Saturday, August 30, 2008

Chapter 1 and 2

I think I've been chalking up a good 7 hours per day typing notes and re-reading the works of Michael Walzer. It's quite laughable really, to study a prominent thinker and believing that I actually got something to argue against him. I don't really know what is that something. I'm currently surviving on borrowed ideas to sustain that belief. I need originality.

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Searching for Serendipity

'The Month of the Grape Harvest', Magritte

'Woman at the Window', Caspar David Friedrich





















Looking in, gazing out. The anonymous and detached crowd closes in on me. But I've no great desire to express my thoughts. In the space between my invisible thoughts and visible expressions, I realized that I have not been true to myself. Reduce the space, for there I'll find you waiting.

Wednesday, August 13, 2008

And you wonder why...


Fame is but a fruit tree
So very unsound.
It can never flourish
Till its stalk is in the ground.
So men of fame
Can never find a way
Till time has flown
Far from their dying day.
Forgotten while you're here
Remembered for a while
A much updated ruin
From a much outdated style.

Fruit Tree, Nick Drake

Sunday, August 10, 2008

Salt and Light Sermon















My sermon script today. I find it hard to do spontaneous preaching so I sort of typed everything out. Many thanks to Pastor Joshua, Ian and of course God for the inspiration and advice.


Introduction

Look at the two photos in the slide. Can you recognize them?

The person on the left is Mother Theresa. She was a Catholic nun and in 1950, she founded a ministry in India, known as the ‘Missionaries of Charities’. In the next 45 years of her ministry, Mother Theresa was known throughout the world as someone who cared for the poor, the orphans, the sick and the dying.

The person on the right is Martin Luther King. He was a Baptist pastor in America in the 1960s. He was famous for his speech in which he said those few words “I have a dream”. There was a lot of racism against the blacks during the 1960s. Luther’s dream was a desire for a future where American blacks and whites can live together in harmony. In history textbooks, people now recognize Luther as a key leader in the civil rights movement in the 1960s.

What do they have in common? They are people who are driven by a strong sense of compassion for other people. That led them to make a difference in other people’s lives. They influence society in a positive way.

Today, as part of our sermon series, I am privileged to share with you my reflections on these verses taken from Matthew 5: 13 – 16, to see how we can influence society in a positive way. Let us turn to the bible now.

You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.

You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under the bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.


Before we begin, let us enter into a word of prayer…

There are several lessons that we can learn from these 4 verses. For the purpose of today’s sermon, I am going to focus on two. The first is that we are called to be different; we are – in some sense – distinct from the world in the way we look at things. The second lesson is this: although there is a distinction, there is also a need for engagement. We, as ambassadors for God’s kingdom, must get up close and personal with human society. We need to enter into society and influence it in a God-centered way.

Distinction: We are called to be different

People living during Jesus’ time must be familiar with everyday items such as salt and lamps. Let us understand a bit more why Jesus choose to use these items to illustrate the influence he expects his disciples to exert in society. Let us first look at salt:

You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again?

Back in those days when refrigerators weren’t invented, salt was used as a preservative to prevent the meat from decaying. In some sense, Jesus is saying that the world is ‘decaying’. This decadence can be seen in the sufferings of people, and a general sense of sins and evilness that are found in society. As Christians, we are different or distinctive in the sense that our Christian values should compel us to try to rise up to the occasion and prevent (or preserve) the world from further decay.

However, I will like to also highlight the fact that we may lose this distinctiveness, if we are not watchful of our lives. According to my bible commentary, most of the salt used in Israel came from the Dead Sea. I’m not so sure how people in Israel exactly extract salt from the Dead Sea, but I guess all of us with a little bit of primary school science background can imagine that it is through a process of evaporating the sea water. However, the salt from the Dead Sea are full of impurities. Do you know that ocean salts – together with other impurities and minerals – are actually derived from the breaking up of the Earth’s crusts and rocks on the sea bed? I have with me here a diagram that illustrates the sources of the salt. Maybe this is why Jesus says that although we are the salt of the earth, the presence of impurities means that it is possible for us to lose our saltiness. If a meat is decaying, salt can reduce the speed of the decay, but if the salt loses its saltiness, it cannot be made salty again.

Let us turn our attention to light:

You are the light of the world.

Just as earth is the source of the salt, God is the source of the light in us. Just as salt is useful, light is useful in illuminating a dark world – but perhaps even more glorious. Christ calls himself the light of the world in John 8:12: “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life”. Because God is so glorious, and is the source of the light in us, Paul says in Philippians chapter 2 that we are to “shine like stars in the universe” as we hold fast to the word of life.

Engagement: We need to get up close, and personal with society.

I hope now we can get an idea of our distinctiveness as believers in Christ. Jesus told the disciples that they are as different as light from darkness, and salt from decay. God is calling out from the world a people for himself, and the purpose of this people is to be holy or different. ‘Be holy,’ Jesus says to them again and again, “because I am holy”.

Because we are called to be different, and because we have a God-centered purpose in the way we look at the world, we ought to be as visible to human society as a ‘city on a hill’. It is illogical for a city on a hill to be invisible from the eyes of those who are staying in the valleys. Jesus tries to illustrate the illogical idea of a ‘hidden city on a hill’ by comparing it with the absurd idea of putting a lamp under a bowl.

[Show and tell] I have a Sony Ericsson phone with me. It is very a useful gadget for me to connect to people. Imagine I choose to use it as a paper weight. I've removed the purpose of this phone. This is what Jesus means when he says “neither do people light a lamp and put it under the bowl”. This is also why he concludes his salt and light lesson with the following: “In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven”

Notice that Jesus uses the word ‘see’? I’m not so sure what is the actual Aramaic word that Jesus used to speak to his disciples, but probably he meant it in the context that people can appreciate the good works done by Christians.

So as Christians, how do we do good deeds? As salt, how do we rub and soak ourselves into a decaying fish or meat? As light, how do we dispel the darkness of evil? In other words, how do we get up close and personal in society, to show compassion and uphold justice to people in need of God? Here, I need to stress that I’m not calling you to be Martin Luthers or Mother Theresas to impact hundreds of people. We are ordinary people. But we do not need to think that we are insignificant for God. God can use us in different ways. Here I would like to show some of the ways in which our youth leaders have tried in their different ways to be salt and light for Christ.

Renita: I try to engage and talk to the elderly both at my office (the cleaning aunty) and at my block – asking about their family, looking through their holiday photographs, talking about their hobbies…etc and through doing so I’ve seen a glimpse of the loneliness old age can bring… Almost everyday when I come out of the train station, from around 10pm-midnight, there is a lady holding on to her young daughter and selling tissue and I try to buy from her regardless of the number of tissue packets I have in my bag.

Kwang How: I don’t see being the salt and light of this world as looking for good deeds to do everyday. Instead, I think being salt and light stems from being a God centered person. That in turn translates into every other thing like studying hard cos God put you in school, loving others as myself cos the bible says so, keeping fit cos it’s the temple of the holy spirit, not saying spiteful things cos the bible says we need to control our tongue, not being anxious about anything but presenting my requests to God, doing small things to encourage others. So, while everyone else is chasing worldly things, getting worried about everything, … I am the salt and light of this world by being different, and hopefully the people around me can see the difference.

Andy: To have convictions and make a stand on issues without being hyper spiritual or religious. To look at the culture of the world and how it tells me how to behave and what I need and chucking out everything that doesn't sit well with what the culture of God has called me to live by.

Huan Yang: During a teaching session on Educational Psychology, the lecturer showed us a video. The video showed a half-naked Jesus prancing around the streets, MTV-style, singing “I Will Survive” by Cake. His actions were highly exaggerated and evoke much laughter from the class. I was hopping mad within. After the class, I requested to speak to the lecturer, and shared my thoughts with him. I made a point that there seems to be a grotesque inconsistency in our “westernized, liberal” Singapore culture that deems it ok to make fun of Christianity, while leaving other religions untouched. I asked whether he would show a similar video featuring the Prophet Mohammad. The lecturer agreed with me, and apologized. He also issued an apology to the class at the next class. He also further promised to never show the video in class again. I felt grateful that God could use someone like me to preserve his glory, and dignity, and to combat false values and ideas in our secular society.

Through their life stories, I hope we can see that it is not exactly that difficult to be salt and light of the earth. Through their life stories, I hope we can also see that we do not always need to go on a mission trip in order to be a salt and light of the world, or think that we are too young, or not ready enough, in order to be salt and light for Christ. We can be salt and light right now. This is why Jesus says:

You are the salt of the earth… You are the light of the world.

He didn’t say you ‘were’, or you ‘are going to’. He simply says you ‘are’, because Christ is in you.

I would like to urge you all to go through the devotion materials in the 40 Day Prayer Book. It contains much practical advice and much wisdom in teaching us to be salt and light for Christ, in influencing society. I would like to urge you to go back to the gospels to look at Christ. Through Christ, you find that God did not love from a distance. In Christ Jesus, God became one of them. He became poor. In the ultimate act of identification, He experienced the full intensity of what it meant to be poor, to be a refugee, to be on the run, and ultimately to be a target of the Roman death squad at the cross of Calvary.

Like Christ, we may experience rejection or be ridiculed as we try to present ourselves as salt and light for Christ. But Church, we are all in it together. The people that I’ve interviewed all experience fear in one way or another, when they engage with society. But perfect love casts out all fear [personal testimony of Sri Lanka expedition]

Closing

I will end my sermon with the 'The Franciscan Benediction'

May God bless you with discomfort at easy answers, half-truths, and superficial relationships so that you may live deep within your heart.
May God bless you with anger at injustice, oppression and exploitation of people, so that you may work for justice, freedom and peace
May God bless you with tears to shed for those who suffer pain, rejection, hunger and war, so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and to turn their pain into joy
And may God bless you enough foolishness to believe that you can make a difference in the world, so that you can do what others claim cannot be done to bring justice and kindness to all our children and the poor.
Amen

Tuesday, August 05, 2008

A List

After watching Randy Pausch's Last Lecture on youtube, and on the verge of completing 'Naive.Super', I've decided to make a list of dreams that I've always wanted to fulfill before I die.

1) Work (not intern) in an NGO
2) Set up a social entrepreneur project
3) Teach in a university
4) Live overseas for a year
5) Find a wife (who share the same values)
6) Write a book

Technically speaking, I've done point (3).

Between old age insecurities and unfulfilled dreams, the latter disturbs me more. It's reassuring to know that I haven't accomplished much in life, other than point (3). Gives my life a bit of purpose to work out the rest of my dreams.