, you know one thing good about making a habit is that you don’t need self control. Once you make a habit, because it’s not hard, it just becomes automatic, like a part of you. Every morning I’m usually the first one to wake up. So my routine is every morning I get up, I come up very, very quietly not to wake up anybody, then I wash whatever dishes that I have. Then I finish washing dishes and then I take out the garbage and then fill up with a new garbage bag and after that I put on coffee and then that’s it. I do that everyday.

That’s true. I mean it’s not a big deal. It doesn’t even take 20 minutes. Everyday you do it. It becomes routine. It becomes a part of you, you don’t need self control to do that. You make the habit of doing it. You know, our self control is exhaustible. It’s not limitless. It is exhaustible. There’s an experimental puzzle. So two group of students, they gave the puzzle. One group is unsolvable puzzle. You cannot solve it. There’s no answer. Two groups, one group was given cookies before attempting to solve the puzzle while the other group was given radish. What the result was the group that ate the cookies gave up after 19 minutes with 34 attempts, but the group that ate the radish gave up after 8 minutes and they only tried 19 times. That is about half of the attempts the cookie group had.

So they realized that our self control is exhaustible because they use self control already by eating radish so they don’t have any more self control to control themselves for solving the puzzle. Chip Heath and Dan Heath, his book “Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard.” And this is what they said, both of them are professors. One is at Stanford, the other is a Duke University. This is what they said, “When people exhaust their self control, what they are exhausting are the mental muscles needed to think creatively to focus, to inhibit their impulses and to persist in the face of frustration or failure.” So self control is something exhaustible. So when you make something a habit, then you don’t need to use that self control and that you can use that self control for something else. When you want to make a habit, you cannot start with a big thing.

You have to start with a small thing. You cannot start with a big commitment. You have to start with a small commitment. It is better to read the Bible. If you want to read the Bible really seriously. If you want to read the Bible, then 10 minutes every day for two months is better than 10 hours in a day.

10 hours you read in a day is not helpful. What is more helpful is 10 minutes every day for two months. Then it becomes habit. You will create reading habit of the Bible. Whatever you do, think about doing it for the rest of your life, not just one year for the rest of your life. A reporter asked Mark Twain, novelist, “How did you become a great writer?” And this is what he said, “I start writing a sentence or so every day and without knowing, I became a writer.”

So every day he wrote something and then without him realizing it, he became a writer. Mark Twain said that that same person said this. “The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex, overwhelming tasks into small, manageable tasks and then starting on the first one.” So at the retreat you think about why do you want to change? And think of a one thing that you want to do for the rest of your life. Very small thing, doesn’t matter what it is, that is good for you, for the rest of your life.

Break down into smallest and start with that. A journey of a thousand miles must begin with the first step. The important thing is not to make lots of changes, but to create a path. That’s what habit does. Important thing is don’t make too many changes. Create a path. Once you create a path and then changes will happen. Shape the path. The path for the soul to freely move towards who I want to become.

The important thing is that you create a path and you have to start with small. Don’t start with big. Start with small change because we human beings are very weak. You know how we are? There is a clock invented by Gauri Nanda, a MIT student. It’s called “Clocky” and within two years he sold 35,000 units for 50 bucks in two years. This alarm has wheels so in the morning when the alarm goes off, it rolls around the room. So it doesn’t just stay still, just jumps off and then rolls around. Just imagine you running around in your panties, you’re running around trying to stop this machine.

Because we are so weak that they created this kind of stuff and it works. We are weak. So we have to understand that we are weak and we need to create small step at a time. Little by little. That’s better than trying big things and then giving up altogether. Small things everyday.

Jonathan Haidt, a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia, gives us a metaphor in his book; “The Happiness Hypothesis,” and then he talks about a rider and his elephant. This rider and elephant is within us. When the rider and the elephant are in sync, then that’s great news. The rider thinks, “Okay, let’s go that way.” and the elephant has the power to move. So you go that way, but if the elephant refuses to move, then you cannot do anything about it. You can kick it. Yell at it, but elephant will not move and you cannot make the elephant move. And that’s our situation. Many times, we ride the elephant, but this elephant does not move in the way you want to go.

That’s why change cannot happen from your own will. “Okay. From today I’m going to change.” You can’t change. This elephant will not move, even though the rider wants to move. The elephant will not move just because you have willed it to change. Elephant will never do any creative thinking or has any plan to change. Elephant doesn’t do that. It is the rider who has the vision and creative thinking to change. It is the rider who does that, but to make effective change, you need energy, drive and the power of the elephant. There are few reasons why the elephant may refuse to go where you want to go. The first reason is when a certain habit is so strong in you, the elephant is comfortable with that. So automatically, the elephant will go do whatever you have been doing all your life, it’s like automatic behaviour. It’s like, before you enter a new situation you’re thinking, “Oh, I’m not going to get angry,” but once you enter in that situation you automatically get angry.

Anger comes out, or in certain situations, “Oh, I’m not gonna do that,” and you go into the situation automatically. You’re too weak to fight against the elephant because you have been doing the same thing for so long that way in your life. So to change the elephant, then you need to start small, little by little, like a big ship you have to slowly move around. You cannot just kick it and yell at it and you cannot just make a decision, so you have to create a path so that the elephant slowly moves into the new direction.

The disciples wanted to follow Jesus, but their old habits were so strong that they were always rebuked by Jesus. It took them a long time for them to truly be able to follow Jesus. Especially a sinful habit, it’s very difficult to change; like greed, selfishness, self centeredness, pride, self-righteousness, timidity, stubbornness, inferiority complex, habitual lying. All these things are hard to change.

It is so deeply ingrained in us, almost a part of us. So if you live mindlessly, who leads your life? Elephant leads your life. The rider is just riding but the elephant is going wherever you have been going all the time. And that’s why we feel so helpless. So we don’t change it. We just let the elephant continuously move. We just sit on it rather than really taking the course of the change. Another reason for the elephant to refuse to go where you want to go is, this elephant is easily scared, very easily scared. So if the task is new, uncertain and too much, it doesn’t move. The only way to change is to move the elephant. And you cannot do it by force. You cannot do it by your will. You need to create a path by your spiritual discipline. A new habit. Also, the elephant is easily scared, you need to break down what you want to do into manageable tasks so that the elephant doesn’t get scared. To motivate the elephant, you need to shrink the change. If you try to do something big, elephant will not take it. So shrink the change. John Wooden, UCLA basketball coach, he was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame. He said this, “When you improve a little each day, eventually pick things occur. Not Tomorrow, not the next day, but eventually a big gain is made. Don’t look for the big quick improvement. See the small improvement one day at a time. That’s the only way you’d happens. And when it happens, it lasts.”

Spiritual discipline is repetition. Doing something once in a while gets you nowhere. Until that task becomes part of you. You continue. Continue the repetition. You want another prayer? Pray every day. You read the Bible? You do it everyday. You have bad habits you want to change? Then change it little by little, everyday break it down smaller and do it everyday.

Malcolm Gladwell in his book, “Outliers”. He said, “It takes 10,000 hours for anyone to be good at anything. 10,000 hours, you keep doing what you’re doing then you’ll be good at it. So if you want to do a new habit, new spiritual practice, if you do it for 10,000 hours, then you will master it. You will get to the level and then you automatically, you will be able to do it. To have a long term spiritual discipline. Break down the task into small, manageable pieces. Jesus’ principle is mustard seed principle. The mustard seed is so small that you cannot even see it. The seed is so small, you need very special eyes or some magnifier to see it. That small mustard seed will grow large and the birds of the air will come. Jesus wanted you to start with, if you have faith of a mustard seed, then you will see that miracle. So from your faith of mustard seeds, a small thing, but you will see very big thing. So you need to continuously motivate yourself. There was a carwash experiment. One carwash they said, “Okay, if you get 8 stamps, then next a car wash is a free.” So one set of car washes has 8 spots and the other one has 10 spots, but two stamps are already done for you. So for both, you really only need 8 stamp. The ones who have eight slots, only 19% came back, but the one with 10 slots with 2 stamped already, 34% came back. This is almost double the people because there’s incentive since it’s already started, so it’s easier for you to follow. Horace in 60 BC said, “He has half the deed done, who has made a beginning” What is it in Korean? What is it? Shijaki Ban Ee Da (the beginning is half). This is what Horace said in 60 BC. At the first happiness seminar, I said, “I’m confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.” Believe that. If you believe that, then something wonderful will happen. We are not alone. We have a helper. The Holy Spirit. This holy spirit will guide your first step. You will not do everything. If you take one small step, the Holy Spirit can take it to the next level. It’s not just what you do when you take a small step, the Holy Spirit will take you to the next level. Have courage to take the first small step. Think about what you need to change. Think about what you need to change.

At first, they’ll be difficult. What do I need? Change? Because it’s so buried too much inside of you. You won’t even know what to change, but when you think about it slowly, you will be able to see, “Ah, I want to change this. I want to change that,” and these things will come up. Then cultivate the desire to change, and when you change you will go through some dark times, disappointing time, difficult time. Wait. Don’t give up. Meet God. Experience God. And then the little things start with a small thing and then do it every day. Then you’ll be able to see the miracle of it.

We have a Bible study at our church every Wednesday morning, about 10-12 people come every Wednesday in the morning at 10:00am. Eight years? Eight years. Almost every Wednesday, the people came and at first, it was kind of difficult. First of all, bunch of women are sitting there and I’m the only man. They always talk about their husbands, they usually complain and I’m sitting there, “Oh my goodness. How am I going to lead this group?” And so it was really, really difficult in the beginning, but for eight years, every day is a small step. Every day, almost every week, they didn’t really miss a single day. Now? It has become so mature. The kind of things that we learn, the kind of things that we share, it is so deep and profound. You won’t see that anywhere else. I don’t see that anywhere else. Even with theological students that I talked to, I don’t get that kind of depth, but in that group I see and I hear that depth. So small beginnings create the miracle of the community.

Do you know how difficult it is to build a community? It takes long time and that community was built. So whatever you do, start with a small change and then see how God will take you and don’t just look for the easier solution. Don’t just look at easier solution. A man on the street at night, he was looking for something and the police came by, “What you’re looking for?” And he said, “I’m looking for my key.” “Where did you think you lost it?” “Oh, I think I lost at the end of the street there.” “Why are you looking for it here? Why don’t you go there?” And the man said, “The light is better here.” Don’t look for the easy solution just because the light is better.

Find it where you think you lost your key. Even though it is dark. Visit the darkness. Visit the dark place. Visit the uncomfortable place. Visit the place where you don’t want to go, maybe there is an answer there. Instead of always finding the easy answer and thinking that change happen.

This is all I have prepared for you in this seminar.

I hope that this helps you a little bit to get you thinking about that change. So the first night we talked about attitude towards change. Second lecture we talked about the dynamics of change and the third lecture we talked about the action to make a change. Thank you for listening and have a great pilgrimage. Thank You.

The post Change: Lecture 3 appeared first on St Timothy Presbyterian Church.

Click on the images above to read this session in e-book format.

Yesterday we talked about the importance of cultivating the desire within us. Cultivating the desire within us is important because you don’t want to be victims of the change that is imposed on you. You want to be active change makers, active agents of change. That means you have to know what you want to change. A problem we have is that a lot of people don’t know what to change because they’re so used to being changed and they don’t even know what do I need to change? Even though they are a lot of changes that are possible, we do not really know what to change. That’s why by cultivating the desire, you know what you need to change, you find out who you are. You find out what you need to do to in order to have a more fulfilling life. You change so that you become truer to yourself, and without knowing what you are and what you want to be, there cannot be any change. That’s why cultivating the desire within us is very, very important. In today’s second lecture on “change,” we are going to talk about the dynamics of change, and change itself in a way.

This is a picture I took in Galilee, the Galilee Lake. Change is a journey, not a one time event, even though on the surface it looks like one time event. For example, when you immigrate from Korea to Canada, you pack, you take a plane and you come to Canada. It's a one time event, it can be done in a day. In the morning you leave, and in the evening or the next day (probably) you’ll get here, it’s a one time event. When you send your kids off to school in different cities, you drive them, you find a room, you drop off some homemade food and then you say goodbye. Right?. Its is a one time event. When your children get married off, you have a wonderful wedding and you let them go. In a day, it can be finished. Even when you send away your loved ones, you have a funeral and you bury them. They are gone from us, so it is a one time event. On the surface it looks like that, but it’s not, its never just a one time event.

When we talk about changes, we are not talking about what’s happening on the outside. What’s happening on the outside, what does that do to you as a person? What that does to you as a person is never a one-time event, it lasts a long time. What’s going on inside of us is never just a one time event. It takes a long time for the inner change to take place. What’s happening inside of us is not a mechanical process. What’s happening on the outside is a mechanical process, but what’s happening inside of us is not a mechanical process. It's complex and takes a long time, everybody is different. How people take what is happening outside differs, everybody is different. Immigration is not just packing up and coming to a different country. When you are in a totally different culture using a different foreign language and eating western food, what you’re going through is much more than just moving to another country.

I still remember when I first came to Canada. Whenever I saw an airplane flying in the sky I thought, “Oh my goodness, that airplane must be going to Korea”, even though it was not. I thought “That plane can take me to Korea anywhere, it doesn’t have to be Seoul even though I grew up there. It can be Seoul, Gangwon-do, Shigol. Anywhere is fine, just take me to Korea. I don’t know how sad I was whenever I was there thinking about Korea, it just saddened me a lot. But after 37 years, I don’t feel that anymore. I look at a plane now, and think “Oh good. It’s noisy. Where are they going?” I don’t feel that sentiment anymore, but it took a long time. It’s been 37 years, and I still remember what I did in Korea, it was beautiful. You could just go to the river naked and swim. It was natural, so everybody was naked, all the boys were naked. We swam and we caught frogs and then all kinds of things. It was a fun memory, but it doesn’t sadden me anymore. It’s now just a nice, good memory.

Our inner change does not happen overnight. Now I’m more comfortable here and if people tell me to go in live in Korea, I don’t think I could. I visited Korea about once or twice, but I just wanted to leave as soon as possible. Once my job was done, I just wanted to come back home to Canada because this has become my home. So the real change is not what’s happening outside, the real change is a change of the heart. That’s the second point that I want to make, real change is a change of the heart. So a journey is not the outside journey, but a journey is the inner journey. It is journey of the heart, what’s happening in your heart. So you have to pay attention to the journey of your heart. What is your heart going through in the changes that are happening in your lives? That’s what’s important. You need to be aware of what is happening in your heart. What journey is your heart going through when things happen in your lives.

In the story of Emmaus, two disciples were walking on the road to Emmaus after Jesus died. Their journey was going towards the West in the evening, it’s such a beautiful story, beautifully said. So they were walking very slowly like this. They followed Jesus for three years. They gave up everything but now Jesus had died on the cross and although they heard about Jesus’ resurrection, they didn’t really hear it. They thought that all their dreams were gone, so they were walking like this, very slowly towards sunset. On on the road they met Jesus, he was talking to them. They couldn’t even recognize who he was, but somehow when Jesus was talking to them, their hearts were burning. I mean it’s a physical journey just walking on the road to Emmaus, but what was happening? Their hearts were kind of burning hot and then when they got to a place, when Jesus broke the bread, all of a sudden their eyes opened and then they could see Jesus. Until then they couldn’t recognize who he was. So it’s not really what is happening outside, because inside, their hearts were burning and then later their eyes were opened and they were able to see Jesus. So almost like our journey, we go to church or we have been to church all our lives, but at one moment our hearts are burning somehow. We have this burning desire within us and when our eyes start opening little by little and we see Jesus, we meet Jesus.

The next day in the morning the disciples were going back to Jerusalem and they made it by sunrise. In the evening it was sunset, now it was Sunrise. They weren’t just walking slowly like before, they were running because they wanted to tell others the good news. That describes beautifully and graphically, the journey of your heart. What is most important is that you pay attention to what is going on in your heart. People somehow take the heart, very lightly. They think that heart is just related to feeling, but this is Henry Nouwen’s definition of the heart. “Heart is not just feeling, heart is more than that. The source of all physical, emotional, intellectual, volitional, and moral energies. It is the seat of the wheel. It makes plans and comes to good decisions. Thus the heart is the central unifying organ of our personal life. Our heart determines our personality and the place where God dwells, but also the place to which the evil one directs fear attacks causing us to doubt, fear, despair, resent, overconsume, and so on.

That’s where the heart is. A lot of times we say “I don’t have heart for it.” , or “I don’t feel like it,” but the heart is more than feeling. When you say “Oh, I just feel like doing it.”, it doesn’t mean that your heart is doing it. Cultivating your heart is much more than just feeling for it. You know, having a heart for Jesus is much more than feeling for Jesus. So your heart is not feelings, it’s not emotion. It’s not a place of emotion, but it is a place of everything and is our core existence. A lot of people get emotional about praise and they think they are giving a heart-full worship. No, that’s not heart-full worship, that’s the emotional worship. Heart-full worship is much deeper than that. Heart-full worship is like spiritual worship, so you have to really pay attention to what is going on in your heart.

How does your heart react? For example, when you’re fired from a company, how does your heart react? Let’s say you just move, how does your heart react? You have to understand what your heart is doing inside of you. If you make changes without paying attention to what’s going on in your heart, you don’t really change. Yesterday I talked about (back eun neun go)/(pyeon ah eun go) with Bruce a little bit and we talked about the difference between them. You know when, for example, you bought a TV, you want to go and return the TV. (Mo rwa gu rae? Back eun da rae. TV-reul back eun da). That’s physical, but (pyeon ah), you leave milk outside for long time then you don’t say, “Oh milk is (back was seo). Milk is (pyeon eu seo), right? So a more quality change. So, if you make changes without really paying attention to what is going on in your heart, you’ll just (back eu-ing) all the time instead of (pyeon ah-ing).  I’m using different language here, right? So what is important is a (pyeon ah), not (back eun neun go). You’re repeating the same thing in different ways. That’s not what changes. You know?

Changes you’re making on the surface only become a distraction. We need to see what’s in our heart. One day, a little boy walked along the road and then found a sculptor. He was working with a marble, a bunch of marble. He was cutting it and then all that. After a few days later, he went by again and then he a saw beautiful lion made from marble. And the boy, asked the sculpture. “How did you know that there was a lion in there?” This is a block of marble for the boy, but the sculptor saw a lion in the block of marble. What do you see in your heart that you will cultivate? Will you produce? What you see in your heart, that’s what you’re going to sculpt. If you see an image of God in your heart, then you’ll sculpt the image of God. But if your heart is filled with fear and doubt, then fear and doubt will be sculpted. If we have faith in our heart, trust will be sculpted. If we have arrogance and pride, then condemnation and negative criticism will be sculpt. It doesn’t matter what, whatever you see in your heart will be sculpted.

Jesus gave us a parable of different soils. Well, what are four different soils, if you remember from Sunday school? What are those 4? So Simon said, “Path and thorny and rocks.” So these three things. And then good soil of course. So I want you to just turn to your neighbour, three or four. Talk about what is on the “path” and what is a “stone” and what is a “thorny ground?” I want you to discuss it together just briefly, but just turn around with the people around you. Let’s come back together. Let’s first talk about the “path.” What kind of heart is that? “Path.” What kind of heart is that? Hardened? Maybe “rock” is more hardened. Sounds like it.

The “path,” what kind of heart is that? It’s kind of indifferent. It’s more than a rocky path. You know, when you hate somebody so much, after that you become indifferent. “I don’t care what you do.” It’s like even with God, almost like indifferent. You don’t really care what God is. You’re not even angry. Like nonexistent. “Hey, hello, I’m here.” But you’re almost nonexistent. This type of heart, what causes that? What causes this indifferent heart? Burnout? Uncultivated? Distracted? Lack of desire? This is almost like a dead heart. It’s there, but its dead. spiritually dead. If you don’t take care of it. That’s what happens to the heart.

What we’re talking about is not, “Okay, so this person has a thorny ground and that person has a rocky ground and that person has a path.” No. Within us, we go through all these four stages. It’s not just certain people are rocky and people are thorny. No, we all go through it. If you don’t take care of your heart, you become indifferent. Worship. Bible. God. It doesn’t matter. Your heart becomes very, very indifferent. You need to take care of your heart. That’s why cultivating your heart and cultivating your desire is very important. When you’re indifferent, it is difficult at first. Once it is cultivated, it’s easier, but if you don’t have that, it is very difficult to cultivate that. That’s an indifferent heart. The second, rocky ground is what? A more hardened heart. Either you’re deeply disappointed or angry and something happened that you don’t like. So it is a hardened heart. The third, thorny ground is what? Distraction, basically, a tangled heart. Your heart is so tangled so you don’t even know what you want. At one point you desire god, but at another point, you desire the worst. You’re so tangled, you don’t even know who you are. You really desire worldly success at the same time, you want to be spiritual. All kinds of things are going on in you. You’re so tangled, it’s complicated within you. So the seed cannot grow.

You cannot change the heart just like that. It's not like a light in which you turn the switch on and off. You can’t do that. Either it is growing or not, you cannot just turn it on and off, the heart. So you have to be very careful with your heart. What is going on in your heart is very, very important. When you hold anger for a long time, it becomes hatred in the heart, hatred is formed in your heart. Once hatred is formed, object doesn’t matter. You become angry person. Over little things, you get angry. At first, you began with concrete reason, but once that takes hold of your heart it doesn’t matter, you become an angry person. If you hold greed for a long time, it creates selfishness and corruption in your heart. When you hold insecurities for so long, you become indifferent because you’re so insecure that you don’t want to do anything. You get a lazy attitude. You don’t really care about what happens to you. When you hold judgmental attitude for long time, you become self righteous. Self righteousness is created in the heart. You have to be very careful. You’ll experience all kinds of things anger, selfishness, all kinds of things. That’s okay, but when you hold it too long, then certain negative things are formed in your heart. Then it is very difficult to really change. So the heart is very important.

Now let us see what journey our heart goes through when the change happens. In external change, there is an ending and the beginning. The ending comes first and then the beginning follows. If you start a new job, then there has to be an ending to the old job and the beginning of the new job, so the end comes before the beginning. But the change of heart does not happen from ending to beginning, just like that. Our heart cannot go directly from ending to beginning. There is an in-between stage that ends and begins and there is an in-between stage.

When we send away our loved ones, just because the funeral is done, you cannot enter into the beginning. The ending is not done yet, the ending lasts much longer. There has to be a period of sending away the person. That’s why we have things like memorial services to have a proper ending so we can go through that in-between stage. Physical separation happened, but the separation did not finish in our hearts. When my mother passed away, for several days my mother kept coming to me in my dreams. In other words, the ending was not properly done yet. Even though the funeral was over still I was going through the mourning period. The ending was not done for me yet. The same happens with breakups, when you end a relationship it takes a long time for your heart to truly end a relationship. Our hearts do not move from the ending to the beginning directly. It has to go through the in-between stage.

When you go to the airport, you see the signs for departures and arrivals, but the real important thing is the travel itself. But the travel of your heart is not as simple as riding the plane, it’s not just a mechanical process. There is a journey where you experience so much about yourself and about life. So in this in-between stage, you learn so much about yourself and about what you want and what you don’t want. This in-between stage is not just a matter of getting rid of it or shortening it, you have to go through this in-between stage properly. William Bridges in his book, ‘The Way of Transition,’ he quotes Herman Hesse, a German novelist. His famous book is Siddhartha' and in that book, this quotation, “I have taken thousands of people across the river.”

This is said by a boy, who helps people get to the ferryboat which carries people across the river. He continues saying To all of them my river has been nothing but a hindrance on their journey. They have traveled for money and business to weddings and on pilgrimages. The river has been in their way and the ferryman was there to take them quickly across the obstacle. However, amongst the thousands, there have been a few, four or five to whom the river was not an obstacle. They have heard it’s voice and listen to it, and the river has become holy to them as it has to me.” It’s a beautiful quote.

The transition is not something that you just have to crossover. It’s something that you have to ponder upon. We like to move from one place to another as quickly as possible, like crossing the road. Don’t stay in the middle of the road. Go across as quickly as possible, it’s dangerous. But our change should not be like that. We cannot just move from one place to another, just like that. It’s very easy to do, but without really understanding what your heart is going through, that movement becomes meaningless and also that movement can become hazardous to you too. We should pay attention to the in-between stages. When I look back, many times I have changed without this in-between stage and then later regret it. “Gosh, if I could think a little bit more, if I prayed a little bit more, if I stayed in the in-between state little bit longer,” then the change would have been much smoother. In the inner change, this in-between stage is not just an obstacle. For change, this in-between stage is not an obstacle, it’s a very, very important place. To have a meaningful change, there has to be the proper ending of our past. There has to be a dying process of the old. This is what St Paul said, “In Christ, we are a new creation. Behold, first the old has to go before the new come.” So the old has to go first, the old has gone and the new has come. You cannot have the new wine in the old wine skin. You have to let go of the old for the new to come. The old has to go for the new to come. Charles Du Bos said, “The important thing is this, to be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become.” If you don’t sacrifice what you are, then what you could become, can never come.

Elizabeth Kubler Ross, in her book, “On Death and Dying” explains how when a person faces death, they don’t just face death. There is a process that they go through, that process first is denial when they have a terminal disease. “No, I don’t have that. The doctors must be wrong, misdiagnosed.” So they go to different doctors, different hospitals to really see whether they have that cancer or whatever. When denial can not be done then what they’re going through is anger. They say “Why is this happening to me?” You get angry, you know? “I’ve done so much for God” and whatever, but you experience that anger and after that begins the bargaining process. “You know, God, if you make me live, then I will do this for you.” Or something like that. When bargaining doesn’t work, depression begins and they go into deep sadness, depression. Then finally, acceptance. Even one single death  is that difficult to go through. You don’t just go through from life to death. You go through all these in-between stages to face your own death. Change does not just happen. Just because you made a surface change, that doesn’t mean that you made a real change. You have to go through a proper in-between stage. There has to be a stage in your heart for the real change to take place, so then you have to create a path for the heart to follow.

To make change, you have to create a path. You have to learn to see how your heart moves. You need the guidance of the Holy Spirit at that moment when the change has happened, and when you go through the in-between stages, that’s when you need guidance of the Holy Spirit. What is the Holy Spirit speaking to me? For example, when you break up with a person without having a proper ending and if you enter into another relationship, you’ll most likely fail in that new relationship because you never learned from the previous relationship. You never learned about yourself. When the first relationship is over, you have to learn about what do I like about relationships? What do I not like about relationships? What kind of person do I really like, what kind of person do I really not like and what kind of person am I? What is the experience that I really went through with that person? You need to have a proper ending and you need to learn and grow from it in that in-between stage. Without learning, you just go right into the next relationship and it is bound to fail because you’re going to repeat the same mistakes over and over again.

When you talk to your parents they mostly talk about their past life. They talk about the Korean war, how they survived and how they came to Canada. Almost like a tape recorder, you know exactly the same order about 100 times a year. Why? The old is stuck there for them. For some other people I meet, they always talk about their university life. They always talk about it, what they did, and their stuff. For some KSM members I talked to, they always talked about their time in the army, saying “When I went to the army…” They continuously talk about that and in other words, that old is still there for them. It’s not completely gone because it was a traumatic experience for them, so it is still there. People say what’s done is done. No, what’s done is never done. What’s done is doing something funny even now, the past is not finished.

The past is not determined yet, the past is yet to be determined by our future. For example, if your past mistakes teach you, change you, and make you become a bigger person, then you will remember your past as a beautiful memory and as a worthwhile experience. But if your past mistakes only make you hardened, bitter and you become ruined, because of that, then that past becomes a nightmare, and a painful memory to you. So our past is not determined yet. The past is yet to be determined in your lives, depending on how your future is going to turn out. If you enter into the beginning without the proper ending, you’re ending with linger around you and it will haunt you. You know what the scariest Gwishin (Ghost) in Korea is? Chenyeo Gwishin (Virgin Girl Ghost), “The virgin who died.” They linger around, they haunt you, they never go away. The ending is not properly done yet.

So when the ending is not properly done, they still linger on. William Bridges had some very good insight about the ending so I quoted it for you, “The breakdown of the old reality releases energy that has been trapped in the form of our old lives and converse it back into its original state of pure and formless energy. It is recapturing that energy that permits us to be reborn new.” So to be renewed, you need energy and only when that old is gone, that energy is released and then you can use that to start a new life.

What should we call the in-between stage? I’ll call it “wilderness.” In the Bible, the second book of the Old Testament is Exodus. Exodus is a book of the in-between stages. The Israelites left Egypt, but they have not arrived in the promise land yet. So the whole book is about them leaving Egypt but they have not arrived yet to The Promised Land, they are in the “wilderness.” That’s the in-between stage. So I’ll call the in-between stage as “wilderness.” Even Jesus, when he ended his 30 years of his personal life before he entered into a new stage of ministry, went to the “wilderness” to be tempted by Satan for 40 days. Saint Paul after meeting Jesus Christ on the road to Damascus before he entered into the actual ministry of Jesus, he went to Arabia. Not necessarily geographically “wilderness,” but spiritually. That was a wilderness for him.

We all have this “wilderness” in making changes. The “wilderness” is not a place of certainty, it is a place of uncertainty. You left the old, but the new has not yet come. You have some regrets, some unresolved emotions, sentiments of the old. The new environment came and yet, your heart has not yet changed, only the environment has changed. Your heart has not changed and there’s confusion and chaos. An Old Testament scholar, Walter Brueggemann, calls this “wilderness” as nothingness. Emptiness, nothingness, emptiness. That’s why people want to avoid this “wilderness.” People want to avoid the “wilderness” in the process of change. Why? The wilderness is an uncomfortable place, it is a place of uncertainty. It is a place where you don’t want to stay too long, but if you come out of it too fast, you’ll go right back into the “wilderness.”`

You have to stay there long enough to learn everything that you need to learn. Then naturally you enter into the new, but if you just quit it, then you go right back into the wilderness. People want to skip the in-between stage and go directly from ending to the beginning, but the wilderness is a place where your heart changes. Your heart is prepared and the energy is created for the new. Our daily life is like that, we cannot finish the day and start the next day immediately. We need in-between stage; that’s sleep. When you sleep, what happens? Your brain still operates, it configures what you saw, what you experienced, and what you heard. During sleep, it configures, so the next day you can start a new day in an organized way. “Wilderness” in Hebrew, is called “mid bar.” It’s strange, it’s interesting. The same word, the word of God or the holy place (sanctuary) has the same root with the word “wilderness.” So in Hebrew, “wilderness,” and the word of God or holy place are the same.

Very interesting, their mentality is very interesting. The wilderness is the in-between stage, but it is a holy place where you listen to God. Of course, you may also experience temptation, confusion, difficulties, and loneliness, but you also experience the guidance of God. At this in-between stage you need to experience God deeply. When I left Korea, and when I came to Canada I was 19. In Korea, whatever problems I had, I have lots of friends so I could call them. We would meet, we talk over beer and then the problem was solved and I could move on. But when I first came here, I didn’t have friends. I had nobody, nobody to talk to and I was so lonely. But you know what? At that time, I met God, because I had no human friends around me. I had to talk to God and there I experienced my own spiritual journey.

I think the most important place in the course of change is this in-between stage. I think the most important place in the course of change if you want to make meaningful change, the most important place is the in-between stage for all of you. So think about in-between stage. When you’re entering the in-between stage, just pay attention to that a lot and see what your heart is going through in that in-between stage. Depending on how we go through this in-between stage, the quality of our change will be very, very different. If you don’t go through this in between stage very well, then the changes you’re making a will not help you that much, but depending on how well you go through this in-between stage, your change will be a very, very meaningful change.

As I said it is easy to decide change. I can always change, but that’s only physical change, but to grow and experience meaningful change, you have to go through this in-between stage very well. Don’t try to shorten this stage, when it is time to move on, you will know it. We talked about St Augustine, in a woman’s Bible study last Wednesday. St Augustine is a saint but he was not always Saint. He loved this woman and his mother, Monica, did not allow her to marry her because her status wasn’t good enough, but he really loved her very much so. But his mother did not let them marry so he had to marry a girl, but she was too young to have a sexual relationship. Since he could not have sexual relations with this woman that he married to, he fooled around. So he had a lot of sexual relationships with others and he was going through a tremendous in-between stage, had lot of struggles, in the wilderness. At one point he went to his friend’s house and then the kids were playing. He was sitting and the kids were playing outside. He then heard, “Tolle legit, tolle legit.” That means in Latin, “Pick up and read it. Pick up and read it.” So he looked around and there was a scroll of Romans he picked up and he started reading, saying, “Finish your nightly life and start the new day.” That passage came and just hit him like a rock and at that moment he was completely changed and became a Saint later. So you should not shorten your in-between stage by your new initiative. When the time comes, it will happen. For example, somebody goes, “Oh, I didn’t know want to go to a party and all that.” and at that party you find your soulmate. It’s not just an accident, the time came. You don’t want to come to the retreat and then you came to the retreat and then all of a sudden, you become you a new person. You become ready for change. So, this in-between stage, you don’t finish it by yourself. It just naturally happens and you will come out of it. You don’t even know that you come out of it sometimes.

Our reading is not just passing time meaninglessly. Waiting is a very, very good time. In our waiting, life is being created. God is working on us in our waiting, our circumstances do not change us. We did not change ourselves it is God who changes us. For the seed to bear fruit, it has to destroy the shell that surrounds it. In this in-between stage, our shells will be destroyed. Florida Scott Maxwell said this beautiful quote, “Life does not accommodate you. It shatters you. Every seed destroys its container or else there will no fruition.” Beautiful, isn’t it? The shell has to be destroyed and where is the shell destroyed? In the in-between stage. Then the seed will bear fruit.

Elizabeth Lesser makes this confession in her book: “Broken Open.” She wanted to find out who she was. She was crying and searching, but she just couldn’t. Her old self couldn't really describe who she was and she wasn’t satisfied with her old self. So she decided to do deep soul searching and went to Isreal as she was really searching for who she was. She was walking around and she found this one antique shop. She went in and there was a middle aged man who greeted her and took her to the back of the store. In the back there was a picture of a flower and underneath the flower, there was a poem. She read the poem and at that point, it made her really, really cry. She was sobbing right there, it was a poem by Anais Nin. Anais Nin actually lived with Henry Miller and wrote this in the poem, “And the time came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”

There will be time when you experience this. Just tight in a bud because you’re scared, you’re insecure, whatever. But that is more painful than taking the risk to blossom. That’s when the in-between stage is over, that’s when you enter into the new stage. When you go through the in-between stage, you will experience the renewal. There is pain, but there is joy in being reborn. The in-between stage is where our hearts are molded and shaped through deep reflection, deep understanding, and patient but fervent waiting. Listen to God and experience the presence of God, because if you don’t do any of those, how can you be a new person? Reflection, deep understanding, patient waiting and fervent waiting.

This modern world makes me sick. So superficial. Just activities, lot of activities, a lot of surface things. Even movies, I don’t want to watch them anymore. It’s all special effects. No story, no heart, nothing internal. Nothing, no inner journey. This world just makes me so stuffy. We need to get out of it. I don’t want this world to destroy my life. I have a precious life, hopefully at most 150 years. That’s how long I want to live and for most of the 150 years of my precious life I have, I don’t want to live in a stuffy manner. I want to be renewed.

I want to live a free, liberated life, and empowered life. I don’t want to just live doing activities and activities. I want my heart to jump with rejoice and with joy. Live day by day with full of meaning. To do that, we have to go through the in-between stage, through reflection, prayer, patient waiting, and then you’ll experience something new in your life. You’ll see the change happening in you. The change happens in the wilderness, cultivate desire, and today we talked about dynamics of change. What is actually happening in the change?

So let us pray together. Lord, we thank you for the precious life that you have given to us as we live our lives. We ask you, lord, to truly bless us, bless each and every one of us so that we may be filled with joy, and meaning. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.

The post Change: Lecture 2 appeared first on St Timothy Presbyterian Church.

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Our topic this weekend is change. Change is very important in our lives. It’s the very, very core of the life that we’re living. Depending on what kind of change you make, your life will be very, very different. If I didn’t change to become a minister, my life would have been very different. If I didn’t change to come to Canada, my life would have been very different. So depending on what kind of changes you make in your lives, your life will turn out very differently depending on which university you go to, or depending on what you try to major in, or where to live, or what to do with your lives. So all these changes, little changes, make tremendous impact on your life and so it is a very important topic… but how mindlessly and carelessly we make changes. Just for a moment, we just change and then you regret and you change back.

And so a lot of times we make these changes without really thinking about it, even though it is very, very important that we think very carefully when we make changes, and a lot of people don’t make changes like that. Just by the emotion, by the feeling, by the circumstances or by having to make changes – they make changes like that – but I don’t think that is a healthy way of making changes in our lives. So this weekend we’re going to talk then about how do we change and what is involved in making changes. So the first night tonight I’m going to mainly focus on the attitude towards change and tomorrow morning for the second lecture, I’m going to talk about the dynamics of change or what is going on in the change itself, and the third lecture I’m going to talk about what do we need to do in making changes.

So maybe attitude and change itself and action and the three topics are: the first one is change happens from the deep desire, and the second one is change happens in the wilderness, and third one is change happens from the mustard seed. Those are the three topics that I’m going to talk about. This is our fourth lecture on happiness. First lecture we talked about happiness itself. How do people become happy? And then we talked about St. Paul a lot and then in Philippians he was in prison, he was waiting for death and he was going through all difficult times, but he said, “Rejoice. And I’ll say it again. Rejoice.” Where did he get that joy? Where did he get that happiness?  

Where did he get that happiness? And this is what we studied; that happiness does not come from circumstances, we realized. And then the study showed that 50 percent of your happiness you’re born with it and then 10 percent your circumstances give you, and 40 percent is your attitude. So some people are born with like a 48 other people born with 47, 46, 45, whatever. You’re born with it, you can’t change it. Some people are happier than others. Just a little bit of a difference. Some people, 9-10 percent difference of happiness or 8-7 percent. So the degrees are small but depending on your attitude you have 40 percent to work with. So even if you are on the lower scale in your genetics, you still have 40 percent to work with so anybody can be happy… but how does a person become happy? It is to do with the whole series of your belief system which produces your thought, your thought produces your feelings, your feeling produces your action, your action produces your habit, and your habit produces lifestyle. So it all begins with your belief system, what belief system you have inside of you that determines how happy you become and your lifestyle.

And a belief system Paul had was this. This was Paul’s belief system: “I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.” It doesn’t matter what happens, but Jesus will bring it to completion. He had that belief system and that belief system controlled his thought. His thought controlled his feeling, his feeling controlled his action, his action controlled his habit, his habit controlled his lifestyle. That’s how he could say, “Rejoice and rejoice again.” So that was the first lecture that we discussed, and the second lecture we said that, you are happy with your life, not just because you have lot of things, you are happy with your life because life is meaningful. Meaningfulness is very important. And then where do we find the meaning?

We write our own stories.

In a way, we all create stories through your life. You are writing stories. Your life is like story. You hear the story of Abraham, you hear the story of Joseph, you hear the story of Jacob, their stories are all different, but their life created those stories. Each person is creating a story. What kind of story are you going to write in your life? In other words, you’re all novelists. You’re writing a novel, a good novel with your life, and what kind of novel are you going to write? Just a flat novel or a very exciting life are you going to make? Every story has meaning. Life has a meaning. Think about what kind of story you want to make with your life. When you look at the Bible, it is all about stories, different people’s life stories. And when we look at it very carefully, there’s one theme that is going on, that is from bondage to freedom.

That is the story of the Bible. Every person, even though their lives are all different – one common thread, one common theme was from bondage to freedom. That is a kind of life story. So life has a meaning because it makes up stories in your lives. And in the third lecture we talked about your happiness comes from not money, not success, not career, not comfort. Your happiness comes from your relationship with other people. And in relationships there are two kinds of relationship. I-thou relationship and I-it relationship. I-it relationship is when you go to a restaurant and order food. The person who’s serving you and yourself, that is I-it relationship. I pay for the money and they give me the food. So that is I-it relationship. I-it relationship, 90 percent of our relationship is I-it relationship, professional relationship is I-it relationship, but only 10 percent is an I-thou relationship.

I-thou relationship is more than I give you this money, you do something for me. It's not that kind of relationship. An I-thou relationship is essentially Jesus sacrificing himself for us. That is a real love relationship. You sacrifice yourself for the other person because you love them. There's a deep interconnectedness between you and them. You are deeply sharing with each other, that is an I-thou relationship. This relationship only happens for 10 percent of your life, but it governs your happiness. The more I-thou relationships you have, the happier you’ll become. The more I-it relationship you have, the less happier you will become. So these relationships determines what kind of happiness and what kind of life you’re going to live with your children. What is your relationship? Is it an I-it relationship or an I-thou relationship with your spouse or with your friends or among your Christian brothers and sisters?

Do we create I-it relationships or I-thou relationships? Do we have to think about it and if so, are we trying to build I-thou relationship in every relationship that we have? Even in an I-it relationship, we try our best to build some kind of I-thou relationship from that. Say you're talking with a customer, you ask, “How are you? You look kind of down today?” This type of gesture is what is helping us create an I-thou relationship in our life. At this retreat, I want to examine the different aspects of change.

To be truly happy, there has to be meaningful change. I believe that Jesus Christ came to us and made us happy by bringing meaningful changes in people’s lives. That’s what Jesus did. Every person he met, he brought changes. That’s what Jesus did. Every person who met Jesus Christ, there was nobody who was not changed. They somehow was affected by Jesus and they somehow got changed and they became happy – not necessarily that they became more successful, not necessarily they became more comfortable or they made more money.

For example, St. Paul before Jesus, he was much, much more comfortable. He had more money then, but after meeting Jesus Christ, he was kicked out from his home and he got persecuted. Their life circumstances did not become better necessarily, but they became happier. So whoever met Jesus Christ, they somehow experienced some kind of change, profound change in them, and Jesus Christ came to make us happy by bringing changes in us. So that’s what we’re going to discuss together.

{Group Discussion till 16:39}  

Change in the Bible

First of all, let us talk about the Samaritan woman first. The Samaritan woman, what changes did she experience?

She didn’t want to meet anybody. That’s why she came out at noon to draw water, to make sure that nobody was there. In other words, she did not want to associate with anybody, but she met Jesus at the well. After that encounter, she threw away her water jar and went back to town and started talking to other people, she communicated with people. Meeting Jesus changed her life completely.

How about Zacchaeus? Who was Zacchaeus?  

That’s right. He was tax collector at that time, although he was not just a tax collector. During those times, they were comparable to thieves and crooks. They were considered crooked people because they are the ones who could exploit their own people. If they can collect more taxes, they in turn get to have more. Due to this, they were despised by other people but Jesus called unto him and singled him out. And Zacchaeus was so impressed by Jesus that he gave up everything. Before his meeting with Jesus, money was everything to him. Money was his god. After meeting Jesus Christ, he was able to give up his god. This kind of change happened in Zacchaeus.

How about Simon (Peter)?

Before, Simon (Peter) thought that he could do it with his own will, with his own strength, but yet he denied Jesus three times after Jesus Christ came and said, “Do love me?” What he really meant was, you can only follow me when you truly love me. He realized that about the power of Jesus' love and that changed him completely. He was forgiven. He was given a new chance to live his life.

St. Paul?

He was a very zealous Pharisee. He said, As far as law is concerned, I’m blameless. He was full of self righteousness. “I am the best.” But after meeting Christ, he realized that he was nobody. So that kind of understanding completely changed St. Paul around.

And finally Nicodemus?

He comes out three times in the gospel of John, but Nicodemus was a very respected person. He was rich, he was religious, he was a leader, he was political, he was powerful; he had everything. But somehow he met Jesus Christ and Jesus said to him that you have to be born again. You have to change from the bottom. And then he realized that what he achieved was not everything, and through the course of his life, he really changed.

Change is Happening

So all of these people were changed by Jesus Christ. They met Jesus Christ and they changed. When you meet Jesus Christ; change is bound to happen. Change is going to happen. When you truly meet Jesus Christ; change is going to happen. Then what are some of the questions about change? Like what is change? Why are people reluctant to change? How do people decide to change? What are the dynamics of change? These are the questions that we are going to explore together. It's difficult to talk about change because change is very complex and there is no single formula or theory by which people change. People change for all kinds of reasons. They walk around and all of a sudden, “I don’t want to live like this,” and they change. All of a sudden they change.

So we don’t know exactly what is going on in the dynamics. Change is complex. It is hard to really pinpoint what changes exactly and the people who have changed, they cannot explain how they changed. They can't explain how they became Christian or how they became a followers of Jesus Christ. How they’ve changed from one life to another life. They themselves don’t know how to explain what happened to them, but even though change is complex and difficult to explain, we know that change always happens. This past winter was very, very difficult. We had to have a worship service without electricity. It was so hard. But soon after we see this new bud, and then I hear the birds chirping and I was so glad. I was so happy that winter is finally over. Now it’s summer.

Things always change. Children grow up fast. I still remember my daughter playing with the waves when we would go to a beach. She was so small. She goes out to the ocean. When the wave comes, she runs away but when the waves retreat, she goes out. And then now this year she says she’s getting married.  

Things change. Kids leave home. Old people pass away. There is nothing that stays the same. It is an illusion to say that everything stays the same. When you plant a new seed, it doesn’t look like any changes are being made. But the next day, you walk around, you go here and there and then all of a sudden it has changed into the flower. If you put a camera there all night, then you will be able to see the whole process of change. We don’t see it with our physical eyes, but change is always happening. That’s why Heraclitus – he was an Ephesian philosopher – he said, “No one ever steps in the same river twice. The second time you put your foot in, the water is not the same water anymore.” Different water comes in so no one ever steps in the same river twice. Nothing stays the same except one.

Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

Everything changes in the world. That is the number one truth of life, but we are not very good at accepting this number one truth of life. And second, we are not very good at accepting changes. Elizabeth Lesser in her book, Broken Open, she said, “How strange that the nature of life is change. Yet the nature of human beings is to resist change.” There’s an old saying, “You cannot teach an old dog new tricks.” Human beings are habitual animals. Once we are thrown into an environment, we get used to our circumstances and once we are used to our circumstances we then become good at repeating the same task over and over. We do it mindlessly.

We don’t like to change unless we have to. We are habitual beings, we are good at adjusting to our circumstances, but we are not good at changing our circumstances. We’re only good at adjusting to our circumstances. We’re good at adapting to a new pattern of life, but we’re not very good at changing the pattern of our lives. In other words, we are good at being a passive recipient of change but not very good at being an active agent of change. Do you want to be a passive recipient of change or an active agent of change? We wait and wait until we are left with no choice but to make a change, and then we change. We don’t actively search for a way to make changes.

You know, it is one thing to receive changes. It is another thing to make changes. What is your life like? Do you continuously receive changes or do you continuously make changes? What kind of lifestyle do you live? Do you just let things change you or do you yourself make changes in your lives? If you just receive your changes, then you have no ownership of the change, and if you have no ownership, then you have no responsibility for the change that you are making. This means that you always blame other people. You always blame the circumstances. “Oh, I didn’t want to change, but these things change me.” Parents cannot make all the choices for their children. The children need to have the freedom to make their own decisions and even the freedom to make mistakes. We cannot let our circumstances dictate the change in our lives.

If we do that, we will live our lives constantly blaming our circumstances. We won’t feel the empowerment. American author and aviator Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s said, “There is no sin punished more implacably by nature than the sin of resistance to change.” For every change that happens in me, I want to be solely in charge of that. I don’t want change just to happen and impose on me, I want to be in charge of changes. I don’t want to receive changes. I want to make changes for every change. I want to take charge.

I’m not saying that you have to make a lot of changes. Some people make lots of changes, they change jobs and they change this and that. They change mindlessly. They feel bored and make changes on a whim. This is just escapism. By making changes, it only really changes the surface, but that doesn't make it real change. They are making only superficial changes, but these are not considered real changes. They are only changing the exterior, not the true inner core of what really needs to be changed.

In Korean, there is a good saying; difference between and (change). These are two different things. . Do you understand this Korean? / . is change just on the surface; you change your circumstances or sceneries, but is of deeper insight; real inner change. Inner change is what is needed. Not only changing the sceneries and circumstances. In this fast changing society, I want to be awake, otherwise I’ll be swept away by the changes that are happening  within me. I want to be awake. What changes are happening in me? I want to be awake. I want to know. I don’t want to be blindly influenced by changes that are happening without me knowing. If I'm ignorant, I’ll just be swept away by the changes that are imposed on me.

I don’t want my circumstances to shape who I am exclusively. I don’t want other people, peers, or even my own parents to mold who I am. Truly. I want to be the main character of the change that happens in me and I know that realistically I have no choice but to be shaped by the change, against my own will, but I don’t want to be shaped helplessly and mindlessly. I have no choice but to be shaped, but I don’t want that to happen mindlessly and helplessly, at least I want to be aware of changes that happen in me. I don’t want to live the same life simply because I’ve lived like that for the last 10 years.

I don’t want to continue just because I’ve lived like that for the last several years. If I don’t like a part of who I am and don’t like what I am doing, I will change. I will not powerlessly just accept my life. That is essentially a defeated mentality. God accepts me for who I am, but God never leaves me there. God accepts me as I am, but God never leaves me there. God desires to change us. God always wants to take us to the next level. That’s what our God does.

St Paul experienced this kind of change within him. He said, “In Christ, we are a new creation. Behold, the old has gone and the new has come.” He boldly proclaimed this change that is happening within him, and this was St Paul’s attitude about his life. Philippians 3:12-14. “Not that I’ve already obtained this or have reached the goal, but I press on to make it my own because Christ Jesus has made me his own.” Even St. Paul doesn’t think that he’s finished changing.

I’m not already there yet, but I press on and then he said, “This one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead. I press on toward the goal.” That is a true spiritual person's attitude. Instead of just accepting what you have right now, you press on to the end goal. You have so much potential yet why are you just sitting on it? You cannot just sit on it. You have to move on. What St. Paul talked about was the inner change within us. 2 Corinthians 4:16 says, Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. We all get old. We all get weak. But our inner nature needs to be renewed every day. So every day becomes a new life rather than another same day.

I want to live like each day is a new day. It doesn’t matter how old you are. When you are renewed inwardly, then you become fresh every day. That is the kind of life St. Paul lived. If your life is full of worries and anxieties, if you’re filled with anger, rage, and even hatred, if you’re not sure about your future, if you’re not sure about what you want to do in your life, if you’re under your guilt and fear, if you’re so conceded that you don’t even feel for other people, then we all need change. You don’t need to change your jobs or your circumstances. We need to change here; in our heart. We change because I want to be truer to myself. That’s why I want to change, not to become great, but because I want to be truer to myself.

That’s why we change. The Bible believed in the change. Jesus believed in the change. Stories in the Bible are stories of change. We already looked at all these people; Nicodemus, the Samaritan Woman and more. If Bible believes the change, if God believes in the change, if Jesus believes in the change, why don’t we all believe in the change?

We have the belief that we can change. Change is not a theory. Change is a spiritual reality. God is god of making changes. It has God’s attribute, God’s nature. I have done 27 years of ministry. I have seen so many beautiful changes in people. When people change it is so beautiful. They make other people so happy. Do you know who the greatest enemy of change is? Who do you think? Satan? It is much simpler than that; it is ourselves. We are the greatest enemy of change.

It is our lack of belief that change can happen. Our pessimistic belief has to be challenged. It is like poison. It kills the dynamics of change in you. That’s why we don’t change because of our pessimistic belief, because it kills the dynamics of change. We don’t change. We get stuck in where we are. So then to make changes, the most important thing is your desire to change. When you have the desire to change, then change happens. That is the miracle. When you desire change, then change happens. George Bernard Shaw said, “Those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.” If there's a will, there’s a way. We need to cultivate the strong desire to change within us since that desire sits within us. You will experience the miraculous movement of change within you. The more your desire grows within you, the more active the movement of change you will experience. You have to actually experience that movement within you. When you have the desire; that active movement of change is happening within your belly, within your heart, within you. You feel that something is changing, something is moving. When you have a baby, you feel that life moving within you. In the same way, when you have the seed of change within you, you don’t feel flat. You feel something is moving within you. That desire creates the movement. Cultivate that desire and bear the fruit of change.

This is what Henri Nouwen said. “When the human heart is open and responsive to the movements of the spirit, healthy spiritual formation inevitably occurs. Having the desire to change and going through real change, these are two different realities. Why? Those are two different realities. What is the correlation between these two? What connects these two? Having the desire to change and actually changing. That is a mystery. What connects them?

It is not what that connects them; it is God.

It is God that makes it happen. You don't make real changes. When you have the desire to change, God uses that desire to bring about changes within you. 1 Corinthians 3:6, this is what St. Paul said. “I planted, apollos watered, but God gave the growth.” It is not I who brought growth but God who brought growth. These are the very famous words that Jesus said in the book of Matthew, “Ask now and it will be given to you.” I divided it into 2, the left side is desire and right side is real change. “Ask” is your desire, but “it will be given to you” is the true change that happens. “Search and you shall find, knock and the door will open for you.” So when you desire change, then actual change happens, but that is what God does. The important thing is that we build the desire within us. How can we build the desire to change? If you build that desire to change, change is going to happen, but since we don’t have that desire, we think that change cannot happen. I will never change. I’ll be like this for the rest of my life. Then change will not happen. But when you believe that you can change, when you have that desire to change; that will miraculously bring about the movement within you and bring about real changes within you.

Have you heard of the Pool of Bethesda? There was a person who was sick for 38 years. The story goes when the pool was stirred up, the first person who goes inside of the pool will be healed. So all the sick people were gathering around the pool so they can see the water being stirred up. Just imagine what would happen when water stirs up. Everybody would try to go into the pool to be the first person.

All these sick people will do anything to be the first person to go in. So the Pool of Bethesda really means a “pool of mercy.” What kind of mercy is that? So whenever the water is stirred up, we try our best to be perfect. That’s just like us. Whoever is at the top, whoever’s the fastest, whoever’s the highest, they will be the one healed.

That’s a myth.

When Jesus Christ came to this one person who was sick, who had been sick for 38 years, Jesus’ question was this, “Do you want to be healed?” What kind of question is that? He was sick for 38 years and Jesus asked, “Do you want to be healed?” What a strange question, but the answer is even more strange. The man didn’t say that he wanted to be healed. What did he say? “Don’t push me into the pool, I cannot be the first person.” He believes that change is only possible If he's the first person who goes into the pool.

Sometimes we have wrong desire, But do you really want to be healed? Do you really want to be well? In the back of my mind, I'm thinking only if I make this kind of money, only if I have this job, then I’ll be healed. If we have this mentality, then we cannot be healed. If I truly have the desire to be healed then come to Jesus. Come humbly to Jesus. Jesus did not push him into the pool. He healed this man.

Ask yourself, do you want to be healed? Do you want to be well? Do you want to be whole? Prayer is our desire. Our prayer is our desire. When we pray, we express our desire. Every morning when we pray, we express our desire and God uses that desire to change us. In our world, there are so many things that kill our desire to change. Cynicism, skepticism, lack of experience of the wonder, stubbornness or helplessness. Due to this, people cannot cultivate this desire. No wonder we don’t experience real change.

For me, change is a mystery. It’s not a mechanical process. To me, change is mystery. How did I change? I don’t know. It’s a mystery. I still need to change but I’m so excited. How is God going to change me? In the last 10 years, he has changed you so much. The next 10 years, how is he going to change you? You might not even see anything immediate.

Very soon, God is going to change me tremendously. God is going to change each and every one of you tremendously. Change is beyond our understanding and beyond our control.  Change is not just our own effort. Change is more than effort. Change is entering into a different level of reality. Change is entering into a different reality. The first reality is basic pleasure and entertainment. That’s the reality we live in. You only need to think about how to have a good time and then after meeting your needs, you want to serve others, you want to help others. The second level of reality and then the third level of reality is ultimately being one with God; a union with God. Change is entering into different levels of reality, day by day, year by year. Change is possible because God is leading us, using our desire to change. Grow this desire within you. Don’t stay where you are. Grow desire to become what you want to be. You will encounter the amazing miracle of change. The people who have no desire to change, they’re the victims of fear and failure.

They have been defeated so much that they don’t even have a desire to change. Don’t live your lives as victims. Anybody can change if they have desire to change, you have the powerhouse within you. It's the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is your power to change you, “As the deer pants for the water. My Soul thirsts for you.” Jesus said, “Anyone who is thirsty come to me. I’ll give them the living water.” When you’re thirsty for change, you come to Jesus and Jesus will give you that living water. Think about these questions. What do I want to change? How can I change? What do I want to change? How can I change? Asking the simpler questions are good enough. What do I want to change? How can I change? Did you know that your brain cannot refuse your questions? When you ask questions, your brain is working hard to find the answer. So if you ask yourself this question, Why am I so stupid? The brain continuously goes seeking for an answer. Your brain cannot refuse our own questions, so if you continuously ask that question, your brain will come up with answers to those questions, but if you ask, What can I change? How can I change? You will get answers.

Grow strong desire in you to change. You will find a way. You will be amazed by how God shows you the way. The artist Henri Matisse was diagnosed with cancer in 1941. From then on, he had to depend on the wheelchair. He could not draw anymore. He said, “My life after cancer was my second life,” but that didn't stop him from creating art. He started using paper and scissors to express himself artistically, in his own way. This is what he said, “Only what I created after the illness constitutes my real self, free liberated.”

When the change happens, life looks different. Life looks different. If you have the desire to change and then change starts happening in you. Your eyes will open and their life looks different. People look different. God will help you. The proverb says, “The plans of the mind belongs to mortals, but the answer of the tongue is from the Lord. The human mind plans the way, but the Lord directs the steps.” You don’t make changes alone. You are not alone. God will help you. Think about yourself. Are you so defeated that you don’t even have a desire to change?

Build that desire within you day by day and be awed by the mystery God brings in your lives. What you experience, the life you lived, is not everything. There is much more ahead of you, much more waiting for you. When you have the desire growing in you, then you will experience it. “I’ve never seen this before. I didn’t know that there is such a beautiful thing in life,” and then your eyes will be opened and life becomes alive.

You experience fulfillment of life, and that is a kind of change God wants to bring about. So during this retreat, think about what desires you have. What kind of change do you want to make in your lives? Don’t just be a passive recipient to simply receive changes imposed on you. I’m not going to do that anymore. I used to do that. I’m not gonna make changes because they are being imposed on me. I want to intentionally make changes with the help of God. I’m not gonna be swayed by the circumstances, by the forces of nature, by the forces of life. I’m going to be directed by the forces of the spirit. That’s what I’m going to do for the rest of my life and you do too. How can the spirit guide you, lead you. What kind of a change does the spirit want to make in your lives? That is the power of empowerment.

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So the last lecture, as I said, this is going to be short and then I want you to discuss more how we can build more meaningful relationships in our lives. And when we are able to build a meaningful relationship in our lives, then we are truly free. You don’t need to be so obsessed about ourselves and then we can bring about real change in us, in others and in the society they will live in and that’s where true transformation happens. Jesus Christ came not in a vacuum and Jesus Christ does not bring about transformation, not individually alone. Jesus brings about transformation in a relationship through a relationship. That’s why Jesus Christ called the disciples and made relationships with them for three years so that they can go out and build a new kind of relationship with others. It is very different from the old power related relationship. This new relationship is a love-related relationship and Jesus taught them what, how to have that relationship so that they can.

They may go out and build relationships with others. It’s not. We don’t need that many people to bring about transformation. The world is not changed by the majority. The world is not transformed by the great multitude. When you look at the change of the world, that world was transformed by a few people by small, committed people, and they made a transformation in the world. You know the very famous our anthropologist Margaret Mead and Margaret Mead said this: never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has. I think she saw it right, not the multitude, not the majority changed the world, few dedicated. Few dedicated people change the world. And that’s it only then they change the world. That’s why Jesus said, walk the narrow path. Jesus Christ came alone and he had only 12 disciples to bring about change.

So God came, Jesus Christ came to teach us that new kind of relationship and we want to learn this new kind of relationship so that we can relate to other people in a new way. Now, in the way, everybody relates to each other, not in the way the world of relates to each other that we want to build. What is the quality of the relationship that I wanna relate to people, witch and everything begins with our relationship with God? When we can build a true I thou relationship not religious relationship. I’m not talking about religion, I don’t want you to be religious alone. That itself will not change anything. Jesus Christ was also a victim of that religion at that time, so being religious is not really the only answer, but I want you to have genuine, real I thou relationship with God and then you can be a healing presence for other people, not only for yourself but to other people through quality relationship.

My life can bring healing to other people. we saw a few examples already that I mentioned about the person that I counselled with, and then a few through that relationship they truly brought about the transformation. As you see there are, there are a destructive relationship and healing relationship and we want to build healing, relationship, not a destructive relationship. Then I thou relationship is necessary. Then I like to see examine some of it and Chung moksanim had a book. Actually, I and Thou by Martin Buber, but, you read this for a long time ago and then, and, this is a book, but probably if you read it, it will be quite different from what I’m saying because is pretty difficult to read. First of all, when you read it, you’ll get confused a second. Second of all, I just use a title, borrowed his title, so I’m not really summarizing his book, but, that will give you a lot of, ideas about either our relationship and I thou relationship is the only relationship that can bring about transformation.

I-if relationship. Doesn’t matter how long you build a relationship with another person that I-if relationship will not bring about transformation. When we are able to truly seek others. I said three things, in a relationship. Either you manipulate others or you become manipulated, or third, you can truly seek others and either relationship is truly sick. Other other people, you know, love is funny and strange. Love is by nature giving yourself to others. But as a result, the person who gives love receives tremendous healing as they give love, you practice it when you give love to somebody. Then as a result, strangely, you experienced tremendous healing in your own self. Henry Nowan, he’s a, he was a professor at Harvard University. He was a well-known professor and he was respected. His life was going well, but he wasn’t happy. So he quit his university position. He came to large community daybreak community here in Richmond Hill area.

So he helped, mentally and physically challenged people. They, they cannot even get up by themselves. So he has to go and then wakes them up and takes him to the wheelchair and it carries them. And, he, he did that every day and he did conversation. And this person has no idea about Harvard. If he says, okay, I’m from Harvard University University, he will know what Harvard is. So I mean, he had to relate to this person, not as a Harvard professor, not as somebody who achieves so much, but as just as a human being. And he related out and he gave a lot of love to this person. And at the end he said, I was changed. I experienced my own healing by taking care of this person. So love is strange when you give, actually, you receive healing in your own life. So when you are able to give love to the people around you, ultimately you receive that love, as a result by giving love, we experience our vision, not when I, oh, I want to be safe.

Not when I say that, but when you truly give love, you experience salvation. And Salvation is the restoration of relationship, relationship with God and relationship with each other. That’s what salvation is. When there is a relationship problem between when there was a relationship problem between Adam and Eve. This is what Adam said. before What did he say first? He saw him. What did he say? You are bone of my bones. The flesh of my flesh. Wow. So beautiful. Hey, you and I are so connected. We are almost one together. But after they had a fight, this is what Adam said, the woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree and I ate very differently. She’s not bone on bone or flesh of flesh. The woman you gave to me, you know, he’s blaming God. He’s blaming the woman at, at the same time.

It’s very different. There is no bone of my bones. Only the woman whom you gave to be with me. She’s not thou anymore. She has become it or other and he blames her and also blamed God. But when you look at it, before this happened, already broken relationship happened, with God. When this, before he said this, he said about God this way. I heard the sound of you in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid. He was always naked, but all of a sudden he was embarrassed about his nakedness. I think the Genesis writer, knew human psychology very well.

When a relationship is broken, we are afraid of our own nakedness. We cannot be ourselves in true I thou relationship. You can be yourself as weak as you are. You are free to be yourself, but when that I thou relationship is broken, you are not any more free to be yourself. Pretension takes over. You have to show the good side of yourself and you’re embarrassed about your nakedness, your darkness, your weaknesses, but when I thou relationship is truly formed, then all this pretension disappear and then you become totally free to be yourself. I thou relationship gives freedom to be who we are, not scared of our faults and shortcomings, so when you come to God, when you have me thou relationship, you can truly be naked to God, but if your relationship with God is not I-Thou relationship, you’ll be scared of God. You will not come to God with a naked self.

You have to somehow show your good side of it and already that relationship is a broken relationship, but with God, there’s no other relationship but I thou relationship with human beings. We can have other relationships, but with God the only relationship that is possible is I thou relationship where you’re completely free to be yourself, to show your shortcomings. So yesterday we saw today or yesterday, I’m not sure, but, we saw that Paul, after meeting Christ, he was able to show his naked self instead of saying that, oh I used to be bad, but I am good now. But now he could truly show his weaknesses, his darkness and his shortcomings. Being free to be who you are instead of running away is healing. That Samaritan woman we explored, she tried to run away, run away from people. She shot herself from the rest of the people and she was in her own closet.

Jesus went there and brought her out and brought about the transformation and she was free. Now she was free to dance. She was free to run, she was free to fly and she ran to the community. And then told them that this Jesus changed me and transformed me. That’s what I thou relationship does to people. Freedom from their bondage. Empower them to go beyond their weaknesses. Give them the courage to accept who they are, no matter how painful that may be open their hearts to be connected with others. We are all in sense victims of expectations, judgment and condemnation of the world. John Welwood said in his book, “Perfect love, imperfect relationships”, he said: expectations in relationships, can often be a subtle form of violence, for they can be a demand that others conform to our will, so sometimes expectations are poison because it can be a subtle form of violence in the relationship.

Good I, Bad Other

Many times through our relationships, instead of feeling liberated and empowered, we feel trapped, chained and belittled, and then you cannot demand the other person to continue that relationship. When you feel belittled, when you feel chained, when you feel trapped, you have to deal with that relationship first before just asking that person to continue that relationship. Sometimes we are way too judgmental of each other. The less you demand total fulfillment from the relationship, the more you can appreciate them. For the beautiful tapestries, they are in which absolute and relative perfect and imperfect, infinite and finite are marvellously interwoven. You can experience that tapestry. Within us. We all have this thing. Good. I versus bad other that mentality kills the relationship. There is a word between good I and bad other and actually bad other is an internal image of the person who doesn’t love us. Whoever does not love us. We label them sometimes as bad other our relationship. Instead of loving, of lifting relationship, they have become a competition of who is right and who is more righteous. When you make the other bad, you cannot have genuine relationships. As I said, if you don’t find beauty in other people, you cannot have I thou relationship. When you make another person as bad, then you cannot build a genuine real relationship. So we need to, think about this. Good. I and bad. Other.

Think about yourself whether you have this good I, bad another attitude in you. I’m always good. I’m always right. Always the other person is bad and always the other person is wrong. Think about whether you have this good I, bad other mentality within you because that mentality is very opposite of biblical teaching. You may think that this is right, but this is self-righteousness without realizing you have fallen into your own self Righteousness. I’m always right and others are always wrong and, you’re busy proving that others are wrong and you’re right. Even by destroying the relationship, you try to prove that others are wrong, but the relationship is broken but doesn’t matter. I am right. They are wrong. That’s what matter that good I, bad other mentality kills and destroys the relationship. Let me give you biblical example whether this is biblical mentality or not. It is the opposite of what the Bible says. Let me give you a little example for you first, “do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others better than yourselves.”

Is it this teaching? Good I, bad other? No, Paul teaches: consider others better than yourself. Let me give you another example. This time, this time it’s Jesus’ teaching: “do not judge so that you may not be judged for with the judgement you make, you will be judged and the measure you give will be the measure you get. Why do you see the speck in your neighbour’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? You see Spec in another side, but you don’t see. Log in your own eyes it’s not good I, bad another teaching I have a law. Jesus said, others have only a Spec, maybe good other bad I, and it is a very different from this teaching and typical example of the opposite of this teaching is Jesus teaching about Pharisee’s prayer. Let me read it, and then you listen two men went up to the temple to pray one a Pharisee and the other, a tax collector.

The Pharisee standing by himself was praying to us. “God, I thank you that I am not like other people”. What is he doing? Good, I bad other, thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I give a 10th of all my income. Good I, bad other, but at the end, you know what did what Jesus said. Do you know who went home? Considered righteous by God. Not pharisee, but tax collector. He was proven wrong. St. Paul had this good I, bad another attitude when before he met God in an I thou relationship, he went out to persecute Christians and then he said this to himself. He said, listen, if anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh, I have more circumcised. On the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews, as to the law of Pharisee, as the zeal a persecutor of the church as to righteousness under the law, blameless. Good, he was full of good I and he went out to capture the bad other. That’s when he met the risen Christ, and then everything collapsed. Everything he believed collapse. This is what he said after meeting Christ Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners of whom I am the foremost.

This is after he met Christ. No more good I bad Other mentality in Paul, in a relationship this good I bad other mentality is always in the way. As long as we have this mentality, the relationship cannot last long or get deepened. When people do that, first you fight, but there are so strong because they want to prove that I am right and you’re wrong until even though relationships are broken, so then after a while you don’t even try. When that person says, I am. Right, okay, you’re right, but is there a relationship you just move on? But the relationship is not deepened. Other people just avoid. It’s not that they agree with you. They avoid any conflict. So this good. I bet another relationship is always in the way. John Welwood said, the most destructive element in human relationships is the urge to make other people bad or wrong, and then judge reject or punish them for that. When you fail to grieve your own hurt, you create grievance within you. And I’m going to just talk about five As for you and then I want you to let you go and then discuss, there are five a’s in his book. How to be an adult in relationships. First is attention.

Attention is when I, thou relationship occurs. Everything else goes into the background. The person you’re talking to becomes the entire universe. It shows how interested you are in that person while listening to someone. If you’re thinking about something else, you’re not giving attention. So when you build wanna build, build a good relationship, learn to give attention in the fellowship hall or whatever. When you hear somebody then don’t get distracted. You pay total attention to that person. As I said about them, the men that I met in Brazil, when he listened to me, he looked at me as though I am the entire universe and he was very interested in what I have to say. But Lot of times when we hear other people, well, what do we do? We are thinking of something else, you know? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Really? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, you’re not sure what you heard, you know, you just want to pretend that you heard, but give total attention is difficult because we are scattered we are distracted. There’s a book that, I was reading a by Carr Nicholas and that title is: the shallows what the Internet is doing to our brains. I mean, this, Internet, age is very difficult to have real a real attention and concentration. He, this is what he said and what the net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation. Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words, now I zip along the surface like a guy on a jet ski so he cannot really enter into the ocean of words and enter into the ocean of thoughts, enter into the ocean of the other people. We’re just zipping along just this person and that person and we cannot really have concentration and this will affect our relationship.

How do we communicate? A lot of times with text message, you know, very short, especially with the iPhone is really, really hard to write anything. So I just. Okay. Yes, just, just one or two words, right? That’s how we communicate. And with that how can you talk about your feelings? How can you talk about your deep thoughts, your struggles and, we are so used to this kind of form of communication. And also, a lot of times we are filled with our own agenda. When you listen to people, paying attention means you’re not judging that person, but as soon as you hear one word already make a judgment and, you don’t listen. Really, you’re listening to your own voice, you know, they are talking, but you’re creating your own novel, you know, by listening to their stories, you’re making up your own stories because of the, you’re not paying you’re filled with your own agenda.

So when you listen to other people, pay attention, truly listen. Anthony Demello said a lot of people see persons and things not as they are, but as you are, we see things not as they are, but as we are let down all our prejudgments and pay attention to what they say. Second, acceptance. You don’t have to agree with everyone. The fact that we don’t agree with them can make us very uncomfortable, but we have to accept the fact that people are different. People are different. And when, and we have to learn to accept people who are different from us. We don’t have to always change them to be like us. So that we may relate to them. Accepting, accepting somebody means to respect their choices, their feelings, and their personal traits. When a woman caught in adultery was brought before Jesus and Jesus said, let those who have no sin cast the first stone, Jesus accepted the sinners and outcasts without moralizing them accepting somebody is opposite of moralizing them.

You don’t have to agree with their lifestyle. You don’t have to agree with their philosophy, you don’t have to agree with what they say, but we have to learn to accept them as they are. We need to be a bigger person to accept those who are different. We try to earn love through our efforts, looks talents and achievements. By doing that, we may earn approval, but what we need is love that. Accept us as we are. We want to be where we are accepted and then we should practice this acceptance instead of trying to make changes so fast. By doing that, you don’t change anybody. Third, appreciation. Appreciation is finding good values in each person. Everyone has a beautiful, good quality and we discover that good quality, that’s talent. When you discover others faults, you’re not genius because everybody knows how to do it, but when you find a good value that other people don’t find, then you’re genius, you can find treasure in every person. That woman who’s was 20 years older than, than the person that I mentioned in the first night, that woman found treasure in him and then he, she was able to help him and transformed him. John M Gutman a professor at the University of Washington in Seattle. He said, the ratio of appreciation to the complaint in couples that stay together. You know what? That is? Five to one.

People who stayed together. They give appreciation five times more than the complaints. So in your all those married couples, learn to show appreciation. Learn to express appreciation when you are thankful, don’t just be thankful inside. Say it, express it. Thank you. And then by doing that, you build a better relationship. When we are appreciated, we know it, we feel valued. I know when I’m appreciated, I feel good. I feel empowered, I feel precious and I can move on in spite of the fact that I have shortcomings, I can move on through that appreciation and I’m going to move to the next.. in building I, thou relationship. Finding others. Precious quality is very important. Uh, and of course you have to be very sincere about your appreciation for people like me. If you say, oh, you’re so tall and handsome, then that person is half right.

I mean, so when you show appreciation, you have to be genuine and sincere. You cannot make up then that’s not appreciated. That’s a ridiculing Somebody next, affection. Love is our primary need. Relationship. Grows on love. Like a tree cannot grow without water. Relationships cannot grow without love. Love is a warm feeling, but it is not just warm. Feeling. Love is the way you respond to different situations. Let me tell you when love meets suffering and pain, love is expressed as compassion, but when love needs enemies, it is expressed as forgiveness. When love meets, the evil, the love is expressed as justice, to people who are kind to us. Love shows appreciation to people who want to stay away from us because they are angry. Love waits, to people who misunderstand us, love explains to them and helps them understand to people who cannot stand us.

Love embraces them as the ocean. Embrace the water. Rivers, bring down, and as the sky embraces the cloud to people who need us, love stays with them and be with them. So love has many different faces. Love is the way you respond to different situations and expresses itself in different ways. So love is not just always warm, fuzzy feeling sometimes because of love. You speak the truth sometimes because of love you are firm sometimes because of love. You critique. So love expresses itself in many different ways. The last, an allowing. So first let’s go over. First one is what? Attention, second acceptance, third appreciation and fourth affection. Try to remember this. And then in your relationship, try to, be aware of these five, five an’s. The last one is most difficult. That is allowing, but that is most important. We allow people who they are, we let people express their pain, their hurt, their deep needs, and even their deep insecurities. We allow them to do so because that’s what our Lord Jesus did. He allowed Peter to deny him.

The cross is the ultimate expression of allowing. When you read the last part, the last supper in John, Jesus said this, Jesus knew exactly who was going to betray him. Judas. He said, one of you will betray me, and then he gave everyone the element and then he said this, do it to Judas. Do quickly what you’re going to do. He allowed Judas to be trained and to the end, he gave the bread and wine. This allowing is very painful and very difficult, but Jesus did it. Jesus did not say, Judas Why are you trying to do that? Don’t do it. Jesus knew that that won’t be helpful. Jesus knew that Judas was going to betray him, so he allowed Judas to betray him. I thou relationship gives, total freedom to the other. A true relationship is possible only in this total freedom. A true relationship is not in our control. So these five A’s. I’m going to stop here tonight and I want you to go to your group and share it together. Uh, and you come back and then because it’s last night, I don’t know. How much time do we have? Yeah. Including group discussion. How much time. Oh, what time are they supposed to finish their group discussion? Nine o’clock. Really? Yeah. Can you come back a 10 tonight? I said sure. Okay. Nine o’clock. Okay. So can you come back at 9:00 and share a little bit of what you discussed and I liked to hear all the groups sharing that. What is the best way? Attitude or behaviour to build good either relationship.

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Yesterday, we said Adam and Eve were created, and the important thing is not that Adam and Eve were there. The important thing that I wanted to emphasize was that “and” was created. The relationship was created from that moment on, we are born to live in relationship. Through this “and”, Adam comes alive, and through this “and”, Eve comes out. So the important thing is the “and”, not Adam or Eve, but the important thing is the “and”. That is what’s important and also in our relationship “I” and “you”. How can I overcome my own “I” so that I can build this “and”? When this “and” is built, I come alive and you come alive, but we are focused so much on “I” that we kill end and when the “and” is killed, then “I” is killed and “you” is killed. Both are destroyed. The important thing is that I cannot be “I” be without “you”. I am because you are. Because we are, I am, so this “I” can only possibly survive with this “and”.

I really liked that song, “I am Free”. How can I be free from myself? How can I be free from the bondage of myself and then build this strong “and” that connects “you” and “I”?. It’s like a bridge. This is a secret. When we find this “and”, then “I” come alive and “you” come alive. When that “and” is gone, then I cannot exist meaningfully, and you cannot exist meaningfully; we live in separation. We are not an island. We are connected. We are people of relationships, but relationships are so difficult. It’s not easy just because you’re married, just because you are now boyfriend and girlfriend, just because you’re engaged. That doesn’t mean the relationship is there. A relationship is something that consciously you have to continuously build, otherwise, the relationship dies.

So whenever I do marriage counselling, I do that in the beginning. The first year is very important for all of you. You try to connect with each other, but if you don’t do anything after 10 years, that relationship is not there anymore. And after 10 years down the road, “Gee, what happened?”. You’re supposed to love me, but there is no such thing as “supposed” to love me. Either you love or not, there is no such thing. There’s no rule that you’re supposed to love anyone, so even though you’re married, you have to continuously build that “and”, then it grows, but if you just leave it aside and don’t do anything about it, then after 10 years is not there anymore. So this “and” is very, very important, but the “and” is very difficult to build. Today I’m going to talk about this “and”, and what that “and” looks like.

To build relationships, it takes a long time to build it and take so much of our energy and patience and love to build a good relationship, but once it is built, the relationship makes all of us very, very strong. Relationships make us strong. Even though everything else fails, if the relationship is there, you can survive, but if even if everything is there if a relationship is not there, then it is pretty difficult to survive. When you look at your booklet, Ecclesiastes 4:12, it says: “And though one might prevail against another, two will withstand one. A threefold cord is not quickly broken.”. A threefold cord is not quickly broken. If you’re connected, you’re not going to be easily broken. That relationship is strong.

There was a Jewish scholar who was born in 1878. He was born than 100 years ago, but his thinking and his thoughts are still very much relevant to us, so I’m going to use them. I’m not going to describe his theology or anything. He was a Jewish theologian. He wasn’t a Christian, rather a Jewish theologian, but he studies, I think are still very relevant after 100 some years. His name is Martin Buber. He was born in Vienna, Austria. When he was three years old, his mother left without any explanation. She just left. After a while, his father took him to his grandparents, Carl Buber took little Martin to a small rural area in Galicia. And for eight decades of his life, he had to endure the heartache of rejection. He grew up under his grandparents, so as soon after the father dropped him off, he was gone too. So he lived without a mother or a father. He lived alone, under his grandparents. Maybe because of his personal situation, he was very interested in relationships. So sometimes I wonder, life difficulties are not necessarily always bad. Sometimes because we human beings are kind of weak, unless we experienced something through our skin, we can never experience or learn. He truly experienced this rejection and loneliness and tremendous, a sense of being alone in the entire universe. So he thought a lot about relationships. He never blamed anyone for his situation. I think that’s maturity. You can blame people and just be done with it, but he never blamed anyone for that. He chose to meditate on, contemplate the relationship. He was Albert Einstein’s friend.

Albert Einstein explained the world through scientific fiscal understanding, but Martin Buber explained the world through meaningful relationships. Martin Buber explains our relationship in two ways. There are two kinds of relationships and even the title itself when you look at it, you’ll figure out what he tries to say: “I – thou” relationship and “I – it” relationship. And “thou” and “it” does not describe the people that you have relationships with. They describe the kind of dash (-) that you have. Depending on the kind of relationship you have, the other person can become “thou” or “it”. Sometimes even God can be an “it” rather than a “thou”. The parents can be “it” instead of being “thou”. When you use God or your parents just for your personal need, then it becomes an “I – it” relationship. But an “I – thou” relationship is very different and I like to talk about the dash (-) that connects between I and you and whether an I and your relationship is either “I – thou” or “I – it”

I want you to think about the kind of relationships that you’re building right now. Are they “I-thou” relationship or “I-it” relationships? As I said, even with God you can build “I-It” relationship without knowing that you’re building an “I-It” relationship. You think that you’re building “I-thou”, but ultimately you’re just building an “I-It”  relationship just for your own salvation, your security, your peace of mind and your blessings. If that is all you think about, then you are building “I-It” relationships. You are just using God for your own self. Then that is an “I-It” relationship. I cannot say that “I-It” relationships are necessarily bad relationships. I don’t want to say that. An “I-It” relationship is only the beginning point to be transformed to “I-Thou”. An “I-It”  relationship is a kind of a cocoon,

If an “I – thou” relationship is a butterfly. An “I-Thou”  relationship can fly and this “I-It” is only a cocoon. And this is where I become totally free. As we sang, I am free. In this relationship, I become free. But in this relationship, I am not yet truly free. Ninety percent of the relationships that you have, is the “I-It”  relationship. Probably 80-90 percent of relationships are “I-It” relationships. At Dixie and Eglinton, there is a good Afghanistan restaurant, if you want to go try middle-eastern Afghanistan food, it’s a kind of fast food restaurant. When you go there, there are combos, so it is very easy to order. So I order combo 3. I then they gave me a number 58, then I go to my seat and then sit down and wait for my number to be called. And then they call my number and I go there. And then, I show my number 58 and they gave me my number three. So I take my number three and come back and then eat. That’s all the relationship between that person means just number. I’m number 58 and I order number three. So that’s how are our relationship is like that is “I-It”  relationship. It doesn’t go beyond that.

When Nelson Mandela was imprisoned on Robben Island as a prisoner, his number was 46664, because he was imprisoned in the year ’64 and he was the 466th prisoner which makes 46664. Bono wrote a song just to say that this is not just a number. So if you go to Youtube, you will see Bono’s song, 46664. While a Nelson Mandela was in prison, to the prison guards, he was just number 46664. He was just number. Nothing beyond that. Their relationship was the “I-It” relationship.

I’m trying to describe this dash. We can see “I-it” relationship in a professional relationship. When a patient goes to see a doctor, the patient is not interested in the illness of the of the doctor. I’m interested in myself. Of course, I’m different, because my doctor is James, so I’m much more interested in his health. So, when I go, how are you doing, how’s your heart condition? and all that stuff before he asks me anything. But in a regular situation, when you go see a doctor, you’re not interested in the doctor's physical conditional, you're interested in your physical condition. You tell them what’s wrong with you and all that, and then they tell you and nothing goes beyond that. Just a functional relationship. Because 80 to 90 percent of our relationship is “I-it” relationship, we are used to “I-it” relationships. In “I-it” relationship it is dispensable. It exists only for my needs. The interest is not in the dash. The interest is in me, that my needs are met, not in the dash, not in the relationship. To fulfill my needs, we use others. There is no deep sharing. We are there together just for our needs. When we are in a lineup while grocery shopping, a cashier sometimes talks to a customer and is like “Yesterday, I went to the party and all that stuff. You know, that drink was so great,” and the people in the line, they get frustrated because they get delayed, right? I mean rightly so, but the unspoken rule is don’t go beyond “I-it” relationship. Here, just do “I-it” relationship and that’s it. That is “I-it” relationship. All the self-centred relationship ends up with “I-it” relationship.

Even our friendship can become “I-it” relationship. I’m lonely, so I need you. I need my playmate, so I can do something together. So, friends are just there to fulfill my loneliness and that’s a friendship, but that’s an “I-it” friendship. I believe that friendship is more than that, more than just using each other for my own loneliness. In a marriage, your spouse is more than just to fulfill my social needs. Then we need to go beyond an I- it relationship to the “I-thou” relationship. But a lot of friendships remains at “I-it” relationships. And Jesus said, I’m your friend and a good friend is you die for your friend. That is a real friendship. That is the “I-thou” relationship, not “I-it” relationship. We are so used to. We are so used to this kind of relationship. So, we think that all the relationships are “I-it” relationship, but you are wrong. With that kind of thinking, we will never experience the beauty that relationship can bring to us. With “I-it” relationship, I can never be transformed. I use it , but I can never be transformed. 80 to 90 percent of our relationship is “I-it” relationship, but what transforms I is an “I-thou” relationship, which is only 10 to 20 percent of your relationship. The love and sacrifice of our parents are similar to an “I-thou” relationship. They don’t think about themselves, they only think about the other. So that is more like an “I-thou” relationship.

Have you seen the praying hands, the picture? The beautiful praying hands. There’s a beautiful story behind that l picture. These two friends were artists and they were preparing themselves to be artists, but they didn’t have enough money so that they said, they were talking to each other. You study first, I’ll help you , No, you study first, I’ll help you . And finally, they made an arrangement. So, the other guy, studied first, went to university and studied art and the other friend, because he didn’t have money, he went to a construction site and he was carrying bricks and all that. So, he was helping. But because he worked such rough labour, his hands got all calloused and everything, so he cannot draw anymore, and so he became kind-of bitter. The other guy became very famous and kind of forgot about his friend. And one day he came to visit his friend and saw his friend pray and so the praying hands and it was so beautiful, with that imagination, he came back home he drew that picture. That is the “I-thou” friendship.

With “I-it” alone we don’t experience the transformation. I want to express “I-it” relationship in a different way. I can say I-other relationship. “I-it” relationship is the same as I-other relationship. When you become, not thou , but other , we cannot have meaningful relationships. The other has nothing to do with me. The other is there outside of me with no involvement with me. There’s a good Korean word for other . You know what that is? (nam). We call it . It’s a very good Korean word. We don’t call our family . We don’t call our friends . We don’t call our parents . , others, are strangers. Not one of us. Not within my circle. Outside of my circle.

I plus you equals we. I plus other equals what? Still I . What we are trying to build this is I plus you, we. Not I plus other, which is just I. When you hate somebody, you must make the person other, because you can never hate thou. You must make that person first, other, then you can hate the person. When thou become the other or it, it is much easier to do whatever I want. When you make other, racially, other, sexually, other, politically, other, ethnically, other, morally, other, religiously, other, personally, other, you have a good excuse not to have a relationship with them. I don’t want to pinpoint one person, but Mena has been with us for a few months in our church. And she even came to the retreat. She’s an Italian Canadian and she was raised practicing Catholic. Now she is a Protestant, in a majority of Koreans. I think it takes tremendous courage to be with people who are other on the surface, but when you’re connected that other can become thou . Other can become you .

Last year I went to Israel. Israel is a strange place. It is religiously charged. Religion is in the air. Religious feelings are in the air. When you go there, from early in the morning, the first day, around 4 or 5, I heard hmmm (humming noise). What is this? I don’t even know how many minutes that lasted. And then around noon, hmmmmm . In the evening, hmmmmmm . At first, it was so strange. It stressed me out but I after a while I was waiting for hmmmmm . Why isn’t it coming out? It’s 12:00? Come on! You’re late today! You feel comfortable hearing it. It religiously charged, spiritually charged. Even the airplane to Israel was religiously charged. I took a lot of airplane trips, and we don’t talk about religion, we don’t talk about deep sharing, but when I went to Israel, there was a Holocaust survivor, she was sharing her own experiences. And there was a missionary from South America, and he tried to convert her. And then in the back, there was a messianic Jew and they were talking, but I mean the whole airplane is charged with meaningfulness, meaningful conversation. And the person right beside me, she was a Jew, but she was a retired teacher. Her husband was a doctor and he was retired too. They live in Vancouver, and they were on the way to Israel. Every year, she goes back to Israel. We were talking. In the beginning, we were just chit-chatting, but then we started talking about the issue of Palestine and the Jews, and then she was sharing about how she felt after retirement and you know, her kids. And two or three hours just passed by without us realizing it. We are so absorbed in our conversation that we didn’t know that two or three hours passed by. I didn’t need to use her. She didn’t need to use me. That is an “I-thou” relationship. That is an “I-thou” relationship. We are beyond “I-it” relationship. You don’t have to be family or even a longtime friend to have “I-thou” relationship.

An I-thou relationship does not have to be a long-lasting relationship. You don’t demand that it should be a long-lasting relationship. It can be there briefly and disappear. It’s not something within your control. You don’t control “I-thou” relationships. It is not something that I can dictate. No, you and I, from today, after this lecture, we will have “I-thou” relationship. No, you cannot because “I-thou” relationship is not something that you can dictate. When it happens, it is a blessing, but when you try to possess it, it disappears. When you’re obsessed to have it, it goes away further from you. But when you quietly wait, it comes. Rabbi Pinhas said this, “what you pursue, you don’t get, but what you allow to grow slowly in his own way, comes to you.”. So, I-thou relationship is not something that you make.

Do you remember the story of manna? When the Israelites did not have food, every day God gave them manna, but they could not store and it went bad after the day. It is just like a blessing. “I-thou” relationships are like that. It is given to you, but you cannot possess it and hold it. You don’t control it’s coming and it’s going. It can come silently and go silently. When it comes, don’t try to possess it, when it goes, don’t be too sad. It can be 10 minutes, it can be 10 hours, it can be 10 years. It has nothing to do with the length of time. It is the quality of the relationship, not the length of the relationship. But the thing is, even if it is 10 minutes, its impact and effect can last a lifetime. That “I-thou” relationship, even though it lasts only for 10 minutes, it can impact for your lifetime.

People who met Jesus Christ experienced this “I-thou” relationship and that short moment impacted them for their whole entire life. Do you remember Nicodemus? He came to Jesus. He wanted to talk to him and Jesus says, as soon as he saw him, you have to be born again, he said, and he talked about spirit probably 10 minutes, 15 minutes at the most, but that had a profound impact on Nicodemus. When you read the scripture, Nicodemus comes out only in John. He comes out three times in John. In the beginning and he disappears and when Jesus was in Sanhedrin and they wanted to kill him, and he stood up and said, “do we kill somebody without properly going through the procedure?”. I mean, it was very courageous for him to do that. Everybody wanted to kill him, and he stood up and spoke up for Jesus. And at the end, after Jesus died, he was the one who took Jesus’ body down and gave a proper burial. And even though he had 10 minutes of experience that had a profound influence on him.

There was a person like that to me. I still remember that encounter. When I went to Brazil many years ago, I went there and met this old man. He was shorter than me. He looked up to me like this. I felt great. For a long time, I always had to look up, but not this time. I mean, from the first moment that I met him, he would give me his total attention to me.  So, we were talking, and he was saying he was a priest once, but he quit his priesthood and then one day at home, he heard this baby crying outside. So, he went outside and there was a baby. Somebody dropped the baby. So, he took the baby and then after a few weeks another baby was dropped. He did for a few times and then he became kind of famous in the village. “Oh, if you have unwanted babies, drop them there, he will take good care of them.”. So, people kept dropping the babies. He did not want to do the orphanage, but by the time I went there, he was running an orphanage without it being his intention. And he was saying all that and he was such a nice guy. And at the end of our conversations, he just hugged me really hard and said, “See you in heaven.” That moment. I couldn’t hold back my tears, you know? I probably met him for about 25 minutes and he held me, and said, “See you in heaven.” By now probably he’s in heaven and I know that I will see him in heaven. That brief encounter, that feeling,  is still with me. The words he said, “see you in heaven, is very fresh even though it was from 30 some years ago. That “I-thou” experience can transform me and can transform others. It is a beautiful relationship. When there is a relationship of “I-thou”, you experience oneness, and you see nothing but that person. Everything retreats into the background and only that person is there. Do experience that? That total attention when you are in conversation, that total absorption.

Rabbi Chaim, he saw this tightrope walker and he said this, “this man is risking his life and I cannot say why, but I am quite sure that while he’s walking the rope, he’s not thinking of the fact that he’s earning money by what is doing for if he did, he would fall.” Total focus and concentration. In the “I-thou” relationship, you experience this kind of focus and concentration. Thou becomes the whole universe. I come alive and thou comes alive. You know people who do extreme sports? Bicycle or ski or extreme sports, you ask them, why do you do it? Why do you risk your life? And you know what they say? I feel alive by doing that. You don’t have to do extreme sports to feel alive. When you experienced the “I-thou” relationship, you feel alive. In our relationships, we don’t know how to focus and how to concentrate because we are so scared. We are so filled with our own personal agenda. Our minds are scattered, and our relationships become scattered. We are too self-focused. My continuous struggle for myself and for helping other people is that. How can you be free from this? How can you be free from this? When you are free from this, you will experience true freedom. You come alive! But when you’re obsessed with this, then slowly you’ll die.

We let down our agenda, our demands, our expectations, and we open our hearts to each other. Then “I-thou” will come. I may not be able to create “I-thou”, but I can block “I-thou” from coming by my attitude. If I is filled with prejudice, obsession, expectation, “I-thou” relationship is not possible. If I is too strong and too big, the relationship is not possible. That’s why Jesus said to follow me, to make fish yourself. What do you have to do first? You must deny yourself. That means you must make yourself small. Otherwise, you can never build a meaningful relationship. When I become bigger, the dash (-) becomes smaller, then I become smaller, the dash becomes bigger. The modern world is obsessed with building bigger I s. When you build big I, dash becomes smaller.

This illusionary I destroys the relationship. When I is transformed, it is transformed into thou and “and” comes alive. No more separation, no more division, just oneness. In the “I-thou” relationship, there is no dominant other .  Whoever has the most stable foothold supports the climb that day. There is no dominant one. So, as Saint Paul said, when you experienced Jesus Christ and build that “I-thou” relationship with Jesus Christ, this what happens, there is no longer Jew or Greek. There is no longer a slave or free. There is no longer male and female for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. We all become connected.”

Let me give you the last prayer of Jesus Christ for the human beings. He said this. John 17: that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us,[f] so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, 23 I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. .  Look at that. It is filled with oneness. This is Jesus’ last prayer. Jesus is talking about the beautiful “I-thou” relationship.

Don’t expect the “I-thou” relationship to always be there. You’ll get frustrated and disappointed. It’s not realistic. “I-thou” becomes, “I-it” and we experience another “I-thou”. All these things, “I-it” and “I-thou”, flow like a tide. It comes and goes. Our relationship goes up and down. If there is a flat line, you’re dead. There always ups and downs. I mean relationship goes up and down. “I-thou” becomes an “I-it”, but then “I-it” changes into “I-thou.” So, don’t expect it to be always there. That’s not realistic, but the important thing is every moment we need to be awake and be aware of what kind of quality your relationships are right now. You need to be aware of what kind of relationship am I building. Even with the spouse. After a while, you just demand and demand and demand and everything turns into an “I-it” relationship. Instead of building an “I-thou relationship. We all have our weaknesses, and because of these weaknesses, we hurt others and we get hurt. We close our heart. When we get hurt, the first thing you do is you close your heart to other people and a true relationship cannot be built.

Do you know what Thomas Merton said? “Prayer and love are learned in the hour when prayer has become impossible and your heart has turned to stone.”. There are times when our hearts have turned to stone. That’s when we truly love. We truly learn love. Our weaknesses sometimes can poison our relationship, but in Tibet, there is a saying: “The medicine can be found in the poison.”. When our weaknesses poison our relationship and when our relationship is in an ill condition, maybe that’s when we can find the true cure for our relationship. Yes, we see a lot of people with a lot of weaknesses, but behind all those weaknesses, I hope that you can also find treasures, some beautiful qualities behind them.

You know, I’m reminded of a scene, Jean Valjean, that movie. What is that? Les Misérables. Yeah. A beautiful movie. And when Jean Valjean was arrested, the bishop said to him, “Oh, you left in such a hurry, you forgot to take the candlestick that I gave to you and here, take it.”. Even though the bishop knew that Jean Valjean did something bad, he didn’t just look at the ugly side of it, but he saw the potential beauty behind it. And we see Jean Valjean live the potential beauty at the end. That’s what we need to see. As we look at each other, yes, we see each other’s weaknesses, but I hope that we can also see the beauty that is hidden behind those weaknesses. When you don’t see beauty in other people, you cannot build the “I-thou” relationship. When you see ugliness in other people, you have no choice but to build an “I-it” relationship. But when you start discovering the beauty in other people, then you can build “I-thou” relationships. Have a big heart like an ocean. The ocean is at the bottom, but it embraces all the waters from small rivers and big rivers. So, it is good to be like the ocean so that you can embrace their weaknesses, but the ocean is bigger than the rivers. I believe that love is bigger than hatred. Love can embrace the hatred, but hatred cannot embrace love.

When Jesus said, “love your enemies,” Jesus is talking about the magnitude, the size of the love that is bigger than the hatred. The cloud cannot embrace the Sky. Sky embraces the cloud. Love is like that. As the ocean embraces the rivers, as the sky embraces the cloud, the true humility can embrace other weaknesses, and I believe that true humility is courage. So, if I may say the last word, when you make I so big then you becomes so small. But when you make I small, “and” becomes bigger, and through that you both become alive. So, two kinds of dashes, two kinds of relationship. Think about it. What are the relationships that you’re pursuing in your own relationships, in your own life? With your parents, with a church, with God, with others? Are you building a relationship just to be meet my needs, or do you build relationships so that you can give? Think about it.

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Introduction

I hope that this is the most memorable retreat for all of us, especially this time since we’re going to focus on relationships. A relationship is something that we all have, and that is what I like to see. A relationship is what we are all interested in, but how little we really know about relationships. We always have some relationships with people, but how little we think about them, the dynamics or the meaning of a relationship. Everything is a relationship and relationships affects us the most, more than anything else. In almost every moment of our lives, relationships affect us and yet we are very ignorant of the dynamics of a relationship. So for the next three days, we’re going to explore together three different aspects of relationships. Tonight I’m going to talk about me, the person, I can be only understood in the context of the relationships we have. In the second lecture, I’m going to focus on if I can only be understood in the context of the relationship, what is that relationship that shapes me and defines me, and that is what I’m going to focus on tomorrow morning. Tomorrow night I’m going to focus on what should be our attitude and the third lecture will be short because it is a practical suggestion, but I'd like to hear more from you. So first you will hear two lectures and then, of course, I will give some meat to it, but you will think about it, what will be the best, what would be the most appropriate attitude to have a good relationship? So we will discuss together and you will explore together and we’ll learn from each other.

So the last night, I hope that we can talk a lot. So each group talks about what we learned, what kind of attitude we should have to keep good relationships. So today, of course, I’m going to talk about Christian relationships. Christians are not the only ones who have relationships, everybody has a relationship, but of course, I’m going to reflect on the relationship from a Christian point of view, or rather, biblical point of view. What does the Bible say? What does the Bible say about the relationships that we have? I hope that we can all learn about relationships and share what you think about relationships, especially from a biblical point of view. The first proposition: I can be only understood in the context of the relationship we have.

Who am I?

Who am I is a question we all ask. Who am I, and what is this I ? We question a lot about this I . Who am I? We always ask this question, who am I? However this I does not exist in isolation, by itself. This I always exists in relationships. I cannot be defined on its own. God stands alone. God said, I am who I am. Yahweh, in English, is called Jehovah. Yahweh came from the phrase, I am who I am. When Moses met God in a burning Bush, What is your name? Moses asked and then God said, I am who I am, Yahweh, and from there most Bible translations, they called it Lord Jehovah, Yahweh, that's where the name came from. I’m going to talk about it a little later to even God stands alone, but even God does not stand alone in that sense, but God can stand alone, but we, cannot stand alone. I can be understood always by the relationship that I have. So I’m connected with all these people like a matrix. When we tried to understand I as a separate unconnected being, I don’t understand what this is, it's only a concept, but, when I see I in a relationship, then we can see what it is. As an example, let us look at oxygen. Oxygen by itself is hard to understand what it is, but when oxygen is understood in its relationship with the other elements, then we can see what it is. What is H20? Becomes water.

So by yourself, it's hard to understand. But when we connect them with our other elements, ah, that’s what it looks like, but in the same way I by itself. It's hard to see what it is, but when we understand I  in the context of my relationship with others, ah! This I looks like this, we can see that little bit. The whole universe exists in relationship. They moved together in relating to each other. I mean Galileo had a trouble because he said that oh, it’s not the sun that is moving. It is the earth that is moving. Well, you know, modern scientists say that Sun and Earth are moving in relation. It’s not that one is fixed and the other moves depending on the frame of reference, both move, but they move in a relationship. So a whole universe moves in a relationship.

I

Let’s see who I am. Let’s say I’m a son or a daughter without relationships with parents, we cannot say that I’m a son or a daughter before I say that I’m a daughter. My relationship with my mother has to be established because I cannot be a daughter by myself, can you? You can't be a daughter by yourself. You can only be a daughter with your relationship with your mother. When I say I’m a doctor, I cannot say that without my relationship, with my patients. I cannot say that I’m a doctor. I was born as a result of the relationship. I was born in a relationship and I live in relationship. My identity is intimately connected with the relationship that I have. So the theme of this retreat is you and I, the relationship that we are going to talk about. An African saying, there’s an African saying “I am because you are.

I am because you are and because we are, I am. That’s how they understand I , I am. Because you are because we are. They don’t think of I on its own. Always. They understood I in the context of the relationship with others. In other words, I is connected. I is connected with you. They didn’t see I as a separated, individual unit, but a connected one, I in the rugged individualism. I , as an autonomous, unconnected self, sufficient being. I think that’s an illusion. When we think about I separate from everything else, autonomous, self-sufficient and unconnected being. I think that’s an illusion. Sometimes we think of salvation, I go to heaven. We only think of heaven in terms of I going to the heaven, so very individualistic. I exist all by itself without really realizing he is very much connected with all the people around you.

Without you, I does not exist because you are, I am in Christianity is not just human being that exists in relationship, in Christianity, in the Bible, even God exists in relationship. That’s what Trinity is all about. God in three, one in three, three in one. Oh, we are not going to deal with the complex theory of Trinity. All I want to say is that God, the father, God the son, and God, the Holy Spirit exists in a dynamic relationship with each other. Today we are going to read the scripture and think about these three persons do not exist in isolation. In the dynamic relationship, they interact with each other and they exist in perfect harmony. Did the relationship they have is not a dead static relationship? But a dynamic living relationship. They work together in perfect harmony.

God's Nature

Lecture on note one, John Fourteen. 10. When you look at it, do you not believe that I am in the father and the father is in me? See, I am in the father. Jesus is in the father and the father is in Jesus. The words that I say to you, I do not speak on my own, but the father who dwells in me does his works. So father and Jesus are very connected. Even the word Jesus speaks is the word that God, the father gives from within.

I mean it’s hard to understand all the dynamics, but what we need to understand at this moment is that the father and son, Jesus very connected and the Jesus uses language like I am in the father and the father is in me, not separated being. I am alone. I’m by myself, but I am in the father and the father is in me, and also when you look at the next verse, that is the relationship with the Holy Spirit, John Sixteen, 13 to 15. When the spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth. For he will not speak on his own, the spirit, he will not speak on his own but will speak whatever he hears and he will declare to you the things there are to come. He will glorify me because he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

All that the father has is mine. For this reason, I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you. When you look at it, the son and the Holy Spirit, they are connected they are not speaking on their own. They are not speaking their own opinions. They are in perfect harmony. They are speaking things together. The father gives to the son, and the son gives to the spirit, and the spirit speaks, but that was spirit speaks is connected to the father and connected with the son. So when you look at God, all three persons are moving in perfect harmony. I mean you don’t know. I mean you said God’s realm is, is hard to understand what is going on there, but what we can see is that there is a movement, perfect movement, perfect harmony in God. So God is not alone. God works in a relationship. They’re tremendous, intimate relationships going on in God’s realm. So the Trinity is not about mathematics. Three in one and one in three. The main point about the Trinity is that God exists in relationship. That’s what the Christianity proclaims. That’s what the Bible proclaims. The God exists in relationship. They exist. They work, they move in perfect harmony. They are distinct persons, distinct persons, but not divided, but united in one through perfect relationship. We are a distinct individual, but we are not divided. We are not separated. We are connected together. This oneness, oneness of harmony.

That is God’s nature, the creation of God also is in a relationship. Everything that God made is in a relationship. For example, the whole universe that God created and the whole universe exists in relationship. He cannot exist all by itself. It all exists in relationship to human beings were created in God’s image I mean. Do we have to think about what does it mean to be created in God’s image? There are three things, substantive, functional and relational. Are those three things are the ones most people talked about. I’m not going to talk about much of it. Substantive is a rational being, and then functional things. God takes care of the creation in the same way we human beings a take care of creation there or one is relational that God is so we are created in God’s image. The most powerful statement about us being creating God’s image is that as God is in a relationship, we are also in a relationship because we are created in God’s image, so it is not a matter of whether I want relationship or not. It is the order of God’s creation that we all human beings may be in a relationship. What did Jesus say? The greatest commandment was, what is the greatest commandment? Jesus said,

Do Not Use God and Others for Personal Gain

Love your neighbour as yourself. What is the greatest commandment? It's to have a relationship, to have a relationship with God, and to have a relationship with neighbours, and the characteristic of that relationship is love, God is great. Jesus’ greatest commandment is to have a relationship for all of us to have a great relationship, not just relationships, but a great relationship with God and a great relationship with one another. That’s God’s greatest commandment. The most important thing then the disobedience is that instead of building a relationship, use each other for the sake of building one’s ego and benefits. That’s the greatest disobedience. Instead of building a relationship with God and with each other? You use God and each other for your benefits and for your own personal ego. Then that is the greatest disobedience. Instead of loving God and loving neighbour, use God and use neighbour for yourself. The greatest sin is not just a moral failure, oh, I did this, I did that.

The Greatest Sin

The greatest sin is not a just moral failure. The greatest sin is to used other people only to satisfy one’s self-centred agenda, doesn’t matter what you do. The greatest sin and greatest disobedience is using others and also use God only to satisfy one’s self-centred agenda. Others become only tools to get what I want. All I want is me and all others exist only as tools to satisfy what I need. That is the greatest sin. That is the greatest disobedience. When we look at God’s greatest commandment is to have a relationship with one another. There is, I mean in that kind of attitude, there is no real relationship. I mean you don’t know what, what relationship is, but only self-centred and self-interested agenda. This self is corrupt self. The self is corrupted self and this kind of false identity. When you live with this kind of false identity, then you will have a false relationship with reality. When you fall into your corrupt itself and false identity, then you will relate to the world in a false way, totally corrupted way.

Dispensable Tools

This self-does not have to be one individual. Sometimes it is collective. I, for example, for example, Naziism that is collective I for us. We use everybody else to move forward our own agenda and our own interest and that is the greatest sin and greatest disobedience. Others become easily dispensable. Oh, if you’re there, if you’re not there, I will find somebody else. They are always dispensable. You move from one friend to another from one human being to another human being. As long as my needs are met, I don’t care who that is, so other people become dispensable. They are not at all connected with me. They are just there to serve my needs. There is no understanding of because you are, I am. There is no you and I. There is only I, I and I in this self-centeredness, we see a tremendous fear that I don’t matter at all.

That’s why I try to make myself visible so hard. That’s why you become more and more self-centred and then you create this false identity, St Paul described us as for what? St Paul describes the church as what? Body. St. Paul Describe our existence as the body. We don’t exist by ourselves. We are the body of Christ. I am a part of a body and I am connected with all other parts of the body. The hands cannot say to the feet, I don’t need you because they both are part of the body. One part of the body hurts. Then the whole body hurts. What does this say? This is very much the idea of because you are I am because you are. I am without you. I am not. So we are very connected in that way.

Embrace Imperfection

Only when hands are connected with a body, and their hands, then there’s a function. Here’s a living a reality there, but hands by themselves, they don’t mean anything. in the same way, the same thing, when we exist all by ourselves, it doesn’t mean much, but when we are connected with each other than it has meaning. Soren Kierkegaard, an existentialist philosopher, said in his work of love in his book a work of love, I have a quotation. “Their true love does not embrace others in spite of their flaws as if are rising above them. Rather he finds the other lovable in spite of and together with his weaknesses and errors and imperfections. Because of your beloveds weakness, you shall not remove yourself from him or make your relationship or remote. On the contrary, the two of you shall hold together with greater solidarity and inwardness in order to remove weakness.”

So what he’s saying is you’re not just accepting other people in spite of their weaknesses, but when you are connected, you work together to overcome each other’s weaknesses. So it is our responsibility to help each other to overcome their own weaknesses. When God created the world every day, he said, after creation he said, it is good. Whatever he created, it is good, but only once in creation. His creation story, only once God said: It is not good. When did he say that? It is not good, that man should be alone. That’s only time God said that it is not good. That’s a genesis two. 18, so Lord created eve.  it’s not that Adam needed a romance because he’s all by himself. He is not good. He needs Romance. He needs a woman. That’s not what the scripture is saying. When God created eve does not simply mean that he created another human being by creating another human being. What is God really doing is that God created a relationship by creating Eve. He did not just create another human being. God created a relationship with Adam. Adam needed the relationship so in that sense,

Rethink your Perception of Relationships

one plus one is not equal to two. One plus one is equal to three. That is Adam is created, eve is created and adam this created, created and the relationship is created So one plus one is equal to three. By creating eve, God created the relationship. I think that’s more important. Creation is not just the creation of the physical and material things. People understanding of creation is more focused on the quality of creation. By creating the relationship, our life is more beautiful. By creating a relationship. Adam’s life is much, much more beautiful and fulfilling. Sometimes we see things only literally so we don’t get the beautiful meaning behind it. Once at Oxford University, a professor in English class professor gave a test. Okay, can a story. Jesus turning water into wine. I want you to make your own interpretation. And then he gave the class for one hour.

Everybody was writing about what that means, that God, Jesus turned water into wine and there was one guy, he was just sitting there looking out the window and then he didn’t do anything for a whole hour and just before the exam was over, he wrote something and he wrote this. The conscious water saw its God and blushed. He just simply said one sentence and he got the Conscious water, saw his God and blushed. Adam and Eve. The important thing is what kind of relationship were they in. Adam and Eve were created, but what kind of relationship, were they in that’s more important, that’s what more important if they were fighting all the time, that’s a curse rather than a blessing. Adam and Eve, after they were created, what did Adam say? He said in Genesis 2:23, this, at last, is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh. It’s not just messaging about a married couple its a passage used often at the marriage ceremony but, it’s not just about marriage, the quality of the relationship. The first human beings had your bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh and the quality of the first relationship? The first relationship human beings had was this beautiful. And the relationship, the first human beings had was this beautiful bone of my bones, flesh of my flesh. They were in perfect harmony. They have become one, in the self-centred person who is in the center, I is in the center.  But, when the relationship of you and I,

Treat Everyone as your Equal

when the relationship between you and I are created, when you’re all by yourself, I is a center. But when the relationship between you and I are created, what is in the center and is the center, the Self-centred person doesn’t see is so absorbed in themselves. When true relationship is created, they start seeing the importance of and, you and I is the important thing is, and it’s not I , I’m not using you to fulfill my needs for what is important is the relationship that we are building. That’s what’s more important than my needs. So the center changes when the true relationship is built, not you , not I , we are created to live in this relationship. We are not meant to be autonomous self-centred individuals. We are created to continuously build relationship with each other. Because of humans, these relationships were destroyed, and Jesus came to restore this relationship, Jesus called his disciples and said,

The kind of relationship you have with others will shape you and form you will shape the kind of person you become. If you’re in an abusive relationship, then that will shape you as a certain person, but as you are in a very self-centered relationship that will shape you to become a self-centered person from when you’re young, you had been shaped by the relationship that you have consciously or unconsciously made from when you’re young. You were shaped by your parents, by the relationship you had with your parents and different kinds of friends over the years have shaped you to be who you are now. you may know or may not know, but the kinds of friends you have had all these years have shaped you in a certain way and all kinds of people you have associated with your colleagues, the people who loved you, who respected you, have shaped you in a certain way.

If I didn’t do the ministry, I would have had different relationships with the people and I would have become a very different person. Now the quality of relationships I have is a quality of who I am. There was a guy that I have counselled many years ago, a council for several months. he had a big problem with drugs. He was addicted, and by the time, he came to me, he was a really, really heavily addicted to drugs, and so I met with him every week. I mean his face, his skin, everything just changed quite a bit because of drug addiction. So I, met him, every week, and then, he also developed an antisocial behaviour. so whenever we met, he always had a fight with people, an antisocial behaviour, and he had a really difficult time surviving in the society. He calls at any time, sometimes. Ten o’clock, 11:00. Doesn’t matter. Whenever he feels like talking, he calls me and then, he starts talking until one, 2:00 and then I don’t get to say anything. He just talks, talks, talks for about two, three hours. I get nervous. Oh my goodness, what am I going to do if I answer it or not? , but I had no choice. I’m a minister. I’m supposed to respond to that, you know. So I received a phone call and then he starts talking. Oh, my goodness. Oh, when is it going to end? I mean, he, he applies for a job, he is a mechanic. He gets a job and because of his antisocial behaviour in a week he gets fired and when he gets fired, he calls me.

Do Not Blame Others

All you said was all about blaming everyone, none of his own problems. Everybody else sees the all bad, you know, they did this, Oh, a, I did that for about several months and then he was getting little, little, little, little, a little bit better, but almost I felt hopeless and helpless. See, I cannot just go on like this. I have my own life too, you know, I cannot once a, once a week I can’t do this. And then, and then, after he left the church and he left me, I was very sad. But also, relieved a little too, but sadder, right? Because I couldn’t really help him, but we’ve built a friendship. So after a while, he came back to me one day, he said, Reverend, can you marry me? Can you marry me? This Friday. That was Thursday or something like that when he asked me. Tomorrow. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Of course. Do you have any witness? He said No, I don’t have any. Also, I just called to two of my Bible Study Group. You will be with this. So I did the wedding and then she was about to 20 years older than him.

Embrace Others No Matter What

She really changed him, the relationship he had with her through her. I mean she’s much older, but she understood what he was going through. She, she was the only one who could understand him. Everybody else was so judgmental. They could not help him. Well, she was able to handle that. So she was changing his life radically.

Relationships Reshape Us

I didn’t see him for about two, three years. And then one day he called me again and then

“reverend I want to bring my baby. You’re the first person I want to show. Then he brought a baby. Wow, the kind of relationship we can shape. Wow. The beautiful relationships you create can shape the person in a beautiful way. When we build a new relationship with God, he will have a profound impact not only on you but also on your relationship with others. So who I am and the relationship I have are influencing each other. St Paul, after he met Christ in a real way, he met God in a real way. He said this, I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. This is what Saint Paul said. He didn’t say, Oh before I’m at God, I was this bad. But after I met God, I’m this good Now, that is exactly opposite of what, you know, the, what Saint Paul said, I do not understand.

I mean, before he said I’m good but now after meeting Christ, he said, I do not understand myself because I did not do the good I want, but the evil that I didn’t want to do that I do what does that mean? Paul was able to see himself in a naked way. He was awakened by his true self. He was not scared of his own darkness. That’s courage, isn’t it? He knew that his darkness cannot destroy him. That’s confidence, isn’t it? He knew the power of God’s grace working within him when he truly met God in a real way and build a real relationship with God. He was able to accept himself, no matter who he was, that is a power of grace, and then he became a very humble person and he saw others weaknesses and he could have empathy and compassion, and he lived his life with thankfulness.

Transformation Through God

The point is, depending on what kind of relationship we have with God, we can have tremendous transformation within us, but you have very fearful relationship with God that will shape you in a different way when you have very superficial relationship with God that will shape you in a different way, but St Paul had a real relationship with God and that shaped him and showed him God’s grace. The transformation so powerful. St Paul said in Christ we are a new creation. The old has gone and the new has come. That transformation was so powerful that he was even able to say that we are a new creation. When we are comfortable with ourselves. We’ll be comfortable with our relationship. We don’t need to be so defensive. We don’t need to be so judgmental. We don’t need to be so angry all the time. You don’t need to live with a victim mentality.

Now. When Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John, although it was not Jesus himself, but his disciples who baptized, he left Judea and started back to Galilee, but he had to go through Samaria, so he came to a Samaritan city, near the plot of the ground that Jacob had given to his son. Joseph. Jacob’s well was there and Jesus tired out by his journey was sitting by the well, it was about noon. A Samaritan woman came to draw water and Jesus said to her, give me a drink.

His disciples had gone to the city to buy food. The Samaritan woman said to him, how was it that you a Jew ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria, Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans. Jesus answered her If you knew the gift of God, who it is that is saying to you, give me a drink. You would have asked him and he would have given you living water. The woman said to him, Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water are you greater than our ancestor Jacob who gave us the well and with his sons and his flocks, drank from it. Jesus said to her, everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but those who drink of water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I give will give them, will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.

The woman said to him, Sir, give me this water so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water. Jesus said to her, go call your husband and come back. The woman answered, I have no husband. Jesus said to her, you’re right in saying, I have no husband where you have had five husbands and the only one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true. The woman said to him, sir I see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem? Jesus said to the woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You worship what you do not know. We worship what we know for salvation is from the Jews, but the hour is coming and is nowhere.

When the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth for the Father seeks such as these to worship him, Lord in spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth. The woman said to him, I know that Messiah is coming who is called Christ. When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us. Jesus said to her, I am he the one who is speaking to you. Just then his disciples came. They were astonished that he was speaking with a woman, but no one said, what do you want or why are you speaking with her? The woman left her water jar and went back to the city. She said to the people, come and see a man who has told me everything I have ever done. He cannot be the Messiah. Can he? They left the city and were on their way to him.

This Samaritan woman, she came out to draw water at 12:00 at noon, but in Jewish, a climate, you don’t come out at 12:00 too hot. So most women came out in the morning, early in the morning when it is cool. She came out at 12. Why she didn’t want to meet anybody. At first when Jesus approached her, her rejection, you are men and you are a Jew. Why do you talk to me immediately? Just herself is very off. In other words, she did not want to associate with anybody. She was living in isolation. Jesus try to keep talking to her? But she was shut off. She didn’t say anything. Finally, Jesus, Jesus had no way,  But to say that you have five husbands and then she was shocked. Nobody knew. And then Jesus knew.

Transformation Creates Confidence

And from then on she started talking to her and then Jesus was talking to her as though she was a colleague. Jesus was talking about worship. Jesus was talking about salvation. Jesus was talking about the end of the world. Jesus was talking about Messiah all this important theological stuff. Jesus was talking with this Samaritan woman. She was engaged in that conversation. At the end of that conversation, she was transformed. How do you know? She threw away the water bucket and where did she go? She went to the town to meet people and talk to them about this Messiah. These are the people she did not want to meet. That’s why she came out at 12:00 and noon, but after the meeting, after building a relationship with Jesus Christ, she experienced tremendous transformation. She threw away that jar and she went back to the town and met people and related to them. When we meet God in a real way, then we can come out of the closet. We can come out of the isolation and only then we can build a relationship with others. When we, when I used to teach them the baptism, this is what I drew. I’m not a good drawer.

You are alone and you die with Christ, When you rise with Christ, you are connected with people, you’re alone, but now you are in a relationship and that’s what real spiritual formation does. Before you were scared of people, now you overcome. They overcame that fear and now you can relate to people in a meaningful way. St Dorothea of Gaza??. You’re. You have that picture there, right? When you’re closer to God you can get closer to each other. When you get closer to each other, you get closer to God. They are both connected so you cannot meet God separately. When you’re closer to God, your relationship becomes closer and when your relationship becomes closer, you can get closer to God. Thanks.

Love is Not Always About Feelings

Love is not always about how you feel. Love is the way I exist in the world. It is my attitude towards the world and to others. Rainer Maria Rilke said this, for a human being to love another human being that is perhaps the most difficult tasks that have been entrusted to us. The ultimate task, the final test, and proof the work for which all other work is mere preparation. The most liberated person is the person who is free to love that freedom is the greatest freedom one can enjoy from this freedom. The most beautiful relationship can be created. An authentic relationship comes from this freedom. Authentic relationships are different from codependency. Codependency is not bonding, but it is entanglement. It does not free us. It binds us. We are called to build meaningful relationships. The spiritual journey is a journey to make this relationship. Jesus called us and said, now I’ll make you fishers of people

Do Not Take Relationships For Granted

we can’t take the relationship for granted. We cannot treat, treat each other with our raw emotion. We cannot treat each other with our greed, selfishness, self-centeredness, indifference, arrogance and rudeness because these things destroy the relationship, not only what we do, but our inner attitude can destroy the relationship. Our judgment or attitude deeply seeded anger insecurity and all these things destroy our relationship to build a relationship. It takes time, energy, money, and everything. You don’t just throw away. I have to build a relationship. For example, you spend so much time and energy, you save a certain amount in the bank account. The next day we’ll just. We’ll just throw it away. You will not a relationship, the same thing. It takes time, energy and money to build a relationship. Just because you were ticked off, just because you’re a little upset, you throw away the relationship that’s dumb. We can’t do that. Sometimes we do that why? because we think that, oh, I can always have a relationship with anybody if not her somebody else, but the relationship to build another relationship. It takes that much time to build by throwing a throwing away relationship like that. We are back to zero. You have to start all over again. Your friendship or your relationship?

One person at night. I mean in the. In the morning before sunrise, a human out and then on the shore at the shore, he was walking around but he couldn’t see anything. Pitch dark still in the morning. Oh, and then some he hits something. It’s some kind of package kind of pebbles. So he was bored. So he took out one pebble and threw it and counted how many times you could do that. He throws away all day and then while he was doing that, the sun started rising and he had about three pebbles left and then he saw it wasn’t pebble. It was diamond all this time. He throw it all the diamonds into the ocean. The only thing that he had was three times three diamonds. Sometimes relationships like that. Not Thinking that that was a diamond we throw away one by one for fun and the only thing that is left, not even three, one or two in a lot of people live a lonely life at the end of their life, no friends anymore. They’re just by themselves because they throw away. They throw away all the relationship they have only their spouse. No one left a relationship is precious. How often we take that as a useless, insignificant pebble, pebble, and throw away Jesus related to the sick Jesus related to the lepers, the texts collectors, adulterers, prostitute, the sinners. He treats them as the most precious people in the world. He knew the price. he knew the priceless value of relationships. Guitar $700,

Mike. $300, water, $2, relationship priceless. You are mysteriously precious. Each person is mysteriously precious. When we discover the treasure and they relate to each other in a meaningful way and you’re fulfilling Lord’s mission. That’s what God wants to do. God created each and every one of us mysteriously precious and we don’t see that and we treat each other like a garbage. When is a precious diamond? When we discover that beauty and preciousness and relate to each other in a meaningful way, then our life will turn around. It’ll be more, much, much more abundant and blessed life when we are able to build a relationship in a new way. So this is it for tonight first tonight, tomorrow I’m going to talk about then what is that relationship?

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