Monthly Archives: May 2013

Trinity Sunday: God’s Peace

Readings

Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31

Psalm 8

Romans 5:1-5

John 16:12-15

Devotion

Peace be with you!

The storm has passed. The initial shock has worn off. The damage has been evaluated, accessed, and documented. Now the rebuilding begins amongst the rubble and the dust. The government promises funding to rebuild homes, schools, and other public places, but what does it mean to rebuild? Where do you even start? In forty minutes, twelve to thirteen thousand homes were destroyed by the second biggest tornado in history. What do you do when you don’t understand what God is doing or where to go from here?

Jesus has been talking with his disciples about his death and ascension to heaven. There is not enough time for Jesus to explain everything he wishes he could to his disciples. Even if he could, they would not understand (John 16:12). Sometimes you truly have to live through an event to understand the outcome. Jesus’ disciples will experience extreme loss and grief when he is crucified and dies.

However, through Jesus’ crucifixion, death, and resurrection, God the Father gives us the peace (Romans 5:1b) that comes from being in a relationship with him and believing in the good news. Our faith in God the Son justifies us in the eyes of God the Father (Romans 5:1a).

God gives the kind of peace that you feel when you hold a newborn baby and see his innocence and beauty. God gives the kind of peace that you feel at dawn just as the sun wakes up the birds as you sip your coffee before the rush of the day. God gives the kind of peace that you feel when you sit quietly in a garden, chapel, or [wherever “it” is] reflecting on life. God gives the kind of peace that you feel when everything is going right in the world. God gives that kind of peace – the peace of understanding (Philippians 4). But he gives the same feeling of well-being and peace even when everything seems to be going wrong.

Yet with all good news comes responsibility. We are given peace, grace, and love to share with others (Romans 5:2). Peace, grace, and love are not things we can keep to ourselves; they have spirits of their own that show themselves through our actions. With the responsibility of believing in the Good News comes suffering (Romans 5:3). Not everyone will come to believe in God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit and they will torment us for believing. Some of us will die sharing the good news, while others will be banished. And we will all face the human sufferings that come with living in this broken world.

But we continue to share the good news to give the Triune God glory, because without them we have no hope, peace, grace, or love. Our relationship with the Triune God outweighs the threats this world throws at us. Once we give God’s peace to others in the darkness, we are blessed with a community that will continue to grow and flourish.

Suffering never goes away since Satan rules the world. People will always judge us based on our belief in the unseen, unheard, and untouched. Nothing about our beliefs makes sense to those who are not in a relationship with the Triune God.

In those times of suffering, Jesus promises us the Holy Spirit will give us guidance in the truth (John 16:13a). Like God the Father sending God the Son, Jesus sends the Holy Spirit to tell and show us the truth by glorifying Jesus Christ (John 16:13-14).

Jesus could not possibly tell the disciples everything; therefore he sends the Holy Spirit to claim us and to declare to us (John 16:14) God the Father’s hope, peace, grace, and love for us. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit work together to declare the glory of the Trinity. The Triune God works towards a common goal – to declare love for the whole world.

Even during and after the storm, the Trinity is in control and has a plan. You may feel lost in the rubble and dust; you may feel lost in the destruction; you may feel hopeless in midst of rebuilding. In these times, we need to trust in the Triune God and hang on to the hope, peace, grace, and love that Jesus’ resurrection brings us. Nothing else matters but his love for us. It is that love that will see us through.

Thanks be to God!

Dear Heavenly Father, Thank you for working with Jesus and the Holy Spirit to declare your love for us. Help us to share your good news with others by expressing the hope, peace, grace, and love only you can give us. Remind us that even though Jesus Christ ascended into heaven we are not alone – the Holy Spirit shares the truth with us. Thank you for your love that reaches into the darkness and pulls into the light. Amen.

Works Cited

Thanks to the Triune God – God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.

Reflective Questions

Please answer the following reflective questions in the comments below.  Please agree to disagree and be respectful to each other. (If you have not already done so, please also take a moment, to sign the comment covenant.)  You can answer as many questions as you would like. 

1. Where do you find God’s gifts of hope, peace, grace, and love? How do you share them?

2. How do you feel the presence of the Holy Spirit?

Book Review: Amos Yong’s The Bible, Disability, and the Church

Book Review:

The Bible, Disability, and the Church: a New Vision of the People of God by Amos Yong

Before I jump right into my first book review, you have to understand who I am as a person and as a Biblical scholar. I am a person with a disability who is the token Christian among my friends with disabilities. When I say “token Christian,” I mean I was the one who always went to church with her family growing up. I was the one who was supposed to know why God allowed us to have disabilities. As a scholar, I look for way to answer those kinds of questions and to expand the definition of healing in order to create a more welcoming atmosphere for individuals with disabilities in the church.

So it seems fitting that my first book review would be Amos Yong’s book, The Bible, Disability, and the Church: a New Vision of the People of God. Yong’s brother suffers from Down syndrome. His parents are pastors. He writes from the point of view of a man who watched his parents question why God gave them an imperfect son. These kinds question often hunt parents of children with disabilities and individuals with disabilities.

Yong introduced me to important terms in the first chapter of the book: normate and ableism. Normate is the standard society lives by based on the needs and abilities of people without disabilities. The normate bias subjects people with disabilities to an unfair standard, not recognizing that their lifestyle is different than that of a normate. Ableism names the discrimination of the normate bias. Yong makes the point to make a distinction between the normate bias and ableism. The normate bias is the unconscious views of society regarding people with disabilities, while “…ableism names the discriminatory attitudes, negative stereotypes, and sociopolitical and economic structures and institutions that function to exclude people with disabilities from full participation in society” (Yong 11).  Fortunately, people with disabilities have come a long ways with the Americans with Disabilities Acts of 1970 and 1990 and the Disabilities Education Act.

In the next three chapters Yong carefully analyzes Biblical stories where there is a character with blemishes. I will choose one story from each chapter to show how Yong builds his argument. In chapter two, Yong rereads the story of Jacob, Israel, and the limp (Genesis 32:24-32) with the lens of disabilities. Jacob wrestles with the Lord in the form of a man for a whole night and comes out with only a limp. Yong argues that Jacob’s disability does not make him weaker but gives him the status of an equal with the human/divine man. Furthermore, Jacob is blessed by the man for struggling with humans and with God and having prevailed (Genesis 32:28). This frees the normate bias of the story of Jacob and gives him redemption.

In chapter three, Yong does a rereading of the story of Pentecost where “each one heard them speaking in the native language of each” (Acts 2:6) and “in our own languages we hear them speaking of God’s deeds of power” (Acts 2:11) (71). Yong argues that first God creates ways for the mute and those who stutter to communicate (Exodus 4:10-12). Second, God inspires people to listen and hear what the other person is saying. Third, God uses our other senses to communicate, such as touching, feeling, and perceiving. This would expand society’s ways of thinking of how individuals communicate with each other.

In chapter four, Yong does a rereading of First Corinthians 13. Yong argues Paul describes an inclusive theology of disabilities. When Paul talks about the “weaker” body parts, Yong urges his readers to see how Paul is describing how the “stronger” protects the “weaker” and how both groups need the other one to function as a whole. Therefore, Yong argues that Paul is addressing the unnecessary stereotypes that society has about the “weaker” by using phrases such as “that seem to be weaker” or “that we think less honorable” (1 Corinthians 12:22-23). Furthermore, Paul sees the “weaker” as the “stronger” with his explanation of the “varieties of gifts but same Spirit” (1 Corinthians 12:4-7, 11-13). God gives everyone – people with and without disabilities – gifts to further his mission of the good news.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading Yong’s retelling of the Biblical stories through the lens of disability hermeneutics. The disabled community finally has a book to engage congregations in the discussion of what it means to be an inclusive community. Yong provides discussion questions for small groups in order to help them find ways to include people with disabilities in worship and other activities, even before they walk through the door. A lot of churches do not think about these issues until someone with a disability shows up. But an unprepared church can actually be a barrier that keeps a disabled person from joining their community.

I do disagree with Yong on one matter. He says that we will not get new bodies in heaven. Although I do like Yong’s thought process that God accepts us as we are in our current state, I argue that we saw Jesus before he went to heaven (so his disciples could recognize him by his piercings) and that we get new bodies in heaven because the Devil and imperfections will not be there. Truth be told, I pray heaven takes away the disadvantages of this world and creates the perfect world God planned for us all along. Yet any argument on heaven is speculation, because we simply do not know.

Yong does an excellent job of articulating the disability hermeneutic and challenges churches to be inclusive communities. Hopefully churches take the time to read and discuss this book.

Recommended for: church small groups and parents of children with disabilities (physical and psychosocial)

Star Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (highly recommended)

Day of Pentecost: New and Unexpected Places

Readings

Acts 2:1-21

Psalm 104:24-34, 35b

Romans 8:14-17

John 14:8-17, (25-27)

Devotion

Peace be with you!

The majority in the society and the world determines the definition of “normal.” Walking with two feet without assistance of a cane, walker, or another person is the norm. Articulating sounds in the right way so other people can understand you is the norm. Using your hands to eat, dress, shower, and write is the norm. Society determines the norm, which creates discrimination called ableism against those who do things differently.

People with disabilities are discriminated against simply because they do certain things differently than how the norm says it should be done. Most individuals with disabilities need simple adaptations to be able to function in the world. For example, I use an electric wheelchair and a walker for mobility, Intellikeys (an oversized keyboard) to type, an iPad to speak, and a car with a ramp to travel. With a few adaptations, any person with a disability strives in the world.

In his book The Bible, Disability, and the Church: a New Vision of the People of God, Amos Yong talks about his younger brother who has Down syndrome. Yong remembers staying home with his brother every Sunday morning when his parents, both pastors, went to church. Due to his many medical issues, his brother required intense care when he was young.. As a teenager, Yong could tend to his brother’s needs (changing diapers, feeding, bathing) when his parents worked.

The Spirit comes and rests on all of the disciples on the day of the Pentecost (Acts 2:1-3). The disciples begin to speak in other languages and are able to understand each other (Acts 2:4). How incredible that the Holy Spirit could cross the language barrier to allow men and women of different languages to communicate with each other. The language barriers create norms for society – as a general rule Americans speak English and individuals from Japan speak Japanese and are not able to understand each other. Yong’s brother, like myself, has his own language barrier with his speech impediment. Many times when I meet someone new – an unfamiliar listener – they do not take the time to understand me. Just the other day I had a consult with a new doctor who would not slow down to understand me and would look to my step-dad to interpret and to answer her questions. After we left, my step-dad voiced his annoyance, especially since, in his opinion, I was speaking pretty clearly for a change.

The Jews do not understand what is going on. The disciples appear to be drunk, and it is still morning (Acts 2:7, 13). The Jews, who did not accept Jesus’ teachings, are now questioning the disciples’ integrity. The Holy Spirit brings the disciples together, despite language barriers, to worship God the Father and to share the good news with others. The Holy Spirit operates under the power of God, and therefore he sends the disciples, including us, to new and unexpected places of ministry.  Our driving force becomes the Holy Spirit, which marks God’s presence in the world.

The prophet-hood makes up the community of disciples who are in the world to make the presence of God known to the lost and the poor. Prophets (including us) are messengers of Jesus’ good news who work to expand the community of believers. Our prophecy becomes proof that God is in the world here and now.

The Holy Spirit becomes a sign of God reaching for us and  reclaiming us as his children; he becomes a sign of our salvation from our sins. Without the Holy Spirit, we would not be crossing barriers to spread the good news. With the Holy Spirit, we make God known to the world by spreading the good news and sharing his love, forgiveness, and grace.

The Holy Spirit is in Yong’s brother who has Down syndrome. As an adult, his brother has transcribed the Bible several times and helps his parents lead worship from the pew. His brother is an inspiration to the members of the congregation as he greets everyone at the door and raises his hands while singing. The Holy Spirit rests in Yong’s brother and gathers others around him to see how God the Father and God the Son is forever present in the world.

Thanks be to God!

Dear Heavenly Father, Thank you for sending the Holy Spirit to blow us to new and unexpected places of ministry. Help us to trust the Holy Spirit to drive us where you need us to be. Gather us into your community of disciples and send us out into the world to share the good news in new and unexpected places. Thank you for making your presence in the world known to us. Amen.

Works Cited

Thanks to the Triune God – God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.

Reflective Questions

Please answer the following reflective questions in the comments below.  Please agree to disagree and be respectful to each other. (If you have not already done so, please also take a moment, to sign the comment covenant.)  You can answer as many questions as you would like. 

1. How do you feel the presence of the Holy Spirit in your life?

2. Where does the Holy Spirit gather you and other people together?

Seventh Sunday of Easter: Praising the Lord in Difficult Times

Readings

Acts 16:16-34

Psalm 97

Revelation 22:12-14, 16-17, 20-21

John 17:20-26

Devotion

Peace be with you!

For every decision you make, there is a consequence – good, bad, or indifferent. As a student, you make the decision whether to do your homework and whether to study for your tests. When you do your homework and study, you get good grades, into the college you want, and scholarships for college. But if you do not do homework and study, you get bad grades and colleges turn you down. Of course, there are exceptions to the rules. Schoolwork comes easily to some students and they can take half the time of other students to get the same grades.

As adults, we face decisions every day. We decide whether to pay our bills, to take a shower daily, to eat healthy, and more. We make decisions every day which affect our not only our lives, but also the lives of others around us, especially our dependent children and elderly parents.

Societies also make decisions regarding the moral codes and laws of the group. They decide who is an insider and who is an outsider. In the United States of America, many states are voting on whether or not gay marriage should be legalized and if gay couples should be granted the same benefits of straight couples. No matter what side you stand on in this debate, there is a part of you that feels threatened by the opposing side. Those who oppose the amendments feel their sense of family values is being challenged. Supporters of the amendments, especially gays and lesbians, fear being outcasts for loving someone of the same gender or supporting friends who are gay or lesbian.

Christians find themselves in two worlds at times. The Bible teaches us a moral code to live by; it teaches us the Ten Commandments and the value of loving our neighbor. Societies have many of the same moral codes: no killing or stealing. Yet there are places where societies and the Bible contradict each other. For instance, what is more important: success and money or God and living in a community with other Christians? As Americans, the society says success and money are important to one’s livelihood. How much money you have determines what you can do and where you can live. As Christians, the Bible teaches us having a relationship with God and living in community with other Christians are the most important. We value the love, grace, forgiveness, and promise of eternal life that the Triune God gives to us freely.

In today’s reading, Paul and Silas are caught in the cross fire between the world and the Lord. A woman who is possessed with a spirit of divination keeps bothering the two men while they are in the city for days – proclaiming Paul and Silas are slaves of the Most High (Acts 16:16-17). Finally, Paul has enough of the woman – or maybe of the spirit of divination – bothering them, so he orders it to come out of her (Acts 16:18).

The woman’s slave owner is greatly upset with Paul for releasing her from the spirit of divination. When the spirit of divination was in the woman, the slave owner made a lot of money from the woman’s fortune-telling (Acts 16:16, 19). Paul takes away the slave owner’s source of income by releasing the woman from the spirit of divination and imposes economic hardship on him. For Paul’s “wrong doing,” the slave owner takes Paul and Silas to the Roman officials and charges them with disturbing the peace and advocating for unlawful activities (Acts 16:20-21). The Roman officials order Paul and Silas to be beaten and thrown into jail (Acts 16:22-23).

We have all been where Paul and Silas are – at odds with others for doing a good deed. When we give loose change to the beggar on the corner, we are told that we are advocating laziness. When we take an extended leave from work to care for a parent who needs care, our sibling criticizes us for kissing up and tells us to just put them in a nursing home. No matter what we do, someone will criticize us.

Paul and Silas give us a great example to live by when facing criticism: sing praises to the Lord (Acts 16:25). Paul and Silas are in the most inner jail cell with shackles around their ankles, tied to the wall, singing praises to the Lord (Acts 16:24-25). Who does that? Paul and Silas show the Lord their thankfulness for all he has provided them.

The Lord hears Paul and Silas, and there is an earthquake causing the jail doors to open and the chains to be unlocked releasing the prisoners (Acts 16:26). Upon seeing the damage of the earthquake, the jailer threatens suicide until Paul says we are all here (Acts 16:27-28). The jailer is overwhelmed with gratitude for if Paul and Silas escaped, he would have lost his job.

The jailer asks how he can be saved (Acts 16:30). Obviously the jailer listened to Paul and Silas singing praises to the Lord and felt the earthquake was the answer to their prayers. Paul and Silas spoke to the jailer about the grace, love, and forgiveness of God the Father and told him to believe in the Lord and he would be saved (Acts 16:31-32). The jailer released Paul and Silas and took them to his house to clean their wounds (Acts 16:33a). Upon hearing the good news, the jailer and his household got baptized and celebrated with Paul and Silas (Acts 16:33b-34).

I am always amazed at how the Lord uses the most unlikely situations to share the good news through us, his children. I was running late to my flight a few months ago when I realized I did not have my cell phone. I quickly scanned my surroundings looking for someone to ask to call my cell phone and my step-dad. I decided to ask a family, and they were more than willing to help. Unfortunately, by the time we got a hold of my step-dad on my cell phone, he was already twenty minutes away. Luckily, I had my iPad, which I could use to send my friends texts. The Lord used my forgetfulness to show a random family how he had blessed me, despite my disability. The family was amazed at how I could use my iPad to communicate with them and my friends. I was also able to share my website and the good news with them.

Thanks be to God!

Dear Heavenly Father, Thank you for helping us to make decisions according to your will. Help us to share the good news in difficult places and situations. May we sing your praises, even when we are being criticized. Remind us the good news is for everyone, not just a lucky few. Thank you for using us to share the good news. Amen.

Works Cited

Thanks to the Triune God – God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.

Reflective Questions

Please answer the following reflective questions in the comments below.  Please agree to disagree and be respectful to each other. (If you have not already done so, please also take a moment, to sign the comment covenant.)  You can answer as many questions as you would like. 

1. How are you criticized as a Christian?

2. What unexpected place did you share the good news?

Sixth Sunday of Easter: Difficulty in Understanding Jesus’ Call

Readings

Acts 16:9-15

Psalm 67

Revelation 21:10, 21:22-22:5

John 14:23-29

Devotion

Peace be with you!

What does God want me to do? Where does God want me to go? How does God want me to spread the good news? No matter what life stage you are in, these questions run through your mind, especially on days when things do not make sense. We expect teenagers and even college students to feel a bit lost as they begin to look for their place in the world. They are just entering the world as adults with their own opinions and ideas; they are looking for ways to leave their mark on the world and to make a difference.

What happens when adults have a successful career, but they begin to feel lost in the shuffle? Their boss no longer values their input and ideas. Their industry begins to take a new direction in the world, leaving them behind in the process. The company downsizes and lays off the older generation in order to focus on the new ideas and ways of the younger generation. People are forced to find new callings at different times in their lives.

Throughout our entire lifetime, we are moving from one transition to another.  Relationships end; situations change; people move; supply and demand fluctuates; societies evolve; technology gets faster and more efficient. Life as we know it today will not be the same in a year.

In our reading today, Paul is at a crossroads. He has travelled throughout Galilee and Judea spreading the good news about the Triune God – God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Paul has wanted to go into Asia to share the good news, but the Holy Spirit always stopped him (Acts 16:7). Now Paul has a dream about a man calling him to Macedonia, a Roman province just north of Greece (Acts 16:9).

Paul and his companions, Silas and Timothy, go to Macedonia to share the good news with the people there (Acts 16:10). The three men are convinced the Lord is calling them to share the good news with a man in Macedonia. After travelling for a few days, Paul, Silas, and Timothy arrive in Macedonia and spend the next week getting to know the area (Acts 16:12). It takes a few days for the men to find the individual who the Lord sent them to share the good news with. Unfortunately, the Lord did not give Paul a name or even a physical description of the man.

At some point in our lives, we have all been a little lost as to where and what the Lord is calling us to do. You got your Masters of Divinity so you could be a pastor, but you can’t find a church position anywhere. You got a business degree, only to find out that the pressures of the corporate world are too much for you. When you started your degree, the economy was booming, but four years later, the economy no longer supports the unique job you dream about. The [whatever “it” is] prefect scenario is never there when you are ready for it – and if it is take it.

Then there are the relationships in our lives, which are also always undergoing change. The girl who has always been there for you through breakups and transitions is suddenly your whole world…and then your wife! Or perhaps the guy who you married and promised to spend the rest of your life with walks out the door after six years. Suddenly, the world crashes around you, and you wonder what happened

Transitions are life’s necessary changes to help us grow and make us wiser and stronger. They are exciting, because they mean new possibilities to experience, new people to meet, and new places to go. However, transitions are also scary because we are stepping out on a limb. We know the Lord is here [wherever “it” is], but how?

Paul is asking the Lord why he has called him to Macedonia. The man in his vision has not made himself known to Paul. Where do you start in a new region? Who do you approach first? Who will listen? How do you know people will be receptive to your message of the good news?

The three men come to a place of prayer on the Sabbath and spend time talking to the women who are gathered there (Acts 16:13). Lydia listens to the men talking, and the Lord opens her to hear and to accept the good news (Acts 16:14). Brian Peterson writes on Working Preacher, “At this crucial point, Paul practically disappears from the story. It is not the charismatic personality of the pastor or preacher that has the power to create faith; it must come from God’s own merciful activity. From beginning to end, this text stresses that it is God who is in charge of the mission, God who sets its direction, and God who determines its results” (Peterson 2013). Paul is not at the central of the mission – God is.

Lydia and her whole household are baptized, and the three men stay at her home (Acts 16:15). Paul expected to share the good news with a man, but he finds himself alongside a river with a group of woman who accept his message.

God’s plan is not always clear. Sometimes it is exhausting to figure out where God is calling you. At some points, it would be easier to walk away and do something easier and more fun. Yet along the way, you see God’s blessings, love, and grace. This is what makes transitions worthwhile.

Thanks be to God!

Dear Heavenly Father, Thank you for sending people into our lives to share the good news with us. Help us through the transitions in our lives. Guide us as we answer your calling. Catch us as we stumble around. Help us to figure out how our callings further your mission. Thank you for the many blessings in our lives. Amen.

Works Cited

Peterson, B. (2013 йил 5-April). Commentary on Acts 16:9-15. Retrieved 2013 йил 3-May from Working Preacher: http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=1627

Thanks to the Triune God – God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.

Reflective Questions

Please answer the following reflective questions in the comments below.  Please agree to disagree and be respectful to each other. (If you have not already done so, please also take a moment, to sign the comment covenant.)  You can answer as many questions as you would like. 

1. What kind of transitions are you going through?

2. How do you feel the Lord is calling you?

3. Where do you see God’s blessings in your life?