Grace as Currency

So it hit me this evening that finances can tell us a lot about grace. I'm sure we all know what it's like to be scraping the bottom of our bank accounts not knowing where our next meal will come from or how we will pay our bills. When you're poor you carefully budget every last penny you earn so you do not miss any obligations. You wonder if you can afford to order a sandwich from the dollar menu or if you should just wait until you get home. You meticulously count out each purchase you make and you constantly worry that something unexpected will happen that you will not be able to handle financially. You often find yourself eating ramen soup or, if you're Korean, rice. That is your meal. You worry if you have somehow made a mistake in your calculations and think "Oh no! If I mess this up I'm going to be in trouble!" What if you've forgotten something critical? You worry so much when you're in a serious financial situation!

I think we all have the bad habit of treating God's economy the way we do our own. At least I do. We carefully budget God's grace hoping we will have enough to cover all of our obligations. And we work like the dickens making sure we have earned enough grace to cover whatever situation we face. We worry that some crisis will come up where we will not have enough grace to cover us. The only thing is that at least with a monetary account we can check our balance before making a purchase. There is a concrete amount. I look at my account, "Okay! I have 45 000 won in there. I can afford this." With God though, we worry because there's nowhere we can look to see if we have enough. We have to go on intuition. This leads to worrying that we have overestimated how much grace is available to us today. Like we will face some situation during the day and suddenly discover that there's not enough grace left! When we live like this we live very weak, fragile, cautious lives. We constantly tread on thin ice trying not to put too much weight on our "grace account" in case it's been depleted. We tread softly and we are weak. Our lights are dim and our salt is only mildly salty. We do not exhibit the greatness of Christ.

What do we do then? Well do you know what it's like to have a full bank account? I got paid today and I feel rich all of a sudden! My first inclination, though, is to still be careful. "What if it's not as much as it really is somehow? I need to be careful what I spend it on or it could still run out!" I have about more money than I've ever had at once in my life right now with the possible exception of one or two other times! And I'm still worrying! Let me tell you right now! Your "grace account" is FULL! It is ridiculous! It's bigger than Bill Gates' bank account! You couldn't put a dent in it if you bought the most luxurious things in the world all day every day for the rest of your life! God does not run out of grace! It's like the sun running out of heat or light! Or like the universe running out of space! It's like the color blue running out of blueness! It ain't gonna happen, folks! And even if all those other things could happen God could still not run out of grace! God does not HAVE grace! He IS gracious!

It is this attribute of God that the universe hinges upon! And how is this grace available to us? Did God just say "I'm going to show grace to those people!"? No! God can't just dispense grace to us when we are His enemies! He cannot just hand grace out to the wicked people that we are! That would make Him an unjust judge! How then is this grace available to us? Through Christ! "For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might become rich." --2 Corinthians 8:9. Jesus said "I love them enough that I will leave all my riches behind. I will humble myself and become a human. I will veil my power and majesty and take on poverty stricken, weak human nature. I will die instead of them. Then, Father, then you can bless them. Make them rich through what I do for them." The Father loved his Son more than any of our minds could ever possibly wrap our minds around. The love they shared is utterly incomprehensible to our small creature minds. How deeply must God love us that He would be willing for this event to take place?

So now we are free! Go out! Spend wildly! Jesus says in Luke 6, "But I say to you who hear, love your enemies! Do good to those who hate you! Bless those who curse you! And pray for those who spitefully use you!" In other words, "You've got more grace than you know what to do with! Don't be careful who you show grace too because you're never going to run out! Go crazy!" So go out there and spend like your resources can never be depleted! Because they can't!

Huge Praise/ Prayer Request!

So last night I was eating dinner with my director and I asked what she was doing for Chusok, the holiday where Koreans go to family's houses, eat a lot, and worship/give thanks to their ancestors and ask them for blessing for another year. This led into a conversation about matters of faith and we talked for about an hour! I was able to explain the gospel and give my testimony of the grace of God in my life! She asked about Easter so I worked my way through trying to explain the significance of Jesus coming to Jerusalem, the fact that He lived the perfect life, the fact that He was God in the flesh, the Trinity, why the High Priest wanted to kill Jesus, what Jesus death accomplished on my behalf, and the fact that Jesus rose from the dead. All throughout, she was asking questions about things she did not understand and when I'd finished explaining I was blown away! "So Jesus was punished instead of you," she said! She got it! She understood the gospel! So on the walk home I was praying, "Lord, don't let her walk away from this conversation unfazed! Let her keep thinking about all of this over and over and over again!" I ask everyone else to pray with me too! Pray that we would have more chances to talk and that I would speak as the Holy Spirit guides me! Pray that her heart would be soft and open to the love of Christ! Thanks everyone!

First Helping of Culture Shock

I've been here for a little bit less than a month and I was beginning to grow very much acclimated to South Korea when I had my first dose of culture shock. I had started to think of Koreans as polite Americans that were very concerned with showing respect to each other when I got sucker punched with the revelation that there is very possible demonic activity right under my nose. As I was leaving work tonight I went to say goodbye to the director of my school. She just happened to be preparing to burn incense and pray to good ghosts to keep the school running well and to protect the students. She explained that this was a Korean tradition and all I could say was "Okay! Well, I'll see you tomorrow!" I mean what do you say to something like that???

As I was walking home I thought about whether this was empty tradition or if there could be something truly Satanic working in that place. Honestly, I have no idea. Either way, though, I would appreciate prayer, prayer, and more prayer for my own safety and for my director to come under conviction. Pray for opportunities to share the Truth with her and pray for wisdom on my part to speak what needs to be spoken but also to speak with tact and respect for her as a person. Pray for her heart to be soft and open to Christ and pray for my life to be exemplary of Christ's grace and love for the lost.

Hanbit International

I don't have a lot of time to compose a full blog post but I wanted to share about church yesterday! I really didn't know what to expect so I went in with an open mind. The first thing that really stood out was that I was greeted in the parking lot. And it wasn't an elder or an official greeter that went out of their way to say hello to me! It was a regular church attender! And it wasn't just them! When I got inside it was like people swarmed to meet me and make me feel welcome! The worship was really solid, Christ and God focused, and the sermon was great! The main pastor and preacher are away so it was a visiting pastor. Next week it will be a visiting pastor also but the preaching is solid. Yesterday it was about God using ordinary people to do extraordinary things and that the fact that we are ordinary should encourage us rather than discourage us because God likes using ordinary people rather than people with amazing talents or abilities.

After services I met many other people including a girl who graduated from Liberty around the same time as I did and a guy who went to Virginia Tech! I just felt God's providence there! :-) Then a few of us went to help out at the kid's program and I helped them put on a puppet show about Peter seeing the vision of all the animals and then going to preach the gospel to Cornelius. After this, we went to Andy's house where a group of about 6 or 8 of us discussed the story about Boy Jesus staying at the temple. What struck me was that these people ask hard questions about their faith. The main question of the night was "Did Jesus make a mistake in staying in the temple?" We talked for a long time about the fact that Jesus made mistakes in His learning process but that mistakes must not be equated with sin. It was refreshing and I was shocked at the insights some of them had into something I've glossed over many, many times.

As a whole, I was struck by the emphasis placed on obedience to God's word and striving wholeheartedly to become the people Christ longs for us to be. But it's not slavish obedience they were preaching! It was obedience borne of grace and of love and I loved that. The challenge coupled with the assurance. But yeah! It was a great day!

Gershom's Gleanings

Well, most of you have heard by now that I accepted a job offer teaching English in Korea for a year. For those who haven't (if any of you even read this blog, which I doubt) sorry to drop the bombshell on you through here. The countdown to departure is about t-minus 21 days and counting. For the next three weeks I'll be finishing up at Subway, filing paperwork, trying to gain a slight hold on basic Korean, and bidding adieu to friends, family, and acquaintances. If you're interested, you can follow my odyssey via this blog. I'll try to update at least once every couple of weeks. I'm sure there will be no shortage of fascinating tidbits, stories, and insights into both myself and the culture that I'm adapting myself to. You may have noticed that I've changed the blog name to reflect my new life. I chose this because 1) It's a corny name and that's just how I roll (haha) and 2) I think it is an apt description of what I'm going to feel like for the duration of my time in Korea. I'm hoping I'll be able to learn a great deal about the incarnation of Christ and how He fit Himself into our culture but without compromising His mission or His message. Anyway, that's the state of things now! Pray for me if you get a chance!

All-Consuming Fire

I once had a list of goals and landmarks I planned to reach in my life. Among them were publishing anthologies of poetry, going skydiving, owning a home and a car, getting married, and running a marathon. I've dumped all that. I have only one enduring goal. And that is to fall more in love with my savior. The one who laid his life down and poured himself out until death and held nothing back. The only enduring legacy I would really want to leave is that I loved him to the end. Real love too. Not just the words. And if that means dying out without having accomplished anything in this world's eyes then so be it. I don't care. I wasn't made for publishing anthologies of poetry, going skydiving, or running in marathons. I was made for a singular purpose. And that is to love and adore the Lord Jesus Christ and to worship him alone. Hang all the rest of it, if need be. I want nothing else.

Death

Death. No Christian can experience the joy of Christ apart from it. It is why Christ came to earth and it is why God has put us here too. "For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it" (Mark 8:35). Of course I'm not talking about physical death, but spiritual death-- synonymous with an acceptance of suffering and being abused by people and with the possibility of martyrdom. This death is not negotiable. "When Christ calls a man, He bids him come and die," said Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German martyr. We cannot make conditions on our death ('Okay, God, I'll die if... you promise I won't have to suffer too much, you promise that I'll always feel your presence with me, you'll let me always have good food to eat or good health or a spouse who will remain faithful to me.) We. Must. Die. God will not be bargained with and we are not in any position to bargain anyway. We don't suffer joylessly, though. That's what makes us different from the world. When unbelievers suffer they have no consolation, no hope that their suffering amounts to anything or any promises to grasp onto. "We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed" (2 Corinthians 4:8-9). "But in all things we commend ourselves as ministers of God: in much patience, in tribulations, in needs, in distresses, ⁵ in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in sleeplessness, in fastings; ⁶ by purity, by knowledge, by longsuffering, by kindness, by the Holy Spirit, by sincere love, ⁷ by the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, ⁸ by honor and dishonor, by evil report and good report; as deceivers, and yet true; ⁹ as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold we live; as chastened, and yet not killed; ¹⁰ as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things" (2 Corinthians 6:4-10). The road to Calvary is a painful one but it is not without joy. And our joy in the cross does not stem from masochism or a delight in pain itself but in the promise of what that pain is producing in us. We delight in the cross because our good, kind Lord and Savior tells us that it is the pathway to deeper joy. There is no deeper joy available to men than the joy of denying ourselves. There may be great pain in love but love does not see the pain as so very important. It is happy to love without concern for being loved in return and death is always the pathway to true love. This is why the Bible says that Jesus was "the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." Before the world was created, Jesus Christ knew and accepted that he would have to die for those He redeemed. This was the basis for the love which God showed the world. The death of Christ was the reason God had any genuine compassion to show the world. The entire redemptive history hinged on the fact that Christ would pour out His life to ransom the children of God. Without it, the entire universe would have been obliterated the very second Eve ate that fruit. Apart from the death of Christ God would have not exhibited one ounce of compassion or pity on us. And the death of Christ is the only thing that enables us to die. Through our deaths, we can enter the joy which God prepared for us. So the sooner we embrace death, the sooner we embrace the highest form of joy God has prepared for us. Let us embrace our death today, one moment at a time.