St Timothy Presbyterian Church in Toronto: Sermons

Scripture Reading

Isaiah 40: 3-11

By the grace of God a team consisting of 10 members from KSM and ESM was able to go to South Africa and do a short term mission from August 1st to 15th. I would like to take this opportunity to thank our church and our members who prayed for us as supported us generously. Moreover, I give great thanksgiving to God for God’s guidance for the team and God’s abundant grace during the short term mission. Personally, I have experienced so much grace even before the trip and while we were in South Africa. Today, I will give you the report of the mission trip and share with you how our God has done for the team. Today’s report has a title. I call it Abundant Grace of God. I could not think of any other titles but this one, Abundant Grace of God. There are a few areas where I saw the abundant grace of God.

First of all, the abundance of financial support. Last year at the session retreat in October, I was asked to lead this year’s South Africa mission trip, but due to the church’s financial situation, I was asked to do lots of fundraising for the mission trip. We even raised the personal fee from $1,300 to $2,000. Not only that, ESM did not have any budget for the short term mission. I was like, ‘okay, I’m leading the team, but there’s no budget?’. As a leader of the team, I became so burdened and desperate. So I began to pray to God, a lot. Fundraising was my prayer topic for a long time, from November last year. ‘God, you appointed me as a leader for the short term mission team, but we do not have budget. God, we ask you to help us. You’re the only hope. Please help us’. This was my prayer on my lips and in my heart for a long time.

During the time I was reading a book and this short sentence caught my attention. Love creates community. Meaning, when you do something, anything with love, people will gather and support you. Aha. So with constant prayers, I prepared for the mission trip with love and passion. Whether that is fundraising or whether that is training sessions, I did it with love and passion. And I asked our team members whenever I emailed them, how many emails did I send you? I don’t know, a hundred? Whenever I did, I always thought love creates community, have have faith in that. I asked our team members to do the same thing with me. As you know, our teams served during the mission dinner, let us see some pictures of our fundraising events. We had yard sale, carwash, hamburger sale and we sold special drinks at church picnic. I have iPhone SE, it has an app which shows how many steps you took, right? During the mission dinner, I took over 20,000 steps. Yard sale, almost 20,000 steps. Oh my goodness. It’s good for me, right? Lot of steps. But were so desperate. We were just doing the best that we could, right? And asking for God’s help. God, we will try our best. Please help us. We have no money.

Not only that but we, as a team, met every Saturday from 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM. Sometimes we stayed until 10:00 PM for 14 weeks. Think about that. Every Saturday night, you committed yourself to learn and to work with the team. That’s a commitment. We studied the word of God. We prepared personal testimonies, gospel presentation, craft materials, group skit, and travel preparations. So many things to work on. As if people noticed our love and passion for everything we did, we began to receive more and more financial support from our church members. As a team leader who was desperate for financial support, God gave me the wisdom to reach out to non church members. I wrote a letter about this mission trip and about our five youths who are in that mission trip, and explaining in that letter that I hope that they can see Gods greatness in that kind of place and let them have life purpose for themselves. And it worked. I signed it, converted it to a PDF file, and distributed to our team members. And from non church members, we have collected almost $4,000. Almost $4,000. Abundant grace of God, isn’t it.

As of July 7th, I got this information from the KSM finance department that we had collected more than $44,000 for South Africa mission. Abundant grace of God, isn’t it. As you can see from the fundraising graph across the kitchen upstairs, our goal for the trip was already reached even a few weeks before the trip. The day when we left for South Africa, a few KSM s (kwonsanims) prepared (galbi) and (naengmyeon) for the team. That was so great. And there were quite a few members like elders who came out and prayed for our team. So much love we have received from the church and the members. On that day, Reverend In Kee Kim said this to us, “God has prepared everything for you and God has led you thus far. God will prepare everything for you and lead you when you’re in South Africa as well. So trusting God’s grace and have a great time in South Africa”. That gave me confidence and grace. We as a team already experienced abundant grace before our departure and we were empowered by grace to go this trip.

Secondly, I want to talk about the abundance of leadership from our team. When we were gathered for training on Saturdays. Some of the adults in our team, as Lauren shared, showed leadership in many ways, especially one (kwonsanim) who always brought something to eat. Watermelon, or some different fruit, or some muffins. Every Saturday. It’s not easy. It’s not easy, but she had that kind of care and love for the team. Love comes from higher level, always going down and roll down to lower level. And adults, they show that kind of love and care for the team. And our youth, the five of them, received that and felt so confident in we as a team. When we went to South Africa, it’s not just a team anymore, as Lauren said, we became a family, solid family. I truly thank God for our five youth when I look back on this mission trip. To me it was like watching a flower coming into bloom. Look at the slide. It’s a tissue paper flower with Bible lesson and Julia. It was a great pleasure to witness how they became themselves, being comfortable with themselves and with others. They became brighter, smiling more and laughing more among themselves. It was true joy for me to witness that. They were becoming more and more God’s kind of princess and prince.

We went to an area called Transkei, the second week. Transkei is about 1000 kilometers from Cape town where missionary Ohm does his ministry. Cape town is the most, I think, crowded city in South Africa. But that that area is called Transkei and Nelson Mandela he’s from the Xhosa people. We went there on the second week. It took 14, 15 hours driving 1000 kilometers. I did not know why we had to go there, but now I realize, I understand clearly why we had to go there because missionary Ohm does his ministry in this special area called Khayelitsha. That’s a kind of ghetto area, poorest of the poor. And most of them come from that Transkei area. They left their hometown because to make money and 97% of the population in Khayelitsha is from Transkei.

And after that, after the Transkei experience, we attended this church in Khayelitsha and some of our youth shared their experience in Transkei. And when they shared that, the church members they’re originally from Transkei, they stood up and clapped and gave them a warm thanks. So it is like the poorest of the poor. Missionary Ohm is ministering to them and we were able to go there, to their original hometown, and reach out to them with good news and share the love of God with them. And among them, our youth, I remember that they said that they never met these people before. But they prayed for them. They asked what kind of prayer topics they had. I would like to pray for you. And then once they prayed, they cried, our youth cried because the situation was so, so poor.

God gave that heart in you. When you pray for other people, you have that heart for God and that is priceless. That is something you will never ever experience in this kind of setting. But in that barren land, nothing there, no electricity, no running water. We drank from rainwater. I slept on the floor made of cow dung, but no one complained. 10 of us, none of us complained. And this missionary called missionary Nam, he was so surprised. And he talked to me one day. Moksanim, I cannot believe this. Your team, no one complained, no one got sick. I praise God for you guys. And I thank God for God’s grace that we were able to truly enjoy God’s presence in that barren land.

Our youth took more leadership in Transkei. They took care of Sunday school. They went out and shouted towards this Valley, that Valley Sunday school! Sunday school! One or two kids came up from the house, we gathered them. And then adults did not do anything. In Transkei, you know, our youth, five of them, they prepared craft activities. They read the Bible lesson. They dramatize that and they show how to do the craft and they kneeled down and worked with them. Or even go out to the field and play with them, with the bubbles and all that. They took care of everything. I was so glad to see them taking care of that. You know, assuming that leadership. I thank God for that.

Our youth’s life goals got clear and they know what to do with their life after the mission trip. One of them said that she wanted to be a medical doctor and go back to South Africa and serve the poor people there. Priscilla actually said that. I pray that God grant her prayers.

Lastly. And thirdly, I want to talk about the abundance of God’s word. Here we are so saturated. The word of God is so plentiful. Here we can listen to the word of God, there you can’t just connect to internet and listen to famous, popular speakers and all that. There’s no electricity, no visitors. Only grandma Maza and little children. They welcome us with open hearts. And even our youth, when they just share simply how our God touched their lives. As soon as their testimonies were over, presentation of good news is over, people said “I want to accept Jesus. Please pray for me”. So the word of God and prayer, those two items, so powerful and real, so real in that context. On the first day in Transkei, I visited with the team, the house of chief of the village. We will welcomed by the chief and we will welcomed to spread the gospel in his village. As I began to share the good news with the people in the house, one lady who was in the corner asking me this question. I received God into my life awhile ago, but nowadays I can’t seem to feel God in my life.

Please help me. As soon as I heard her, I don’t know why, but I stood up and started talking to her. And the translator began to translate what was I was talking to her. I said to her, God will never leave you lady. Even though you may not be able to feel God in your life, it doesn’t mean God has left you. For God will never leave you. I was waiting for the translator to finish what I just said. I was looking at her with compassion and conviction. As soon as the translation was done, she began to cry and wiping her tears from her face and asking me to pray for her. So I prayed for her, asking God to answer her when she couldn’t even cry out to God. God, you are merciful. You will hear even her groan. As soon as the prayer was over one man in this corner in his thirties at the other side, knelt down and asked me to pray for him. He also received Jesus a long time ago, but he was like the prodigal son running away from God. He wanted to go back home. Out of compassion, I held his hands and we prayed together. I asked him to repeat after me. It was so spontaneous. Prayer and word of God, it is so spontaneous. As a minister everybody’s looking at me when we visited our household and the local church pastors asking me, “Oh brother, can you give the Word of God to this household?”

I was, kind of expecting that, but it was so spontaneous. So I asked God, what is your message for this household? And God gave me a message, the Word of God. I was so surprised. Even now, it gives me goosebumps because it’s not about me. It’s not by my power and by my might, but I was just clay jars. I’m just a container holding the Word of God, living God. It just overflows out of me and gives. The last day we were visiting the household and people looking at me, asking give the Word of God to this household. You know what? That was my big thing. I never experienced that before. It is grace to me, because I was able to be used by God. Not that I do something for God, but just being used by God. That is a great experience. And the Word of God was just in me, it just came out. And I realized that mission is not something we do. We humans plan and do and execute. It is giving ourselves to God’s leading, God’s word. And God will use us. That his mission.

There’s no greater grace than this. There was no abundant grace than this. Out of abundance, the word of God, overflows and reaches out to people who are in need of the Word of God. The five youth saying they want to go back to South Africa again, it tells you many things about the mission trip, doesn’t it. So my friends, our church began this relationship with missionary Ohm from 1998. We have sent 12 teams so far, and there’s a reason behind this. We are giving something to them, but there’s so much we receive, we experience God’s presence in a real way. So I encourage every one of you to think about that. Every two years, we will have a short term mission to South Africa and ask one of our youth, ask me, how was it truly? It is God’s glory. God is working really hard and we want to be used for God’s glory. Once again, I would like to thank God for everything. God has prepared and provided for us. And I thank you for your support and prayers for 2016, South Africa mission, let us pray.

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Scripture Reading

Ephesians 2: 13-14

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But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility,

This is what Saint Paul said, for he is our peace. In his flesh, he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall that is the hostility between us. Just reflect on this. What a powerful insight and a wonderful, beautiful vision. This is how Paul saw what Jesus did. This is Paul’s interpretation of Jesus’ life. Jesus’ teaching. Jesus’ action. He summarizes what Jesus did on earth. Paul’s interpretation is very powerful and insightful. Paul saw the work of Jesus as the work of peace. Jesus came to give us peace. That is how Paul saw it. Paul never met Jesus in his life. He only heard about Jesus, heard about his teaching, heard about his ministry and his action, and yet he saw through what Jesus was thinking and what Jesus had in his heart, and he said this, Jesus came to bring peace, breaking down the dividing wall, putting an end to the hostility and bringing two groups into one and give peace to the world. That’s exactly what Jesus also said. Jesus said this, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives.” Last week we talked about forgiveness and in that context he also said, I will give you peace and this peace will be different from the peace that you can see in the world. It will be a very different peace that I came to give you.

That’s what Jesus said, and Paul saw that so clearly and critically. How did he do that? That is just wonderful to me. Whenever I read Paul’s epistles, it amazes me. It amazes me how Paul was able to figure out what Jesus wanted to do so clearly. That’s why Paul said this, “there is no longer Jew or Greek. There is no longer slave or free. There is no longer male and female for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.” In one sentence, Paul summarized what humanity is all about, what Jesus teaching is all about, and what life is all about. In one sentence, he was able to do that. How genius. No more division, but peace and oneness. That’s what we aspire towards, what we are supposed to achieve. Race, religion, social status and gender. These used to be the walls, the calls for division, but Paul saw that these walls being broken down, crumbled down to the ground, and now there is no division but peace and unity. That was what Jesus did on earth. That was 2000 years ago. Not 200 years ago, 2000 years ago. He saw this vision, a wonderful vision in Jesus. Regionalism or parochialism was taken for granted at that time, so it was a status was what determined one person’s identity, male domination was taken as a natural order of society, and yet Paul saw that the world Jesus envisioned at the time was different. That’s why Paul was shocked hearing about Jesus.

These things were prevalent at the time, but Paul saw the world Jesus envisioned was very different from the world he witnessed during his time. Peace and oneness. That was what Jesus wanted to establish, young and old, male and female, rich and poor, white and black, all become one. It just amazes me about how Paul can see through Jesus’ inner thought in our heart. How he could capture the world that Jesus dreamed about. Nobody truly understood what Jesus meant. Even the disciples did not understand what Jesus meant to the world, but Paul saw that. And what is more amazing about this is his message is so relevant to us today in 2016.

His message is so relevant. Every day we are witnessing how fragmented this world is. We are living in a divided world, but my friends, division comes from within us, not anywhere else. Because we are divided inside, we create more division. Division comes from within us. We don’t have peace and harmony within us. We are divided in our heart, you don’t look inside. That’s why in this world, there is much division.

For those who are not divided, for those who have peace within them, race is not the reason for division. For those who have peace within them, gender is not the reason for division. For that peace and harmony within them, our differences are not the reason for division. But the world has no peace and all these things divide us and we use them and we make excuses that these are the reasons for our division. Humanity is divided. My friends, I do believe that division is going to be a serious problem for the future of humanity and this division is as serious as the environment that we’re living in. There’s environmental corruption right now but this division is going to be a threat and it will bring a crisis to the future of humanity. We have to seriously change our attitude towards division. We have to turn it around. And think how can we live together in harmony and unity rather than in dividedness. This very serious issue that we have to tackle starting right now.

The WCC, the World Council of Churches is a worldwide church organization, which include Protestant churches, Eastern Orthodox, and many others, held a meeting in Busan, South Korea in 2013. And that day, they decided this particular Sunday, the Sunday prior to August 15th as the Sunday of prayer for the peaceful unification of the Korean Peninsula. That is the only country that is divided. So they have decided this. It’s not just us who are praying for the Korean peninsula, but the whole world right now is praying for the Korean Peninsula that is a divided north and south. That country has been divided for more than half a century. But I do believe that is not just Korea that is divided. People are divided everywhere. Even in the same country. Martin Luther King Junior said at 11:00 AM on Sunday, we stand at the most segregated hour in this nation.

I’m reading a book called Disunity in Christ. It is written by Christina Cleveland, an associate professor of reconciliation studies at Bethel University in St Paul, Minnesota. She talks about how divided Chicago is. In fact, Chicago has recently been named the most segregated city in America. She said, “by simply knowing a person’s race, you can predict where they live and even what teams they will root for.” In Chicago, many black people live on the south side and many white people live on the north side and blacks tend to be White Sox fans and whites tend to be Cubs fans. So it’s all divided. One of our congregation members, she is not Korean. She said once, she wanted her children to be exposed to more than just a white congregation. That’s why she decided to come to this church so that her children may be exposed to different races. She has been here for some years. She is a Catholic and this church is Presbyterian. Catholic, Presbyterian, Pentecostal. Does it matter? Tomato, tomoto, potato, patato. Does it matter? Shall We dance?

Her cousin came from Maryland and last week she told me as she was sitting right here. She insists that she had to come to this church today. So they are here. She told me that she used to attend a Catholic church right downtown in Maryland. It is a predominantly black church. She told me it had a beautiful congregation. Their service is just like our service and she enjoys the service so much. But unfortunately, that church closed down because they didn’t have a priest. And then she said, when I go back to Maryland, this time, I’m going to look for a church like this. We should celebrate diversity. We just celebrate our differences. Division is what destroys humanity. God created Adam and Eve and said, two shall become one. It is not just a romantic passage about people who are getting married. Yesterday, I did a wedding and according to this passage, but it’s not just for the romantic message for a married couple. This is for humanity. Two shall become one. Adam and Eve were different, male and female.

When Adam and Eve were created, the difference was created. The diversity was created, but God told them, you shall become one. Diversity should not be the reason for your division. You’re two different people. There is a diversity, but you shall become one. Without diversity, there’s no unity. Only uniformity. Uniformity is not unity.  God told the first human beings to become one. Celebrate each other’s gifts, respect each other’s differences, but work together to become one. Reach out to those who are different from you and learn to build bridges, not walls. Don’t build walls. Build bridges, and don’t listen to the politicians who try to build walls because they are not Christians.

That was Jesus’ vision and Paul saw it very well. Forgive each other, accept each other, appreciate each other, and respect each other. Learn to live harmoniously. That is humanity 101. Before you learn to make money, learn to live together with others in unity and harmony. Put down greed, put down selfishness, be generous and don’t have us and them mentality. We are all one in the bond of love. There is no us and them. We are all one in the bond of love. That’s what Jesus proclaimed and that’s what Paul saw and that’s what I proclaim and that’s what you should proclaim to the world. That is the Gospel. We are one in the bond of love and that will be our pronouncement. We are proclaiming that we are one and Jesus made us one. He broke down all the walls to make all of us One.

Now let us pray together. Let us pray for the Korean Peninsula. The country’s divided north and South, still threatening each other, but not only that country, but the Middle East and everywhere in the world. There’s tremendous division, divided heart, animosity, hatred, continues to revenge, let us pray for humanity. That we may learn to live together, to co-exist, to love each other, to become one. Let us pray. This time, let us pray for ourselves. A lot of division is caused by us because we are divided within us. So let us pray for the healing so that our divided heart, may be unified and we may find true harmony within us. Let us pray for ourselves so that wherever we go, instead of creating division, we bring reconciliation and unity and peace.

Maybe you can hold hands together with the person beside you and we’ll sing together. We are one in the bond of love. Let us sing together. Just first the first verse. We are one in the bond of love.

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Scripture Reading

John 20: 19-23

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That was the last word that Jesus left to the disciples, the last message that he gave to the disciples, you know, when people leave or die, they often leave a last message and they don’t just say casual thing. So they say the most important thing, this is the message that I want you to remember, and then live out this message. And that’s what, people do when they speak the last message. And there was last message that Jesus spoke to the disciples. And that was this message. “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiving them. If you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” Forgiveness. Forgive one another. That is the last word Jesus taught the disciples. Nothing in life is more important than forgiveness. Doesn’t matter what you do. The most important thing that Jesus thought about his life was forgiveness.

That’s why he even died on the cross to give us forgiveness. Desmond Tutu, a South African Nobel Prize winner said, “in South Africa, there would have been no future without forgiveness.” When apartheid was terminated, he saw the danger in crisis of the country being totally paralyzed. If the people chose the way of retaliation, they could easily go into the way of retaliation and he saw the danger and crisis of his own country through his skin. He felt that, but they chose the way of forgiveness. The film invictus capture the sentiment very well. Blacks in South Africa hated their only a rugby team. The Springboks, they wanted to scrap the Springboks because the team was mostly white and it represented prejudice and apartheid in their minds. Mandela was concerned about racial divisions between black and white South Africans, which could easily lead to violence, chaos, and total disorder. Mandela supported the team and had the vision that this team maybe would unite this country before the big game of the world championship. At that time held in South Africa. The team captain visits Robben Island where Mandela spent 18 of 27 years in jail. There are the coach looking around the cell and he said this, Mandela spent so many years in a tiny cell and came out ready to forgive the people who put him there.

Desmond Tutu was, right South Africa would have no future without forgiveness. My friends. This world has no future without forgiveness. We have no future without forgiveness. This world is filled with anger, hatred, and vengeful heart. The violence you see these days is often motivated by greed. You take away somebody else’s, property, whatever, but these days the violence and terror are not motivated by greed, but by anger, hatred and retaliation. Hatred cannot be defeated by hatred. Evil cannot be defeated by evil. When somebody hates you by hating back, you cannot defeat the hatred. You’re destroying both. So many people live in this world, in uncontrollable anger. No one can survive with that degree of anger no one can survive with that bitterness. No society can survive with that deep anger and resentment. Good life is full of love, joy and gratitude. The world, the life that we see in these, these days, it’s not really true life it’s dysfunctional life. Life is supposed to be full of joy, happiness, gratitude and love.

And I believe that that is only possible by forgiveness. You know, we are not surrounded by angels and saints. We are surrounded by many broken people around us. There are so many broken people around us and broken people can be hurting, their words, their behavior and their attitude can hurt us. They may not mean it, but because they’re suffering so much that suffering also cause suffering in other people. It’s like poisoning us. It’s like poison within us and we carry the poison sometimes with us and in return poison other people. Sometimes we don’t even know what kind of bitterness we have inside of us. We’re not even conscious of walking a bitterness we have inside of us and we don’t even know how we hurt other people because of the poison within us. Hurt and pain spread like infectious diseases. We cannot live our lives with poison within us that will destroy us and destroy other people. Forgiveness is like taking the poison of hatred out of your system. That is why forgiveness is the most important thing in life.

That is why before modern research, we only talked forgiveness in church and all that, but these days modern research scientists, they are studying forgiveness and they realized after studying forgiveness they realize that forgiveness can transform people, physically, mentally, and spiritually. I do believe that forgiveness can transform us and so many of us suffering from that poison without even realizing it because he manifests itself in a very, very different way, but only through forgiveness that poison can be melted, can be taken out of our system. So forgiveness is a powerful skill, powerful life skill. It is an essential life skill. You want to live a good life? You have to have this skill of forgiveness to survive in this hostile world. It is necessary skill, a life skill that we must have not only to survive, but to thrive in life. We need to learn the art of forgiveness, it should be the focus of our life every day, every moment we think about forgiveness. How can I forgive somebody that should be always in our brain? We should find it. We should search hard for the way to forgive, not the way to retaliate, to pay back and to conquer.

We have to always think hard to find a way to forgive this. Desmond Tutu said this. I’m using a quote from South Africans a lot because our team is in South Africa right now. They are doing mission there. As Desmond Tutu said, “choosing forgiveness rather than retaliation ultimately serves to make you a stronger and a freer person.” How true that is. This world needs forgiveness. Without forgiveness, this world will not be able to sustain itself. Each and every one of us and one of them has to learn how to forgive. Forgiveness is so hard. It is so difficult. Probably the most difficult thing to do in life. That’s why you don’t see true forgiveness often around us because the forgiveness is so hard. Retaliation is always easy way out. That’s the easiest to do. That’s why in many Hollywood movies the conclusion is retaliation, payback, show them off, but there’s not really many stories about forgiveness. Jesus' story about forgiveness or the story about the cross that is a very unique story that we have as Christians. Forgiveness is so hard, that it’s almost impossible we say, “I can’t do that.” You say, I don’t want to forgive.

Jesus knew that very well, so in today’s scripture passage, before Jesus told them to forgive, what did Jesus do? What did Jesus do? Jesus, what Jesus did was this. Jesus said to them, again, peace be with you as the father has sent me, so I send you. When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, receive the Holy Spirit. Then he said to forgive. Jesus knew that disciples cannot do the forgiving on their own with your own strength. They needed the help of the Holy Spirit.

So we realize that forgiveness is a spiritual thing. I went to Ohio one day and then this a guest speaker. He was telling me or telling us about his own, struggle that I mean he had such a hard time with one of the congregation members. When he was doing ministry in another part of the city and then the other city, he was doing the seminar and then when he saw this person, that person who gave them, so I gave him so much difficult time. Hardship was right there. It was fine. So he greeted them and and all that, he came to the motel they were staying and all of a sudden all the rash, all over the body and he realized how painful that was, how much he was hurt inside and how he didn’t really deal with it and reconcile with it. Forgiveness is difficult. You cannot do it emotionally. Your emotion does not allow that.

Too painful to forgive. We are too weak to choose the way of forgiveness. Forgiveness is a result of our spiritual discipline. When you become spiritual and deeply enter into spirituality only little you can forgive. It’s not that you just do a little bit of a spirituality and you can’t forgive this much. No, you can do so much of spiritual discipline and at the end the result is only little. You can truly forgive, but that little forgiveness is so liberating. It is so beautiful where there is true forgiveness, life comes alive. My friends, we all need forgiveness and also we all need to give forgiveness. That’s what humanity is supposed to live by. That’s how humanity survives. We don’t survive just on bread. We survive on forgiveness and this world simply doesn’t know anymore how to forgive and  god called us to do that ministry of forgiveness with each other, and that is. That is God’s calling this afternoon.

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Scripture Reading

1 Samuel 17: 19-51

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Today’s scripture is taken from first Samuel chapter 17, verses 19 to 51. It’s kind of a long passage. It is a nice and interesting story. So let us hear the word now. Saul, and all the men of Israel were in the valley of Elah, fighting with the Philistines. David rose early in the morning, left someone in charge of the sheep, took the provisions and went, as Jesse had commanded him, he came to the encampment. As the army was going forward to the battle line, army against army. David left the things in charge of the keeper of the baggage ran to the ranks. And they went and greeted his brothers as he talked with them.

The champion Goliath, the Philistine of Gath, Goliath by name came up out of the ranks of the Philistines and spoke the same words as before. And David heard him all the Israelites when they saw the man fled from him and were very much afraid, the Israelite said, have you seen this man who has come up? Surely he has come up to defy Israel. The king will greatly enrich the man who kills him and we’ll give him his daughter and make his family family free in Israel. David says, the man who stood by him, what shall be done for the man who kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel, for who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God. The people answered them in the same way. So shall it be done for the man who kills him.

His eldest brother, Eliab heard him talking to the man and Eliab’s anger was kindled against David. He said, why have you come down with whom have you left those few sheep in the Wilderness? I know your presumption and the evil of your heart for you have come down just to see the battle. David said. What have I done now? He was on your question. He turned away from him towards another and spoke in the same way and the people answered him again as before, when the words that David spoke were heard, they repeated them before Saul and he sent for him. David said to Saul, “let no one’s heart fail because of him.” Your servant will go and fight with this Philistine. Saul said to David, you are not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him, for you are just a boy, and he has been a warrior from his youth.

But David said to Saul, your servant used to keep sheep for his father, and whenever a lion or bear came and took a lamb from the flock, I went after it and struck it down, rescuing the lamb from its mouth and if it turned against me out, catch it by the jaw. Strike it down and kill it. Your servant has killed both lions and bears, and this uncircumcised Philistine shall be like one of them, since he has defied the armies of the living God. David said, the Lord who saved me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear will save me from the hand of this Philistine, so Saul said to David, “go and may the Lord be with you. Saul clothed David with his armor. He put a bronze helmet on his head and clothed him with a coat of mail.

David strapped Saul’s sword over the armor and he tried in vain to walk for he was not used to them. Then David said to Saul, I cannot walk with these. For I’m not used to them, so David removed them. Then he took his staff in his hand and chose five smooth stones from the wadi and put them in his shepherd’s bag and in the pouch. His sling was in his hand and he drew near to the Philistines. The philistines came on and drew near to David with his shield bearer in front of him. When the Philistine looked and saw David, he disdained him for he was only a youth, ruddy and handsome in appearance. The Philistine said to David, am I a dog that you came to me with sticks and the Philistine cursed David by his gods. The Philistine said to David, come to me and I’ll give you flesh to the birds of the air and to the wild.

Animals of the field, but David said to Philistine, you come to me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel whom you have defied. This very day the Lord will deliver you into my hand and I will strike you down and cut off your head and I’ll give the dead bodies of the Philistine army to this very day, to the birds of the air and to the wild animals, animals of the earth, so that all the earth may know that there is God in Israel and that all this assembly may know that the Lord does not save by the sword and spear for the battle is the Lord and he will give you into our hand. When the Philistines drew nearer today to meet David, David ran quickly towards the battle line to meet the Philistine.

David put his hand in his bag took out a stone slung it and struck the Philistine on his forehead. The stone sank into his forehead and he fell down on the ground, so David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and the stone striking down the Philistine and killing him. There was no sword in David’s hand. And then David ran and stood over the Philistine. He grasped his sword, drew it out of its sheath and killed him. Then he cut off his head with it. When the Philistines saw that their champion was dead, they fled. This is the word of the Lord.

Having confidence in life is very important. Without confidence, you cannot do anything right. When you have confidence, you can live out your potential to the maximum. You all have potential. When you have confidence that potential will become maximum. Now when I look at athletes, professional athletes, they all have good skills. They are the best of the best. There are a chosen few baseball or golf or softball or basketball. They are really good at skills. They can do anything, but once they have confidence they can fly, but then when they don’t have confidence, they cannot really fully function to their full potential, but when they have confidence, they really fly. They thrive in the same way with confidence. You can live, you can thrive in your life. You won’t live mediocre life when you have confidence, all your potential will come out and you will thrive in your life, and so I’m wondering where does confidence come from and what does confidence truly look like?

I was thinking about it and I realize that confidence comes from within. It’s not what somebody’s gives me. It comes from within me. It is not something that I can decide, “okay, from tomorrow I’m going to be confident.” You can’t do that. It’s just there. When you have confidence, it’s just there. It comes from within. It is to do with what you believe about yourself. Confidence has lot to do with what you believe about yourself. If you truly believe that you are a very important person, then you will have confidence about yourself, but unfortunately so many people around me don’t believe that they are very important people. That’s why so many people don’t have confidence about themselves. I don’t know where they got that kind of insecurity. I don’t know why they do that. I mean, when I look at them, they’re wonderful.

Equipped with many talents and skills they’re just wonderful, beautiful people, but they somehow don’t have confidence about themselves. Maybe they have too many negative and unhappy people around them. You know when you’re with unhappy people, when you’re around negative people, you don’t feel very good because they never make you feel good. They’re designed to not to make you feel good, so when you’re around negative and unhappy people, you become negative and unhappy and then you will not be respected in that environment. I don’t know where. Maybe you have too many negative and unhappy people around, why we don’t have confidence about ourselves. In today’s passage. David’s eldest brother, Eliab was one of those unhappy people. I mean, there was, as you read, there was a war between Philistines and Israelites and then this guy from Philistine is a strong man, I mean a powerful, scary man.

He came out to anybody who comes out and challenges me. I’ll kill you. And all the men in Israelites were strong too, but they were all scared they did not have confidence to fight against this Philistine. Until then they boasted about their strength and oh, whatever. But now they saw Goliath. And then they got really, really scared and they didn’t dare to come out. You know, men with pride, you know, when you are standing in front of strong man and you’re scared, you’re scared, but you’re also angry because of your pride right? So they were all scared but they were all angry too. And this little boy David came out and ran around and asked, what’s going on? Why are you guys doing nothing? You know? And he was going and his older brother, Eliab saw that he got really angry.

I mean, as it is, he was angry because his pride was totally smashed. So he let out his anger on David and he made David feel like garbage. This is what he said. Why have you come down with whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness in other words, you belong to the field. You’re supposed to take care of the sheep. Why are you here? I know your presumption and the evil of your heart for you have come down just to see the battle. He made David feel like he’s just a little curious rat. And he really treated David like garbage. But David never took that garbage as garbage. And this is what he said. “What have I done now? It was on your question” and it looked at. He turned away from him towards another, you’re not worth it.

He turned away from and towards another and spoke in the same way. He didn’t back down. He spoke in the same way. And the people answered them again as before. That’s confidence just because people make you feel like garbage. You don’t take the garbage. You don’t think that you're garbage. I’m an important person. And he was challenging his brother in that way. Even when you came to Saul, Saul did not think much of David. He said to David, this is what is that he said: “you are not able to go against the Philistine to fight with him, for you are just a boy. And he has been a warrior from his youth.”

I mean everybody kind of put down David. David was kind of a young looking and a kind of red on his face and a cute looking boy. So they never thought that he could do anything good. So you’re just a boy and then David without backing down he said this, “the Lord who saved me me from the paw of the lion, from the paw of the bear will save me from the hand of this Philistine.” You know, when I read this scripture this time, and then at the same time I was watching youtube of a lion killing other small animals and also, attacking human being and I realized that David was not a weak man. He wasn’t just a weak boy and unfortunately he somehow threw the stone and killed Goliath, but he was a strong man. He was a strong man. Listen to what is said when is when Saul said he was on your boy. “Your servant used to keep sheep for his father, and whenever a lion or a bear came and took a lamb from the flock, I went after it and struck it down and rescuing the land from his mouth and if he turned against me I would catch it by the jaw, strike it down and killed him. Your servant has killed both lions and bears. I don’t know whether he’s lying or not, I’m not sure, but somehow he said he claimed that he killed both lions and bears with bear hands.

He was so strong, this man. His confidence was not empty confidence.

And I realized that all his life he had built himself. Shepherding was not a glorious job. He belonged to, you know, manual labor and they belonged to a really low class, low quality job. Nobody wants to do shepherding, nobody wants to be a shepherd. But David, all his life, he did a shepherding and his father. I mean, he, he had the other brothers too, but you know, they all said, David, you go going, take care of this ship. And they didn’t do it, you know, it’s an important job. You are the youngest. You’re the smallest. You're going to do the shepherding, you know. Do you remember when Samuel came to Jessie to find the new King.  And he told Jesse, David’s father, why don’t you bring all your sons and all sons sending there? And then Samuel looked at everyone I know.

He said, everything that you have is there every Sunday that you have. Oh yeah, there’s actually one more. But he’s in the field, you know, so what did Jesse do? Your brothers have to have, have to meet very important person today. So you go out and take care of the sheep and then these people have a important meeting. So I’m in, that’s what Jesse did, and so David finally, he called David later. In other words, even his family did not recognize David. Nobody recognized David and his strength, his skill, and what he could do. Nobody recognized him, but it didn’t matter to David. It didn’t matter whether people recognize me or not. That didn’t matter. David was doing what the world did not recognize at all as important.

Right now these days, US presidential nominating conventions are going on, all the important important people are there. All the important singers and actors and then movers and shakers of the world are there, all the important people who make policy and all that. Shepherds were not movers and shakers of the world. They were invisible people in the eyes of the world. Nobody came to them for advice or help, but David, it didn’t matter to him all that mattered to David was that, how can I do the best job as a shepherd? He didn’t say, Oh, this is not an important job. I don’t want to do it. Nobody wants to do it. I’m going to just to get a mediocre job. I don’t care. He did not have that kind of attitude. He was thinking about what is the best way to do shepherding, and he did shepherding passionately when the lions and bears came. He didn’t just run away. He just went after them and fought against the lions and bears and he took the sheep. He did his best in whatever job that he was given to do.  

Now ultimately, what killed Goliath was a stone. Do you think? I mean, David was good at throwing stones. Do you think he was born with that talent? I mean, shepherding wild animals doesn't happen every day. Once in a while. Wild animals come sometimes. What he does is he just a let the sheep eat grass and he had nothing to do. You’re just sitting there all day until they are finished with feeding. During that time, he didn’t waste his time. He thought that throwing stone can be a good skill to learn. So he practiced throwing the stone and ultimately the stone destroyed Goliath. Goliath had a helmet on and in between there was little gap and David had only one chance to throw a stone, and then with laser sharp, sharp focus, he threw the stone right in the middle and destroyed Goliath. In other words, David had skill to do so. He did all this. Why? Because he had confidence about his life because he believed in himself because he believed that God has special plan for him. He trusted that God  put special plan for him and God would use him he always knew that I’m a special person, chosen by God to do important things. When you have that confidence, it doesn’t matter what you do, whether you do shepherding or do insignificant work, it doesn’t matter. You can build yourself, you can be strong and you can be good at what you do. That confidence about life continuously builds you up. They never give up. So from the beginning to the end, your life is very different. In the beginning they run much talent. They may not have much talents, but because they believe about themselves, they have confidence about themselves. Day by day they get better and at the end there’s a big difference between the person who has confidence and the person who doesn’t have confidence. The person who lives with confidence ultimately they prevail.

They can be good at it. People who have no confidence, what do they do? What did they do? Probably nobody knows here because we all have confidence, right? But let’s think about this creatively, imaginatively, people who have no confidence, what do they do? They just complain. They complain about their situation, they complain about how people treat them they complain about their lack of ability they just complain and they did nothing to improve themselves. Why? Because they are scared of failures they don’t do anything but just complain, but people who have confidence will not be scared of failures. Why? Because failures are the best teacher they know.

Through failure. They know what they are lacking and go at it and overcome their weakness. Only with confidence. You can do this God called each and every one of you for God’s great purpose. Have confidence in God. Have confidence in yourself. When David went out to fight against Goliath, this was what he said, “you came to me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel whom you have defied. Come in the name of the Lord of hosts. Face your challenges in the name of the Lord of hosts live your life in the name of the Lord of hosts. By the ministry in the eyes of the world they may think it’s nothing, but to me it is the most important and most precious thing that I do.

If I were born again, I will still do ministry. I love ministry. Simon, you’re smart. You chose the right way, the best way to live. It doesn’t matter what you do. If you’re confident you can do well, you can be well. Live your life, one life you have. Why suffer from a lack of confidence. Challenges. You want to do something big beyond your ability? Challenge it, especially high school students. Don’t back down. First think about what you want to do. Doesn’t matter whether you can do it or not. Don’t think about that first, think about what you want to do and challenge it. Have confidence God will give you the strength. Believe about yourself. That’s how we are supposed to live. Live with confidence.

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Joshua 24: 14-15

Now therefore revere the Lord, and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness; put away the gods that your ancestors served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord. Now if you are unwilling to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served in the region beyond the River or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.

As I said last week. It is just wonderful to gather together a once a week and look at our lives and reflect upon it instead of just living it, we want to understand our life I’m living and what am I doing with my life, so it is wonderful. Once a week we come together like this and then reflect on life itself. Today I like to think about the fact that life is a choice. Life is a choice. You don’t live just because we are alive. We live because we choose to live. If I don’t have children, if I don’t have a choice in life, I don’t think I can call that life is a slavery. If I don’t have a choice and somebody else cannot make this choice for me, or my life is slavery. It’s not my life, so life without choice, I don’t call that life. God. wants us to be human beings, to have that choice right from the very beginning of creation, God made a forbidden tree in the garden of Eden and then God told Adam, don’t take any fruit from this tree, and I was always wondering why God put that forbidden tree in the middle of the garden of Eden. If God did not put that tree, then we human beings would not have fallen into sin and we would not have suffered so much only if he did not put the forbidden tree in the garden of Eden. But the moment God said to Adam and Eve that this is the forbidden tree and you should not take any fruit from that tree, the moment he said that Adam and Eve got the choice. We human beings received the right to choose. In other words, God gave them the power to choose, the right to choose. When everything was permitted, it was good, but there was no choice, but the moment God gave them the forbidden tree, now they had a choice. Precious gifts, so in that sense, choice is a precious gift. God did not give the forbidden tree to tempt Adam and Eve or test them or restrict them. It was God’s way of saying to Adam and Eve, now you have a choice, and what are you gonna do with that? Choice is God’s greatest gift to humanity. Choice means freedom. And also choice means empowerment.

People who can make choice, they are empower. People can make choice. They are free to do so. You know your children grow with your love under your care. They enjoy your care and protection, but as they get older they get rebellious. Even my little grandson, he gets rebellious. He wants to do everything on his own so we can’t even go to a restaurant anymore because when we go to a restaurant, he yells and he wants a spoon. He cannot even use it very well, but he wanted for himself. And so, they will rebel and so when they get to the high school level, the rebellion comes to a climax. Why do they do that? is it because they don’t agree with you or because they don’t trust you? It is because they’re claiming their right. They are claiming their right to choose. They want to make choice for themselves. They’re claiming they’re basic human right. Not that they’ll do better because they have a choice. Now, sometimes they do worse. Sometimes they make the wrong choices, but the important thing is that they are making choices for themselves. Life is not just about not making mistakes and being always safe and successful. Life is about finding your authentic life and we doubt making a choice. How can you find your own authentic life that is worth calling is all about God called each and every one very uniquely to find that unique life for yourself. You have to learn to choose and without that choice, you cannot find that unique life. You’re just living a life of somebody else. You’re just imitating somebody else. Life, not your life, and to live my life, I have to know that I have the power and freedom to choose the life that I want to live.

It will take time to figure that out though. It’s not that easy. Taking away choice is taking away our basic human dignity. Taking away choice is the worst thing that you can do to a person. We all know the inspiring story of Malala Yousafzai probably. Saw this picture around you in the bookstore or everywhere. And she said, when the whole world is silent, even one voice becomes powerful. A very inspiring story of a person. She was born in 1997, so that makes her 17 or 19 already. Yeah, in 1997 in Swat valley, Pakistan. So valleys, like as they are called the Switzerland of Pakistan, she was born in a beautiful village and she loves to study. She loved to ride. She always a release was striving for good education. And in 2009 she wrote a blog on BBC. Anything anonymously she wrote a blog on BBC and she became famous but nobody knew who she was. And then soon her identity was revealed. So in 2011, she was a nominee for international children’s peace prize. So we should receive this great price in 2011, but in 2012, uh, I mean she wrote about life under Taliban and in 2012 Taliban, some members of Taliban came and shot her into her head and then the bullet went through and then a kill some nerves and all that. And by the time she was a famous and somehow she was taken to the hospital in Pakistan, a major city, but soon she was taken to London, England. And she survived miraculously. And in 2014 as the youngest person, she received a Nobel prize peace prize. She said, “I didn’t want my future to be imprisoned in my four walls and just cooking and giving birth.” She wanted to get an education and just because of the fact that she wanted an education and the girl, her choice was taken away by the Taliban and she didn’t just sit there and let her choice taken away. She fought for that choice knowing that it was dangerous for her to do that and many people around her told her not to do that, but she did that because, without that choice, her life was not life. She fought for basic human dignity. My friend’s life without choice is not life, but choice does not come easily. Choice has cost formula. It was her life. That was the cost she had to risk pe. She said, “I am stronger than fear.” She’s only 19 years old.

That’s what Jesus taught us Jesus came to show us that you are stronger than fear. The disciples followed Jesus for yes, they were with Jesus. They did not realize that there were stronger than fear, but as time went along, they started realizing that they were stronger than fear and ultimately they embraced even the fear of death and they understood that truth. I am stronger than fear. My friend to Jesus Cross was the choice. The cross wasn’t as something imposed upon him. Cross was a deliberate choice of Jesus Christ. He could avoid it. He didn’t have to take the cross. He could go around, but Jesus could not throw away the right to choose. Jesus lived out the power to choose even though that meant death. The power to choose was greater than the fear of death. Ultimately, the choice that Jesus man bade led Jesus to go beyond death, even though he had he chose cross risking his life and he died, but ultimately the choice led Jesus to go beyond death to resurrection. That’s kind of resurrection, I believe. I don’t believe in the resurrection. You just live and you die and you go to heaven. I believe in the resurrection that comes as a result of choice. I’m looking at Jesus’ life. When I read it, when I reflect on Jesus’ life, this thing comes to me. I don’t know whether or not it comes to you but he was completely free to choose. I don’t have that kind of freedom. Jesus lived with that freedom to choose.

He made most difficult choice. Every situation he had that freedom. Maybe that’s why Jesus said, “you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.” And he really knew the truth and that’s why he was free to choose in the most difficult situation. That’s why I respect Jesus. That’s why I believe in Jesus. He showed what your life is all about. Every morning I get up and say to myself, this date is given to me. I choose to live God, help me choose life over death, courage over fear, love over hate, treat truth over safety or success. That’s why what I pray in the morning,

God has given all of you the wonderful gift, the gift of choice. Don’t let the world take away that gift from you. Don’t let your fear take away that precious gift from you. Don’t live a single moment of your life without making choice. My high school friends ahead of you. You have so many important decisions that you have to make, whether you like it or not, you have to make those important decisions. Learn to choose every single moment of your life. Learn to choose. Don’t live other people’s choice. Live the life you choose. Don’t live out other people’s choice and later, don’t blame them. Oh, he wasn’t my choice. It wasn’t my parent’s choice. Coil wasn’t my torso and my friends did it. No, don’t do that. Make your choice and don’t blame anybody else. May God help you as you make choice in the beginning, you’ll make lots of mistakes. That’s all right, but over the years you will learn how to choose wisely. In today’s passage, Joshua explaining the history of his ancestors asked people to choose whom to serve. This is what he said. Now, if you’re unwilling to serve the Lord to this day whom you will serve, whether the gods of your ancestors survived in the region beyond river or the gods of the Amorites in whose land are living, but as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord. In other words, we’ll choose to serve the Lord. He chose to serve God. Choose to serve God. That was Jesus’ choice. He said to Satan, don’t send me. I chose to serve God and God alone. Don’t just come to church. Choose to come to church. Don’t just believe in God. Choose to believe in God. May God empower you and help you as you make choice for the Lord, for the truth, for the compassion. Let us sync together. I have decided that’s our choice to follow Jesus Very Old Gospel Song, a very meaningful phrase. I had decided, I’ve chosen to follow, with Jesus behind me. Go with me.

Let us have a moment of reflection about our own lives. Do make a conscious choice every moment, or do we just live habitually or do we just follow our emotion or mood? Do we just let the environment dictate us or to make a conscious choice to live? Let us pray that God give me the power and freedom to be able to choose. Let us pray for Katie. Yesterday I visited her. No, I couldn’t even talk to her. She was not able to communicate. She’s bedridden. She wasn’t able to eat any food. Let us pray for Katie often. She opens her eyes and she calls out, mommy, mommy, let us pray for her last moment.

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{Sermon}

Before we read the scripture, to give a little background about the scripture, Elijah is one of the greatest prophets in the Old Testament and just fought against 450 prophets on Mount Carmel, becoming the greatest victory. But somehow what you are going to hear today is very strange, he was really depressed and he was really down. The word of the Lord is taken from First Kings Chapter 19 verse 11 to 13 he said Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by there. Now, there was a great wind so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind and after the wind and earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake and after the earthquake or fire, but the Lord was not in the fire and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him, What are you doing here, Elijah? . After the fire, a sound of sheer silence , that is a very strange kind of phrase. You know, every Sunday we gather here together, not just to reflect about being religious. I don’t come here to just talk about religion every Sunday, I come up here thinking about life. Once a week, we gather together, we think about life, what do we believe about life? what do you believe about myself? what do we believe about God? what is the core thing that defines my existence? That’s something that I like to reflect every Sunday, we want to reflect on life. Life is not always good, I wish it was always good, but life is not always good. Not always bad either, but it’s not always good. It’s too bad that life is not always good, especially life with God. Even that is not always good. Maybe that's the nature of life, that is a deal of life. Life is not always good whether you believe it or not, whether you believe in God or not, whether you’re a good person or not sometimes a tragedy happens. Those innocent children were killed in Nice, didn’t do anything bad. There was probably a lot of good people there, but all these things happen. Why did these things happen to me? There is no answer, life is not always good. Whether you’re a good person or not, whether you’re a believer or not, that's why life is a drama. Life is good and bad. Together they make up a drama. Life is a rhythm, there are ups and downs in life. Life cannot always be up nor always down. There are always ups and downs and there's a very famous picture that you all know “If there are no ups and downs in your life. It means you’re dead , flat line. That is being dead. So life together, ups and downs and good and bad make a rhythm. Life is like a drama, drama in the sense that life isn’t mechanical, predictable and controllable. Tomorrow? you don’t know, those people who went to Nice probably they went out to celebrate the great lights. It would have been a fun exciting night but it turned into a nightmare. Life is not predictable.

I went down to Boston this year to see my daughter who gave birth to a son, that itself was a drama to me. As I shared before, this really happened, she almost did not make it to the world when he was born. I was at a church and then the doctor called me and then I rushed to the hospital and the doctor told me she has a 10 percent chance to live, you want to do the surgery? c-section right now? you have a 10 percent chance. I said, Of course , 10 percent even if it was one percent, I’ll take that. I still remember my prayers, I mean every day, every moment I was at the chapel at a women’s college hospital praying for the survival of my child because she was waiting for the blood and there was no blood in the world. The doctor told me that todays probably the last day, If blood doesn’t arrive today, your child will die , and so I prayed and prayed. I remember my prayer from that time, I said to God, Lord, I don’t pray for the perfectly healthy baby, probably that will be my greed, but this humble prayer, I pray that you please help me so that the child at least doesn’t get brain damage and that will be fine for me, I can take it . At then at the very end of the hospital, a life there, I came out with a perfectly healthy baby. I couldn’t even imagine it. So when I went to hospital and she gave very easy birth, I said Are you hurting? , she replied saying she was fine and she gave birth and all was well. I then held my grandson and said to myself again, Life is drama . Life is trauma, it's not always good, it’s not always bad. There’s no formula. Life is not always good, but we should never give up. That’s what I believe about life. That’s what I believe about myself. Life’s not always good, but we should never give up, do you believe that? I hope that you believe that. I feel like giving up sometimes, many times. I feel like many times especially when we face challenges, and they are too difficult to overcome we want to give up.

Todays story, Prophet Elijah was not just a prophet, he was the prophet, a prophet. He was like Michael Jordan in basketball, or he was like tiger woods in golf. He was the prophet. He defeated 450 false prophets in Mount Carmel. He won the biggest victory. You know when Jesus went up to the mountain and then experienced a transfiguration to representative and old testament figures come out of there? Who are they? One is Moses and the other was Elijah, very powerful figures, but one woman threatened him because she didn’t like what Elijah did on Mount Carmel, she threatened to kill Elijah. I mean at this time. He was really scared. He probably received all kinds of threats throughout his life, but he was fine. He was able to handle all of those, but this time he was really, really scared. He was running away. He was vulnerable. Human beings are like that. Sometimes we can take any challenge in life no problem, and when difficulties come, we can fight and fight and fight, but one woman, just a little problem comes and attacks you. You get so scared, you lose all your confidence. This time you say to yourself, I don’t think I can make it this time. All this time I have made it, but not this time. Maybe that’s what human beings are like. He came under a solitary broom tree and this was what he said It’s enough now, oh Lord is enough is enough, take away my life for I am no better than my ancestors . Then he laid down under the broom tree and fell asleep. It’s like saying I give up, even the greatest profit experience, this kind of vulnerability, this kind of brokenness. All the figures in the Bible, they are not invincible people. We’re special people, they are like you and me. Same as us and he feels so vulnerable, but you said, I give up. I’m not going to do anything anymore. I’m going to just lie down here. I sleep. If I’m gonna die, I’m gonna die. I don’t care anymore. No one is invincible. Not a single one, they just pretend to be invincible, the are all vulnerable in a certain way. That’s what life is like. That’s what we human beings are like, but Elijah was totally beaten down. When you are totally beaten down, that itself is not necessarily bad. Why? because at that moment, Elijah, he heard the voice. Sometimes that’s when God speaks to you, that’s when we hear God. God always speaks to us, but only when we are totally beaten down. That’s when we hear God’s voice more clearly than ever before. Not a loud voice, but small voice. Rather the sound of silence. Elijah heard the sound of sheer silence. The scripture says, after the fire a sound of sheer silence, he heard Greek wind that split the mountain. There was an earthquake and there was a fire, but Elijah could not hear God in those loud voices, in loud noises. He could not hear God’s voice, but when there was complete silence after that, he heard the sound of silence. When there was complete silence, he heard it, and this is what the scripture says. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle because he heard something. That’s life. Sometimes we hear when everything is so quiet, when it is noisy, we can not hear, but when there’s complete silence, sometimes we hear better. How do you hear the sound of silence? That’s like oxymoron. Silence is no sound and sound of silence is sound of no sound, it doesn’t make sense, but somehow we all know we can hear silence. We can hear the voice. When everything is silent, you know my friend. I realize the more important thing to hear, is not the noise or the sound that is audible. The more important sound is the silence. Sound of silence. I realized that I hear what I need to hear in silence. It the is deep inner voice. When everything is silent, it speaks from the heart it speaks from the depth of your soul. God often speaks to our heart. When it is noisy. We cannot hear what’s in there, but when everything is silent, we can hear the deep inner voice. Elijah was able to hear the voice deep within him and what did the voice say? Simple, Elijah, what are you doing? what are you doing lying there? . Sometimes when we hear the voice, the voice tells us, what are you doing? What are you doing with your life? He was completely tired and exhausted from running away from his life. He was just sitting under the tree. He’s sitting on his life. He did not do anything with his life, it's not that he was making his life looking at the vision, he was just sitting on his life doing nothing. God asked Elijah, what are you doing? Elijah? , and said three things. First of all, you’re not alone. There are other prophets too who do the great things, who do great things and not so great things. Thirdly, God said I am with you, I will give you strength and let you know what you need to do . Very clearly he spoke to Elijah. Elijah heard what he needed to hear, sound of silence. It’s not audible and you can not hear it when you’re totally confident, arrogant and thinking that you’re capable. When you are full of yourself, you cannot hear the sound of silence, but when you’re broken and you become humble, you can hear the sound of silence. We have to learn to hear the sound of silence. Jesus always said Let those who have ears to hear, let them hear . I hope that all of us have the ears to hear, and become people who are able to hear and listen to the sound of silence. When the prodigal son, when he was at home, he was not able to hear anything, but when he went far away from home, he lost everything. He was completely broken down. He had to even steal pigs food and this is when he heard the sound of silence.

When we are completely down, it’s not always bad. When you guys are down, hear the sound of silence, that’s what I believe about life. God works in that way. To me, that was my life, my life was like that when I was completely down and God spoke to me. God spoke to me what I never heard before, and God will still speak to you in a very small voice sometimes in silence. I hoped that you all are able to hear that voice. That voice is like the star in the dark.

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Scripture Reading

John 1: 35-42

I’m going to talk about life in general and also life of disciples, discipleship. Those two are related. What kind of life is a meaningful life? Desirable life? But at the same time, as Christians, we are following Jesus and discipleship in life is connected. It can’t be separate. They are all related to each other. So I’m going to talk about that today. What kind of life is meaningful life, maybe a life with a purpose? If you have a goal for your life, and if you have worked so hard towards that goal, can we call that life a meaningful life and wonderful life? I think so. Such life is better than having no goal at all. My question is: it doesn’t matter what kind of goal you have for your life? What kind of goal do you have for your life? If our goal for life is nothing but money, can we call that life meaningful and desirable?

What is a meaningful life? 

What is meaningful life to you? When we look at the two disciples of John, the Baptist in today’s text, we will say they had a clear sense of their life’s goal. What was their life goal? Their life’s goal was to meet,the Messiah and be part of the new world that the messiah will bring about. When John the Baptist saw Jesus was passing by, he said, look, here’s the lamb of God. The title “lamb of God” is for Jesus as Messiah, who will offer himself as a perfect sacrifice in obedience to his divine father. So lamb of God is a title that signifies Jesus, as Messiah. As soon as the two disciples heard him saying that they followed Jesus. Today’s scripture is short, but the questions and answers are a little strange. So let’s go through that. As soon as the two disciples heard him saying that, they followed Jesus. What we can see from this is that the two disciples of John the Baptist had a clear sense of what they wanted to follow in their life. That is to follow the Messiah. Once they found the Messiah, without hesitance, they left John the Baptist and followed Jesus.

Jesus as the purpose for our lives 

When Jesus saw them following him, he asked this question: what are you looking for? Don’t you find Jesus’s question a bit strange. Jesus, didn’t say welcome, Welcome to me. Or where have you been? He didn’t say that, Jesus asked what they were looking for.  Can’t he see that they were following him already? But when I looked into the original meaning of the word “look” I realized that the reason why Jesus asked that question, the original meaning of the word look has a deeper meaning: to seek and to desire. Jesus was not merely asking, what do you want from me? But asking for their purpose. In other words, Jesus was asking them, what is your reason? What is your purpose of following me? Then the two said to Jesus: Rabbi, where are you staying? So strange, right? It’s not logical. It is so hard to understand these conversations. So again, I had to look into the original of meaning of the word “stay”. And I realized the two did not ask for the physical address of Jesus, per se, but wanted to know where Jesus was so that they could be with him. The word stay in original languages called “mano” means to stay and to dwell. But it has deeper meanings – like the presence of Jesus or the life itself of Jesus. So what they wanted to say to Jesus was: I want to know where you are so I can want to be with you, and I want to learn from you. That’s already there in the question.  In other words, they are saying: Jesus, you are the sole purpose of my life. When Jesus knew about their desire to truly follow him. He said to this, to them: come and see. Come and stay with me and see for yourself, feel for yourself, understand for yourself and live an authentic life for yourself.

Henri Nouwen also talks about discipleship in this way. Following Jesus means to give our own unique form, our own unique incarnation to God’s love to follow Jesus means to live our lives. As authentically as he lived his. It means to give away our ego and follow the God of love as Jesus showed us how. So “come and see” was Jesus’s invitation to those who want to follow Jesus and live their life authentically. If you want to live your life authentically, we need to find Jesus. We need to find Jesus. Jesus is saying, if your goal is to follow me, come to me and learn from me. We find a similar invitation in the gospel of Matthew: come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens. And I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for, I am gentle and humble in heart. And you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy. And my burden is light.

Following Jesus transforms us 

The movement is leaving me, myself, behind and coming to Jesus. When we say”I come to Jesus and I want to follow Jesus, but live only for myself”, we haven’t truly followed through the invitation of come and see. Without departure, there’ll be no arrival. In this sense, life of discipleship is constantly leaving myself behind and constantly arriving at Jesus. Once we have come to Jesus, then we can see for ourselves, experience for ourselves.

Jesus was totally different than John The Baptist. Jesus did not shout like John the Baptist. John the Baptist is used to shout: “repent, repent you brood of Vipers!” Jesus did not provide fixed answers to those who followed him. Jesus lived with them and showed them how to live life authentically. And that’s why Jesus said simply: come and see. Only when we follow Jesus and only when Jesus is our sole purpose for life, we’ll be able to live our life authentically. One can find oneself only in Jesus, and that’s one meaningful life.

Our unique invitation to follow Jesus 

I was born and raised in a Christian family. However, I used to be a Sunday believer. I did not take my faith seriously as I grew up. However, I never denied the existence of God since God should be somewhere out there. But God that God was a conceptual God, an unmovable and untouchable God. I was just a churchgoer on Sundays. When I went to university in Korea, the same pattern continued. But when I was in the third year, joining this officer cadet program, I met a friend who was such a devoted Christian. I did not want to reveal my identity as Christian to him, I would feel really embarrassed back then. I had this wrong understanding of being a Christian. Anyways, he discovered that I was Christian and he kept inviting me to this Christian meeting at campus.  He was so persistent, but not aggressive, so, I finally decided to drop by at this campus Christian meeting one night. That very night when I attended the student meeting, people there welcomed me and treated me like a prodigal son. The friend who invited me and cared for me while I was in university, his name is Sung Hyun Cho, and I will not forget him. Since I came to Canada, as soon as I was discharged from the military service, I heard tragic news about him. A few years later, he lost his life during helicopter training in the army. The helicopter went down and he died from that accident – It was March 17th, 1992. He was married at the time and his wife was pregnant. The boy, who was born in the same year, is now turning 24 years old. I totally forgot about him and his death altogether by living this busy immigrant life but when I decided to study in seminary in 1999, all of a sudden his memory came back to me. Hey, just come and see. Only once is enough. His voice is still ringing in my heart.

What is meaningful life? Upon hearing the invitation of Jesus “Come and see”, if we actually walk towards Jesus every day and live an authentic life as Jesus did – I think this is a meaningful life. I’m not saying that everybody should be a minister or something else, but living an authentic life is only possible when Jesus becomes our life, go and walk towards him. Walk with him day by day, no matter what kind of job or profession we may have, we can live our life authentically when Jesus is our goal and when we walk with him daily. Henry Nouwen talks about the same thing here, following Jesus does not mean imitating Jesus, copying his way of doing things. If we imitate someone, we are not developing an intimate relationship with that person because so often we follow into this misunderstanding, just trying to copy, not trying to live my life authentically. My friends, those who follow Jesus invitation will experience amazing things in life. Andrew, who was one of the two disciples who followed Jesus, said to his brother, Peter, that “we have found the Messiah”. He discovered, he met his own Messiah and Andrew brought Peter to Jesus. Today’s Scripture doesn’t say it, but he must have said come and see just once. We can see that those who found Jesus will introduce Jesus to others.

Share God with others 

This year, we are sending a team to South Africa in August. We have three weeks to go. The purpose of this short term mission is the same. Our purpose for the mission is not exercising any power or authority over the vulnerable people of South Africa, but witnessing the love of God to the people of South Africa. They don’t have this sense of hope, that’s why they are always talking about past stories. We want be witnesses for them that Jesus is our hope. We will invite them with the same attitude, Come and see, and let them meet with Jesus and walk with Jesus and have their life authentic life with Jesus.

When we truthfully share our testimonies and witness Jesus, whom we met, I believe the Holy spirit will touch their hearts and heal their hearts. I remind our team members constantly that being who you are in front of God is way more important than what you can do or what you can say. It doesn’t really matter how much you can say or do, but who you are before God is much more important. This is what it means not to copy Jesus; to live authentically and to give our own unique incarnation to God’s love. When we can say to others “Come and see”, that will be a true blessing and we would be living a meaningful life.

Invite other to “come and see” 

Let us pray for that person and simply see for that moment to say. And witness “come and see”. This year’s slogan is” Pressing on to know God. I love that expression of pressing on, pressing on to do something should not be extravagant. Pressing on to do something means to do just one thing more, one simple thing more – that is to invite a person by saying, “”come and see”. When we truly seek Jesus as our goal will be changed and will be renewed and we can share Jesus’s love with others by saying: “come and see”. That life is meaningful life and wonderful life.

Think about this. What is your goal for this life? How can we live this life authentically? Only through Jesus we’ll be able to live that. So focus your lives on Jesus, give yourself to Jesus. Just pause for a moment and reflect where you are heading. Ask yourself: What is my goal for this life? Invite Jesus into your heart. Let it be your sole purpose to follow Jesus so that you will be changed. You will be used by God as a channel of his blessings.

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Scripture Passage

Exodus 16: 2-15

We do not like wilderness. We are fearful of any barren land. And why? Because wilderness is a place of lifelessness, there’s no water, no plants and thus our livelihood is seriously threatened. No one likes to go into the wilderness. So it is a natural response that we try our best to avoid any wilderness. We will go around the wilderness, even go extra miles, to avoid the wilderness. Today’s text shows us the story of wilderness. The ancient Israel people, when they came out of Egypt and came to the wilderness, call it the wilderness of sin here, a sin means moon in ancient language. They started to complain against their leaders, Moses and Aaron.

Let’s take a look at the map. The green color, that’s their journey. It’s not that long. When they left Egypt and started to complain, it was evidence of their dislike of the wilderness they happened to be in. In today’s verse today’s passage, Verse three says the Israelites said to them, if only we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flash pots and ate our fill of bread for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger. As we can see from this, when we face life difficulties, something we cannot handle, something we do not know, or something we do not want to face; we always want to go back to the past in order to escape the harsh present reality.

Radical truth is hidden in wilderness.

God in the wilderness

John the Baptist used to say this: I have to decrease and Jesus has to increase. But in wilderness we need to empty ourselves totally. So the God can be God in the wilderness. My friends, faith, by definition, is a radical thing. Faith urges us to choose either this or that. Whether choosing my ways or God’s ways, whether choosing me or God. If you try to have it both ways, we will not be able to accomplish anything. The way God works, God itself is mystery. Unknown and unfamiliar is our God. We heard from Reverend Ingee Kim at NBC last weekend. The Saint Agustine said something similar about God. He said:if you understood him, it will not be God. If God works as I want. And if God is in my control – Is that God real? That is not God but an idol. If we want to seek God and meet God, we need to look for the unknown God and unfamiliar God. Where can we meet this kind of unknown and mysterious God? Wilderness.

In the wilderness, God provides

In today’s texts the Israelites were wondering about this flaky substance. They had never seen it before. Verse 15 says: when the Israelites saw it, they said to one another, what is it for? They did not know what it was. Moses said to them. It is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat. The Isrealites encountered God’s mystery in the wilderness. They didn’t not know what this white and flaky stuff covered the ground, but because of this, they survived in the wilderness. Have you heard the word manna? Manna is a Hebrew word meaning “what is it?”. It signifies something beyond our human experience and knowledge. It signifies and indicates something greater than ourselves, something mysterious in God’s work. This manna was there for the Israelites for 40 years, when there were in the wilderness. It never stopped. God to care of them by supplying Manna and quails, while they were in the wilderness. My friends, wilderness will strip away what we know. It will stop us from doing things by our own effort. Wilderness will dis-construct us so that we can be constructed by God again. Therefore, wilderness is nothing but a blessed time and place where we will encounter God be molded by God. When we live this life, we will go through the wilderness periods here and there because of unexpected life challenges. We feel like we are plunging into the wilderness because of this hardship that life throws at us. We are pushed to be in the hopeless and helpless wilderness.

I cannot help but to share this story with you. It was April 21st this year where we had Evangel hall ministry. It was ESMs turn so some of our ESM members came out and help such as Katie Ang. That’s the very day Katie found out from the hospital that her cancer had spread throughout her whole body. But you know what happened that day, Katie decided to come out and still serve at Evangel hall that day. She said, whether I die today or tomorrow, I’m ready for this and I have things to do today. That’s what she said to me. She was so calm and her heart was at peace because she went through the wilderness already and found God in the midst of it. I have served this church from 2002. That means it has been 14 years. It has been my privilege and honor to witness the passing of our members and attend their funerals to pay final respects.

Faith in the wilderness 

Thomas Martin, in his other book: Bred in Wilderness says “when Israel went out of Egypt and wandered in the desert, God became a Pilgrim with them in the dark years of their tribulation “. A few years ago, we heard from Reverend Ingee Kim during the ESM retreat that every story in the Bible and every story in our life has the theme of the movement from bondage to freedom. The fact that Israelites were out of Egypt was that same movement. And when they became God’s chosen people after the wilderness, that has the same theme of bondage to freedom. In this sense, God did not test Israelites in the wilderness, but trained them. God wanted them to put their trust only in him. God wanted them to learn a new way of living, not following the old ways – their ways, human ways – but God’s ways. God provided manna to them because God wanted them to put their trusts only on God. They could not store up more manna, even though they could gather them, because whatever amount was left over went bad. God wanted them to learn, to rely on God day by day, moment by moment. That is the new way of living, walking with God, wherever we may go. Jesus too, after his baptism, was driven by the Holy spirit to the wilderness before he began his ministry. Jesus needed time and place to learn God’s will alone in the wilderness.

If this is the case, how much more do we have to go through the wilderness period? When Katie told me about her condition on that day in April, Bob was there at Evangel hall aswell. He came to me and said to me: Reverend, I feel like I am Job in the Bible. These days, my friends, how are you doing? And how is your life lately? Has your life been like going through the wilderness helpless and hopeless? Remember that in that very moment you can experience the living God and God’s mysterious grace. Let us open our heart, open our hands, lift them up to heaven. That’s something we can do in the wilderness.

God will send us manner and quails when we have nothing. When we cannot do anything in the wilderness, I hope and pray that we will be able to see God truly and thus meet God. When we face and it feels like a huge wall to us, that’s the very moment we have to wait and see how God will work for us. You know the word Sabbath, have you heard of Sabbath? Sabbath day. God created the world in six days and God rested on the seventh day and he called it Sabbath. And it’s original. Meaning Sabbath means: To stop. In the wilderness. We have to stop being the old self, but to look for God for help. Psalm 46, echoes the same thoughts: be still and know that I am God. Unless we become still, we will not be able to hear God’s voice. The wilderness indeed demands our patience. But sooner or later, God will provide manna and quails or something we could not ever imagine before guiding us through. So do not dwell in the past, do not be afraid of the future, but go into the wilderness directly. Do not go around the wilderness, but take a good look at the wilderness and go straight through it. God will be there for you.

God saves us 

Take a moment to reflect. You may be in the wilderness but God has a purpose. Let us lift our lives to God and ask for God’s grace and guidance. Help us go through this difficult time, give us strength and wisdom, and know how good you are, how great you are.

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The second of a 2-part series on “Knowing God”.

Recorded at the 2016 congregational retreat held on June 24, 2016.

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

I was sitting here while the praise team was practicing, it’s not always simple as you think because they have to change their chord and emphasize certain parts and they have to coordinate, so it’s always emotional and inspiring and inspirational. Thank you very much. And while listening to the praise I had this kind of image or message in my mind. The message is that you go in and liberate people from the concept of me because people are instantly in their own concept of me. I want them to know me rather than holding onto the concept that they have. I want them to know me. That kind of message came up very strongly while listening to praise. I think that’s the main message for this retreat. Instead of just holding onto that concept of God, we need to let go. Even though it’s scary sometimes, you have to let go of that so that we can encounter and meet the living God the real god. So what we want to do. Now we want you to be the agent of doing that movement of truly knowing the living God. I’m going to explain a little bit later.

This morning we discussed three things at least. Depending on what understanding you have about God your relationship with God will be very different. If you have nominal God, your relationship with God will be just, “God is there”, and God is not involved in your lives. It affects the relationship between you and God and also affects your lifestyle, your worldview, and your morality. So it is important to have, not right understanding, I don’t want to say right or wrong, I want to say living understanding, the real understanding of God. Then your relationship with God will become much more vital, alive, and your life will become much more abundant, filled with hope and riches and the power of God. When you truly have an understanding of God all these things will be the characteristic of your life. I hope that we all understand that God, cause it’s important to know God.

Secondly, knowing God is not to fill your brain with the information. We have a tendency to continuously know with our brain because that’s the only way we learn how to know. The education system's only way to know is through your brain. But the real knowledge does not necessarily come from the brain. The real knowledge comes from your life, the whole existence. Our whole understanding of knowledge is a problem because we only think, when we get to know somebody, we only think about brain exercise, cerebral exercise. But knowing God is very different. You can never know God with your brain, you can only know God through your whole existence. So knowing God always brings about transformation and change. Knowing God does not leave you alone, knowing God and change always go together. When we do a brain exercise it can be totally separate from the rest of your life. But in knowing God you have no choice but to change, personal change. It brings transformation, not information.

Thirdly, knowing God is a process. It’s a journey. It is a process of our eyes being opened. It is a journey of hide and seek. Sometimes God hides and we seek and we find God and then we get arrogant and too confident, and God hides again. And then we seek God again and you find God and then you get overconfident and God hides again. And then you go and seek out. That process has to continue. Hide and seek, but sometimes we find God about 10 years ago, 20 years ago, and nothing changes at all. How is it possible? How’s it possible that you know God once and then that’s it. Because the only thing that you can see is a small fraction of God. You cannot see the whole of God. How can you say that? This is everything about God. That is problematic, that itself is a problem because we only see a partial thing and you’re making it whole.  A blind man went to the elephant and touched it on the leg and he said, oh, it’s a cylinder. I mean yes, he has a leg like a cylinder, but it’s not. You’re right that when you say that, yeah, an elephant has a cylinder-like leg', that is right. But when you start saying that that elephant is a cylinder, then you’re wrong. In the same way when you know only partial God and then you say that that is a whole of God then it becomes a problem. If 10 years ago, 20 years ago you understood God in a certain way, and that doesn’t evolve, that doesn’t change at all, after 10, 20 years, then you have to ask yourself is that really a true God to you?

Or you’re fixed there. So we have to ask ourselves. Knowing God is an ongoing process until we die. Every day a new understanding of God will be revealed to you. So we looked at Ephesians 1:17-19.  You come to know Him and then the eyes of your heart are enlightened. You will have hope, riches, and power. This is a process. That’s what’s going to happen. That’s what Saint Paul prayed for. He sees his future life, the X-Ray, he sees so well. That’s what he prayed for. The Christians in Ephesians, in Acts, something like scales came off from Paul’s eyes. That is embodied. Say, yes, maybe it actually happened but it is a symbolic way of saying that Paul’s eyes were open. So when you look at Acts 9:18 it says: “and immediately , that’s right after Paul met Christ on the road to Damascus, and immediately something like scales fell from his eyes and his sight was restored. Then he got up and was baptized, and after taking some food, he regained his strength . His sight was restored; he was never blind. He was able to see fine, but his sight was restored for his insight was restored. His insight about God was restored. He became a new man and he was able to see God in a different way.

The reason Jesus Christ came to us was to show the living God. When people were totally enslaved by the God of law, Jesus Christ came to reveal the living God. That’s why Jesus Christ came to us, not to teach us more information about God, but to reveal the living God to each of us. Revealing does not mean that everybody can see it obviously. That’s not what a revelation is. There is a hidden aspect in revealing, you have to have a certain condition to be able to see what is revealed. For example, Paul did not see what he saw for the longest time and something happened within him and then he was able to see, that’s what revelation is. There has to be a certain condition of the heart to be able to see what is revealed. Elizabeth Johnson defined the living God in this way: The term living God evokes the realization that there is always more to divine history than humans beings can nail down . If you nail down who God is 10 years ago and do not change, then is that the living God or a concept of God? Living God always is a realization that there is always more to divine history than human beings can nail down.

Jesus Christ came to not only save us, Jesus Christ came to save God. Jesus came to save God from stale, naive, worn out concepts to be the living God. Jesus Christ came to save God, Jesus Christ came to free God from the prison of human ideas and concepts. So Jesus Christ did not come just to save human beings, Jesus Christ came to save God and ultimately that is a way to save human beings. They have fallen into the idols. It’s like living water that is always springing up and running. You know, even though Jesus Christ came to give us, to reveal to us, the living God, many people didn’t get it. Even the disciples didn’t get it and we still don’t get it. The disciples started something new. They didn’t get it at first it, but they finally got it and they started something new. Then 2000 years later, we human beings fell into their old self. We don’t get it.

I want to give you an example. It’s a conversation between Jesus and Philip, one of Jesus’ disciples. Jesus said, if you know me. You will know my father also. From now on, you do know him and have seen it because Jesus Christ came to reveal the living God . That’s what Jesus is saying to Phil, Phil said to him, “Lord show us the father and we will be satisfied”. How frustrated Jesus must have been. Jesus just revealed the living God and then Philip is asking Lord, show us the father and we’ll be satisfied . And Jesus said,  “Have I been with you all this time Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the father . How can you say “show us the father?” It was such a frustrating moment. I mean, Jesus was so frustrated. He revealed the living God, but people did not get it because their eyes are not open. Even now, a lot of people don’t get it. Ultimately Philip encountered the living God. But it was hard for him to understand it at first.

We need to encounter the living God. My friends let us not be by a counterfeit God. Counterfeit money looks exactly like real money. A counterfeit God looks exactly like real God, but let’s not be fooled by the counterfeit God. We human beings, strangely, have a tendency to create God instead of searching for the living God. That’s strange. I do that, all of us do that. We have a tendency to create God rather than searching for the living God. I call that idol. We have idols within us. Idols look very, very attractive to you. But we create idols because it’s easier, more simple, and more convenient. Idols are not a wooden sculpture that we worship. Idols are your perception, that’s what idols are. Having wooden sculptures are very naive idols, but your perception, that is your idols. When we impose certain fixed perceptions, ideas, or images on God then they become idols even though they are ideas.

Yesterday, I said, God is revealed to you uniquely. That’s wonderful, personally and uniquely, but when you start absolutizing the God who is revealed to you, then that becomes an idol to you. You start oppressing other people. God created us in God’s image, but in the modern world, we create God in our image. God created us in God’s image, we should not create God in our image. But in modern days, we create God in our image. That is not the living God, that is a powerless concept of God. This powerless concept of God will never save you, will never make your life different. Counterfeit God only creates counterfeit religiosity, phony happiness. Almost like happiness forced upon yourself, almost like I have to be happy, I have to be happy', why? Why? Because I’m Christian, I’m supposed to be happy. It’s almost like happiness being is forced upon you. That’s phony happiness, when you have counterfeit God then you impose that happiness on yourself, phony happiness. Language is all there, hope, riches, and power, but they are merely concepts. The content is empty. Sometimes in other services, when they do praise, content is missing. Real hope is not there, and you say you have hope, it is not real. Idols are the personification of what you wish and what you dream. That’s what idols are. From them you create God in your own image, idols are a personification of what you wish and what you dream.

Martin Buber, we talked about him a few years ago. The one who wrote I Thou he wrote another book Between Man and Man. In that book, he said, everyone should carefully observe what way his heart draws into . You have to carefully observe what draws your heart is heart drawn to. What is your heart drawn to? Honestly, frankly, nakedly, we have to ask ourselves, how is your heart drawn? To where is it drawn to? We have to see what is our God. Simon said, those who made them, idols right, those who make them are like them. So are all who trust in that. And then I realized that ah idols are not just perception, idols are not just personification of what to dream and what you want to reach; idols are yourself'. Idols are yourself. You are worse than yourself. That’s what idols are. And people like to do that. Your wishes, your dreams, your desires, your greed, are all about you. Idols are God we create in our own image. We kick out the living God to create our own image.

One rabbi said, God is not silent. God is silenced . In your life God is not silent, you have made God silent, you have silenced God. He said, God is in exile . That’s what I’m saying that Jesus came to save God because God is in exile. Nietzsche, the modern philosopher, existentialist philosopher he described this very graphically, he said: “a madman lit a lantern at noon and went into the pumping market looking for God. Where is God? Mocked by the townspeople in an escalating series of exchanges, he finally threw the lantern to the ground it shattered and its light went out, ‘God is dead’ cried the madman. And we have killed him! . That’s what Nietzsche saw what modern people do.

In the modern world, we don’t create a space for the living God. We have kicked out God. God has been pushed out of our hearts, from this society, from this world. The only thing that is left within us is the god we created in our own image. Only concepts remain. The living God is not there, only the concept remains within us. Just the ideas of God, just the doctrine, and one’s own conviction remain. When we push God away from us when we are creating God’s image, what is left? A beast, only a beast. But animals with high intelligence and greed are very dangerous. Animals without intelligence or greed are non-threatening, but animals with high intelligence and greed are very dangerous. We see that all around we create nuclear missiles to destroy the whole world. What happened in Orlando? That’s what human beings can do and are doing all the time. Animals with high intelligence and greed are very dangerous. It is important for us to restore the living God within us. Knowing God is restoring the living God within us.

So now I’d like to talk about three things in getting to know God. We can say that there are three stages. The three stages overlap each other. This is what we go through in our journey of searching for the living God. So if you really want to know the living God then this is what we need to.

The first stage is the stage of accepting our ignorance as a first stage is accepting our ignorance. We have to accept the fact that we don’t know God. It is a way of casting out our idols that are made by our own prejudice, our greed, and our convenience. It is our humble attitude. This is the way to keep us from creating our own idols. Thomas Merton’s prayer is, our prayer, “my God, I have no idea where I’m going”. St. John of the Cross described his journey of knowing God in this way: when we humans beings reach the top of the mountain, unexpectedly, we see a huge cliff in front of you and you see many mountains in front of you. The more you think you know, the more you build . I said you know nothing.

All these spiritual giants, Thomas Merton or St. John of the cross, they are confessing that, and he said: “that's when we enter into the cloud of beyond . You start walking into the journey through the heart's desire or pain, not by reasoning because reasoning can fool you. So you can search for God with your heart’s desire and or pain. We have to accept our ignorance, but there are two kinds of ignorance: acknowledged ignorance and unacknowledged ignorance. The ignorance that you do not even know that you don’t know is unacknowledged ignorance. But ignorance that you know that you don’t know is acknowledged ignorance, see the difference?

When you read the Bible, Jesus often encountered unacknowledged ignorance. They don’t even know that they don’t know. Many religious leaders Jesus encountered were those, but unacknowledged ignorance is dangerous because it’s a different animal from acknowledged ignorance. Unacknowledged ignorance often accompanies violence. The people who live with unacknowledged ignorance, they’re violent, because they have to protect themselves. They don’t want to admit that they know so they are violent, they are aggressive. These people ultimately killed Jesus. What did Jesus say on the cross? Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing . They do not even know what they don’t know. Unacknowledged ignorance killed Jesus. Unacknowledged ignorance always brings violence and this kind of ignorance is total blindness. That is a kind of blindness St. Paul had before he met Christ. He thought he knew everything, but he did not even know what he did not know.

They thought they knew or not but they did not know what they’re supposed to know, they shouldn’t know. Once Jesus healed a blind man on the Sabbath and to the Jewish religious leaders, the people who have ideas of God, the concept of God, it didn’t make sense. How could you heal a man on Sabbath? They said You are a sinner! How can a sinner heal the blind man? That’s not possible! So they asked the blind man, Were you really blind? and the blind man replied, Yes, I was blind . The religious leaders said, I cannot believe you, bring your parents . So they asked the parents, “was he really born blind?” and the parents were scared. They said, “he is old enough, ask him!” and they left. So the leaders came back and said He’s a sinner. Jesus is a sinner because he healed on Sabbath . Then the blind man said, “My friends I don’t know whether he’s a sinner or not but one thing I know for sure is that I was blind, but I see now, what else do you want?” That’s unacknowledged ignorance. What did Jesus say at the end? “If you were blind you would not have sinned, but now that you say you see, your sin remains.” Your sin remains meaning you’re still blind. The man who was born a blind man was not the real blind man. The real blind men were the Pharisees who thought they saw, who thought that they knew. They did not even know they did not know. That's unacknowledged ignorance.

This kind of blindness comes from religious convictions, so religious people, be very careful because if you’re not careful that leads to unacknowledged ignorance. It comes from over-dependency on your reason. Smart people be very careful. It comes from stubborn pride, and it comes from insatiable greed and strong narcissism. These things create and cause unacknowledged ignorance. But as we enter into the awesome and mysterious world of God we realize how little we know compared to the wonderful awesome world of God. That’s when you start seeing that you don’t know much. When you see true light, you see your darkness. When you see true righteousness, you see your own imperfection and simpleness and selfishness. When you see true love, then you’ll see your own selfishness.

Letter to the Romans is all about that. Do you want to find out more about that? Read letters to Romans. He’s talking about acknowledged ignorance. He said, I don’t understand myself. I try to do good, but when I look at myself, I’m doing exactly the opposite of the good. I keep doing evil, I don’t understand myself . That’s acknowledged ignorance. It’s not I understand myself because he saw a bigger thing. That’s when you see the need for God’s grace. You recognize that I need God’s grace to survive. I need God’s grace to live'. That’s when you can recognize your own ignorance.

Jacob had a problem with his brother Esau. They were twins, Jacob and Esau. But Esau was a hunter, he went out and he lived like a man. Jacob was like a mama’s boy, he stayed home all day. But mom liked Jacob so he cheated at all kinds of things, and he got the blessing. But as a result of that blessing, he was kicked out. He had to run away from home because Esau was trying to kill him. So he ran away. When he got to the wilderness, he was sleeping and in the cold night in the wilderness, he finally realized “ah God is right here”. God has always been with him, but on that cold night in the wilderness, in the desert, he found God. This is what he said: “surely the Lord is in this place and I did not know it”. that’s acknowledged ignorance. “The Lord is here, but I did not know it”. You know, God is always with us and many times we don’t recognize God, you know the question Where is God?' is a fish swimming in water asking “where is water?” Once we had a retreat to Algonquin. Every year, 20, 30 young people went and we’d go into the interior. So we got to the North Tea lake and we parked the car and we rented the canoe and then we go in. So about two hours we were canoeing to find the island then all of a sudden Susie asked, “are we there at Algonquin yet?” We’ve been there the whole time! It’s like the “where is God” question and like a fish asking, “where is water?” God is always with us always around us, but sometimes we don’t recognize that.

The prodigal son, only when he had to eat the pig's meal, he recognized how little he knew and how arrogant he was. He didn’t know. Now he knew how much there was in father’s house. Sometimes when we encounter a crisis that paralyzes us and experience failure that drives us into helplessness and face problems that seemingly have no solution, our eyes open. I don’t know why. When we encounter those situations, our eyes all of a sudden open and see our own ignorance. We are so stubborn sometimes that we don’t see until something hits us. Only then we acknowledge how little we know.

The story of a father, who had an epileptic son, he threw himself into the fire into the water and all that. He came to the disciples and asked: “please heal my son?” And the disciples could not heal him, and he came to Jesus, and he asked, “Jesus if can, can you heal my son?” And Jesus said, “what do you mean if you can? Nothing is impossible with God?” And then he got desperate. And he was afraid that he might have offended Jesus and then he said, “I believe, I believe.” Then Jesus said, For those who believe nothing is impossible . And then the man said, “I believe” and immediately after that he said, “help my unbelief.” That “help my unbelief” is acknowledged ignorance. We all need to have that, “Lord, I don’t know you, can you please help me see you? Help me know you, help me experience you. I don’t know you.” Like Thomas Merton, “I don’t know where I’m going”; “can you please help me?”. That’s acknowledging ignorance.  An early church father, Anselm said a very wise truth. He said, For I do not seek to understand in order that I may believe, but I believe in order to understand. For this also I believe that unless I believe I shall not understand. How wise that is. It is not knowledge that brings faith, it is faith that brings knowledge.

Only through that faith can you know God. Faith is not just religious activity, it’s not religious sentiment either, it’s not religious knowledge. For Paul, all of these things had blinded Paul: religious sentiment, religious knowledge, and religious activity. These things totally blinded Paul. To me, faith is kind of acknowledged ignorance and from that comes a strong desire to know God. When you have that acknowledged ignorance it leads to strong desire know God. When you have unacknowledged ignorance it leads you to violence. Or when you have acknowledged ignorance that leads you to a strong desire to know God and from that strong desire you can know God. As a deer pants for the water, our soul thirsts for the living God'. In other words, in you, deconstruction has to happen first before reconstruction begins. You have to have a deconstruction process first for the reconstruction to begin. Unlearning has to happen first before the real learning can come. All our prejudice stubbornness and arrogance have to crumble down before the journey of knowing the living God begins. Idols have to be destroyed first for the true living God to come.

We are created in God’s image. Let us not create God in our own image. When we reflected on Abraham, when do you think he really started the journey of knowing the living God? When do you think he really started the journey of knowing the living God? When he had to sacrifice his son Isaac, because it didn’t make sense, until that time everything made sense, but that moment it didn’t make sense. That’s why Kierkegaard wrote a whole book on that. That is the moment when he truly encountered his acknowledged ignorance. “I don’t understand this God. I don’t really understand this God.” That’s when the real journey began. God who asked Abraham to sacrifice his own son, was God beyond our ethics, custom, thinking and common sense, that’s the kind of God Paul experienced too. At that moment he realized that he didn’t really know God. All his ideas of God were shattered all his concepts of God were shattered. He was a man who worshiped the idols in them. They were full of concepts of a God who would give him prosperity. Those ideas were totally shattered when God asked him to sacrifice his own son.

When Abraham was challenged with problems he could not solve with his own resources, Abraham finally had to lay down his well-defined concept about God. Then what did he learn about the living God? He learned Jehovah-Jireh. That’s God provides . That is the God he encountered, the living God. Then he lived with that living God all the time he always believed that God provides. Whenever difficulties come whenever dilemmas come, whenever the paradox comes, he always knew that God will provide. That’s the living God he encountered. And he lived with that living God, not with the concept of God.

The first stage is the most important stage because the living God is not what you acquire. The living God comes when you lay down all your manipulation. The coming to the living God is God’s gift, not your effort.

So second and third stages are pretty simple. The second stage is a stage of seeking. The prophet Jeremiah said, ” Then when you call upon me and come and pray to me, I will hear you. When you search for me, you will find me; if you seek me with all your heart, I will let you find me, says the Lord,” Without seeking the living God we can never get to know God. God reveals himself to those who seek God. But things are when you have acknowledged ignorance it leads to the desire to seek, so the second stage almost happens naturally. When the first stage happens the second stage happens naturally. Elizabeth Johnson said in her book, Quest for the Living God, she said, “in every aspect, human freedom, like reason, is a dynamism that keeps on transcending beyond everything it grasps.” Wonderful. She’s a wonderful theologian.  

Human freedom is like that. You don’t just settle with what you know. Once you know it moves forward, to understand further. Jesus said, “you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.” You know, that’s the message that I got when I did praise this evening, set people free from their concept of God. Why are you scared to let go of those useless concepts that don’t do anything for you? Set people free from those useless concepts and let them find the living God. That living God will save them, the truth shall set you free, I want you to be free. Why are you so scared? Do you think God will punish you? God wants you to need him in a real way. That’s what God wants. And we need to be free. Now with that freedom, we keep knocking, we keep seeking. Part of the reason you don’t see, you don’t knock, is because other people say God is like this but I don't believe that. Find your own God. Nobody can dictate who God is you. She also said this, “human spirit is characterized by an unrestricted drive towards the truth, which is ultimately boundless . That should be our life.

With an unrestricted drive, we refuse to stay within the small world we already know. Don’t stay within the small world you already know. You think that’s safe? That’s not safe. In life, if you don’t take the journey, you die. We strive towards the bigger world, we do not yet know that is seeking. That is a lifestyle Jesus taught us to emulate. Ask and it will be given to you search and you’ll find, knock and the door will be opened you. For everyone who asks receives and everyone who searches finds for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened . When you seek, when you search, when you knock you will find it.

I guarantee that you’ll find it the living God. You will find a God who matters to you. A God for whom you would sacrifice everything. A God who has no effect on you, why do you need that God? Why do you need that kind of God? That’s the only concept of God, not the real God. We’ll meet the living God when we have a seeking attitude. The Prophet Jeremiah also said, “call to me and I’ll answer you and I will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known.” What you have not known, God will reveal to you. Call to me'.

The last stage is a stage of waiting. You have acknowledging ignorance, you seek and you wait. Knowing God is not a result of our efforts. It’s not even the result of our seeking. I’m not saying that our efforts are useless, but I’m saying that knowing God is not the automatic result of our efforts. Knowing God is only by God’s grace. If God does not reveal himself to us we cannot know God, and we thank God because God has a strong desire to reveal himself or herself to us. He even sent Jesus Christ to reveal. So in knowing God, there’s an active part and a passive part. The active part is seeking, searching and knocking. The passive part is waiting. The journey of knowing God is a cycle of active and passive process continuously. We seek and wait, we search and wait, we knock and wait. That should be our journey of knowing God. The living God is enveloped in mystery. We pursue, but we wait until the mystery is unveiled. We do not know how God will change us. We do not know that. We don't know how God will change each person. You will hear the testimony tomorrow. God changes us in the way we can’t possibly fathom or imagine, God is beyond our imagination. This is not a statement of our limitation, but it’s a statement of God’s limitlessness. God is beyond our imagination that is. Isaiah saw that very well, For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts . It’s wonderful, isn’t it? In our pursuit of knowing God, we enter into the endless and limitless world of God. That’s why we don’t make conclusions or make closure on our own. We wait. We wait for what kind of world God will show us.

The other day I was shocked that Britain is gonna leave EU. I never even imagined for 48 years. They are leaving EU, and what kind of world we’ll see, we don’t know. Life itself is a mystery. Everything has time. God planted his seed within us. There is the time the seed will break out of the shell. That’s when we truly meet the living God and know God. That’s why the song said, “be still and know that I’m God . He knew what it meant to wait. Be still and know that I am God. Every day this waiting has to be there. The process of letting our prejudice down, seeking, and waiting.

You know what's more important in the waiting stage? It’s listening, in the waiting stage the most important thing is listening. God speaks to each of us differently, so we will hear different things. Also, our understanding will be all different. We won't have a whole understanding of God, but it will be our authentic experience and knowledge of God. Isn’t that kind of exciting? Searching for the real God, the living God who matters to you? Instead of just holding onto the concept of God that you already knew. God is going to reveal himself or herself to you in a very fresh way and understanding that will be exciting. Saint Paul experienced and lived an exciting life. He died of persecution but until then he lived an exciting life. I would prefer to live an exciting life for one or two years rather than going ten years always scared, without knowing who God is. Knowing God is knowing ourselves because we are created in God’s image. Knowing God is also discovering yourself. It is to discover the essence of life. It is to discover the beauty of life. It is to discover the mystery of life knowing God is eternal life. and this is eternal life that they may know you the only true God and Jesus Christ who whom we have sent , that’s how John saw eternal life, I hope all of you live eternal life and have that eternal life.

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

Rev. Kim provides an insightful discussion on what “Knowing God” is all about. The first of a 2-part series.

This lecture was provided at the 2016 congregational retreat on June 24, 2016.

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

Forget about everything that you left behind in Toronto, your work, your worries, and anxieties, at least for two days. Let us not worry about what’s ahead of us and let us focus on the present moment and enjoy the fellowship here. Let us be soaked in the presence of the love of our brothers and sisters and also in God’s awesome presence. I hope that we can be all soaked, even though it’s one or two days, then we can be really soaked by the presence of God. I hope that you can spend some time with your family, with your friends, and with your children, but also, have some time alone, to walk around, to think in this beautiful nature. Especially since this year’s theme is Knowing God. It’s a very important topic and there are lots of things that you can reflect on.

I hope that we have a great time together singing, talking, having a discussion and playing sports. To all the group leaders, the questions that you receive are not mandatory questions for you to answer, those are discussions starters. As you listen to the lecture, I hope that you can also come up with your own questions, jot down whatever triggers you and instead of just following each question and answering them one by one, just get the discussion going. While you’re listening to the lecture you can take some of the insight and some of the things that interest you. I want you to write down those things and then discuss them with your group. Knowing God is a big and difficult topic.

How do we know God whom we cannot see, touch or analyze? It’s a difficult topic. What does it mean to know God and what happens when you know God? Is there a process in knowing God? These are some of the questions that we are going to deal with at this retreat. We are going to talk about not only these questions, but there are many other things that we’re going to deal with too. I don’t think too much about the question How do we know God?', or the methodology of how we know God. I don’t think I can give you the methodology. I don’t think I can give you an answer to that. How will you know? I cannot do magic here. So that after this retreat, I want you to, instead of thinking about the methodology of how you know God, I want you to think about your own assumptions about God. I want you to think about some of the assumptions that you do not even question yourself. Assumptions that you just adopted and you don’t even know where you got that idea about God. They may be from Sunday school or from your parents or from society. This is what people say of God, so challenge the assumptions you may have.

You may also have some language and language is great to articulate what we feel. What we experienced and what we know is great, the language is good, but sometimes language can limit you because you're locked up in a certain language. For example, let’s say the word salvation. Then you are locked up. A certain image is already there and you cannot go beyond the image that you have or understand that you have about salvation. Language can limit your understanding, language can limit your perception and your image. So I want you to free up your image. I don’t want it to be locked up in the language. I want you to be freed up from all of that.

When this happens then even about salvation, you have a new understanding of salvation, a new understanding of God. I hope that these without languages and these assumptions, I want you to think about who God really is to you. Certain perceptions and image that you are locked up into, I want you to free that up so that you may experience the reality of God in a real, tangible way. Knowing God or our understanding of God is very important because your relationship with God will be determined by your understanding of God. If your idea of God is a very strict authoritarian God, then your relationship with God will be a very formal and courteous relationship. When we sing the song As the Deer Pants for the Water, the second verse is You are my friend and You are my brother'. Even though He is a king, God is our friend.

Jesus is our friend. One lady came up to me and said, I can never understand that. I can never understand that God can be a friend or Jesus can be a friend. Jesus who’s always up there. Oh, the powerful person. But I can never see Jesus as a friend . Since some people just have a hard time understanding God in that way, their relationship with God will be determined by their perception of God. For example, another woman came to me and said I cannot relate to the father image of God. The last song is a beautiful song. But is a good, good father only, if they could put good, good mother, then it would have been perfect. For me, I love my father and my father loved me, but we didn’t really have that kind of relationship. First of all, my father passed away when I was young, and he was 70 years old. And until then my father was somebody so far so I cannot get near to and never had a discussion. So when we say that my God is my father. It doesn’t really ring true to me. My mother has been always with me. We have a very intimate relationship, we have and the kind of love she showed. So when I said, my God is like my mother, then it rings more true to me . Depending on what image that you have about God, your relationship with God will be determined, and also your life will be affected by your understanding of God. Knowledge of God affects you and your life. You all have certain ideas of God and these ideas shape your worldview, your morality and your lifestyle consciously or unconsciously sometimes. You think Oh God is like this as well I have to behave like this . Some people do that more consciously, religious people do that.

Always think about God, always think what would God think?'. What would Jesus do? WWJD Right? Some religious people always think about WWJD, what would Jesus do, so they’re more consciously and explicitly think about God. But a lot of other people also unconsciously or implicitly think about God in the back of their minds. That kind of shapes your worldview, your morality, and your lifestyle. Depending on their understanding of God, some people may live with tremendous, guilt and pressure. So knowledge of God is very much related to our life and it is important. Knowing God is not just an exercise of the brain, but knowing God is something to do with your whole existence. Knowing God is intertwined intimately with what I experience daily, so knowing God, whether you can define or articulate, this is my understanding of God' or not, is still is very much interrelated to your personal daily life.

This is what Hosea said: “come, let us return to the Lord; for it is he who has torn, and he will heal us; he has struck down, and he will bind us up. After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him. Let us know, let us press on to know the Lord; his appearing is as sure as the dawn; he will come to us like the showers, like the spring rains that water the earth.” Beautiful Poem, that beautiful poem is a beautiful passage. But when you look at this passage, what you can see from this passage is that God is very much involved in our lives very intimately.

God is not God up there somewhere. God is not just a concept. God is the living being who is very much intertwined with our living. God will tear us and God will strike us down but God will also heal us and God will bind us up. Look at the language, it’s very much our daily lives. God is right there with us, things that are happening in our lives, they do not just happen. God is behind it. God is with us. God is within us and God is among us. And Hosea saw that this is what God is doing. God is striking them down, but also God is raising them up and God is healing them. Hosea saw vividly, graphically, what God does to his people. So Hosea’s conclusion is, “let us know. Let us press on to know the Lord.”

Saint Paul’s religious experience right on the road to Damascus he had a divine encounter. He was on the way to persecute Christians. He was pretty sure what he was doing was right and he thought he did it for God. A very strong light came down upon him and he fell from the horse and he heard the voice. The voice said he was Jesus who’s followers Paul persecuted. It was a supernatural experience. Not many of us have that kind of fantastic experience, but what amazes me about St Paul’s experience is not that it was supernatural. What amazes me about Paul’s experience is what happened after his supernatural experience. What happened to him after that supernatural experience? It totally turned him around. See, before that experience, Paul used to live comfortably with a well-defined understanding of God. He probably would say, I know God, I know that what God wants and this is what I want to do, and this is why I’m doing this'. Paul was persecuting Christians because he believed he knew that that was God’s will.

He was very clear, comfortable with his own well-defined understanding of God, but his unchallenged knowledge of God was seriously challenged through his experience. Because of this, he got totally confused. I thought that was God, but now I know that was not God', he was totally confused, disillusioned. From then on, he started a real search for the God whom he truly believed. What is the God and who is the God whom I truly believe deep in my heart, not the God whom he adopted from his tradition, religion, and upbringing. Not the God I took automatically not that kind of God. I want God who really matters to me.

He wanted to find God for whom he’d give his life for, not just a theoretical God, who would have had no effect on his life. He was searching for God for whom he would sacrifice his life for and he did since then he devoted his life to searching for the understanding of God. From that experience, he started searching for the God who really mattered to him. And in the journey in the process of searching for God, he got tremendous insight, not only about God but also about himself, about faith and about life. Knowing God is tremendous. He shared all his insights about God in his letters. You know when I read Paul’s letters and his messages, I felt like he was like looking at the X-ray of our body or kaleidoscope of our body just going through and examining what is going on. Food goes down into the stomach and then from there, it goes through the body and it’s like the whole dynamics of the body is like our life, our spiritual and inner life.

He had clear and sharp insight about life. He found his own authentic God. When you find your authentic God, your life will be affected significantly by that God. I want to call that authentic God, living God. That authentic God is living God. There were three experiences on the road to Damascus. He became free finally from his prejudice and from his uncritically accepted assumptions about God. With that liberated state of mind, he started interacting with the living God. And from that interaction, he got living knowledge about life, about faith, about salvation, and about God. That was where he got all his insights about himself life and God. You know the living God, this living God, is very unique to each person. The living God that appears to you may not be generally agreed on doctrine or dogma about God.

Paul had so much trouble because of the living God he found. When he had God of doctrine, God of dogma, he had no problem, he could live comfortably. But when he found the living God and when he lived out, the will of the living God, he had so much trouble, he discarded the well-defined doctrine such as circumcision, his attitude towards gentiles, and about food and all that stuff. That was a well-established understanding of God, but he started throwing that away as he found the living God. The living God is very personal and unique to you.

The living God that is revealed to me may be different from the living God that is revealed to Simon and different to a God who’s revealed to Inha. Living God is very unique and personal. When you read Genesis, you encountered this passage a lot: God of Abraham God of Isaac, and God of Jacob. It didn’t say God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Why? Because the God of Abraham is different from the God of Isaac and is different from the God of Jacob. Their experience is different. Abraham’s life was very different from Jacob’s life. And God who is revealed to Abraham is very different from God who is revealed to Jacob. Of course, it’s not a different God but a different revelation to different people because their experience is different. God wants us to know the living God because only that knowledge will truly affect us. All other concepts of God will have no effect on us. You will not give your life for, you will not sacrifice your life for that concept. Don’t live with the concept of God. Live with the living God. The concept is very easy to live with, but truly having the living God is very difficult. What kind of God is a God who has no effect on you?

Is there a God? If God has no effect on you then what kind of God is that. If God is that God that you will not sacrifice anything for what kind of God is that? That is a concept of God, not the living God. And many people live with the concept of God and they are comfortable with that. They just like to have nominal God for their own security and comfort. Only when we get to know the living God that God becomes a true God to us. A general understanding of God is really a concept. What God wants from us is to know the Living God, because that will make life our so much more abundant and enjoyable.

Living God is dynamic, not static, the concept of God is static, but living God is dynamic. God himself or herself is a dynamic movement within oneself. God is in dynamic movement. God is not a static concept. God is a dynamic living in me. Listen to the psalmist confession as a deer longs for flowing streams, so my soul longs for you oh God, my soul thirsts for God, for the Living God . He’s not satisfied with the concept of God, his soul thirsts for the living God. When shall I come and behold the face of God by tears have been my food day and night. While people say to me continually, where is your God? . He’s so thirsty for the living God and he was challenged by people: where is your God? . We should ask ourselves, where is your God? Where is your God? Not somebody else's God, not your parents' God. Not your friend’s Gods. Oh, where is your God?

That is something that we have to ask ourselves. We need to encounter the living God. Nicodemus came to Jesus one day and Jesus said, you want to enter into the Kingdom of God? You have to be born again and he said, you hear the wind, but you don’t know where it’s coming from and where it’s going to . It's like in a mystery, uncertainty, but one thing that's clear in that passage is that there’s a movement. The dynamic God is working in your life, that is what it means to be born again. There’s a movement. You don’t know where he’s coming from and where he’s going to, but there’s a movement. Jesus introduced that kind of dynamical living God. Knowing God is not about gathering information on God, then ministers or theologians should know God the best. Do we? No.

We know as much as you do. We know about God, but knowing God does not depend on how much information you have about God. Knowing God is not about information It’s not about knowing about God, knowing God is different, knowing God is not about information, knowing God is about transformation. It’s not a cerebral exercise, it’s not what’s happening in your brain, it’s what’s happening in your whole being, not just information you gather, you get transformation as you get to know God. As you try to get to know God, a new movement begins with us. Somehow before nothing moves, but as you get to know God somehow in your life there’s a movement. Something is moving in your heart, in your thinking, in your emotion in your life, in everything, you start moving.

When you have the concept of God you stay the same, always the same. You’re just going for settlement, security, but as you get to the living God, the movement begins. That’s how the journey begins. Our whole self-starts moving towards the truth to God. The problem is that what we have is the concept of God. That’s why there is no movement, no change, no transformation, just a lot of doctrines within your brain. And with your stubborn will, you’ll clean your doctrine that’s all you do. As you get to know the living God a journey begins. A life that used to try to establish the settlement now starts the journey.  If you believe in God for your settlement, that’s not Christian God. That may be fine in some other religion, but God is not about the settlement.

Knowing God is like taking on the journey of knowing God. The first person who introduced the Judaeo Christian God, who is that, the first person who introduced Judaeo Christian God? Abraham. Abraham was the first person who introduced Judaeo Christian God. He was an idol worshiper, he was living in war, he lived very comfortably serving idols, just like many of us in North American society. Joshua said to all the people, This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: Long ago your ancestors, including Terah the father of Abraham and Nahor, lived beyond the Euphrates River and worshiped other gods. But I took your father Abraham from the land beyond the Euphrates and led him throughout Canaan and gave him many descendants . You go to the promised land. And I said yes we’ll go. So they throw away idols and they started the journey. What happened?

They got tempted. They got settled in Haran so they lived in Haran for many years and God called them again. No, not Haran, go further. To the promise land, to Canaan'. So Isaac wrote this: war to Haran is a settlement. Maybe this God will give us better settlements, better security, better life. So they stayed in Haran. But God told him from he must move from Haran to Canaan. God called Abraham out of the settlement and pushed him into a journey. This journey was not the journey to live a better life. This journey was a journey to know God. If your life is a journey then that journey is a journey of searching for the true living God, the living God Paul found, the living God Abraham found and the living God Jesus introduced.

Jesus prayed in this way. Hear this interesting prayer, his last prayer before he died. And this is eternal life. The thing they know you, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent'. That’s why I like John, Gospel John. That’s why I taught seven times in this church I did seven times the study of Gospel John. His understanding of eternal life is very unique. His understanding of eternal life is knowing God. That’s what eternal life is. Eternal life is not just you go to Heaven after you die. Eternal life is knowing God. So our journey of knowing God is our journey of eternal life. Eternal life is a quality of life, not the quantity, the length of life, it’s the quality of life. The kind of quality you want to live with eternally. That is what eternal life is. Knowing God is the key to eternal life.

That’s why Saint Paul said: knowing Christ is a surpassing value of all things he did and was. Before he didn’t do that. Now, knowing Christ, knowing God is the only thing that’s most valuable. And this is what he said: these things he did and he was, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ. More than that, I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord. For his sake, I have suffered the loss of all things and regard and regard them as rubbish. I called that real God, I call that living God. He was able to regard everything else rubbish because he found the most precious thing and that is Jesus Christ. That is God. That is living God, not the concept of God and he lived. Without knowing God we perish.

This is what Hosea said: my people are destroyed for lack of knowledge because you have rejected knowledge. You know when I look at Saint Paul’s life, his life opened up, you know there is a life that is opened up and there is a life that is not opened up yet when I look at Paul’s life, his life opened up. When he truly got to know the living God, his life opened up. Not God the of the law, not nominal God, not God of the custom or culture, but the living God that opens up our life. The door of the mystery of life opens up when you get to know the living God. As we get to know the living God, meaning, purpose, direction, passion, abundance, hopefulness, joy, aliveness, thankfulness, all these things become characteristic of your life. What more do you ask for?

I think about when people’s lives open up. For example, Paul laid out all his prejudices and then started to get to know God. I was thinking about Katie, she probably thinks that “I don’t have much time left on this earth, I’m gonna go soon”. I think she feels that she senses that. Cancer has spread all over her body, but when that happens, a different door opens up. I think her thinking right now is very different from our thinking. The kind of thing that she reflects on will be very different from the kinds of things that we reflect on. Sometimes when life tragedy hits us the door that did not open before opens up. You see different things through that open door. You know what we do on the surface, it’s very similar. We work and come home tired. You eat, watch movies, dramas and take care of your young children and sometimes we can be relaxed and do things that we enjoy. Sports, movies, music. What determines the quality of life is not what you do on the surface. It’s what you feel and experiences inside in every moment of your life.

Real happiness is not what you do on the outside. Real happiness, is a quality of how you feel inside every moment. When I’m happy inside, what do I do? I enjoy it. Whatever I eat. I enjoy it. My problem is even if I’m not happy I enjoy what I eat. But when I’m not happy inside, whatever I do, I don’t find it enjoyable. When you’re enlightened, everything comes alive. When you’re sad and, when you have problems, when you’re not happy inside, even though you look at a beautiful lake and a pond outside and you see it, it saddens you more. Rather than saying, oh, look how beautiful that is. This is what Saint Paul said in his letter to Ephesians, I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him so that the eyes of your heart enlightened, you may know what is the hope to which he has called you. What are the riches of his glorious inheritance among the saints and what is the measurable greatness of his power for us who believe according to the working of his great power and when you look at this passage, there’s a process. First, you come to know him. The father of glory may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation and then you will come to know him, and then your eyes of the heart are enlightened in other words, open. Then when it’s open you’ll be able to see hope and riches and immeasurable greatness of his power. All these things, this is a process. The process is: you know God, eyes of your heart enlightened, you know the abundance of life and power of life. All eternal quality.

It’s not what’s happening outside it’s what’s happening inside. Two trees that you see, you look at two trees, they look the same when you first see it. But if there’s a water going up and down and up and down there’s a dynamic movement that tree will bloom and have leaves and flowers. A dead tree, as time goes by, will decay, deteriorate, ultimately it will die. Two trees on the outside look the same. But the interior, the inside is very different. What determines our fate, our destiny, is not what’s on the outside, it’s what’s inside. You know, if you want to know how powerful Paul’s inner life was, even in prison, he was happy and told Philippians to rejoice always. In the circumstances where we may feel totally miserable he was happy and advised others to be happy. How is it possible? Because his inner self-was strong, he did not depend on his outer circumstances.

His inner life was so strong that his actual circumstances cannot take away the power of life he enjoyed. I think it’s got to do with his knowledge of God. As we really got to know God, his external life did not necessarily get better. As I said if you want settlement the Christian God may not be the right God for you. Paul’s life after getting to know the living God was very difficult. It wasn’t easy. It got more difficult. His situation became worse: persecution, imprisonment, hardships. He’s telling other people, other disciples, are they the ministers of Christ? I am talking like a madman. I’m a batter one with far greater labors, far more inclusiveness with countless floggings and often near death. Five times I received from the Jews the 40 matches minus one three times I was beaten with rocks. Once I received a stoning, three times I was shipwrecked, for a night and the day I was adrift at Sea, on frequent journeys in danger from rivers, danger from bandits, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the Wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers and sisters, in toil and hardship through many a sleepless night, hungry and thirsty, often without food cold and naked and besides other things, I’m under daily pressure because of my anxiety for all churches .

Think about how difficult his life was. Through all this, his inner life so strongly intact, this is what he said: For I have learned to be content with whatever I had. I know what is very little and I know what it is to have plenty. In any and all circumstances, I have learned the secret of being well fed and of going hungry, of having plenty and of being in need. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me . That’s, confidence, that’s power. That’s the kind of life I envy and I want to follow. What a strong life. What a cool life. That is the kind of life I want to live. That only happens on the inside and as you get to know about that, the inside becomes strong. So truly knowing the living God can do wonderful things to us. My friends, it is difficult to truly know the living God. Why? Knowing God is like an oxymoron. God is by definition unknowable, so knowing the unknowable is an oxymoron. God cannot be contained within our knowledge, God is too big to know, God is ineffable.

About two or three months ago, I had so many nosebleeds, it’s not because I worked harder than before. Every morning I get a nosebleed, I was concerned, what’s going on here? We moved into a condo and the condo is a little too dry. So I bought a humidifier. I think it got a little better one night, but the next day it started bleeding again. I couldn’t figure out what the problem was. And then I finally got the answer. About a week before, I went to clean my nose so thoroughly, in the shower, I cleaned every single thing I don’t know how long I was doing it for, just nose cleaning. And I must have damaged the left nose cause it only came out the left nose not the right nose. Later I found you need to leave something there. You cannot clean it perfectly. So I bought nose cream, and I put it on. Two days later I was fine. I never noticed it was up there. I mean it was a mystery to me, but there’s always a reason, right? It’s always a reason, logic behind it.

Last year, September 14th, legal LIGO observatory discovered the evidence that proves Einstein’s gravitational wave. 1.4 billion years ago, two black holes collided with each other and merged and the rest of the mass created a gravitational wave. The observatory waited and waited and picked up that signal and then picked up another signal after that. So they can prove that Einstein was right. Einstein was amazing, wasn’t he? And these scientists, I think they are amazing. How they find that it happened 1.4 billion years ago? They’re amazing, but still, all it did was to only discover the rules that govern the universe, the rule that governs my body. But there is no rule that governs the movement of God. God is beyond every rule, God made the rules and law, but God is not bound by those rules and laws. There’s nothing in the world that binds God.

God is completely free. God is free to love us, God is beyond everything. So Muslims confess this way, Allahu Akbar, God is greater, God is always greater. God is greater than the greatest thought you may have. And our gospel writer John expressed it, differently, but the same thing. No one has ever seen God beyond our visibility beyond what we can understand . When we say they know something very well we can say we have mastered it. But we can never master God. We can never be experts on God. I think Thomas Merton’s prayer was the honest prayer, when he said, Your brightness is my darkness, I know nothing of You and by myself, I cannot even imagine how to go about knowing You. If I imagined You I’m mistaken. If I understand You, I’m deluded. If I’m conscious and certain I know You, I am crazy. The darkness is enough . What an honest statement. That’s who our God is like. Thomas Merton’s most famous prayer is this: My Lord I have no idea where I’m going . Saint Augustin said: if you have understood, it is not God. God is a mystery, so knowing God is like knowing the mystery.

In your journey of knowing God, you will encounter the hidden God and revealed God it’s like hide and seek. The grandchild of Rabbi Baruch, a very famous rabbi, his grandchild was playing hide and seek with another boy he hid and stayed in his hiding place for a long time assuming that his friend would look for him. Finally, he went out and saw that his friend was gone, apparently not having looked for him at all and that his own hiding had been in vain. He ran into the study of his own grandfather crying and complaining about his friend. Upon hearing this story, Rabbi Baruch broke into tears and said God to says, I hide but there is no one to look for me . Sometimes we don’t know when God reveals himself and when God hides in our journey we will encounter both the hiding God and the revealing God. When God hides I hope that we don’t become the ones that don’t look for God. Share some of the thoughts of knowing God, I hope that some of your assumptions of concepts of God, if they have no effect on you, they’re useless, they’re merely a concept, they’re merely nice ideas.

I hope that we may be in a small way make an encounter with the living God in every day of our lives. I hope that throughout this retreat I hope that you encounter that living God and think about your own assumptions and concepts of God.

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