Speaking in a Language Others Can Understand

This video reminds me so much of my friend David Brush's frequent comments that we Christians have forgotten how to speak the "language" of the cultures around us. Imagine what it would be like if we could learn a new "language."

Hope and Community

Nothing cripples the will like isolation. By the same token, nothing buoys the spirit and fosters hope like the knowledge that others faced equal or greater challenges in the past and continued on to bequeath us a better world.
- Paul Loeb, "Excerpt: The Impossible Will Take a Little While," Beyond Magazine, Spring 2005, p. 12.

Lost Letters of Pergamum - Review

My friend Shannon loaned me another great book. This one is on the assigned reading list for some classes at Nazarene Theological Seminary, and I can see why.
Here's the basic set up. It's historical fiction. The premise is that someone has discovered a set of letters exchanged among ancient noblemen in the late 1st century AD. There are at least 4 different "authors" among the various letters. One is Luke, the author of Luke and Acts, and another is Antipas, a Christian martyr in Pergamum, mentioned in the book of Revelation.
In the process of the letter writing, Antipas slowly converts from a power and prestige seeking nobleman, to a self-sacrificing, humble servant of Jesus and others. But the real value of the book is that it allows the reader to observe how Christianity was lived, interpreted, and heard among those who heard the New Testament texts for the first time.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to better understand the roots of Christianity and/or the New Testament. It is fiction, but it is fiction based on deeply sound historical research.
This book gets a strong 5J's: JJJJJ.

Acts 3 - Healing and Including

Read Acts 3.

For 40 years, he sat.¹
For 40 years, he either crawled or was carried.
For 40 years, he needed help to get his food.
For 40 years, he needed help to get a drink of water from the well.
For 40 years, he needed help to bathe himself.
For 40 years, he needed help to go to the bathroom.
For 40 years, he watched other people do “normal” stuff of life, while he just sat.
For 40 years, he begged.
For 40 years, he was completely dependent on the generosity of others.
For 40 years, people insulted him as one who was cursed by God – punished for some unknown sins.²
For 40 years, he sat outside the temple and watched the people go in to worship.
For 40 years, he was not allowed to enter the temple because he was not “whole.”
For 40 years, he was too dirty for human touch.
For 40 years, he was just a beggar – not a person.
For 40 years, he was on the outside of social life, economic life, and religious life.

Then, three things happened that changed his life forever. ...

To continue reading this post, click here.


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Blue Like Jazz - Review

Mostly during Lent, Sarah and I read Donald Miller's Blue Like Jazz. (Thanks for the great loan Beverly!) Much like jazz music, this book has an outline, but when it comes to the details it doesn't seem like he has much of a plan. He just kind of wanders around the various topics with long, interesting, funny, touching stories, but somehow by the end of each chapter he has wrapped it all up into a very nice and thought provoking take on the topic at hand.
And all of these topics revolve around one central topic - relearning Christianity outside the traditional religious box. Miller calls this "Christian spirituality."
Miller is a great story teller, and his fresh take on lots of old topics is very enticing. Also, the book is filled with first hand stories telling in a very authentic voice his own up and down struggle to make sense of how to follow Jesus in world that has dramatically changed in the last 50 years.
I would highly recommend this book for anyone interested in faithful Christianity in our changing world. I am also seriously considering recommending the book to one of my non-Christian friends who has expressed a beginning interest in the Bible and God.
All in all, I'm torn between 4js and 5Js. Sometimes, what he presents isn't so much profound as fresh, funny and interesting, but I guess that's worth its salt too. And, I can strongly recommend the book, so I'll give it the full JJJJJ.

Statue of Liberty

Not like the vaulted cathedrals,
Not like the pews with names and reservations,
Not like the hair-sprayed televangelists,
Not like the nice churches who say nice things to nice people,
Here at our doors shall stand a sign: All are welcome!
Open hearts, aflame with the burning love of God,
Open, open, open, to all who come.

Keep, o normal churches,
your nice people,
your beautiful people,
your people who have their crap together and put on pretty faces.

Give us your freaks and your punks,
your hippies and granolas,
your Goths and your bikers.
Give us your homeless and your unemployed,
your job-hoppers and bed-hoppers,
your addicts and your hard drinkers.
Give us your hookers and your strippers,
your gamblers and smokers,
your dippers and your chewers.
Give us your church-haters and your liberals,
your atheists and agnostics,
your fundamentalists and your prudes.
Give us your gays and your lesbians,
your transvestites and transsexuals,
your offenders and your victims.
Give us your polluters and your tree-huggers,
your executives and lawyers,
your tax-evaders and your tax-collectors.
Give us your doubters and your name-it-and-claim-its,
your hypocrites and holier-than-thous,
your skeptics and your relativists.
Give us your seekers and your strugglers,
your lovers and haters,
your saints and your sinners.

Send us all of these, for they are like us.
We lift high the cross of Christ,
Brother of exiles, Friend of sinners.
His nail-pierced hands shout world-wide welcome
For all who long to breathe free,
For all who long to find home,
For all who didn't measure up,
For all who need a new start,
For all who want a new world.

We lift high the cross of Christ,
So that we will all be transformed together.

April 15, 2009 (author's copyright by Josh Broward)

----------------------------

This poem was obviously based on Emma Lazarus's famous poem, “The New Colossus,” which is inscribed on the interior of the Statue of Liberty.

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

-----

My poem should not be interpreted to mean that all of the actions implied in the "send us" section are OK and morally acceptable. Rather, the interpretation should be that all of us are welcome in our brokenness to gather around the cross of Christ (the Statue of Liberty) where we will all be made free, healed, loved, and transformed. A community that welcomes like this is a means of God's healing grace for everyone concerned.

My Philsophy of Ministry

Last week a group of KNU theology students interviewed me for a class project. One of their questions asked me to define my Philosophy of Ministry. I thought I'd share that here.

My philosophy of ministry has three core points.

1) Humility: One of my friends from seminary often says, “There is no holiness without humility.” At first I didn't really understand what he meant, but now it seems like one of the most important truths of Christianity. Humility is foundational to living like Jesus and, therefore, to being a minister. For me, humility means at least three things:

a) I can't actually lead our church. I can only help us be led by the Holy Spirit.

b) I must acknowledge my own brokenness, weakness, and sinfulness.

c) We are all equals. I must really believe in “the priesthood of all believers” (1 Peter 2:5,9). My job is not to do the work of the church; my job is to help the people do the work of the church (Ephesians 4:11-12).

2) Honesty: The favorite saying of some of my mentors is: “We cannot change or heal what we do not acknowledge.” Honesty is the first step for healing and change. As a pastor, one of my fundamental responsibilities is to speak honestly. For example:

a) Conflict must be addressed directly and personally and with humility (Matthew 5:23-24, 7:3-5, 18:15-17). Unresolved conflict is like a cancer in the church.

b) Difficulties of life and faith and church should be faced openly and honestly. It doesn't help anyone to pretend that Christianity is easy to practice or simple to believe. Life and faith are full of complexity and unresolved questions. The church is full of weakness as well as strength. Part of my job as a pastor is to speak openly and honestly about all of life – good and bad.

c) We must honestly face change the present and the future. We cannot hide in the past to make the present more comfortable. Our world is changing more quickly than ever, but the Church continues to change slowly. Part of my job as a pastor is to help us to see the changes that are happening around us and to help us make faithful changes as well.

3) Hospitality is a basic part of Christianity. Jesus and the disciples ate together and spent time in each others' homes. The also welcomed the outsiders (open sinners, the poor, the handicapped) into their table fellowship. One of the fundamental roles of the church is to open our hearts, our homes, and our churches to people who feel excluded. As a pastor, I must lead in hospitality by making our church more welcoming to nonChristians and by welcoming many different people into my home and heart.

Saved by Grace, Judged by Works???

On my trip to Manila, I finished Brian McClaren's A New Kind of Christian trilogy, with the last book being The Last Word and the Word After That. I liked this book best of all. (However, the first book, A New Kind of Christian, was the book that first helped me get somewhat of a grasp on postmodernism and how huge this shift is.)
In this book McClaren has three basic points. I'll try to summarize them briefly and then talk about the most controversial one.
1. Most of the conversation in the book is about hell. How can a good and loving God send finite creatures to enternal, conscious torment? McClaren doesn't give an outright answer. Instead, he is content to shoot down the traditional answer(s) and to suggest possible alternatives. It seems as though he advocates, overall, a position of humble agnosticism tempered by grace. Basically, we don't really know because the Bible isn't entirely clear, and in the end we have to trust in God's mercy and grace as well as in his justice.
2. As the main character embarks on this study of hell-ology, he discovers that learning and knowing happen best in community. McClaren advocates again and again the importance of a community that we "know with." In many respects the people at www.emergentnazarenes.blogspot.com serve as some of the people I "know with."
3. We are saved by grace and judged by works. Since this is (by far) his most controversial statement, let me quote a section from the voice of one of his mentoring characters:
So I'm not denying salvation by grace, no, no, not at all. It's all by grace. I'm just advocating judgment by works ...
Salvation by grace, judgement by works. There's nothing in the Bible clearer than those two realities. Of course, you have to define salvation in Jesus' way, not just modern Western Chrsitianty's [way]. ...
You thought that if you are saved, you are not judged, right? Yep, I used to think that too. I didn't realize that being judged isn't the same as being condemned and that being saved means a lot more than not being judged. For a lot of lok, salvation still means little more than escaping from the legal consequences of having original sin on your passport. For them, until you have your passport changed, which is what being saved means, you can't get through customs in heaven and you're stuck going to hell. But remember - conventional Western Christianity is the religion of the empire. It developed at a time when the church and the empire were joined at the hip, if not the heart. A lot of us didn't get too good of a deal from Imperial Christianity. [The character speaking here is a black pastor.] I guess you could say some of us have seceded from Imperial Christianity, the theology of the empire. When you secede from the theology of the empire, your understandings of salvation and judgment can change for the better. ...
Try reading through your New Testament and looking for the word judged or judgement. You'll see it as clear as day: we're judged by our works. But that's not in contradiction to being saved by grace - if you define salvation in a broader way.

This line of reasoning strikes me as intuitively true. The Bible says again that we will be judged according to the deeds we did in our bodies whether good or bad. We just read that yesterday from 2 Corinthians 5. I've had a hard time reconciling Jesus' parables which mostly imply judgment by works with Paul's discussions of being "saved by grace" and even with Paul's comments of being judged by works.
I'm still pretty sure I don't get all of this. It's hard for me as a Protestant, having grown up with the manifesto of "saved by grace through faith and not by works," to wrap my head around a different idea of salvation and judgment and works and grace. (Maybe this is part of what people refer to when they say "post-Protestant.")
However, this seems true to me, and it seems like it is a missing puzzle piece to make sense of the various pieces of the New Testament which have always seemed in tension to me. I'm still trying to figure this out, but I wanted to share with you an idea that is shaking up my theological world, possibly shaking me into a more Biblical theology. I look forward to your comments.

Book Reviews

Here are two quick book reviews.
1. Culture Smart! Korea - by James Hoare. The subtitle is a fair summary of the book: "a quick guide to customs and etiquette." It really is quick. I read it in 1-2 days. I guess this would be a good book for someone brand new to Korea. For me, having lived here 5 years, there was only the occasional new insight (and a few things I thought weren't true). However, I also found a few healthy reminders of the Korean way of thinking and doing. Several times when I read, I thought, "Oh, yes, that's why I have trouble with Korean culture at that point. I often forget that." Also, this book has a nice but brief overview of modern Korean history which is a good review or a good introduction for newcomers. I would recommend it, but it's not profound, so 4js. jjjj.
2. Treasure Island - by Robert Louis Stevenson. This book is also not profound, but it is profoundly entertaining. It was difficult for me to stop reading even late into the night. The action never stops! The characters are well developed, and the action sequences (while not always fully credible) are entrancing. Also, the fate of the pirates in the book serves as a portrait of antinomianism (or anything goes ethics). The pirate language, swashbuckling, and the infamous Long John Silver make for a pretty cool read. I highly recommend this book for someone who wants a quick, fun read. There is a reason this is a classic! 5Js. JJJJJ.

Funeral

How do I lead
where I don't want to go?
How do I walk
a trial I'd rather not know?
How do I help
people hurt a good hurt?
How do I speak
broken heart to broken heart?
How do I pray
words I'd rather not say?
How do I plan
when I'd rather skip that day?




March 18, 2009

So-Young

So-Young

so young

cut down

cut down

like a tree

like a tree

in her prime

not fair

not free

cut down

cut down

so young

So-Young

March 18, 2009

Spring

Violet starbursts dotting the forest air
Purple prisoners breaking free from their frames
Wee white wobblers winking and twinkling
Young yellow ladies dancing on strings
Yellow-green moles burrowing out from brown dens
Two-tone magnolias daring nature's nature
Emerald foot soldiers assembling their ranks
Posses of pink blazing like Moses' miracle bush
Fireballs of orange rising like the morning sun
Blue little bandits blinking with light
Wise white-haired prophets whiling the time
Ruby-red raindrops rising with vigor
All meeting
Slender green sentries keeping life's long winter watch.

SoYoung Update

Yesterday, the hospice called me and asked me to come out to visit SoYoung. (I go every day now anyway, but they wanted me to come out in the morning.) She is now mostly in a semi-coma state. She's not really awake and not really asleep - moving her arms and legs restlessly. She won't keep an IV in her arm, so the strongest pain medicine is not available.
She has occasional moments of apparent lucidity. I saw her shake her head "no" to a question from her mother, and she sometimes wakes enough to take some water. However, most of the time, she seems to be only dimly aware of others.
The doctors at the hospice estimate that she has only a few more days to live. Please pray for SoYoung, her family (especially her mom, who is with her almost 24 hours a day), and us her church.

Miracle Visa Story

Perhaps this is a bit overstated, but I feel like I've experienced a small miracle. Let me explain.
In the Korean immigration system, there are three steps to obtaining a visa. 1) The employer makes the official application at an immigration office in Korea. 2) The immigration office sends the employer an "approval number," similar to a confirmation number when you make an airline reservation. 3) The prospective immigrant (like me) takes that approval number to a Korean embassy (outside Korea) and files for the actual visa which goes in the passport.
The immigration office said that the time between step 1 and step 2 could be anywhere from 3 to 14 days. We heard through the grapevine that the average wait is 5 days. I left Korea on day 9 because my old English teacher's visa was expiring the next day. Every day in the Philippines I anxiously awaited my approval number. I checked my email several times a day. I asked Sarah to call the Nazarene district office. Nothing, nothing, nothing.
Suddenly, on day 13, Thursday, my friend Chul-Hwan, the business manager at the district office, called me in the Philippines to tell me that the approval number had arrived! I was extremely excited, but I also started making plans to delay my flight. The normal wait for step 3 (getting the actual visa) is 3 business days. That would mean 5 days for me, since the weekend was coming.
Sarah, however, strongly encouraged me to ask for an exception.
Timothy Kim, a Korean missionary in the Philippines, called the embassy and asked for an exception. The embassy said that I was out of luck, that they don't make exceptions - 3 days, no ifs, ands, or buts.
Sarah, insisted that I keep trying.
Timothy sent a Korean student at APNTS with me to the embassy on Friday morning. Because I was there with a Korean citizen, I was able to skip to the front of the line (passing about 30 other people).
We talked to one worker, and she sent us to another. I asked for an expidited visa process, but she said it would take 3 days - just like everyone else.
I explained that one of my church members is extremely ill and in a hospice, and that I needed to get home immediately. She said that someone would have to work through their lunch break to help me.
I said that if no one helped me I would loose my ticket, and I might get home too late to be there for my friend. She reluctantly said they could give it to me in the afternoon.
I said that my plane left in the afternoon, and that I couldn't make it to the airport in time to make my flight unless they gave me the ticket in the morning. She put my passport on the shelf and told me to sit down.
I didn't know what was happening. I thought I was probably waiting to speak to the consulate - someone who actually had the authority to make exceptions like this. The thought also occured to me that she might just be putting me to the side to get me out of her hair.
After about 10 minutes, the security guard called my name and gave me my passport, telling me to check to make sure everything was correct. I opened my passport, and there inside was my Korean D-6 religious worker visa!! (This photo is not actually my visa, but it looks pretty much like this.)
I was shocked. I couldn't believe it was real. I anxiously checked all the information, and said "Thank you" about a dozen times.
Then, I got out my money to pay. (By the way Americans have to pay twice as much as people from other countries, and it was the same in Tanzania.) I showed my money to the attendant, and she said, "What you didn't pay?!" I said, "You never asked me to pay."
Then, I paid and found my friends and said, "I got it. Let's get out of here." I was kind of afraid they would stop me at the door and say there was some mistake, that I couldn't actually have the visa afterall. (Irrational I know, but still that's how I felt.)
I was only in the embassy for less than 30 minutes. The process that should have taken 5 days took less than half an hour!
I couldn't believe it. As we were driving to the airport (to catch my flight which left in 5 hours), I opened my passport about 5 times just to stare in awe at my new visa.
I made it back to Korea late Friday night (too late to catch a bus to Cheonan). Sarah met me at the airport, and we came back to Cheonan Saturday morning.
I have my visa. I'm now a registered religious worker in Korea!
Thanks be to God!

Visa Approved!!!

Thanks for your prayers everyone. My visa was approved today.
But now, I have to get the actual visa. So far, I only have a visa approval number. Tomorrow I will go to the Korean Embassy with a Korean student here at APNTS, and we will ask for an exception to give me the visa immediately (instead of the standard 2 day waiting period). This will help me to get back home as soon as possible in case I am needed for SoYoung. Please pray that God will work a miracle and make all of the people with whom we speak gracious and helpful.
If I have to wait the standard period, it looks like I'll come home late Tuesday night or sometime on Wednesday.

Wednesday in Manila

I didn't actually get the camera out today. I got slowed down by a wrong turn on my way to the grocery store. Then, I spent the rest of the day in a long series of spontaneous but very productive meetings.
So here are a few pics of the campus that I lifted from google.


The white building is the chapel building - kind of like an old fashioned campground tabernacle - no AC, just screened windows and fans. It was hot but OK.

The big brown building is APNTS's newest building, and it is unfinished. The first floor and the basement are finished, and as I understand it, they are waiting on work and witness teams to finish the rest of the building - part of which will include a much expanded library.




One of my meetings today was with the director of World Missions Communication - Asia Pacific. Check out their services provided and the portfolio. Because they are located in the Philippines, set up house at APNTS, and get some subsidies from the Church of the Nazarene, they can do excellent stuff at low prices. Part of their mission is to serve churches on the Asia Pacific region to help them become more effective in ministry through better media. I am excited about meeting them. I'm already starting to assemble a wish list of how they can help our church.

I also had two other interesting meetings.
One was with a Philippino couple who will be coming to Seoul this summer to work with a Nazarene church there. They will teach in the church's kindergarten and lead an English worship service.
Another was with the director of the Asia-Pacific Resource Center, also on the campus of APNTS. This organization is working on establish some outsourcing systems within the Nazarene community. For example, I am typing this from within a call center for Nazarene Child Sponsorship. Pretty cool!

Quick Reviews

On the plane down, I finished Thomas Hardy's Return of the Native. It started out pretty slow, so slow, in fact, that Sarah and I gave up reading it aloud. However, the action got started in earnest after a few chapters. There was plenty of drama as the book progressed. Basically, it's a story about rash choices and their consequences, wrongs and reconciliation, patience and shrewdness. It was almost like reading poetry at times, but it was a bit too heavy with allusions to ancient literature. Overall, a very good read: jjjj.

A few months ago, I started The Art of Leadership, by Max DePree, a book recommended in one of my seminary classes. I loved it. Once I told Sarah, "I have never read a book that so clearly explains my own philosophy of leadership." I should add that I want to lead like this, but I often miss the mark.
The book is a bit rambling at times, but I guess leadership is too. I highly recommend it for anyone who wants to lead (especially for those who are beginning to learn that leadership is all about relationships with people). Very, very good: JJJJJ.

Tuesday in Manila

Last night I finally got a full night of sleep, but I'm still feeling a little drowsy - probably due to the lack of coffee. (There are two coffee makers in my apartment, but both are broken. Each is missing different parts, and they aren't interchangable! Argh!)

I went for a walk this morning around campus - several times around actually. APNTS is built on a hill, or on two hills, so there are lots of stairs. That makes for good exercise, and I enjoyed looking at all of the flowers and vegitation. On the backside of campus there is a great view of the neighboring community. Maybe I can take some pictures tomorrow.

I went to faculty chapel at 10:30, and we listened to the graduates share testimonies of their time at APNTS. That was cool. The music was much more traditional than I expected, slow hymns.
Then, I exchanged some money and tried to round up transportation to my afternoon appointment at Faith Academy. At lunch time, I learned that Timothy Kim (Korean missionary to the Philippines would be going at the same time, so he gave me a ride.) At Faith Academy, I talked with the guidance counselor about KNU's Owens International College. He was very kind, and he said he might try to set up a meeting with some of the Korean parents.
Entering Faith Academy was kind of like entering a military compound. There were 2-3 layers of security checks on the way in. (Also we got frisked going into the mall last night.) I guess that makes sense in a country where terrorism is an ever present threat. Faith Academy is an interesting story. It is a Christian private high school, almost exclusively for missionary kids. They just upped their cap to 15% non-missionary kids. They ahve 500 students, over 50% in the high school. It was very surprising to me to see this many missionaries in one place. I've never been anywhere with such a high concentration of missionaries. (That makes me think twice about doing a long-term partnership here. Maybe our help is needed more somewhere else.) The school was pretty big, with several basketball courts, a few soccer fields, a swimming pool, and a large auditorium (paid for with a 1 million dollar donation from a Korean-American church). The students come from all over the world, but mostly North America, Korea, and the Philippines. It seems like an incredible ministry. All of the teachers (and maybe staff) are volunteers - raising their own support. As an almost-missionary, I can say with definity that an international school is a great service to missionaries.

After my meeting, I continued reading my current book - Brian McClaren's The Last Word, and the One After That. Most of the people here are very busy, so I'm trying to spend my down time reading some of the books that had been piling up on my shelf in the office. I made a vow last fall that I would not buy any more books until I had read all of the books I have already purchased. (I have almost kept that vow, but I bought two books this spring. I'm still holding to the fast, though.)

Tonight, Dr. JungHo Lee, a KNU professor on sabbatical at APNTS, has invited me to his house again. I look forward to the company. It is interesting feeling a little lonely in a place full of activity. I expect that this is how many of our new people in Cheonan feel, especially on the campus of KNU. Maybe this experience will make me a little more eager to show hospitality with more intentionality.

In Manila, at APNTS

I arrived in Manila early this morning at about 12:30am, and I was unpacking less than an hour later. Trafic is really light in the middle of the night!
I am staying in a good sized one bedroom apartment on the campus of Asia-Pacific Nazarene Theological Seminary. I went to faculty chapel today (more of a morning Bible study), and I discovered that I already knew four or five people. The Nazarene world really is small!
Today, I don't know what my schedule will be exactly. Dr. Lee (a KNU prof on sabbatical) has invited me to his apartment for lunch, so I will do that.
Tomorrow, I have an appointment with a high school guidance counselor to recruit students for Owens International College at KNU), but I think that I'll probably spend the afternoon reading and/or getting to know the campus.

Please pray that my visa approval will come soon!

Paul and Hoom's Baby

Here are the happy parents and baby Samuel. Emma and Sarah are looking on. In Korea, even the parents have restricted viewing time for their baby. At the time of this picture, Hoom had only held her baby one time - right after giving birth!

And here's a close up of the little dude.

The details:

Jeong TaeHyun (aka - Samuel)

3.36 kg.

Born: Friday March 20, 2009, 7:01pm

Going to Manila

This Sunday evening I'll fly out for the Philippines. One of Korea's odd rules is that if you want to change your visa status, you have to leave the country. I'm changing from an English teacher's visa to a religious worker's visa. (Hopefully! Please, God, please!)
I'm not sure exactly how long I'll have to be gone. Right now, my return is booked for Friday, March 27. If everything goes smoothly, then that should be no problem. But, if the approval process takes longer than normal, then I might have to stay in the Philippines for a few extra days (or weeks).
I'll be staying on the campus of Asia-Pacific Nazarene Theological Seminary, in Tay Tay, just outside Manila. I'm excited about that. I've heard a lot about it, and I've been wanting to visit for a long time. Sometime in the distant future, I think it would be great to teach there. In the meantime, I look forward to meeting the Nazarene leaders in that part of the world. Maybe we'll be able to talk about some options for a long-term partnership for our church.
Also, I'll spend some afternoons recruiting students for Owens International College, a new department here at KNU that offers 100% of its classes in English. I'm excited about the potential of OIC, and I'm excited to be able to offer KNU some practical help.

Unfortunately, Sarah and Emma won't be able to join me for the weekend like we originally planned. The timing just didn't work out. We were all really looking forward to spending some time on the beach together. Next time, next time.

Afternoon of Poetry

Yesterday, I spent several hours on the roof of KNU's JungNamSoo Building. It was a warm, windy, cloudy day. I was melancholy, thinking about SoYoung. The flat roof was lonely and quiet and full of dust, the residue of rain puddles. When I looked at the dust of those dried up puddles, something connected with how I felt, and I began to write.
I used to write lots of poetry, mostly in college. I wrote about love and girlfriends or unrequited love, mostly, but I also wrote about God and life and other stuff. I don't write much any more. I usually write only when I have some deep emotional experience, and going through all of this with SoYoung is moving me deeply.
Listed below are four poems I wrote yesterday. They may not be on the level of Longfellow or Poe, but they are genuinely mine, so I thought I'd share them. I also wrote two more poems which I might post later.
Also, I should say that I wasn't fully as sad as all of this sounds, but I felt a sadness in this direction. Often, it feels good to give full dramatic vent to my emotions, even if the expression is overstated.

"Residue"

The residue resonates
within me
water long gone
swirls of dust
drug from deserts
mined by the wind
caught by the clouds
wrapped in rain
pooled into puddles
left to dry
swirls of dust
water long gone
within me
The residue resonates

"Mixed"

Fleeting, fleeting,

Life is fleeting.

Bitter, bitter,

death is bitter.

Life and death,

death and Life,

Ever mixed

Together.

Joyful, joyful,

Life is joyful.

Mournful, mournful,

death is mournful.

Life and death,

death and Life,

Ever mixed

Together.

Passing, passing,

death is passing.

Lasting, lasting,

Life is lasting.

Life and death,

death and Life,

Ever mixed

Together.

"Eziekiel's Field"

Breathe
Breathe on me
Dry bones walking
Dry bones sitting
My scattered heart
Across Ezekiel's field.


Breathe
Breathe on me
Dry bones searching
Dry bones waiting
Gather my pieces
From Ezekiel's field.


Breathe
Breathe on me
Dry bones mending
Dry bones forming
Make me whole again
On Ezekiel's field

Breathe, Breathe
Breathe on me, Lord.


March 18, 2009


(I imagined this as a lament, sung quietly with a guitar. The “Breathe, breathe on me” parts could be repeated and varied.)

"Let It Be"

Let it be.

It is.

What is

already is.

It cannot

not be.

It is.

It already is.

Let it be.

{I am not a fatalist. Anyone who knows me knows I am a raging optimist. However, some things simply cannot be changed, and sometimes the best thing to do is to stop and let it be.}

Night - Elie Wiesel

This is a short but intensely powerful book.
As a young teen, Elie Wiesel was crowded into a Romanian Ghetto with his family and neighbors. Later, his entire family was taken by train to the concentration camps. He was separated from his mother and sisters and spent years trying to survive starvation, beatings, disease, and random killings with his father.
Night tells the haunting story of how his life and faith and hope were mauled by the beast of human cruelty. Great clouds cemented in his soul blocking out the sun from his heart. He was stripped of meaning even as he was stripped of his clothes for the full-body shave and de-licing.

As an interesting aside, I read this in close conjunction with other works that despaired of meaning - such as Ernest Hemingway's short stories and several movies. It seems that great suffering and great wealth often lead us to the same end - meaningless existence.
For anyone who has never read a personal account of the Holocaust, I would highly recommend this book. I only wish it was longer. Perhaps this was all Wiesel could stomach to retrieve from those dark places of his memory.
The Josh rating: jjjj.

Psalm 19 - Prayers to Connect Us with God

Read Psalm 19.

“God of wonders, beyond our galaxy, You are holy, holy. The universe declares your majesty. You are holy, holy.”¹

The first six verses of Psalm 19 use a very ordinary, generic name for God: El. El was the ancient all-purpose word for God. El was the word you used when you looked up and thought, “Wow! There must be Something Great up there or out there that made all this.” The “Something Great up there or out there” was El or God.

In his book Blue Like Jazz, Donald Miller tells the story of when he went on a long road-trip to find God and to find himself. He says he found God at the Grand Canyon. He was tired and hurting from a long day of hiking, and they camped beside a river.

I was in a lot of pain from the hike, so I was in no mood to mess around. There was no trying to impress Him, no speaking the right words. I simply began to pray and talk to God the way a child might talk to his father.

Beneath the billion stars and beside the river, I called out to God softly.

“Hello?” ...

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Prayers for Guidance - Psalm 25

Imagine a story with me. Somehow your friends convince you to take a once-in-a-lifetime trip. After three planes, an old pick up, and a sputtering boat, you are in the heart of the Amazon Jungle.

Your guide leads your group into the thick forest. For the first two days, you walk along in awe as your guide points out the various kinds of plant and animal life. On the third day, you are walking at the end of the line. You see a Bird of Paradise, a rare and beautiful bird. When you take out your camera to take a picture, your backpack comes unzipped, and everything spills out onto the muddy trail.

By the time you get everything cleaned off and back into your backpack, the Bird of Paradise has floated off into Paradise, and you are alone on your jungle trail. You can't see the rest of your group anywhere.

You run ahead to try to catch up, maybe a little too fast. Suddenly the trail just disappears. There is a hint of a trail to your right, so you try that, but no luck. You tumble 20 meters down the side of a hill. Now you’re standing in the middle of the jungle with no trail and no people in sight, and you’re not even sure where you left the trail. You scream, “HELP!!” But the only thing that answers is a little monkey in a nearby tree, and you're pretty sure he's just laughing.

You search desperately in a hundred different directions trying to regain the trail, but eventually you must face the bitter truth. You are lost. Hopelessly lost. It's just you and the wild animals and the jungle.

Max Lucado says that life is a jungle. ...


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The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway

I'll continue the catch-up reviews for a while. A few months ago I finished a monumental journey through The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway, some 650 pages.
It was a bittersweet experience. Hemingway's writing is both depressing and entrancing. It's like watching a car accident. You want to look away, but it's so powerful that you can't pull your eyes away. He writes so well that I continued reading even though the topics were continually disappointing.
After a while, I sometimes commented to Sarah, "Well, at least no one died in this story." Almost every story is fraught with death and angst. Someone is either dying or getting royally screwed over. The cumulative message of the stories seems to be: "Life generally sucks, so you might as well get some pleasure out of it if you can, but be prepared for that to turn out backfire as well."

Nonetheless, he is a great story teller, and I enjoyed the stories on that level. He is a master of irony and character building. I'll give it a good 3j's - lower on the enjoyment level, but higher on the appreciation level. jjj.

Economic and Spiritual Reform

"Prosperity is when people buy things they can't afford; recession is when they stop doing it."
- H. E. Martz, The Wall Street Journal, 1963.

"There is something about the possession of wealth which is not good for the soul, perhaps. It places artificial value on secondary things. A man losing a million metal tokens will put a revolver to his temple and pull the trigger. But he has lost nothing but money. He has deprived himself of life because misfortune has deprived him of luxuries."
- Clarence Budington Kelland, The American Magazine, 1930.

"The economics of installment selling [buying on credit] is far worse even than at first it seems... Installment buying, as a habit, is enervating [weakening] to character because it leads straight to serfdom [similar to slavery]. If anything is un-American [or I would add, un-Christian], surely that is!
- J. George Frederick, The Independent, 1926.

"In a forum at Washington National Cathedral, historian Thomas Cahill said that because of his Christian faith, he believed there might be a silver lining to the dark cloud of financial crisis hovering over all of us. He said this might be an opportunity for the people of our nation [and world] to discover that they are more than shoppers."
- James P. Wind, Congregations, 2009.

The surest path out of this economic recession is the long slow path of teaching ourselves and our neighbors the basic virtues of patience, planning, compassion, courage, and discipline along with the fundamental growth skills of innovation, collaboration, and foresight. We have placed ourselves in a hole dug by our own foolishness, and we can only escape it in any lasting way by learning true wisdom. There are no quick-fixes.
- me

Emma's Preschool Play

Here is one presentation from Emma's annual preschool event.
The video is a little raw but we hope you enjoy the cutest peacock around.

Vertigo - #9 AFI Best Movie of All Time

Sarah and I are continuing our treck through the AFI's 100 Best Movies of All Time. This is an Alfred Hitchcock movie, and the best thing I can say about it is that it was classically wierd.
The main character (Jimmy Stewart - same as It's a Wonderful Life) has a trauma induced case of vertigo (loss of balance), and this is symbolic of the whole movie. The whole movie is designed to give the viewer a similar sense of psychological vertigo. You don't know which end is up or what is really happening. The whole movie ends in a similar super-wierd manner.
Neither Sarah and I cared for it all that much. I'm inclined to give it 3j's just because it's a classic, but I think it's really only worth 2j's. (After all, this is only my rating of how I feel about the movie.) So, jj it is.

Silas Marner Review

Over the winter, Sarah and I read what turned out to be a perfect winter book and a great book for reading aloud. Silas Marner was written by Mary Anne Evans in 1861, but she published it under the pen name of George Elliot "to make sure her works were taken seriously."
Silas Marner is a man who was wronged by his friends and by his religion. He retreats into his work (weaving) and becomes a shell of a man, hording his meager income and avoiding all contact with others if at all possible.
His life is completely changed when he adopts an orphaned child who wanders into his cottage. She opens him to life again, and she even helps him reconnect with God and with his community.
Silas Marner is a beautiful little story about the meaning of life, redemption, and community. There are also several interesting sideplots which contribute greatly to the story.
I give this book a strong 4j's: jjjj.

No Home Phone

FYI: We moved about two weeks ago. We decided not to keep our home phone number. Instead, we got Sarah a cell phone. The cell was free and the monthly fee was only a little more. If you need her number (or mine), comment, and I'll email the numbers to you.

The West Wing - Season 5

This review is way, way overdue, but here it is nonetheless.
Sarah and I loved seasons 1-4 of The West Wing. Season 4 "jumped the shark" with how it tried to pack too much into the last few episodes, but we decided to go ahead and watch Season 5 (especially since my Mom gave it to me for my birthday).
We still enjoyed it, but the writing and drama just wasn't as good or as crisp as the first four seasons. The creator, Arron Sorkin, left at the end of season 4, and it really showed. We might someday watch seasons 6 and 7, but we're definitely not buying the sets.
So The West Wing Season 5 gets a disappointing 3 js. (jjj)

Prayers of Trust in Hard Times (Psalm 13)

Psalm 13:
¹ O Lord, how long will you forget me? Forever?
How long will you look the other way?
² How long must I struggle with anguish in my soul,
with sorrow in my heart every day?
How long will my enemy have the upper hand?

³ Turn and answer me, O Lord my God!
Restore the sparkle to my eyes, or I will die.
⁴ Don’t let my enemies gloat, saying, “We have defeated him!”
Don’t let them rejoice at my downfall.

⁵ But I trust in your unfailing love.
I will rejoice because you have rescued me.
⁶ I will sing to the Lord
because he is good to me.

Watch this clip from the movie Bruce Almighty: (skip to 4:28, and then watch to 1:30 on the next part).

God is not weak. God is not afraid of us. God is not emotionally challenged. God is not a temperamental ruler that we have to suck up to.

God is GOD. God is the Supreme Ruler of the Universe. God is the great I AM. God is the Almighty, the Unshakable, the Unstopable. God is the Creator and the Sustainer of everything that is.

God can handle us. God can handle our complaints. God can handle our anger, our sadness, our outrage, our doubts, our fears, our feelings – all of our feelings. ...

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Dog Sitting

Our friend Beverly had to make a "visa run" to Japan. Korea has this crazy rule that you can't change your visa status in Korea. If you change employers, you have to leave the country to get your new visa. I may have to do this in a few weeks as well.
Anyway, Beverly has a dog - Sally. Sally is one of the best behaved dogs I've ever known. We gladly volunteered to dog sit because Emma loves dogs.
Ever since Sally came to our house, Emma has had a one track mind. She doesn't want to do anything unless Sally can do it with her. She cried her way out of going to DaeJeon with me today. (Usually, she jumps at the chance to do something unusual with Daddy.) Then she turned down going to Block-I (a lego center) with a friend. And this was all because she preferred to stay home with Sally.
If Nana doesn't come to Korea and rescue us by getting a dog, this little girl just might get a dog for her birthday! (But don't you dare tell her I said that!)

Fast and Slow - Intro to Lent 2009

KNU International English Church

Josh Broward

February 22, 2009

Deuteronomy 8:1-18
1 Peter 5:5-11
Mark 1:21-39

The season of Lent is 40 days. 40 days of praying and fasting. 40 days of remembering and repenting. 40 days to repair and to refocus.

40 is an important number in the Bible.

In Genesis 7, after God told Noah to build an ark, he sent rains for 40 days and 40 nights. I don't really get the flood and why God did it, but I understand this. The world was going all wrong, and God used this “retreat” to purify humanity and to make a fresh start in the world.

In Exodus, two times God called Moses up to the mountain top for a 40 day spiritual retreat (Exodus 24:18 and 34:28). When Moses left the mountain, he had the 10 commandments and the covenant from God.

After being set free from Egypt, God called the people of Israel to wander in the desert for 40 years. He “humbled” them and “tested” them in the wilderness before he led them to the Promised Land. God brought them out of Egypt, but it took 40 years for him to get Egypt out of them. ...

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SoYoung Update

I just visited SoYoung at her hospice room. She is feeling much better than she was on Monday. She has stronger pain killers and sleeping medication, and both of those help a lot. She had more energy and an upbeat spirit. However, after about 20 minutes, she got very tired and laid down and could hardly keep her eyes open. Elena and Brett had just been to visit before me, so she had too many visitors in a row.
On the downside, she has some swelling on her abdomen from water retention. However, she is taking some medicine which will hopefully relieve that.

In a few minutes, we several people are gathering in Anne Cave's office to pray for SoYoung. Wherever you are, whenever you read this, please pray for SoYoung and her family.

Empty InBox

Ahh, an empty in-box. This is a rare experience for me. I just thought I'd share this momentous occasion with my friends. Reaching this point has been on my to-do list for weeks, and I've finally made it.
Now, if all of you will kindly comment, you can fill it up again.

Cancer

Within the past few weeks, I have begun to hate cancer.
One of our key church members, SoYoung Gu, was diagnosed with terminal liver cancer. One week after she was diagnosed, she was admitted into a hospice. Liver cancer moves fast, and hers was already spreading. There is no medical cure available. SoYoung is two weeks older than me.
SoYoung is many things to us. She is our friend and "sister." She was one of the team members for our mission trip to Tanzania this summer. Until she got sick, she was a regular member of our music team, a member of the church Advisory Council (board), and Brett and Emma's piano teacher. She is a woman of many talents and interests: piano, violin, cooking, crafts, language. She always has a beautiful smile to share - even now.
Sarah and I have experienced her illness with deep personal pain. We have been to visit her almost every day since she found out. Her pain is increasing now, and sleep is difficult. Starting soon, we will need to limit visitors from our church, so that she can get rest.
We talked about it in church yesterday for the first time. (SoYoung wanted a little bit of time to talk to people individually.) SoYoung wanted to participate in the worship service and to play piano one more time, but her health has decreased so rapidly that she was unable to come. We spent about 10 minutes praying for her at the end of the worship service.
Now we are beginning to think of ways our church can express our love for SoYoung. Some floating ideas: setting out a crafts table near the snack area so people can make cards for her, helping people send her video greetings, videoing Brett and Emma playing a few songs, establishing a memorial scholarship fund. (By the way, if anyone here would like to help with these, or if you have other ideas, please let me know. We need to start implementing these ideas this Sunday.)

Within the same week that we found out about SoYoung, I also found out that two other church members had pending tests for cancer and that my aunt's cancer is gaining strength again. I was greatly relieved to find out that both of the other two church member's tests came back negative - no cancer for them!

In a confluence of events, we have also had several positive events in our church: a marriage, a birth, a new pregnancy, anniversaries, birthdays, and graduation. It feels so strange to move from SoYoung's bedside to buy Valentine's Day flowers or to go swimming. But somehow these celebrations help with the mourning.

Honestly, I don't know how to pastor well during this time. All I know to do is to encourage people to be open and honest with God and each other about our feelings. This brings us face to face with mystery and unknown and pain, yet one of my deepest prayers is that we will find God in the mystery and unknown and pain. I pray that our community will grow together and grow toward God, not away. This is irrefutable evidence of our mortality. Life is an uncertain gift. Maybe this experience will help us all to live with more gusto and faithfulness.
I don't believe SoYoung is dying for this reason (to strengthen our church and to help us live more faithfully). Actually, I don't believe there is any good reason SoYoung is dying. I don't believe "everything happens for a reason." I don't believe that God has "called her home" or that God is up there in the sky pulling cosmic strings arranging the time of our deaths.
I believe that this cancer and all cancer is junk. It is just part of this broken, messed up (yet still beautiful) world. I don't believe God causes cancer or earthquakes or AIDS or any other disaster or illness. I believe that crap happens, and God hates it just as much as we do. The problems of this world are shrouded in mystery. They are things too great for us to know. Sometimes, some of the mysteries are lessened through science or reason, but they are mysteries still.
I believe that God is with us no matter what happens. I believe that God loves us no matter what happens. I believe that God can bring good out of almost any circumstance. I believe that God is always working for healing or restoration.
But I also believe that sometimes, it's just time to die, time to die with grace and peace. So far, I have not said anything in the worship service about SoYoung dying. She and I have talked about dying well, and I've talked about it individually and in small groups. Maybe I'll talk about it this week as we prepare for Lent, for Lent is -at least in part - a season about our mortality.
SoYoung is at peace with death. Unless God works a miracle, she will die fairly soon. She accepts that and is facing it with courage. She welcomes a miracle, but she knows she can't cause one or work one up simply by her effort. Death is. Death comes to us all. Usually, we cannot choose the time or the place or the manner of death, but it comes. As for me, I feel like the best thing we can do for now is to show SoYoung our love and care and to support her as she gives all her energy to these last few steps of her journey.
For any readers out there, I would appreciate your prayers for SoYoung and her family, for our church, and for me as I try to be a faithful pastor and friend.

Family Series 6: Hospitality

Today, we finish our series on family life by talking about hospitality. I want to start by telling you of some of the greatest hospitality I've ever experienced.

When I was a university student, I went on a six week mission trip to Papua New Guinea. I experienced hospitality like I had never heard of or even dreamed of. We were a team of 6 college students from the USA. We spent the summer visiting remote churches in the mountains and swamps of Papua New Guinea. Sometimes, we were the first white people to ever visit these churches. We traveled by plane, by boat, by bus, by truck, and by foot – sometimes all in the same week.

I remember when we arrived at one church. As we began unloading from the van, the little old ladies (all the ajumas and halmonies) from around the village were so excited that they gathered in the front yard of the church and started screaming (Aaaaiiieeeeee!!!) and waving their hands like they were dying of heat exhaustion. Then, they started coming toward us. We put out our hands to greet them with a handshake American style, but they bypassed our hands and hugged us with their heads in our armpits – still screaming and waving their hands. But once they really got to hugging us, many of the little old ladies would grab our bottoms – not just a pat, mind you, I'm talking about getting a handful and squeezing! Then, they would maybe bounce a little and stand up and start waving their hands and screaming again (Aaaiiiieeeee!!!). Many of them had tears in their eyes. When we got back to little house behind the church, we started comparing notes. “Did that old lady goose you?” “Yep.” “Hey, man, they all goosed me!”

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Family Series 5: Finances

It's time for our next installment of Cajun jokes. One day Boudreaux and Tibedeaux were sitting around complaining about how they never had no money. Boudreaux, he say, “Bra, I'm so broke, my girlfriend and I got married just so we could get the rice they would throw.”

Tibedeaux, he say, “Well, I'm so broke the bank called me yesterday, and they asked for their calendar back.”

Boudreaux, he got another one: “I'm so broke I had to make monthly payments on a Big Mac set at McDonald's.”

Tibedeaux come right back: “Keaw, I'm so broke I was walking down the street with one shoe. They say to me, 'Hey Tib, you lost a shoe!' But I say back, 'No bra, I found one!'”

Boudreax he think hard, and he say one more: “Tib you know that chicken place, KFC, where they say that chicken's finger licking good. Well, I so broke I go there to lick other people's fingers!”

Tibedeaux say, “Yeah, man, you're broke!”

Half of all married couples fight about money. In one survey in the USA, 57% of divorced couples said that money problems were the biggest reason they split up. Parents are the single greatest influence on a child's future financial success. If the parents manage money well, and if they involve their children in that process, then the kids are much more likely to become good money managers. Finances are the highest rank cause of stress in survey after survey.

Money is a big deal for families. ...

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Email Catch-Up

This week, I have two priorities.
1) I need to write the fifth installment of our sermon series on family. This week's topic is finances. This sermon should be fairly easy, since I preached a whole series on finances about two years ago.
2) I want to catch up on my emails. Ever since Christmas, I've been desperately behind on my emails - usually about 80 in my in box. Yesterday, I crossed a milestone. All of my in box could fit onto one screen page! Today, I'm continuing to whittle away at it, and I'm already down to 25. I'm still replying to emails from 10 days ago, though.
When I get all caught up on my emails, I'll finally feel like I'm ready to start the regular full-time pastoring schedule. With Christmas, Solar New Year, English Camp, Lunar New Year, and a little extra time with my Mom, I've really struggled just to draw even. But I'm seeing the light at the end of the tunnel!

Korea Tip 98: Baths and Pots in Icheon

This week, we did a little alternative vacationing. I worked Tuesday (instead of taking the red-letter Lunar New Year holiday). Then, on Wednesday, I took half a day off, and we all headed out to Icheon for a little overnight tourism. Our friends Adam and Elisa introduced us to this little gem, and we followed the same pattern this time.

We arrived in the afternoon, and after securing nice little two rooms in a "Love Motel," (which just means a walk in motel), we enjoyed a nice supper of galbi and an evening at Spa Plus, one of the best bath houses in Korea. it also has a water park attached, but we've always been content with the bath house part. This time, for all of us, our favorite part was sitting in the hot tubs outside while breathing in the cool winter air. I also enjoyed the steam bath. The steam got so thick that I couldn't see the other side of the room.

In the morning, we had a leisurely breakfast at Paris Baguette Cafe, and we taxied over to the Icheon Pottery Village. This is one of the coolest places in Korea, in my humble opinion. There is shop after shop after shop with all sorts of locally made pottery. We really, really enjoyed ourselves.

Sarah and Mom both had birthday cash to spend. Sarah got a nice, round white vase with muted leaves. Mom got a blue/green pot for a house plant. We saw lots of stuff we loved but couldn't (or didn't want to) afford. We also got some cute little gifts for other folks.

Icheon is about 2 hours away by bus. If you wanted to go on a day trip, it would be a very full day trip (maybe not so bad if you don't have kids). If you spend the night, it turns out to be pretty relaxing (except that I was always worried that one of us would trip and knock over a table full of thousands of dollars worth of pottery!). All in all, it was a great little trip.