The Shepherds

"I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.
Today a Savior has been born to you; He is Christ the Lord."

The meditation starts with the general pronouncement that shepherds had a bad reputation in Israel; they were regarded as dishonest and unreliable. Yet God chose to announce to ones “such as these” that the Savior of the world had been born.

What was the response of the shepherds? The Scriptures tell us that they “hurried off” to see the Christ. This is absolutely the right way to respond when God calls us.

What can we learn from the response of the shepherds so many years ago?

1) We have more in common with the shepherds than we might suppose.

We are outwardly fairly respectable people, without the bad reputations that the shepherds had.

But most of us have a good idea what we are inwardly. What if our past histories, all our secret thoughts, intentions, motives and desires on any given day were broadcast for all the world to hear? I wonder how many of us would have such a great reputation then?

2) The shepherds show us the right away to respond.

Just as God revealed His Son to these lowly shepherds, God reveals His Son to sinful ones “such as us” through Bible readings, sermons, prayer etc.

What should be our response when we effectually hear the call to “come and see the Christ” or to “repent” while there is yet time?

Our response should be just like that of the shepherds: to “hurry off” without delay to see the Christ. I’m afraid, though, that we very often “delay”.

The reasons why we delay are as varied as the number of people reading this blog. Laziness. Pride. Idolatry. Unwillingness to repent or to give up a certain pleasure or lifestyle. Some vague feeling that we have to be “absolutely sure”.

All of us have some idea what is holding us back.

I can’t help thinking, though, that we must “hurry off” when God calls us to “come and see”, simply as an act of faith. The shepherds did, and they became changed men. They “spread the word concerning what they had seen and heard”. The shepherds did just what we imagine we would do if we were “better” Christians.

God graciously reveals His Son to us many times. To delay is to potentially miss the time of God's coming. To delay too long is fatal. We must “hurry off” when we hear His voice. As God says, “Today if you hear My voice, do not harden your heart” (Hebrews 3:15).

3) They were new people in the old situation.

The shepherds returned to their lives as “new people in the old situation”. They were never the same after what they had seen and experienced. They were inwardly changed.

Whoever is born of God goes back to their old lives, their jobs, their homes, but as new people.

This Christmas, when Christ is proclaimed as the newborn King, let us all “hurry off” and go to Him without delay, that we might worship Him, as the shepherds did. There we will behold the glory of the Son, as the shepherds did, "full of grace and truth". And may His Holy Spirit “guide us to His perfect and glorious light”.

Bethlehem

This past Sundays sermon by P.James summed it up perfectly: The crude and unwelcome poverty of the birth of Jesus Christ shows us the (1) the depravity of our sins, (2) the humanity of Jesus Christ and (3) it shows us his humility. That describes the circumstance of his birth. And it was that the King of kings was to be born this way. This stable was in a city called Bethlehem. Bethlehem is called the city of David. And it was part of the fulfillment of prophecy that Jesus would be born here. The emperor Augustus was an instrument of God's plan to take Joseph and Mary there as part of an edict, to register for the census. Now, I don't know if any of you ever heard your parents talk about going to visit their "go-yang" (birth place/home town). My father always talked about it on Mother's Day, dreaming of the one day when he would be reunited with her and the rest of his family in his go-yang. It's usually a place that tells us about who we are. Kris and I took Jason and Wes and visited Korea about 10 years ago and visited a beautiful countryside that was the Whang family go-yang. There we can find the registry that keeps records of the Whang family back many generations... they have their roots there in that place. Micah 5:2 says: "But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose origin is from of old, from ancient days." It was known that Jesus would be born here. Jesus, the son of David... how logical! The humanity of Christ has it's roots here back to the first Adam. But Jesus is the only begotten son of the Most High God. He was not a created being but is from of old, from ancient of days! Our identity as Christians is not bound up in a family registry but through our rebirth, we are called sons and daughters of the King and we have an inheritance in heaven, our spiritual go-yang!

Posted by Helen Whang

Mary’s Submission

“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May it be to me as you have said.”
Luke 1:38

In the last part of today’s reading, it reads,

For us too what matters is that we allow God to be God and to do things his way, even if with Mary we thereby risk losing our good name.

So Mary was submissive to God by risking her reputation.....

First, I started to think about what I would have done in that situation. Hmm. So God the Almighty sends his angel to me to give an order. What would you do in that situation? You may disagree with me on this (and I hope not), but I don’t think many of us would choose to disobey in that situation. Who in the right mind would reject God’s order especially when his angel is floating right in front? Of course, I would be terrified and MAY pass out in fear, but eventually, when I’m conscience again, I would surely obey. Wouldn’t most people say, “Yes Lord! I will do anything for you anytime!!!!” Then, what is the big deal of about Mary’s submission here? Wouldn’t most Christians submit to God’s order even if it means jeopardizing their own reputations? Then, what is the big deal here?

Then, I realized the real question was not just simply “would you submit?” but includes the word “how” in front. How would you submit? Let’s look at how Mary responded. Mary’s response was “I am the Lord’s servant.” I am the Lord’s servant…. I am the Lord’s servant…. I am the Lord’s servant….Here, she is acknowledging that God is her master. And that acknowledgement is followed by “May it be to me as you have said”. So she is basically saying, she is just a servant and has no say in God’s plan. She has no certainty of the future, but she was certain that God’s plan will be carried out. Is there any answer that shows more humility than this? Wow.

Lots of times, I say I am doing ‘this and that’ for God because I’m a Christian. I need to help out others for God, I need to give more offerings to God, I need to work harder for God, I need to do more quiet time for God, I need to stop sinning for God….and so on. Why ‘for God’? What does God possibly need from me? What does God, who is omnipotent, God of Universe, God who owns literally everything including my ability to think, ability to work, ability to make money, and even my faith, possibly need from me? What can I possibly offer to God? He owns EVERYTHING! It’s simple. He just simply wants me to surrender and submit. He just wants me to acknowledge that I am his servant. More often than not, I have an attitude of thinking that I am doing favors for God, and when I do nice things for others, I need to take the credit from God because I, myself who is ‘high’ in value, did something nice for someone. Therefore, I deserve some credit from God. That is certainly not the servant’s attitude. I can’t help but to sit here and ponder on how much things would have been different, if Adam and Eve had those servant’s attitudes and said, “Yes, Lord, you are our master. May it be to us as you have said.” Or even Lucifer before he rebelled against God. To me it seems like, God who owns ALL THINGS, wanted this from us since the beginning. Pure submission. Servant’s attitude. After all, Christ, the King of all Kings, the Son of Most High, was born thru a true servant to do what? Serve us all…

The Virgin Birth

‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.’ Luke 1:35

Well, first of all, the title doesn’t make sense to me at all. I don’t know about you, but I can’t figure how a virgin can give birth to a child. If a woman can conceive a child without a guy, there is no use for a man at all. God chose a woman to have The Holy One, because I think that women are smarter, stronger (because they’re smart, they don’t really need to use their physical strength), sensitive, oh! beautiful… on and on, don’t you guys agree with me? (wink). I started to think about what this means--Jesus being the Son of God, both human and divine.
Mary was chosen by God to have a child named Jesus, and she gave birth to a son. And I believe that just like any other mother, Jesus will be in Mary’s heart forever, even after giving the birth. This gave me a clue, that even we can’t bear a holy child like Mary; we can have Jesus in our heart. God chose Mary, so that Jesus would inherit both His humanity and His title to the messianic kingdom. He humbled himself to experience our full humanity, and gave his blood to overshadow us. So we can be called his child, when we have Jesus in our heart, and truly believe in it.

Mary's Song

First of all, I would like to thank everyone who worked so hard to prepare for the lovely Christmas party yesterday and everyone who came out to join in our birthday celebration of our Lord Jesus Christ.

After having said that I would like to share few thoughts from today’s devotional reading. Mary was privileged to be used as God’s instrument to initiate the greatest mission of all, to reconcile His people back to Him through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Mary was able to experience this blessing because she was humble and she had the hunger to see God’s kingdom to come which is clearly demonstrated in her song in the book of Luke. Humbleness and hunger… Those are the two things that this great country called America is working so hard to eliminate. The commercial industries make you believe that you are the king of the world and should be treated like one by buying their products. ‘You deserve faster car, clearer TV, bigger house, better wife or husband…’ That is what we hear each and everyday and that is what we can do in America. We can get anything that we want and that makes us less dependent on God. Humbleness is eliminated. Although we always want better things, we are generally comfortable and satisfied with our life here in America. Life is good, and there is no need to anticipate for something greater which is found in relationship with Jesus Christ. Hunger for God’s kingdom to come is eliminated.

We believe that the greatest spiritual battle is going on in the third world countries but I believe that there is also a great battle going on in this country. The devil has been perfecting his mastery in deviating the people from God for many years and I believe that he will not make his scheme so obvious to us. The devil is scheming to make us proud and complacent and I believe that his plan is working out pretty nicely in America. Let’s be mindful of what we hear and see. Let’s keep our focus away from ourselves and redirect it to our God so that we may be humble. Let’s not settle for the rubbish that this world offers us and ask God to open our eyes so that we may see the greater joy and satisfaction that can be found in Jesus Christ. I want to be used as God’s instrument and I hope you do too so let’s ask God to help us to be humble and hungry just like Mary.

Have a great week everyone!