Yonsei University Church

2020. 11. 22

Mission from the Margins

Ezekiel 34:11-16, Ephesians 1:18-23, Matthew 25:35-40

At the time of Jesus, Israel was in despair. The country was under Roman rule, and the people were suffering from Herod's tyranny. Young people were worried about their future. Most people had a painful day to live on, and the disease was raging. In this situation, five kinds of Jewish sects competed against each other as alternatives to Israel's recovery and reform.

First, there were Pharisees. They executed God's prophets as long as they could keep the temple's religious power. They forced those who had to worry about a day's meals and forced them to keep the provisions of the law that couldn't be kept, and they called it a real reform of the faith. And only those who could keep it monopolized the position of priests. Jesus, who shakes the foundations of that legal system, was treated as an unforgivable sinner who committed blasphemy.

Second, there were Sadducees. They discarded religious beliefs, such as the doctrine of the Resurrection as long as they could keep the power of the world. Despite being religious leaders, they were not interested in the spiritual world. Dominated 70% of the Sanhedrin Council and focused solely on politics. Their science of reinterpreting the law was used solely for success. To them, Jesus was nothing more than an unripe idealism, not knowing the reason and reality of the world.

Thirdly, there were members of the Zealot party. They believed that only they worked for the justice of the world. They encouraged the armed struggle for the revolution and did not hesitate to terrorism. As they became accustomed to violence, they lost their humanity and became a defense force disguised as progress that forced old theories. Like Judas Iscariot, they said they were for the weak, but they were Pharisees with no progressive ideology to practice in their daily lives. They saw Jesus as a revolutionary traitor.

Fourth, there was the Essenes. The world was hopeless, a place to rot and ruin. They went into a cave in the desert to escape judgment. They didn't know what's going on in the world, and they were only concerned about believing in God, so it was enough to go to heaven. To put it more nobly, they believed that sanctification through spiritual practice came first, and that only that spiritual power could correct the world. So they locked the door from the world and developed autistic faith. To them, Jesus seemed to be still spiritually inexperienced and to be an unripe leader who emphasized only the social aspect of faith.

Finally there was Jesus of Nazareth and his followers. He saw himself as a very small one. He said that the poor man's face is his own. He abandoned the throne in heaven, came under our feet, served us to death, and saved us at the cost of his life. And he calls us to go along the way. He tells us that the intense love that values the very little one more than the world can save the world.

John 5 tells the story of Jesus healing a man who had been invalid for 38 years by the pool of BetFhesda. The Lord commanded, "Get up! Pick up your mat and walk." and the man was healed. By the way, that day was the Sabbath. According to the Gospel of John, the direct trigger of the Pharisees plotting to kill Jesus is a violation of the Sabbath law.

Jesus resisted the winner-takes-allism, where only the first to jump in the pool of Bethesda was healed. He rejected the order of the pool of Jerusalem, which did not allow the Bethesda patients to support each other and head to the water of life together. So Jesus abolished Bethesda's Sabbath law, which does not have mercy that does not conform to the name “House of Grace and Mercy.” And he declared, "The Sabbath is for man, not man for the Sabbath." This was a frontal challenge to the legal system established by the Pharisees reform.

For Jesus, the Pool of Bethesda, where all kinds of sick people flock to with hope in a stream of spring water, was the “center” of a new theology that redefines the doctrine of the Sabbath. Saving the patient who was sick for 38 years was the “center” of his interest and ministry, not apologetics and advocacy for the Sabbath law.

Mencius said he felt pity for running and hugging the baby when he saw the toddler running toward the deep well without knowing the danger. He said that the mind of the person is the basis of human nature. But our Lord's compassion does not remain in the heart of humanity. He can't just pass by the sick person by the pond, and he heals the sickness on the Sabbath day, and he does not “unfortunately” even if he is dying. Rather, he invites anyone who is hungry or thirsty to come. He says that it's okay if you don't have money, it's okay if you can't learn it, and bring wine and milk without cost. He says it's okay if I die instead.

His has 'compassion'. He felt the pain of breaking his intestines when he saw the pitiful pain of others. The compassion was the driving force behind the miracle. Faith is to follow the heart of the Lord. It is the church that unfolds the Lord's heart. Restoring that mind is reform. It is missions that follow the Lord.

Mission begins in the heart of the triune God. It is love that unites the Holy Trinity. It is God's mission, missio Dei, that the love overflows to all mankind and the world of creation. Missionary God, who sent his Son into the world, calls all of God's people to be His missionaries. God's Spirit instills power, hope, and passion to build a community of hope in the world. The church has a mission to celebrate the life created by God in the power of the Holy Spirit, to stand up to all life-destroying forces, and to transform it. So, how can we transform these groaning people into a hopeful community?

In 1905, Missionary Underwood rode a horse and appeared at the 5-day marketplace in my hometown Bonghwa, Gyeongsangbuk-do. It is said that it took a week from Gwanghwamun in Seoul. It was a missionary trip made when Kim Jong-sook, who was an official at the Treasury Department for the Korean Empire, begged Missionary Underwood to share the Gospel in his hometown.

Underwood invited the elders of the four honorable families who revere Confucianism to the marketplace soup house. And it is said that he compared Jesus Christ on the cross to Sangje, the deity of Confucianism. On that occasion, On the spot, Indong Jang’s family of Munchon Village and Uiseong Kim's family in Cheokgok accepted the gospel. The two in-laws were baptized after walking from Bonghwa to Yeongju Naemae Church for two years. According to Kakao Map, it is 10 hours and 5 minutes walk from Bonghwa to Yeongju even on the road network that is developed today.

After being baptized, Indong Jangs established the first church of Bonghwa, Munchon Church, in Munchon Village, their home village, in 1906. In the following year, Uiseong Kims established Cheokgok Church the following year, which is now registered as a cultural asset. In particular, the daughters of Indong Jang family made great strides to evangelize the place where they married from southern Gangwon-do to northern Gyeongbuk.

Kim Jong-suk resigned from his official post, served the church, devoted himself to education and the Korean Independence Movement, entered Pyeongyang Theological Seminary, studied theology, and became the first minister of Cheokgok Church. He was released from prison on August 16, 1945 after receiving liberation from the Japanese colonial rule. Although his colleagues arranged a ministry in Seoul, he served the Bonghwa area's churches with Cheokgok Church as the center until the end.

Another point to note is that the Cheokgok Church established Myeongdong Seosuk, the first modern educational institution in Bonghwa, in 1909. On the one hand, Kim Jong-sook's Cheokgok Church and Myeongdong Seosuk were founded in cooperation with Underwood, and on the other hand, there was Pastor Gyuam Yak-yeon Kim, who founded Myeongdong Village in Gando. Myeong-dong Seosuk, which was established in 1908 in Myeong-dong Village, a Christian community of Gando, the cradle of national education and independence movement, was built in Bonghwa the following year. His brother, Kim Jong-ok, was active in Myeong-dong Village in Gando and served as a liaison for the Korean righteous army movement and the Manchurian independence movement, a delivery of funds raised in Korea, and a propagator of the Christian community and modern national education tested in Myeong-dong.

Cheokgok Village, a small village with fewer than 100 households but devoted to missions that participated in the suffering of the nation, God used as a tool to spread the value of the Gospel of God's kingdom like leaven.

God chooses the fools of the world to shame those who pretend to be wise. God chooses the weak of the world to shame those who pretend to be strong. No body, no worldly boast, nothing before God.

The important force to change the world in the era of globalization is not size, but depth. It is the power of change! It's a new spiritual insight. It is the “power of faith” that makes that insight a reality. We believe that the Gospel has the power to transform individuals, values, classes, society, structures and systems, and even the world. Just as the Roman Empire's ruling ideology could not cope with the few Christians in Antioch, we too can transform our world into the vision and values of the kingdom of God of Jesus Christ.

The world is going through great chaos and crisis right now. The weak are being pushed to the cliffs of the fall without any protection. Social minorities are subject to discrimination and hatred. Young people are deprived of even the first chance to start life because of polarization. The rest of the world feels anxious and makes extreme choices to protect their interests through religious fundamentalism, war and corruption, hatred and fear. The era of anti-civilization, which goes back to the era of the jungle, is unfolding before our eyes in the 21st century. In the barbell tower of human desire, COVID-19 pandemic is blowing a decisive blow to disperse us and lock us up.

In this crisis, the world asks for the church. “Are you Jesus' disciples?” The crisis in the world and the church today is caused by the loss and compromise of discipleship of our believers. It is not the size of the chapel, the number of members, or the abundance of finances that make the church. It is the level of discipleship we testify. In a world today where the worship of fetishes that money makes everything possible and that keeps us happy and safe threatens the credibility of the Gospel, where is the true discipleship that can transform the world?

The prophet Ezekiel promises that God's justice will be fulfilled, giving good food to the lost, embracing the chased, strengthening the sick and destroying the dead and the strong by taking from others. The hope of the church is based on the fulfillment of God's promised rule. It is to restore the right relationship between God and mankind and all creation. This vision leads us to participate in God's work of salvation. Participating in God's mission is not to be served, but to serve (Mark 10:45), to strike down the powerful and to exalt the lowly (Luke 1:46-55), to practice the love of interrelationship and dependenc, and to follow Jesus’ footstep. Only the power of Jesus Christ's “self-giving, courageous love,” can overcome the evil forces of hatred and division.

Mission is to reject the church's choosing egocentrism as a way of life, and to secure and expand the space where God's love, justice, and peace permeate human existence. The church is a community called to realize God's life-saving plan for the world revealed in Jesus Christ.

Missions have been seen as a movement from the center to the periphery, the strong to the weak, the rich to the poor, the marginalized from the privileged, and the West toward the southern hemisphere. It was a one-sided movement from the center to the margins. Now, however, marginalized people are demanding their core role as mission agents and claiming that mission is transformation. This reversal of this role in viewing mission has a strong biblical foundation, because God chooses the poor, the foolish, and the weak to advance the mission of God of justice and peace.

Brothers and sisters at Yonsei University Church, Jesus has given us the water of life that will never be thirsty for the price of his life. So our lives, which were poorer than anyone else, take root in His river of life and finally bear fruit, and through us, God heals the nations and nations. Through us, the Lord wipes tears from all eyes and has a great mission plan to open a new heaven and a new earth. The Lord calls us today to “follow me” in the way of that disciple. The Lord overcame the power of death and was resurrected, and went before us to Galilee. He sets a bonfire on the beach, breaks the bread, and speaks to us.

“You are witnesses of all these things” (Luke 24:48) Before this call, we all like the apostle Paul, “ For I am not ashamed of the Gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile.” (Romans 1: 16) I pray that you and I would respond to God’s calling.