NT Wright on 1 Corinthians 2:6-13

Wright summarised this part of the Bible with these two paragraphs. I couldn't agree with him more.

1. There is a wealth of knowledge and life-enhancing understanding waiting for us to explore. Christianity is not simply a set of beliefs and a rule-book for life, such as anyone could master in a weekend. It is as many-sided as the world itself, full of beauty and mystery and power, and as terrifying and wonderful as God himself. There is always much, much more to learn, to relish, to delight in.

2. The Christian message from the very beginning challenged the world of power, including social and political power, with the message of God's superior kingdom unveiled in Jesus' death and resurrection. Paul doesn't want the Corinthians to imagine that he is talking simply about a religious experience that won't have anything to do with the real life of politics and government... Let us not settle for a gospel which allows the world's power-games to proceed without challenge.

Obligation? Love?

This year, I tried to encourage my fellowship committee members to have a good spiritual life with God in order to serve Him well. You need to love God in order to serve Him.

Today, I spent like 3 hours preparing for praise leading tomorrow in the children's service... And honestly, I feel this to be more like an obligation than love for God.

Without love, can I do this? It's certainly a boring thing, preparing powerpoints and what I'm going to say... preparing the music...

I can't help but recall what my fav writer Diana Gabaldon wrote in Drums of Autumn when Roger was trying to decide whether to stay because Brianna was pregnant and the baby might not be his, because she was raped.

"Obligation? Love? How in hell could you have love without obligation?"

I've just started reading 1 Corinthians today. As usual of all Paul's epistles, it started with something about Jesus.

1 Corinthians 1:1-9

1Paul, called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and our brother Sosthenes,

2To the church of God in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be holy, together with all those everywhere who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ—their Lord and ours:

3Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

4I always thank God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus. 5For in him you have been enriched in every way—in all your speaking and in all your knowledge— 6because our testimony about Christ was confirmed in you. 7Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed. 8He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9God, who has called you into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful.

Wright reflected upon the passage and wrote, "It doesn't take long in someone's company... before you discover what's really exciting them, what is at the centre of their waking thoughts... One name keeps coming up, over and over again."

For Paul, just in the first 9 verses, the name of Jesus appeared 8 times...

How many times does Jesus appear in your thought every day?

Sick

I'm so sick, I can't concentrate to read the Bible...

Advent

An advent calender that can help preparing you for Christmas... It's very beautiful, with meditations every day!!

Click here.

I've answered Your call

Well, now it's up to You to solve all the remaining problems.

Is this really Your call??

I've always known that I'll be serving God one day through Bible teaching.

Now here's this thing here, is it from You? Or from humans? Is it the right time?

Tell me...

What is attracting people to church?

Just back from church after the fellowship committee meeting, we had a discussion on how to get more new people to our fellowship, and what can we do?

I participated in the discussion and we talked about various things, e.g. organising hiking trips, sailing, even financial planning seminars (we've got so many accountants, haha)

On my journey home, a thought popped up.

What exactly are we doing??

Are we doing things our way again?

I remembered when I was a kid, our mentors were always saying that we were not in a community centre, we were not the same with non-Christians. We were gathered because of God.

I agree sometimes we may need to compromise. Is this the sort of compromise that God wants??

Or is it just us doing things in our way, in the way we are familiar with??

So it comes back to the question, what attracts people to church? Is it the activity or God? Or people? Or what?

If we get people to come back because of the activity, are they going to stay??

And most importantly what God's plan is? What does He think of all these??

Spring coming

Cold war is ending... at least I hope...

I noticed that there're quite a lot of great co-workers with me in the fellowship. Even when they are not so great and during our misunderstandings, God use us.

It's really miraculous when you think about how God use EVEN the misunderstandings.

Angry

I'm still angry with God... I know I shouldn't be, but I can't help it... I understand EXACTLY why He's doing things this way, but I'm just MAD things didn't go MY way...

I can't control how I feel, can I?

As a result, I don't want to do anything this week.

SANCTIFICATION --An Evangelical Tradition Neglected

Just reading a friend's xanga the other day and he talked about an article (in Chinese) written by Dr. Carver T Yu. In fact, I just discussed this essay with some of my friends a few weeks ago when a certain pastor came to our church and talked about Buddhism for the whole time. I suggested that this might be what he wanted to do-- to tell Chinese people about Christianity in their own way, so that they don't feel like it is something foreign.

This reminded me of this article he wrote on santification. (For the Chinese version of the same article, click here.) I have shared this essay with my fellowship last year.

"As spiritual heirs of the Reformers, evangelicals are all too familiar with the doctrine of justification by faith. We have however often overlooked the fact that sanctification is the other side of justification. Our Reformers put tremendous emphasis on the inseparability of justification and sanctification... Sanctification is the working out in our life the righteousness we have received absolutely free from God in Christ. Our salvation is empty without the holiness that is meant for our life. To Calvin, Christian life on the foundation of justification is a life of sanctification, a life of schooling under Christ, the inner schoolmaster. It is a life of learning to allow the Spirit to root out our heart's distrust and our mind's blindness. It is also a life of learning to submit our will to the Will of God, like Jesus Christ. Thus we can see why Calvin has given such great emphasis to the discipline of self-denial, of bearing the cross and dying with Christ, of meditating on the future life and the proper use of the present life.

However, the great tradition of spiritual discipline (in contradistinction to what we call "spirituality") seems to have fallen by the wayside. The term "sanctification" has become something that sounds rather strange to the ears of our congregations. Why? Because seminaries nowadays seldom teach sanctification as a doctrine, and much less as a way of Christian life.

Secularization has eaten into the bone of our modern life. Among Christians, the sense of the Holy has been seriously eroded, the feeling of fear and trembling before God has become numbed. Many Christians seek spirituality merely to escape from the unhappiness of their pressurized life. They are thus much more at home with the soothing commonsense spiritual wisdom than with Calvin's great teaching on Christian life."

He is a very good observer. And I like reading what he wrote.

Nowadays we can see this everywhere, we try to adapt Christianity to modern society so that more people can accept it. However, it was done in a way that distorts it.

You can see people emphasizing on getting peace and rest from Jesus and omitting the important parts of cross-bearing. (Not that getting peace and rest is not important, but this is NOT the only thing Christianity is all about. And you wonder why people think Buddhism is profound and Christianity is superficial, impractical, out-of-touch with our present life.)

The life of Christians was never easy. It never is, and never will be. Jesus never promised us that.

That's what our pastors promised though. And you wonder why all these people left Christianity after a while being thoroughly disappointed by "Jesus".

How to serve God the best way I can?

This week, a couple of things happened.

God is trying to teach me various things on how to serve Him. And I'm learning.

Learning is painful process.

Just as what I wrote earlier, I'm trying to serve God, not myself. And I'm learning. To identify what God wanted me to learn, not what people tell me to do, and not what I wanted to do.

And I see more and more people whom I can work together for God. Different talents really can work together.

And God gave me some insight on the problems I'm going to face when I continue to serve God. I have never imagined these before. Thank You for preparing me. Please teach me how to deal with these. From my understanding, my way of doing things need some adjustment, but it's still the way You wanted me to go. O Lord, help me to serve you the best way I can.

Hebrews 7:20-28

"He (Jesus) is a truly human being, tempted in every respect just like we are, and he can therefore sympathize fully with our weakness and the pressure we find ourselves under. (Indeed, you could say that he knows more about it than we ever will, since we are inclined to yield to temptation and so never to face its full fury, whereas he, who never sinned, had to go on battling against it without the relief of giving in.)"

I have never thought about it this way. I don't think I can ever imagine how hard that was for Jesus to "go on battling against it without the relief of giving in". Wow...

Living a Christian Life

I wanted to invite some colleagues to my church's evangelical meeting. I had this planned out long ago. Of course, things are never as smooth as planned.

I was really frustrated by some problems. And then I was so unhappy a few of days ago because of this. I wanted to stop doing everything.

I read Hebrews 6:9-12 on the next day.
Even though we speak like this, dear friends, we are confident of better things in your case—things that accompany salvation. God is not unjust; he will not forget your work and the love you have shown him as you have helped his people and continue to help them. We want each of you to show this same diligence to the very end, in order to make your hope sure. We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised.

Again quoting NT Wright, "The important thing, then, is not to wait until you feel like living a holy life, or loving your neighbour, or working at the project of Christian service to which you are called and on which you've made a start... What matters is the call of the gospel, the promise of God, and your task of being faithful and patient in the present:'Until it be throughly finished.'"

Retreat Camp

Did I get a lot from the retreat camp? No. Did I like it? Yes. Especially the sharing by the pastor.

For me, I got reminded of the importance of focusing on Jesus. We have faith in Jesus. It is not the depth of our faith that matters, it is the ONE we focus on.

Jesus' work often get mistaken, Jesus just don't work in the way we think. Jesus will lift us up, but it takes time for us to recover and grow up.

My hand is feeling horrible, so I'm going to stop. If you wanna know why, see here. And if you wanna know about the details of the sharing in the retreat camp, pls read the part 1-3 from the past few days...

What I learnt in the retreat camp on Mark 9 (Part 3)

Mark 9:19-23
"O unbelieving generation," Jesus replied, "how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy to me."So they brought him. When the spirit saw Jesus, it immediately threw the boy into a convulsion. He fell to the ground and rolled around, foaming at the mouth.Jesus asked the boy's father, "How long has he been like this?""From childhood," he answered. "It has often thrown him into fire or water to kill him. But if you can do anything, take pity on us and help us."" 'If you can'?" said Jesus. "Everything is possible for him who believes."Immediately the boy's father exclaimed, "I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!"

Faith cannot be measured by its size. Even with faith as small as a mustard seed, nothing will be impossible. For the father in this case, he didn't have enough faith, but when he cried out for Jesus' help, it worked.

The most important thing is whom we believe, NOT how much we believe. If we are able to believe in Jesus, then it'll be ok.

When you don't feel you have enough faith, try not to say, "I don't have faith". Instead, try repeating, "I don't have faith in Jesus." After a few times, you'll find that you cannot say that anymore.

Mark 9:25-29
When Jesus saw that a crowd was running to the scene, he rebuked the evil spirit. "You deaf and mute spirit," he said, "I command you, come out of him and never enter him again." The spirit shrieked, convulsed him violently and came out. The boy looked so much like a corpse that many said, "He's dead." But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him to his feet, and he stood up. After Jesus had gone indoors, his disciples asked him privately, "Why couldn't we drive it out?" He replied, "This kind can come out only by prayer."

Often Jesus' work got misunderstood. He got the exorcism done, and people thought the kid was dead... They couldn't be more mistaken about the situation here... The kid didn't come back as if he had never been controlled by the ghost.

Jesus lifted the kid up, but the kid still need quite a lot of time for growing up and learning. Like us, we need quite a lot of time for growing up in God.

What I learnt from the retreat camp (Part 2)

Even Judas managed to perform the same miracles as the other disciples, it should be a reminder to us who are doing God's work. Even if we are able to do God's work sucessfully, we can be Judas.

Retreat camp stuff again

When you read the Bible the first time, and you think you understand it, that means you don't.

After you read it again and again, you find something you don't understand, THAT means you understand it a bit more.

REVIVAL - What I have learnt in the retreat camp (on Mark chapter 9) Part 1

Mark 9:12-13
Jesus replied, "To be sure, Elijah does come first, and restores all things. Why then is it written that the Son of Man must suffer much and be rejected? But I tell you, Elijah has come, and they have done to him everything they wished, just as it is written about him."

According to this passage, with Isaiah (i.e. John the Baptist) and Jesus (the Son of Man), everything should be revived already. However, we all know both of them were killed.

Is that revival? What does it mean by revival? There're so many definitions and theological theories on this subject in the last few centuries. What's in the Bible? Not much, and even less in the sense we use today.

And what does it mean? If you continue reading the next passage, you'll realise this is in fact inter-related.

Mark 9:14-15
When they came to the other disciples, they saw a large crowd around them and the teachers of the law arguing with them. As soon as all the people saw Jesus, they were overwhelmed with wonder and ran to greet him.

The disciples and the scholars were debating on why they could not perform the exorcism. They have done it before. They must have known the trick, but why couldn't they do it this time?

They were amazed when Jesus arrived. They obviously have never thought to ask for Jesus' help in this, otherwise, they would not have been surprised by Jesus' appearance.

And what was wrong with them all along?

Was there a problem with their method? The kid perhaps? Or the father?

In fact, the spirit was deaf!!! That's why they had failed. Whatever you said to the spirit, he simply didn't understand.

Jesus succeeded. Well, it's Jesus.

When we're facing our own problems, how do we solve them? In our own way? Or call for Jesus' help?

Back from Retreat

How come I'm even more tired after returning from the retreat camp? Actually I know exactly why, I couldn't sleep in that unfamiliar bed...

Church problems

Yesterday, there was like one of the worst sermons I have ever heard. The whole sermon was about Buddhism rather than Christianity. A friend of mine suggested writing a letter to complain about the preacher. He was a retired pastor from another church. I told her I think the sermon is bad, but I doubt if that's a useful or wise gesture.

Last night, I talked to another friend. Apparently, there was an attempt to complain our church's chief pastor to the deacon's board. It failed because the letter was written anonymously. The person who told me about this said she'll sign the letter if I write one. Honestly, I wanted to write one too.

We have ALL been very ANGRY about the state of our church and its problems for a long time. Last night, I was seriously considering doing that.

Today, I listened to a sermon given by one of the preachers who had left earlier this year. He preached this particular Bible passage to us last year in our fellowship.

This time, when I heard it, (of course there're lots of new examples, some bad ones from our church, though he did not mention the name of our church...) it's been enlightening to me.

It's about Joshua 5:13-15. Just before Joshua went ahead to Jericho.

The Fall of Jericho (NIV)

13 Now when Joshua was near Jericho, he looked up and saw a man standing in front of him with a drawn sword in his hand. Joshua went up to him and asked, "Are you for us or for our enemies?"

14 "Neither," he replied, "but as commander of the army of the LORD I have now come." Then Joshua fell facedown to the ground in reverence, and asked him, "What message does my Lord have for his servant?"

15 The commander of the LORD's army replied, "Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy." And Joshua did so.

When we serve God, we're serving God, not ourselves. We do things in God's way.

"Are you for us or for our enemies?"
"Neither," he replied, "but as commander of the army of the LORD I have now come."

We all worked for God. No one is God's enemy. We should seek God's way in doing this.

And we have to take off our sandals. When we took off our shoes at home, we stayed there, and do not planned to go off in our own way. The same thing when we submit to God. We submit to God and do things His way.

The problem now is whether he's doing things his own way (the pastor I mean), or is it God's way (however unfathomable that is)? And whether if complaining is the best way? Or is it just us doing things in our own way again? What if God is planning something behind all these?

Haha!! Thanks to God

I actually managed to be civil to a certain guy I disliked a LOT today. This MUST be God's work. I could never do that by myself.

If you don't know that guy, you are probably wondering why I need to thank God for that! If you know him, you know the extent of God's work.

A new call

A few days ago I was reminded of my work for God during a conversation with a friend. I can't see exactly where I'm going. (General direction, yes. Precisely, no. I've always felt a deep desire and call to serve God by teaching God's word. I've been working hard in this direction, e.g. studying, teaching for some time.)

A lesson again. Not to complain unless you expect God to answer.

Yesterday, a colleague of mine called me because of her wife's difficult labour. And he asked me to pray for her. He has been in a difficult time for a while. Afterwards, I met several group of my friends and talked about various subjects and various people. Oh no, I almost forgot, things started right after I left home, I ran into an old friend of mine who hasn't been to church (other than for weddings) in almost 10 years.

My eyes were opened. Suddenly all at once, not just my colleague, the needs of several people were revealed before me. As if a veil has been lifted. I saw so many things in one day. I knew I was called by God to help.

I have always knew my vocation was to serve believers, to make them know their God and their religion more. And experience the depth of Christianity. However, when I saw so many Christians in need of God IN ONE SINGLE DAY, I was really sad. Christians should be with God already. Why so many are still struggling?

I knelt down and prayed and cried last night. I asked God to grant me the wisdom to tell all these people what they need to know. And share with them all I have learnt from Him.

Now I know why God has put me at this point at this time. At least I think I know. Maybe more will be revealed later.

Trust

While I was preparing my teaching on Ruth last night, I was thinking more and more about the trust issue. (More detail here.) I realised my problem is not trusting God to give me what I want. And it seemed that it has come to this point again. I had this struggle like ten thousand times before, every time God wants to to relinquish something into His hands. Sometimes over the same issue. I just hated losing control and God wants that.

And I discover that just like forgiveness, trust is also a matter of constant practice. You can trust someone for a day. Then grab the reins back on the next.

And then there's the problem in what God gives you is very different from what you want. For Naomi, for instance, I think for her, she want her sons back. Yeah, now she got these "grandchildren" from Ruth. So what? (She is not EVEN related to her.) Naomi has not said a word on this.

How does she feel? When she looked at her "grandchildren", was she reminded of her sons? Is this one of the loud silences used? If only these are my true grand children? If only my son had not die? If only? Why? When we read the Bible as a kid, we would imagine a happy-ever-after ending, was it really like that?

Of course, we know. We have the benefit of hindsight. If her sons had not die, Ruth would not have married Boaz, and David would not have been born. The fate of two seemingly inconsequential widows was tightly interwined with history. They never would have known that during their lifetime.

I let go again.

I imagine I have to struggle all over with this later on again. That's me. God, thank you for your reminder.

Joshua 3:1-5 Sermon

Before entering Canaan, Israelites waited (v1) before crossing River Jordan. Then they needed to follow the Ark of Covenant. "Then you will know which way to go, since you have never been this way before. But you need to keep a distance of about a thousand yards (900 metres) between you and the ark; do not go near it." (v4) "Joshua said, "Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do amazing things among you." (v5)

1. When we need to wait for God, we need to trust God. (An example: All the people were gathered in a church to pray for rain because of a drought, one girl sat there wearing a thick rain coat. People asked her if she was hot, why she wore such a coat. She said, "How can I get home dry when God answered our prayers and I don't have my coat?" How do you wait??)

2. We need to give some space in between. When we're following someone too closely, all we can see is someone else's back, and we will not be able to find the way again next time. And the Ark of Convenant represents God's will.

3. Consecrate yourself. It means we need to be devoted to God ONLY.

In summary, what does this mean?

Paul said the most important thing is faith, hope and love.

When we wait, we have faith in God doing the right thing. And when we're hoping for something, we do not have that thing yet. When you said, "I am yours only", it means that you love someone.

And then God will do amazing things among us.

For me, waiting is the most difficult part. I hate waiting. I always work very fast. Second most difficult part is devoting to God only. Too many distractions and temptations in the world. A very good reminder.

The Great Omission

A pastor mentioned this book in his church's website. Interesting title. If you're interested, you can read the article here, it's in Chinese though.

We, the "evangelicals", often place our emphasis on spreading the "Gospel". The most important thing in the world is to get someone to believe in Jesus. Then maybe getting that person to go to church, every week preferably (most of the time this is not possible). Then our job gets done.

Hey, a little reminder here, what's the Great Commission?? Matthew 28:19-20.

And what's the Great Omission then?? To teach people to observe all that Jesus taught us.

In order to obey Jesus' in His teachings, we need to pray, think, plan and act. All these through conscious acts. How often do we do this ourselves?? Not to mention teaching others to do this.

What is a good spiritual life??

Is it merely equal to a good "devotional time"? Feeling good every day??

Spiritual life includes everything in your LIFE. You need to apply your religious principles in your life in order to get a boost your spirituality.

I am so sad when you just devote like 15 mins of your time every day (maybe even less) and expect "feeling good" for 24 hours. Yep, "feeling good" is not the same with being close to God. I can feel miserable yet I know I'm very close to God.

Maybe I should blame all these on some of the modern Christianity teachings. Everyone was just told that they'll get peace and joy from God, while all the suffering parts were ignored.

It just makes me angry.

The paradox of praying

Praying in Christianity is a lot different from that of other religion. For Chinese people (I'm a Chinese), most of them prayed to their idols in order to get the things they desired.

For Christians, we sometimes tell God what we want, but in the end praying is more about putting yourself in God's hands and submitting to God's will. This is what I have learnt through years of praying. This is exactly what I'm experiencing recently.

Again from Tom Wright' book, here's a little excerpt on praying and meditation. He's talking about 2 Thessalonians 3:1-5.

" Here again is the paradox of Christian living: because the Lord is faithful and will guard us, therefore we pray that he will do so. This always sounds illogical to those who aren't engaged in it. Those who are will know that prayer has a power and sense which operate below and above logic. Our praying hearts, minds and lives are put at the disposal of the living Lord, who remains sovereign, but who also longs for our collaboration in his work of strengthening the church and guarding it from the evil. ... Go on focusing heart and mind on Jesus himself, Paul says, and as you meditate on his patience, and his strength under suffering, something of that patience will be given to you."

Tired of being "good"

People always say "helping people makes you happy." I doubt if it's always true. I was miserable a couple of days ago after helping others and unselfishly giving people what I had wanted...

I prayed to God and asked why it seemed that I was always denied the stuff I wanted either by Him or by myself (coz I am a Christian and I have always try to consider the Golden Rule for my every action.) How come I felt so bad, and I had to work so hard to be a good Christian??

Yesterday, as always, I read Tom Wright's book (I used it for my daily devotional material.) He's talking about 2 Thesslonians 2:13-17.

"All mature Christian thinking has this two-sided nature: God is powerful and will support you, therfore you need to stand firm and hold tight. We easily suppose that, if God is in control, we can relax; or that, if we have to struggle and work hard, it means that God isn't as powerful as we has thought. That misses the point. The way in which God's power is exercised is precisely through the love, the comfort and the teaching of the gospel, which don't work as it were automatically, without our conscious involvement, but which on the contrary stiffen our resolve and energize our flagging spirits. We see exactly the same balance when Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15.10 that he worked harder than the rest-- yet it was not him, but God's grace that was with him."

I was so touched by this immediate answer of my prayer.

Pistos ho Kalon

"The one who calls you is faithful." 1 Thessalonians 5:24

Someone wrote this on a card to N.T. Wright the day he was ordained. "It was and is a wonderful phrase."

It's not just about a vocation of ministry in church, it's also about our daily lives. In Thessalonians, one of the main themes is God calls us to be Holy. "To be Holy is hard work, but we believe it is God Himself... who enables us to get on and do it."

"Some Christians, emphasizing the boundless love of God and the doctrine of justification by faith apart from works, run the risk of underestimating the call to holiness, which Paul-- who is after all the great exponent of God's love and of free justification-- never did."

Well, this is exactly the problem I've seen for many years, but N.T. Wright put it in better English than I could, haha. I'm really sad when the church emphasized so much on "justification by faith. Not that it is not an important doctrine, but when people said you have to believe in this doctrine in order to be saved, it's just too... bad. Because of the Reformed tradition, I guess, Protestants always emphasize on this point.

For those of you who know me, you may have heard me saying this before. I don't believe you need to know that to be saved. ok, you can quote me on this and brand me as a heretic. =)

Seriously, I think many people doesn't know about this, for example, illiterate old people in China who simply trust God despite Cultural Revolution and everything... I don't think I'll say more on this.

Just that, I need to work even harder to be holy. Let's all work hard on this.

Thoughts on Sermon 8/10/06 (Matthew 22:36-40)

I love listening to the sermons of this particular preacher. He always quotes Jewish sources for stories/explanations. This time on explaining this particular passage (which was originally from Deuteronomy), he used some Jewish examples again. I'm paraphasing a bit, because I can't find the original quote (I don't know the name of the guy who said this), and this is translated from Cantonese in my memory... (Please tell me if you know who said this.)

A certain Jew wrote this before he died in a concentration camp during the Holocaust (after all his other family members has been killed), "God in anger, you wanted to destroy my faith, but you have failed. You have failed to destroy my belief in you, even with all the things you have done."

This is what I believe in. Like Romans 8:35-36. Nothing separates us from God.

I have always believed Christianity is about suffering, self-denial. Nowadays, "believing in Jesus" has been portrayed as the "solution for everything". Not that it isn't, but not in a "living happily ever after" kind of picture.

I am so sad when I heard the so-called "Gospel", when people are called to believe in Jesus so that you can get peace and joy, and NOT mentioning the cross-bearing life of discipleship. Christianity is NOT about what you can get. Like the preacher said today, Christ helps you change your personality, and with your changed personality you can face whatever crisis you encounter in your life.

Also, when you love God, you love other people. This is even more difficult. Love is not an emotion. What I'm trying to do is do whatever I want to be done to me. Not always succeeding.

Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt (Anne Rice)

I had just finished reading this book, the best part of the book for me is the author's note. To read my opinion on the book, click here.

Anne Rice had been a Catholic when she was very young, and then left church at 18, and later on married an atheist. She is famous for her vampire novels, e.g. Interview with the Vampire (starring Tom Cruise in the movie version)

She detailed in the end of the book, how the quest for the history of 1st century, drew her back to God. What she saw in the research for the book is very interesting. Though I need no proof for the existence of Jesus, I'm glad to know she found the skeptics' view unfounded. (I had no time to go through all these research materials myself.)

And it is really true that God calls us in the best way. He really sees us. (Just like the sermon I heard earlier.) And knows us. God, Thank you.

Galatians 5:22-26

Just looking at the verse number, you would have thought I'm going to talk about the fruits of the Spirit.

According to the Everyone Series by Tom Wright (i.e. NT Wright), the point in this part is in lining up with the Spirit. As you know, in Galatians, people are arguing about whether circumcision is necessary for a Gentile Christian to fully receive God's grace.

"The balance this produces is as vital for the church today as it ever was. Often, today, when people emphaisze the need for love, patience, gentleness and the like, this goes with an attitude to truth and the gospel which says that we shouldn't stress the things we disagree on. Equally, when people are passionate for the truth of the gospel, as Paul was, they often allow that zeal to betray them into the kind of anger and even malice that are listed under 'the works of the flesh'. Often the blend of truth and love which Paul so often urged (see, e.g., Ephesians 4.15) seems elusive in church life. Paul's own answer to the problem would be short and clear: we need to learn to line up more effectively with the spirit."

It's so true. We often, in an attempt to avoid conflict, avoid our differences and the truth as well.

I think the answer is to pray more and allow the spirit to change us through our prayers.

This gives me an insight on how to handle conflict in the fellowship/church in the future.

Work & Study & God

When I promised to pick up the various tasks in church, I was still thinking about joining the revision course in December. Now that I have more or less decided to go, I am a bit worried coz I have far too much work that I can handle with my study and work.

Let's see how I'll experience God's grace through the next few months.

Praying

Beyond "Prayer Requests"
What if people's wishes run counter to God's sometimes painful path of transformation?
by Wayne Jacobsen

Offering and Sin (Sermon 10/9/06)

Dead tired after work yesterday... 24 hours of continuous work (only stopped for 2 hours in between), every case is REAL emergency...

I attended the morning service right after work with my exhausted body (not my mind nor my soul, they had been lost somewhere in the midst of my work...) And I was pleasantly surprised when God spoke to me through the sermon. (Though I have slept through a few prayers and even when other people are singing, it felt like lullaby...) The sermon was a bit rushed because of a ceremony scheduled afterwards, points that should be elaborated was just stated, but it had a few really good messages.

The sermon was on Leviticus Chapter 1, as I'm preparing a sermon for children's service on Leviticus, so I paid extra attention, jotting notes while listening. (The fact is if I didn't, I would have fallen asleep after 1 minute. =P)

The theme for the worship service was "Praising the God who filled us with joy."

The sermon was on the meaning of offering. The pastor began with Psalms 16, the psalm from which the theme of the service quoted. We often associate our spiritual life with our feelings, whether we are full of joy, how much time we spent in devotional time, etc. The fact is that the state of our relationship with God does not depend on our feelings.

A kid played with his boomerang for the first time, when the boomerang did not return as expected, he told his father God did not give it back to him.

Offering in the Bible, unlike that in other Near East civilisation, is not for the purpose of providing food to gods. It is for the reconciliation of God and us.

Devotional time is just a reflection of the state of our relationship with God. However, the state is not determined by our effort, our work, how hard we pray or how many times we read our Bible.

God's concern is the sin that separates us from Him.

And the meaning of offering is to remind us to deal with sin. Offering is not meant to be just a penalty for us. When we got our ticket from parking, we just said how unlucky we are. It is different from that. Offerings were made with animals without blemish. It could not be done with the worst animal they had. (You're going to die anyway, so why not do me a favour and die for me?)

Through the act of offering, the Israelites were reminded of their sin. Likewise, we should have certain acts to remind us to deal with our sins.

We often confess the same kinds of sins over and over again. Sometimes even we ourselves got tired of ourselves and can no longer accept our own sins, and we do not even want to deal with them anymore. This is in fact doubting God's love for us. He gave His own Son for our sins. And we doubt if He's ever going to accept our sins? If He can accept them and forgive them, why can't us do the same?

To obey God's command is the positive way to deal with our sins. We need to deal with them seriously and it should remind us that sin has a price.

Reflections on Christianity and Christians

I was listening to a forum with Anne Rice and NT Wright this morning on the way to work, they discussed about the existence of some really bad Christians and good atheists. (btw, Anne Rice is really the one who wrote Interview with the Vampire, I initially thought she's just someone with the same name... she's "re-converted" to Catholicism and vowed to write for God only now.)

Bishop Wright said many Christians who are talking about obeying God's commandments, usually just select the easy ones to obey, and ignore those that are difficult.

Another point mentioned is that we are not supposed to just tolerate each other in church, we are created to love each other in church.

Well, what can I say? I'm guilty. On both charges.

Another point of reflection is on what Christianity is all about. Is it just about getting to heaven when we die? Of course, every Christian would have said no. However, we were doing things as if we believed in that. It seems that our life is about escaping this world. In fact, when we spread the Gospel, we often emphasize on this point. You believe in Christ, you get eternal life, otherwise, you go straight into hell. (Maybe not that frank, but you get the idea. I've been opposed to this for some time even tho I'm a so-called "evangelical Christian".)

Jesus died and rose two thousand years ago, demonstrating his victory over this world. How did this change our present lives? Or are we just a bunch of people waiting for our life after death?

Andrew

Yesterday, we had a sermon on Andrew, the apostle whom our fellowship was named after.

We often knew Andrew as the one who brought people to Jesus. In 1 John, when we read the description clearly, Andrew did bring people to Jesus to see him. However, ultimately, it was Jesus who saw them.

The most important thing for our evangelism is being seen by Jesus. We can bring people before Christ. We should know God sees us, and the way He sees us has a great impact on us. And it is also a great relief to us. We only need to be the one God created us to be. Not more, not less.

As for evangelism, it is NOT limited to bringing people to Jesus, we need to help them into Jesus' disciples and obey all that Christ has commanded.

What does God see when He looks at us right now??

Wrestling with God

I'm not talking about Jacob.

Everyone needs to wrestle with God to get their spiritual revival. In Galatians, Paul said he went to Arabia before he started preaching. According to NT Wright in his "Paul for everyone" series, Arabia is Mount Sinai, and Paul went there to wrestle with God just like the previous prophets e.g. Elijiah did.

"God to Saul's horror and amazement, had now revealed that... Saul, an ultra-orthodox Jew, might tell the pagan nations that God loved them... We are all different, God does not break all hearts in the same way... But the central strand of most Christian living that everybody needs, from time to time, to wrestle with God and His will. It is necessary, too, that Christian leaders should be seen to be telling their own story truly."

I read this when I was travelling to work on a mini-bus yesterday and tears suddenly welled up in my eyes...

網上李思敬博士講道文章/Websites with Dr. Stephen Lee's works

箴言析讀
列王紀析讀
風波裡的信徒
箴言
迎向廿一世紀文字工作者的使命
滄海中開道路
回到聖經裡的神學--專訪李思敬（續篇）
趕上另一個黃金十年--專訪李思敬
但以理書的市井神學
北京之行
「以便以謝」的里程碑
Training Spiritual Leaders for 21st Century China
Marketplace Theology in the Book of Daniel
李思敬博士培靈會 From The Christian and Missionary Alliance San Gabriel Valley Alliance Church

Saul vs David

David tried to cover up one mistake by another, following the Bathesheba incident. God intervened, NOT when David asked for His help. God intervened at the moment when David thought he had successfully covered up the whole thing. God is the one who got David back. And the difference between David and Saul is that David repented immediately afterwards, while Saul still persisted in his own ways.

And in fact through God's "punishment", God blessed David. God pulled him out of his sins.

Sin is never without consequence. That is why David's first son with Bathesheba died.

When I think about it, I realised I am more often like Saul than David... despite being repeatedly warned by God, I still persist in my own ways somehow...

Jealousy

It's so easy to be jealous of someone else.

I read Deuteronomy Ch 2 yesterday. God distributed the lands according to His will among Moab, Ammon and Edom. God told the Jews not to provoke them to war. (If I were the Jews, I would be thinking, hey God, these people had sinned and worshipped idols, and I ouldn't believe that You're still protecting them.)

Just like the way God has distributed gifts among us. We should be happy with what God has given us. This is easier said than done though. It's so difficult to understand how God can love some people that much. I really don't have that much love for everyone.

Got to work harder on this.

Walking with God

I noticed that quite a lot of people equates their spiritual life with the quality of their devotional time. For me, I can have a pretty good spiritual life without much devotional time. (Don't get me wrong, devotional time is important, I just think it is not the most important. You can have the best devotional time in the world, and then when you walk out of your closet, you walk in your own way.)

For me, a good spiritual life is walking with God every moment of my day. Not just in my devotional time. Also during work, and at rest. Whatever you are doing, Wherever you are. It's a habitual sense of God's presence.

It's like what Brother Lawrence did. He is a 17th century monk who learnt to meditate on God through his work in the monastery kitchen.

"This made me resolve to give the all for the All: so after having given myself wholly to GOD, to make all the satisfaction I could for my sins, I renounced, for the love of Him, everything that was not He; and I began to live as if there was none but He and I in the world ... I worshipped Him the oftenest that I could, keeping my mind in His holy Presence, and recalling it as often as I found it wandered from Him. I found no small pain in this exercise, and yet I continued it, notwithstanding all the difficulties that occurred, without troubling or disquieting myself when my mind had wandered involuntarily. I made this my business, as much all the day long as at the appointed times of prayer; for at all times, every hour, every minute, even in the height of my business, I drove away from my mind everything that was capable of interrupting my thought of GOD. Such has been my common practice ever since I entered into religion."

--Brother Lawrence, The Practice of the Presence of God

N.B. Of course, you need to be careful not to do this in a New Age or Buddhism kind of way. These meditation stuff can lead to these non-Christian beliefs.

Abrupt Awakening from a Dream

I was woken up by my mother at 7am while I was having this dream.

It's the usual kind of dream everyone has some time in their life. I dreamt about being chased.

I woke up feeling drowsy but with a sense of hatred. It's Psychology 101. Even I know how to interpret this. The fact is I hate the people who were chasing me. Up till this morning I have never realised how strongly I hate them.

I deceived myself into thinking it's just dislike. When people do certain things to you, it's normal to dislike them, right? Yeah!

I started to question my feelings on this matter while I was reading the Secrets of Vineyard last week. (See my previous entry) I didn't give the matter any more thoughts until I woke up today with the realisation that I HATE these people.

I know I need to resolve this feeling of mine. Again, what Diana Gabaldon (my No. 1 favourite writer, in case you don't know) wrote in Drums in Autumn on the matter of forgiveness came up in my mind. (She's a devout Catholic.)

"How to tell her in words, then, what he had learn himself by pain and grace? That only by forgiveness could she forget -- and that forgiveness was not a single act, but a matter of constant practice."

I'm gonna start practising it- today. Then, and only then I can move on spiritually.

Secrets of Vineyard

I know it's a bit late to read this book. It was published in 2001. Written by Bruce Wilkinson. (Sounds familiar?? he's the author of the Prayer of Jabez)

Well, it's on sale. Its original price is US$9.99, I bought it with HK$15!!!

The whole little book is about John 15. I'm not entirely certain that its interpretation of the passage is right (who can be sure anyway?), though the underlying teaching serves as a great reminder.

In summary, this book is about:

1. If your life consistently bears no fruit, God will intervene to DISCIPLINE you.

2. If your life bears some fruit, God will intervene to PRUNE you.

3. If your life bears a lot of fruit, God will invite you to ABIDE more deeply with him.

For me, the most interesting point is Point #1 on John 15:2, "Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, He takes away." According to the author, the word "taketh away" in Greek is airo. And it doesn't mean cut off, instead it means lift up.

So what does it mean to lift up a branch? The writer learned from a vineyard owner that new branches tend to grow downwards and become covered with dust, and as a result, they cannot bear fruits. What the owner needs to do is lift them up and wash them, so that they can bear fruit again. Of course, the dust represents sins, sadness, etc.

What struck me most while reading this (other than learning about how vines grow) is the example that the writer used in explaining this-- a woman who was stuck spiritually at the same point for years because of her bitterness towards her mother. Not that I have the same problem. Definitely a similar problem though. (I'll explain this in the next entry.)

As for the second point on pruning, it's from "Every branch that bears fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit." John 15:2 In short, it's a test of faith when God wants you to bear even more fruit.

And the third point is from John 15:4, "Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine; so neither can you, unless you abide in Me." When you're already bearing quite a lot of food, you need to abide in God to bear even more.

Sermon on 13/8/06

Last Sunday, I heard a sermon on Revelations Chapter 2, about the letter to Ephesus.

Christians in Ephesus had patience and hard work. However, they had left their first love. Without love, work becomes routine, patience is just tolerance.

This is what I've been doing. Finishing the work in church and fellowship. Tolerating some of the people I don't like all that much.

Low Point

I have been in a trough for some time, spiritually speaking. It hasn't been this bad for a few years. Just immediately before my last spiritual revival, I had been elected as a committee member in my church fellowship (responsible for promoting spiritual growth, yeah God just LOVES irony). And since then I had held this post for 3 consecutive years. THE greatest spiritual growth in my life occurs in the first year, the second year is quite ok, since then it's on a downhill course.

Guess what happens today? I am elected to be the chairperson in the fellowship committee. What exactly is God planning now?? I've been thinking of writing a spiritual journal for some time. It seems to me a good time to start one now, to record God's work on my life. (And a change in the layout of MSN space further pushed me into the decision of starting this new blog.)

Hope my work for God this year can stop being routine, and God can use whatever to shape me the way He wants me to be. (I just hope things don't go too bad. God loves using disasters on stubborn people like me.)