Wholly Following – Living a Submitted Life (part 3)

As we continue along the path of wholly following Christ through living a submitted life, we yield our lives daily, moment-by-moment, to God’s examining Word. This examination comes through the promptings of his Holy Spirit who indwells each and every follower. God cultivates an awareness of our soul to these promptings of the Spirit.  Just as God is the one who grants and develops within us faith as our attitude of heart, he is the one who we can trust to cause us to become more and more sensitive in our souls to the promptings of the Holy Spirit.  Such an awareness of soul is essential for our living a submitted life.

Paul connects faith and the promptings of the Holy Spirit when he speaks to believers about the reality of walking with God each day.  In his letter to the Colossian believers, he taught that “as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him” (Colossians 2:6).  We receive Christ and his gift of salvation by faith (Ephesians 5:8-10), so it is by faith that we are enabled to walk each day in the newness of life he grants to us.  We must depend entirely upon God to enable us to obey him.  In a parallel passage, Paul exhorted the Galatians that “if we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit” (Galatians 5:25).  Thus, walking by faith and walking by the Spirit are two sides of the same coin.

It is God’s Holy Spirit who leads and guides us day-by-day through his Word.  The Spirit enlightens us, teaches us, and convicts us by exposing our own willful disobedience by the light of God’s Word.  If we acknowledge our sins by confession (that is, by saying the same thing about our sins that God’s Word says about them), then we trust the promise of God to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness step-by-step along our walk by the Spirit each day (1 John 1:8-9).  He strengthens and restores to us the joy of our salvation and continues to renew us with a willing spirit yielded to His will (Psalm 51:10-12).

When we fail to respond to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, the Scriptures tells us that we can actually sadden God.  Paul warns the young believers in the church at Ephesus about this very possibility.  “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption” (Ephesians 4:30).  Paul’s admonition against grieving God is given in the midst of very practical instruction about living in the newness of life that Christ grants to us.  For example, instead of speaking lies in an effort to protect or promote our own selfish pride or ambition, we are to speak the truth to one another in love. When we live for ourselves, we grieve the Spirit, but when we respond to the Spirit’s promptings and live our lives according to Christ’s Word, God graciously enables us to glorify him.

Paul emphasizes the role of the Holy Spirit when he writes: “For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.  For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba!  Father!” The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God” (Romans 8:14-16).  As followers of Christ, we need to seek God’s grace to be ever alert to the Spirit’s promptings. 

“As the Holy Spirit says, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness.” (Hebrews 3:7-8).  Our daily prayer should be, “Lord, grant me ears to hear your words and a will to obey your commands.”  As we do, we will be living, more and more, a submitted life.

Wholly Following – Living a Submitted Life (part 2)

If we desire to answer Christ’s call to deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow him today, in this very moment, we must depend wholly upon God’s promised work within and through us.  God is the one who forms faith as the attitude of our heart, and as he does, we begin to take the first steps of living a submitted life – a life examined by his Word and Spirit and fortified by Christ’s faithful mercy of forgiveness.  True self-denial can only occur under the authority of God’s Word.  The follower is called to submit himself and herself to its examining gaze. 

The Word searches and tests the hearts of its hearers. It is such submission to the Word that distinguishes a “different spirit” and enables the disciple to follow fully, to follow wholly.  Caleb yielded himself to the authoritative command to go into the land. He was firmly convinced of God’s purpose in giving his people the land.  Caleb’s confidence in the Word to which he submitted himself bolstered his exhortation to the people:   “The Lord is with us; do not fear” (Numbers 14:9).  Fear could easily have stalled Caleb, but by yielding himself to obey the Word, he was enabled to go into the land, and he called others to follow his path.  

The same is true for every follower of Christ.  We begin that journey by submitting our entire being to the full examining gaze of God’s Word.  His authoritative Word reveals the truth about who we are and shows us our desperate need for Christ to save us, to make us whole in himself, and to grant us ears that hear, eyes that see and hearts that obey his Word.  Only as we live submitted to daily examination under the scrutiny of God’s Word of Truth do we become ones who are wholly following after Christ.

Examinations are common place in human experience.  When we are young and going to school, testing is a regular occurrence.   From weekly quizzes to annual standardized tests, assessments are part and parcel of the educational experience.  But, it is not just in school that testing has a prominent role.  One visit to your physician will most likely result in a battery of diagnostic tests to disclose the source of an existing aliment or expose indicators of some impending disease. 

Even if you shy away from a doctor’s examining eye, you will still encounter tests as prerequisites to many of life’s routine activities. No one is granted a license to operate an automobile without successfully passing an examination.  And, nearly every professional or certified technician must achieve a passing score on a licensing exam before being qualified to practice a profession or to ply a trade.   Indeed, it would not be too much of a stretch to say that life, in its many stages, is all about testing.

And what is true today was also true in ancient days.  One of the most recognized wise men of ancient Greece was Socrates.  In his famous speech defending himself against the charge of corrupting the youth of Athens, Socrates proclaimed, “The life which is unexamined is not worth living!”  Socrates spoke the truth that we as followers of Christ must likewise heed.  So, by faith we yield our lives daily, moment-by-moment, to God’s examining Word by the promptings of his Holy Spirit who indwells each and every follower.  We'll next explore how God cultivates an awareness of our soul to these promptings of the Spirit.

Wholly Following – Living a Submitted Life

Last semester I began a series of articles on the subject of discipleship. That series focused on discovering what it means to wholly follow Christ as an authentic believer in the midst of the realities of life here and now.  As a starting point, I suggested that Christ’s call to discipleship is best expressed when he says, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23). 

As we thought through Jesus’ teaching, we learned that his call on our lives is three-fold:  to deny oneself, to take-up one’s cross and to follow him on the path he walked here on earth.  To deny one’s self is to live a submitted life.  To take-up one’s cross means living a singular life with every facet integrated together in Christ, and following him leads us to sacrifice our lives in real and practical ways for the sake of others.

In this semester’s series, I would like to explore further the first of these three aspects of wholly following Christ.  We’ll examine what it means to deny ourselves daily, to yield our will to God’s, and to submit our lives to Christ and his Word.  We will see, I believe, that we can only live a life of denial of self and submission to God by the grace and mercy of Jesus present and at work in our lives each day.  It is a life that is daily examined by the Spirit through the Word. 

As humans we have a natural tendency to assert and justify ourselves and to promote our self interests.  The disciple, though, is called to say no to these natural inclinations by denying self every day and submitting his will to God’s.  We live such a submitted life by God’s work within us.  He forms faith as the attitude of our heart, develops an awareness of our soul to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, and disciplines us in the life practice of meditating upon His Word as we submit our lives to its examining gaze.

Let’s begin, then, with God’s work of forming faith as the attitude of heart that provides the foundation for living a submitted life.  Faith is God’s gift to us.  (Ephesians 2:8).  At its core, faith is absolute dependence upon Christ and his Word.  Our journey on the pathway of discipleship begins with the single step of faith that is wholly enabled by the grace of God. “Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him.” (Colossians 2:6).  We receive Christ by faith, and so we take the first step to wholly following Christ – denying our self – by faith.

By faith, then, we daily deny our natural self-reliance and depend solely upon Christ’s life in us.  We deny our self-justification and acknowledge sins as they are exposed by the examining scrutiny of God’s Word applied to us by the convicting work of the Holy Spirit.  By faith, we pray: “Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!” (Psalm 139:23-24).  As God forms faith as the attitude of our heart, we begin to take the first steps of living a submitted life -- a lofe examined by his Word and Spirit and fortified by Christ's faithful mercy of forgiveness.

Wholly Following ~ The Pathway of Discipleship (Part 4)

The Apostle Paul passed on the call and character of his life to his protégé Timothy when he wrote, “Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Timothy 3:12).    Paul exemplifies for us what it means to journey daily the three-fold path of wholly following Christ.   In this post, I’ll conclude our brief description of the pathway of a disciple who is wholly following Christ in the concrete realities of life in the present. 

The path for all who wholly follow the Lord Jesus is three-fold – living a submitted, singular and sacrificed life daily for others.  The pattern is set by Christ himself:  to suffer, to die and to rise.  We are called to choose the path of wholly following, but we cannot choose it by our own strength of reason or self-determination.  We are both prompted to choose this path and enabled to follow his pattern of life only by the grace and strength Christ gives to us as his followers.

We must, however, be very clear on this point.  There is nothing, not a single iota of desire nor scintilla of inclination, naturally arising from our human hearts or minds that would prompt us to follow Christ wholly.  From the first to the last step upon this path of self-denial, cross-bearing and following Christ the whole way to death, each step is enabled by grace through faith.  Our daily following is by faith through faith just as much as our initial conversion was (Ephesians 2:8-10).  Just as we began our journey by faith, so the continuation each day on the journey of wholly following after Christ can only be undertaken by faith through the power of God’s Spirit (Galatians 3:2-3). 

Each step along the way is a step of faith – a step believing that Christ lives within us right now.  And so, we pray each day “Live Jesus!”  Wholly following after Christ is patterning our lives in the here and now after the life that Christ himself lived.  “For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps” (1 Peter 2:21).  The path Jesus walked thus becomes the pattern for our living and dying for others at this very moment in time.

We are able to “follow in his steps” only in the strength that God daily provides us to live submitted to his Word, singularly focused to do his will and ultimately sacrificed for others.  It is by such wholly following after Jesus that we humans image God in the person of Christ to others.  Living life in this way is the fulfillment of God’s purpose in re-creating us in Christ.  In so doing, we live lives imitating Christ.  In him we find our pattern; in him is our daily purpose.  And ultimately, Christ’s life living through us will lead us to death for others.  Laying down our life for others is the completion of a life imitating Christ. Wholly following Christ, then, is our destiny as human beings created Imago Dei.

Wholly Following ~ The Pathway of Discipleship (part 3)

Jesus calls his disciples to follow him on his journey to Jerusalem – to taking up the burdens and sins of others.  Ultimately, his journey is along a path to death, yet it is a death with the assured hope of the resurrection.  His call, then, is to live a sacrificed life.  We offer-up ourselves for others just as he offered-up himself us.  Living this sacrificed life is the goal of wholly following. 

We may think about discipleship as a daily walk along a three-fold path wholly following Christ our Lord.  It is the path of living a submitted life, a singular life, and a sacrificed life.  The three-fold path embodies the whole life of a follower of the Son of God who himself lived a full human life and died a full human death.  He died for us not only to accomplish our redemption from eternal separation from God, but also to enable us to pattern our life and death in this present world after His.  He enables this wholly following in the here and now because he is our life – Christ in you the hope of glory (Colossians 1:27). 

When Christ spoke his call to discipleship he spoke not only the particular path that lay before him, but also the pattern for everyone who wholly follows after him.  It was the path of Peter as the risen Jesus foretold it to him when he met Peter on the shore of Galilee.  Jesus said “Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go” (John 21:18).  John explains that by these words Christ showed “by what kind of death he was to glorify God” (21:19).  Peter, as one of the first followers of Jesus, lived a life and died a death that was both patterned after Christ.

The path Jesus walked in his life and in his death was also the pattern of Paul’s life.  God foretold the pattern of Paul’s life in his commission to Ananias, the person God used to convey his call to Paul: “Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel. For I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name” (Acts 9:15b-16).  Paul himself passed on that same destiny to his protégé Timothy when he wrote, “Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Timothy 3:12).    

Wholly Following ~ The Pathway of Discipleship (part 2)

God became fully human in order that humans could become fully men and women bearing His image - the Imago Dei.  Christ now calls and enables all those who follow him to live responsibly in the concrete realities of life in the here and now.    As we ponder this very present reality, we must ask yet another question: Where do we hear this call from God? 

The call to live such a life comes to us in the words of Jesus when he said, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23).  It is a call to live wholly following after him.  It is a call to live a submitted life as we deny ourselves; to live a singular life as we take up his cross daily; and to live a sacrificed life as we follow him on the road that leads to death upon that cross.  Christ calls the disciple to deny himself.  We deny ourselves by submitting to Christ and his Word. 

We subject ourselves to his examining eye.  We pray, “Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me and see if there be any evil way in me.”  God must search us.  We cannot search ourselves.  We cannot examine ourselves.  We would too easily find excuses and justifications for our choices. 

Only by examining ourselves by his Word and as the Spirit of God wields its discriminating blade, sharper than any two-edged sword as it discerns the thoughts and intents of our hearts, (Hebrews 4:12), will we begin to live the submitted life – a life of denial to self.  Through living a submitted life we begin wholly following.

Christ calls the disciple to take us his cross. We take up our cross by recognizing that the cross must mean to us what it meant to Christ.  It is an instrument of death, indeed our place of death, but not merely a death to our self-centered, self-focused life, but a death of the follower for others.  The cross was the fulfillment of Christ’s work on earth -- the work that the Father had given him to do – the giving up of his life for others. 

The cross was the sign-post that marked the way that Christ walked.  It displayed his willingness to do the will of his Father.  So the cross that we take up is for us the singular emblem of the one thing that the follower of Christ desires, and that is: to do the will of God.  Living this singular life takes us to the core of wholly following.

Christ calls the disciple to follow him.  When a person instructs you to follow, he knows the path that must be taken.  So, the question must be asked: where was Jesus going when he issued this call?  The answer is found in the preceding verse: "The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and the third day be raised." (Luke 9:22)  Christ knew the destiny that he had been born to fulfill.  

With that knowledge, he calls upon his disciples to follow him on that journey to Jerusalem – to taking upon himself the burdens and sins of others – ultimately, to death with the assured hope of the resurrection.  His call is for us to live a sacrificed life just as he offered-up himself us.  Living this sacrificed life, then, is the goal of wholly following.   

Wholly Following ~ The Pathway of Discipleship

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.   Henry David Thoreau, Walden (1854)

So what are “the essential facts of life” to which Thoreau refers? We might begin the inquiry with some basic questions: What is a human being that God would take thought of him? What is the purpose of God’s creation of humans and His plan for their redemption? Is that purpose only to provide humans with a future hope that they will live forever with God after they die? Is the essential fact of life found by asking the question, “Where will you spend eternity?” Or, is the fundamental question of human existence something quite different?

Could it be that the primary purpose for which God gave His Son to die was that his human creatures might live fully in the here and now? Did God become a man so that men could live in heaven or rather, was it so that humans could become fully human and live meaningful lives in this present world? Maybe our question still needs to be refined.

What is the meaning of eternal life? When does life begin to be eternal? Does this happen only after we pass on from this present life? Or rather, could it be that eternal life begins the moment God grants a person the gift of faith – the moment that a person is born anew from above by the Word and Spirit of God?

Paul clearly taught that faith in Christ gives us more that just a reason to live in this present world. He wrote in 1 Corinthians 15 – “If only in this life we have hope, we are of all men most miserable.” In Paul’s day, the truth of the Gospel gave men and women a hope to live a meaningful and purposeful life in the here and now. It also assured each follower of Christ of an eternal on-going existence with Christ throughout all eternity. That hope inspired them to face and accept a martyr’s death for the sake of Christ.

In our day, however, we tend to be focused on the other extreme. We have hope for the life to come, but our faith does little for the way we live in the concrete realities of our daily lives. We are all too often simply living like everyone else around us – conforming to the world rather than transforming it. Maybe we need to be challenged by a new word: “If we have hope only for the life to come, we are of all men most meaningless.”

No one wants to live a miserable life. No one wants to live a meaningless life. So what makes the difference? What enables us to live lives freed of misery and full of meaning? Here again, our question needs to be refined. It is not a “what” that enables full and complete living in the here and now. It is a “who”. And the “who” is none other than the very Son of God, Jesus Christ. God, who became fully human that we, his creatures, could become fully men and women bearing His image, the Imago Dei, now calls and enables us to live responsibly in the concrete realities of life here and now.

[I'll continue on this theme in additional posts]

On Being a Christian Professor at Handong

What does it mean to be a Christian Professor at Handong?  This question poses an even more profound inquiry.  What does it mean to engage one’s profession in a Christianly manner?  Within the context of Handong, the question could also be asked, what does it mean to be a Christian student here? Or, what does it mean to be a Christian administrator at Handong?  How does the reality of our life in and through Christ impact the way in which we serve others in our respective callings?

In each of our callings, the life and teachings of Jesus should be the rule and guide showing us what it means to be a Christian who teaches, who studies, and who leads and administers.  Jesus’ teachings about leadership are especially applicable to being a professor who is truly seeking to follow Christ’s example.  When his disciples were bickering about who would be the greatest among them, Jesus said, “You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. But it shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all.  For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10: 42- 45, ESV).

A Christian professor should embody the reality of the life of Christ by serving his students rather than dominating them from some position of claimed cultural or intellectual authority.  Christ turned his disciples’ view on “being the greatest” completely upside down.   Some have even described the “Kingdom of God” that Jesus both proclaimed and lived as “The Upside-Down Kingdom” It’s true!  To follow Christ authentically in our callings, especially in the vocation of a professor at a university such as Handong where Jesus is claimed as Lord, we should be living a life that runs against the flow of this world, and dare I say it, against the flow of every human culture. 

The flow of this world says that one who is in a position of power and authority in the eyes of others (i.e. the professor/teacher) should readily assert his position through control.  The flow of Christ, to the contrary, seeks to serve and to be at the service of those to whom we have been charged to teach.  The Apostle Paul, whom many regard as the greatest teacher of the Church, embodied Christ’s life of service to others.  He did not teach in order to get something from his students.  Rather, in response to God’s gracious call, he served others through his teaching.

Paul lived the reality of the “Upside-Down Kingdom.”  We see it clearly portrayed in his letter to the believers at Thessalonica. “We never came with words of flattery, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed—God is witness.  Nor did we seek glory from people, whether from you or from others, though we could have made demands as apostles of Christ.  But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children.  So, being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us” (I Thessalonians 2:5-8).

Because this sort of self-sacrificing service is true to the life of one who lives in and through Christ, a professor who professes to follow Jesus at a university where God is claimed to be in the center of all things (or at least in the center of its name) should be yielding his life for his students rather than demanding that students give their time and lives at his convenience.  This means that the professor will be so submitted to the sovereignty of God in her service to students that she will allow her schedule to be interrupted because the needs of others are viewed as the professor’s most important task.  We serve the best by giving our lives to listen to and seek to understand the needs of our students.

Through yielded service and a readiness to give of his time and attentiveness, the professor who draws his life from Christ at Handong should be not only led to teach his students in a professional and scholarly manner but also to live a life before and for his students that authentically demonstrates the love of Christ by sharing and even bearing their burdens.  “Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2).  A professor can only bear those burdens he knows, and so he must take the time to get to know what weighs down his students so that he might be of some measure of help in lifting them up.

If our students would learn anything of lasting value from us as Christian professors at Handong, then may it be this – that we live in constant acknowledgement of our need for Christ’s mercy and forgiveness and that we then seek to be professors who are serving, giving and bearing them through this time together here as we are continuing to be formed by the work of Christ’s Spirit into the whole persons that he has designed, called and equipped us all – professors, students, and administrators – to be.

The Teacher and Table Fellowship

  

Learning may occur in a variety of settings.  While classrooms appear to be the conventional locale, many great teachers rarely if ever stood behind a lectern or upon the platform of an auditorium. 

As I read through the Gospel accounts, especially Luke, I'm struck by the number of times that Jesus teaches while reclining at table with his disciples.  One might even conclude that he preferred setting for instruction and thoughtful conversation about truth was indeed during a shared meal.

Students and teachers eating together, not so much in formal arrangements but in more casual settings, provides excellent opportunities for the engagement of ideas through more relaxed dialogue.  It is not surprising then to find other teachers through the ages who have also taken the opportunity for table fellowship as a wonderful venue for enriching the learning experiences of their students.

Martin Luther's kitchen table

Among my model teachers, Luther stands out as one, who through the gracious hospitality of his wife Katharina, regularly extended invitations to his students for discussions around his kitchen table. I've said on more than one occasion that when my students start bringing note pads to discussions we have during meals I will then regard myself as teacher worthy of being heard.

Having the opportunity to share a meal with my students and the good conversation that surrounds the table are clearly some of the most delightful blessings of teaching at a residential university.  In fact, I'm beginning to realize how very important such times of relaxed conversation are for my students.  They need to see and hear me in the totality of life -- not just in the formal setting of a lecture hall.

Paul followed Jesus example in this regard.  He could write to those he had taught, "What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me -- practice these things, and the God of peace with be with you." (Philippians 4:9).  Students rarely "see" in the classroom what their teachers are saying.  Rather, it is when students encounter their teacher in the fullness of life's experiences that they have the opportunity to see if what their teacher has taught is in fact practiced in his life.

I hope that my students here at Handong will be able to see whether that is true for me.  One of my favorite things is to invite several students out for a meal off campus. The student cafeteria at the university is called "Twelve Baskets" and I've been told that's because there are always at least twelve baskets of leftovers after every meal.  So, as you might expect, I don't have any problem gathering a crew to enjoy a Sunday lunch at "Mr. Big" -- the newest place to taste a hamburger in Pohang.

Each shared meal -- whether with many or just one or two -- provides a wonderful occasion for students and teacher to get to know one another better and talk more freely about those persistent questions of life.  Maybe one day, a careful listener within our happy fellowship will publish the Handong edition of "Table Talk."

Playing the Fool

I'm always trying to engage my students through new approaches that I hope will prompt them to examine different perspectives on the persistent questions of life.

So, this past Friday I thought I might take a slightly different approach to April Fool's Day.  I came to class dressed in a brown Franciscan-like habit and without my glasses or shoes (and sockless, too!).

To say my students were taken aback would be putting it somewhat mildly.  Now, you have to understand that in Asian culture in general (and Korean culture in particular), students are taught to accept what their teachers present to them.  That being said, many were still trying hard to suppress their laughter.  Has professor gone completely crazy?  Has separation from his wife and family driven him mad?  Does he really think that he has become a monk?

None of those questions were expressly stated, but you can be sure most of them were puzzling more than one student's mind.  So what was the point of this first of April performance?  I wanted to do for my new students at Handong what I had first done for students at Missouri Baptist University seven years ago on another April Fool's Day.  In the attire of a follower of Francis of Assisi, I told them his story and how he came to be known as Francis the Fool.

I had been assigned the responsibility of giving the message for the student chapel service at MBU on the first of April.  Earlier that year, I had read G.K. Chesterton's Life of St. Francis.  Chesterton's portrayal of Francis challenged me to think more deeply about what it means to follow Jesus fully.  Francis sought to live as Jesus lived and to love as Jesus loved.  He reached out and touched the leper just as Christ had done.  He left behind the wealth and security offered him by his family in order to find the fullness of life as he took seriously Christ's teaching to consider the birds of the air and the flowers of the field.

Having been so challenged by Francis' life, it was quite obvious to me that I was meant to tell his story in that chapel service on the first of April seven years ago.  I thought it would make a more memorable impression if I told the story as Francis himself.  So, now here at Handong, I wanted to continue the tradition and pass along the lessons from the life of the one who was called "Francis the Fool" -- a name that I'm sure he did not resent since he was seeking to follow the one who many had regarded as "God's own Fool."

Evidently that chapel message seven years ago was memorable.  When one of my Handong student's posted the picture above to facebook during our Friday morning class, one of my former students from MBU, who was on-line at the time, commented within minutes: "I remember that robe!"  I guess, playing the fool can sometimes be an effective means of teaching.

Truth is Truth, whether from the Lips of . . .

I look to C.S. Lewis as one of my model teachers.  The portrayal of Lewis' tutorial with his students in the film, Shadowlands, is one of the finest displays of formation-in-process that I can point to in contemporary culture. He challenges his students to explore the significance of a rose as a metaphor for desire. Through a series of questions, he guides his students to ponder a persistent question: "What is desire's one essential quality?"  When one of his pupils shrugs-off the answer proposed, Lewis exhorts him into a deeper debate. The student though, at this early point in their relationship, is reticent to take up the gauntlet.

Now, I don't know if Anthony Hopkins' Lewis is an accurate portrayal, but it is an authentically inspiring one to me, and I think it is quite consistent with the Lewis we come to know in his books, especially Mere Christianity and essays contained in God in the Dock.  Lewis' thinking (and his teaching, I would imagine) was significantly formed by the works of the Scottish pastor and novelist George MacDonald.  One of the first books by Lewis I purchased after reading The Screwtape Letters in my high school years was a little paperback entitled, George MacDonald: Anthology.  In the preface to this collection, Lewis wrote:  "In making these extracts, I have been concerned with MacDonald not as a writer but as a Christian teacher" (14). 

George MacDonald

Though he had never met MacDonald, Lewis recounts how his works and life, as told by MacDonald's son in the biography he wrote of his father, substantially shaped his approach to writing and to living.  One of the most telling quotes that Lewis includes among the 365 extracts (most coming from MacDonald's sermons) composing this little volume is this: "Truth is truth, whether from the lips of Jesus or Balaam" (27). From the very first time I read that line nearly 35 years ago it was indelibly impressed upon my thinking.  MacDonald's words have continued challenged me to listen carefully to many speakers, to read thoughtfully many authors, and to watch observantly many actors.

The search for truth -- true truth, as Francis Schaeffer has called it -- will take us in a variety of directions.  I was reminded of this just last evening.  As on nearly every Wednesday evening, I was engaged in a discussion of the Scriptures with some of my fellow teachers here at Handong. Our focus was the first chapter of James, and someone pointed out how this passage emphasizes the need to look into the Scriptures as a mirror that can reveal to us our true selves.  This comment led another participant in the study to mention a book entitled The Man in the Mirror.   When I heard that phrase, my thoughts turned to a pop song with the same title from the 80's by Michael Jackson. 

And being the sort of "quick to speak" guy that I am, I told the group that Jackson had written a song about the "man in the mirror."  The mention of the "king of pop's" name must have struck a dissonant chord though, because another of my colleagues promptly declared, "But Michael Jackson got it wrong!"  I replied, "Did he? Didn't he just express what Gandhi had said -- "Become the change you wish to make in the world"?  Well, my mention of Michael Jackson and Gandhi in the same sentence seemed to be quite enough to alert the group's leader that we (read "I") had now gone way too far afield in our discussion.  It was a Bible study for heaven's sake!

But hold on!  Truth is truth, right?  Whether spoken from the lips of Jesus or Balaam, right?  Whether spoken from the lips of Gandhi or sung by Michael Jackson? -- Well you tell me.  Did Jackson get it right or not? Here's what he sings:

"As I, Turn Up The Collar On My
Favourite Winter Coat
This Wind Is Blowin' My Mind
I See The Kids In The Street,
With Not Enough To Eat
Who Am I, To Be Blind?
Pretending Not To See Their Needs
"A Summer's Disregard,
A Broken Bottle Top
And A One Man's Soul
They Follow Each Other On
The Wind Ya' Know
'Cause They Got Nowhere To Go
That's Why I Want You To Know

"I'm Starting With The Man In The Mirror
I'm Asking Him To Change His Ways
And No Message Could Have Been Any Clearer
If You Wanna Make The World A Better Place
Take A Look At Yourself,
And Then Make A Change.
"I've Been A Victim Of A Selfish Kind Of Love
It's Time That I Realize
That There Are Some With No Home,
Not A Nickel To Loan
Could It Be Really Me,
Pretending That They're Not Alone?

"A Willow Deeply Scarred,
Somebody's Broken Heart
And A Washed-Out Dream
They Follow The Pattern Of The Wind, Ya' See
Cause They Got No Place To Be
That's Why I'm Starting With Me
"I'm Starting With The Man In The Mirror
I'm Asking Him To Change His Ways
And No Message Could Have Been Any Clearer
If You Wanna Make The World A Better Place
Take A Look At Yourself,
And Then Make A Change."

That's what Michael Jackson sang.  Here's what James wrote:

But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.  For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.  ~ James 1:22-25

If truth is truth no matter from whose lips the message is spoken or from whose pen the words are written, then it would appear to me that a question of first importance is indeed: Have I made a change in my life?

Study Groups -- Bonhoeffer's Example

In her book, Bonhoeffer: Called of God, Elizabeth Raum includes this insightful depiction of a study group Bonhoeffer led for some of his students while he was teaching at the University of Berlin:

"In addition to attending Dietrich's lectures some of his students became part of a study group that met with him one evening a week in the room of Wolf-Dieter Zimmerman, his assistant. Dietrich's preferred teaching strategy was to ask questions and guide discussions. They gathered in Zimmerman's small room in groups of ten to fifteen to discuss theology.  Dietrich enjoyed such informal evenings because they allowed a more natural exchange of ideas than did lecturing.  The students learned to think clearly, to examine issues from all sides, and not to jump to premature conclusions.  At the end of each evening, Dietrich treated them to drinks in a local beer cellar" (52).

Professor-led study groups are a common occurrence here at Handong. I have been asked by my students to lead two this semester.  The Law & Advocacy Society meets each Tuesday evening to practice trial advocacy skills.  Our goal is to conduct a full mock trial by the end of the semester. We're working on a products liability case and will be starting with opening statements tomorrow evening.  As for refreshments, though, Domino's pizza and soda will likely be our best fare.



Law & Advocacy Society

 My second group consists of undergraduate law students who are planning to take the Law School Admissions Test (LSAT) later this year as they look ahead to applying for entrance into an American law school in the fall of 2012 following their graduation in December.  This group meets on Saturday mornings to work through practice LSAT exam questions.  I have promised to cook them all an "American breakfast" in a couple of weeks.  Pancakes, bacon, and scrambled eggs are on the menu!

I hope to be feeding their minds as well as their stomachs as we study together in these informal group settings.

They Could Not Keep Their Eyes Open

During my morning readings a few days back, I came across this phrase.  It suddenly dawned upon me that Jesus' students encountered the very same struggles that students today face.  

At one of the most important times in their life, when they had been asked specifically by their teacher to stay alert, they were found falling asleep!  And we're not talking about one of the stragglers at the back of the class.  No, these were Jesus' three top students -- the inner circle -- the creme of the crop -- the "summa cum laude" guys -- who couldn't keep their eyes open!

So, if that was the case with Peter, James and John, this poor teacher should not be surprised nor offended when even some of his most diligent students occasionally can't seem to keep their eyes open during class.  Now, I try to provide some incentive for them to stay awake. 

Rather than standing in one place at the front of the classroom (which I have observed seems to be the norm among many of the local prof's here), I try to infuse some variety into the discussion by walking about through the aisles and even sometimes taking a place at the back of the room in order to challenge the students to adjust to a new posture in order to engage a new perspective. 

In addition to these peripatetic tendencies, I also take some pains to restrain my natural inclination to speak up and so try to lower my volume a bit.  As you might imagine, though, this strategy tends to have the opposite effect than the one I'm seeking.  So, those short periods of soft tones are usually followed by an abrupt exclamation or the invocation of some Latin maxim whether it is application to the legal issue under consideration or not. 

But you might be asking at this point, why is it that my students are having such a struggle to stay awake.  Am I that boring???  Well --- I’ll let you ask my students to answer that one.  I will only say that I'm trying to be ever interesting and engaging.  I'm trying to talk less and ask questions more -- to encourage dialogue and eliminate monologue.  That said, though, there is another possible cause. 

You see, students here are very conscientious about their studies that they will often stay up quite late diligently studying in preparation for the next day's classes.  They study so much, that when they come to class, the struggle to stay awake -- not because they're uninterested in the subject under discussion or just bored -- they're EXHAUSTED!

Since that is indeed most often the case, I just might start bringing a couple extra pillows to my classes and offer them as rewards (not to be used during lectures, however!) to the most diligent disciple who, like Peter, James and John, find that they "could not keep their eyes open."

There Arose a Reasoning Among Them . . .

Bonhoeffer & his students

In every community of faith and learning there come times of conflict.  Conflicts arise because these communities are composed of humans who are finite and fallen.  At every university where I've taught over the past sixteen years there have been conflicts – conflicts between students and faculty members; between faculty and fellow faculty; and between faculty and university administration.  

A university is in many respects like all other human communities that experience conflict from within among its members.  Universities founded upon a common faith are no less prone to experience conflicts since like every church fellowship since such a university is made-up of humans.  So it should come as no surprise that a Christian university, especially one that is in its early years of growth and development, would experience conflict between some of its faculty and its administrative leaders.

Brother Bonhoeffer knew the reality of conflict from within a fellowship.  During his days leading the Confessing Church’s seminary at Finkenwalde, he experienced it.  When he wrote about this experiment in Christian community in his little book Life Together, he began the fourth chapter with this warning:

“'There arose a reasoning among them, which of them would be the greatest’ (Luke 9:46). We know who it is that sows this thought in the Christian community.  But perhaps we do not bear in mind enough that no Christian community ever comes together without this thought immediately emerging as a seed of discord.  Thus at the very beginning of Christian fellowship there is engendered an invisible, often unconscious, life-and-death contest.  ‘There arose a reasoning among them’; this is enough to destroy a fellowship” (90).

Bonhoeffer’s insight exposes the root cause for many, if not most, of these conflicts in our communities.  It is the human desire for greatness or ascendancy over others.  He continues, “It is vitally necessary that every Christian community from the very outset face this dangerous enemy squarely, and eradicate it.  There is not time to lose here, for from the first moment when a man meets another person he is looking for a strategic position he can assume and hold over against that person.”

Bethge & Bonhoeffer - student & teacher

“There are strong persons and weak ones.  If a man is not strong, he immediately claims the right of the weak as his own and uses it against the strong.  There are gifted and ungifted persons, simple people and difficult people, devout and less devout, the sociable and the solitary.  Does not the ungifted person have to take up a position just as well as the gifted person, the difficult one as well as the simple? . . . Where is there a person who does not with instinctive sureness find the spot where he can stand and defend himself, but which he will never give up to another, for which he will fight with all the drive of his instinct of self-assertion?”

“All this can occur in the most polite or even pious environment.  But the important thing is that a Christian community should know that somewhere in it there will certainly be ‘a reasoning among them, which of them would be the greatest.’ It is the struggle of the natural man for self-justification. He finds it only in comparing himself with others, in condemning and judging others.  Self-justification and judging others go together, as justification by grace and serving others go together “ (91).

If this then is indeed the case, how may members of a community who are presently experiencing such conflict eradicate it?  Bonhoeffer offers a potential path in the remainder of his chapter.  There he addresses seven “ministries” that we owe to one another in community.   Each bears upon me and my colleagues here at Handong if we would be peacemakers and ones who are committed to the growth of our community of learning into wholeness and mutual blessing that flows to all.

Those within our Handong community who would advance and seek to protect  the students’ “right to learn” owe the ministries Bonhoeffer commends to professors, students and fellow administrators.   Those, on the other hand, who uphold and see to maintain the professors’ “right to teach” likewise owe these ministries to all others within the community of learning.

Rather than dispute over issues of control and authority, the ministries that Bonhoeffer teaches us to engage express avenues of service that lead toward mutual edification and the ultimate achievement of the goal of our community – the forming of whole persons who act responsibly in the service of others according to God’s calling upon their lives.

The first of these ministries, as Bonhoeffer describes them, is “the ministry of holding one’s tongue.”  “Often we combat our evil thoughts most effectively if we absolutely refuse to allow them to be expressed in words” (91).    We are admonished in Scripture to be “slow to speak” (James 1:19), so we would do well to hold our tongue and think thoroughly we express comments, especially when they are criticisms of others.

Bonhoeffer advises that “where this discipline of the tongue is practiced right from the beginning, each individual will make a matchless discovery.  He will be able to cease from constantly scrutinizing the other person, judging him, condemning him, putting him in his particular place where he can gain ascendancy over him and thus doing violence to him as a person.  Now he can allow the brother to exist as a completely free person, as God made him to be” (92-93).

The second ministry is meekness. “He who would learn to serve must first learn to think little of himself” (94).  This is not self-loathing, but rather a proper view of self.  “Only he who lives by the forgiveness of his sin in Jesus Christ will rightly think little of himself” (95).  Such a perspective, Bonhoeffer acknowledges, leads to a challenging conclusion: “To forego self-conceit and to associate with the lowly means . . . to consider oneself the greatest of sinners. . . If my sinfulness appears to me to be in any way smaller or less detestable in comparison with the sins of others, I am still not recognizing my sinfulness at all. . .  He who would serve his brother in the fellowship must sink all the way down to these depths of humility” (96).  

Holding one’s tongue and meekness lead naturally to the third ministry we owe one another in community – that of listening. “Just as love to God begins with listening to His Word, so the beginning of love for the brethren [i.e. for others] is learning to listen to them” (97). To be an effective listener, though, is a skill we must be devoted to developing. Our tendency is merely to “wait to talk” when in conversation with others. What we need to be doing is authentic listening. Bonhoeffer warns that “he who can no longer listen to his brother will soon be no longer listening to God either; he will be doing nothing but prattle in the presence of God” (98). 

By listening we are enabled to understand the needs of others and so reach out to them with the ministry of helpfulness. “This means, initially, simple assistance in trifling, external matters . . . Nobody is too good for the meanest (i.e. lowest) service. One who worries about the loss of time that such petty, outward acts of helpfulness entail is usually taking the importance of his own career too solemnly” (99).  

The next service we owe is the ministry of bearing. “’Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ’ (Gal. 6:2). . . Bearing means forbearing and sustaining. . . The Christian . . . must bear the burden of a brother. He must suffer and endure the brother. It is only when he is a burden that another person is really a brother and not merely an object to be manipulated” (100). As we extend this service, Bonhoeffer calls us to bear both the freedom of the other person as well as his sin through regularly practicing forgiveness. 

The thoughtful engagement of these first five ministries – holding one’s tongue, meekness, listening, helpfulness and bearing – provides the only sure foundation for the next – the ministry of proclaiming the Word. This ministry is not the “preaching of the Word” but rather “that unique situation in which one person bears witness in human words to another person, bespeaking the whole consolation of God, the admonition, the kindness, and the severity of God” (103-104). “We speak to one another on the basis of the help we both need. We admonish one another to go the way that Christ bids us to go. We warn one another against the disobedience that is our common destruction” (106).  

Bonhoeffer concludes with the ultimate service we owe -- the ministry of authority. This ministry, however, can only be exercised by those who have first fulfilled the all that come before it because “Jesus made authority in the fellowship dependent upon brotherly service” (108). “Every cult of personality that emphasizes the distinguished qualities, virtues, and talents of another person, even though these be of an altogether spiritual nature, is worldly and has no place in the Christian community . . . The Church does not need brilliant personalities but faithful servants of Jesus and the brethren” (108-109).  

Indeed, no community of faith, no community of learning, needs brilliant personalities. What we need are faithful followers of Christ who seek daily, by His grace, to serve one another according to the call of God. What is needed to eradicate the attitudes and actions that destroy our community of learning are men and women possessed with the mind of Christ that seeks not their own interests and rights but those of others. Such an approach to sustaining our community of learning and faith will not pit the right to learn against the right to teach. Rather, it will serve others by taking seriously the responsibility to teach and the responsibility to learn as we seek together to obey the call of Christ and serve the needs of others in the here and now.

School is Never Out -- Instruction is All Around!

This little guy showed-up outside my apartment window yesterday morning as I was talking on the phone with Sandy.  He's a "Yellow-rumped Flycatcher."  Pretty cool! (I didn't take this picture, but I'm hoping to capture a few photo's in the near future). He has quite a song to sing, too!  His appearance reminded me that I need to get a bird feeder.  As I've looked for one at shops and on-line, though, I've begun to realize that folks don't seem to feed birds around here.

I guess they think that the birds do pretty well for themselves and there is just not much "extra" seed lying about to give over to the birds.  And yet, these little beautiful creatures continue to thrive even though "they sow not, nor gather into barns."  Seeing this beauty reminded me also of the fact that all that we encounter in each day is teaching us.  Jesus exhorts us in his Sermon on the Mount to "consider the birds of the air and the flowers of the field."

The reality of on-going instruction for the one who is aware was also brought home to me recently through a brief passage in Thich Nhat Hanh's little book, Being Peace. He writes:  "We can learn from everything that is around, that is in us.  Even if we are not at a meditation center [or on a retreat or even in a classroom] we can still practice at home because all around us the teaching is present.  Everything is preaching . . . each pebble, each leaf, each flower is preaching . . . (36).

King David said it this way: "The heavens keep telling the wonders of God and the skies declare what he has done.  Each day informs the following day; each night announces to the next. They don't speak a word, and there is never the sound of a voice.  Yet, their message reaches all the earth, and it travels around the world." (Psalm 19:1-4a, CEV).  So, give a listen and keep learning.  School is never out.  Instruction is all around you right now where you are.