Daniel's Response

“But there is a God in heaven who reveals secrets, and He has made known to King Nebuchadnezzar what will be in the latter days.” Daniel 2:28

There is a Chinese/Korean saying: Your thought before going to the toilet is different from your thought after you come out of the toilet. It means when you are desperate to use the toilet you would do anything to get into the restroom. But once you are done with using the toilet, you feel relaxed, and you will think differently.

Daniel was in a similar situation, but he was consistent. The Babylonian king had a dream. In the morning he tried to remember what that dream was, but he couldn’t remember what it was. Being frustrated, he called for the wise men and asked them what the dream was. No one knew. How would anyone know your dreams? It was impossible to tell the king what the dream was and what it meant. The king was angry and started killing all the wise men.

Daniel was one of the wise men, but he was not present when the king had called for the wise men. And now his life was about to be taken away. He is in a desperate situation. He pleads for some more time. When the soldiers left, Daniel prayed. He prayed to our mighty God. God answered Daniel’s prayer and He showed the king’s dream to Daniel.

Then Daniel appears to the king. King Nebuchadnezzar asks, “Are you able to make known to me the dream which I have seen, and its interpretation?” Since Daniel now knows what the dream is, he could have taken credit to himself. After all, you might think differently when you come out of the toilet. You are not that desperate anymore. No, that is not what Daniel did. He gave all the credit to God. “But there is a God in heaven who reveals secrets…”

God will help us speak

“Then Moses said to the LORD, ‘O my LORD, I am not eloquent, neither before nor since You have spoken to Your servant; but I am slow of speech and slow of tongue.’” Exodus 4:10

Have you ever felt this before? When you are asked to speak up front, you just lose your confidence and get all nervous? This was the case even for Moses. Moses was previously a prince of Egypt. With such an advanced civilization, Moses was able to receive the best education and training of all areas. This Moses said he was not eloquent enough and was slow of speech and tongue. There might be some reasons to that: maybe because it has been forty years since he left Egypt. Not speaking the language for so long could have been the reason for not being eloquent. Or he was just never good at speech classes even while he was receiving his education. Whatever the reason was, he was not ready to speak up.

Also, when you see the context of this chapter, God is asking Moses to speak up to not just any person, but to the Pharaoh. Moses ran away from Egypt. And now God is asking him to go back. His message to Pharaoh is to let his people go! It’s not just eloquence of speech that Moses needs. He needs courage and faith to even voice out!

Then God says, “Who has made mans mouth? Or who makes the mute, the deaf, the seeing, or the blind? Have not I, the Lord? Now therefore, go, and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall say.” Exodus 4:11,12

Jesus wants us to be His disciples. As disciples of Jesus, he wants us to go out and serve Him. It takes lots of courage and faith to speak up and share God’s Words to the people. Some people will listen but there will be people that will not listen and be stubborn like Pharaoh. It does not matter. God says we should speak up. For God says, “I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall say.”

Faithful workers

"However there need be no accounting made with them of the money delivered into their hand, because they deal faithfully." 2 Kings 22:7

King Josiah was twenty-six years old when he had started the reformation of the temple. The first thing he does is that he tells the high priest, Hilkiah, to bring in the money that was gathered by the doorkeepers of the house of the Lord. Next he orders that the money be distributed to all the workers that will be involved in repairing the house of the Lord: carpenters, builders, and masons. But here is the point. King Josiah says that “there need be no accounting made with them.” This would be unacceptable today. You are always required to get a receipt for any purchases you make for the church, group, company, institutions, etc. And there would be auditing of the money spent each year. But what do we see here? The king completely trusted them. Why? “Because they deal faithfully.” Wow!

God asks us to be faithful, too. We are living in the time that requires reformation. We need to change first. But we also need to go out and change the world. God does not do it alone. (Well, I do believe God can do anything but He chose to work with us.) Pastor can’t do it by himself. We all need to be involved this work together, just as King Josiah needed the workers to repair (reform) the house of the Lord. And we need to become “faithful” like those workers. God saved us and has called us to the church to serve Him, the church, and the community. And it would be awesome if our heavenly King can say about us, “Oh don’t worry about them. They deal faithfully!”

We must believe

"Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained."

"Do not be unbelieving, but believing." John 20:22,23,27

These are what Jesus said to the disciples when Jesus showed up to the disciples after the resurrection. The disciples just heard from Mary that Jesus was resurrected. Peter and John witnessed the empty tomb. And so the disciples were wondering where Jesus was. Maybe they were worried.

Then Jesus shows up to them! All were there but Thomas. Jesus told them to "receive the Holy Spirit." Isn't that powerful? Jesus has promised the Holy Spirit to us. He is wanting to come into our hearts. We should be open and be able to welcome Him to our hearts. He is knocking at your heart. Please remember to welcome Him.

When Thomas heard about Jesus, he did not believe. He needed solid proof and evidence. When Jesus appeared in front of Thomas for real, Jesus told Thomas "to believe."

Oh how many times we doubt. We don't need to. What the Bible says, we must believe. This is the basis of faith. We must believe.

It was very good

"Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good. So the evening and the morning were the sixth day." Genesis 1:31

On February 4, 2014, one of the biggest issues around the nation was a debate on creation and evolution. Ken Ham and Bill Nye debated for over 2 hours and the video was streamed live. A lot of people were interested in the debate and I noticed many posts on SNS regarding this video streaming.

The Bible is very clear though. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” The Bible does not assume. It simply states that we are created by God. When you read through the first chapter of the Bible you can see how much God is pleased with His creation. On accounts of each day, you can notice that it says, “And God saw that it was good.”

But did you notice that God does not mention that on the second day? On the second day God divided the water from water, thus making the firmament. And God does not express His impression by saying that it was good. It is because God did not finish His work of dividing the waters. On the third day, God finishes the work of diving the water from water and thus making the land to rise. And after that God saw that it was good. You can see that God is a perfectionist.

However, God was not perfectionist enough until the sixth day. The highlight of creation did not come until this moment, when God created human beings. Once that was done, God said, “Indeed it was VERY good!” Don’t you feel blessed? That is how much God thinks of us. He was happy with the rest of the creation. But God was VERY happy when He created us.

God doesn't forget

"A certain woman of the wives of the sons of the prophets cried out to Elisha, saying, 'Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that your servant feared the Lord. And the creditor is coming to take my two sons to be his slaves.'" 2 Kings 4:1

Here we have a woman who lost her husband and she is now asking Elisha the prophet of God for help. Main source of finance is gone in the family, they are now in debt, and now even the sons are about to be taken away. This woman's husband was a good man, faithful to God. He served God. Yet this story reminds us that things can happen to us.

But God is good. God did not forget this woman. He found her a real solution. 

"Then he said, 'Go, borrow vessels from everywhere, from all your neighbors - empty vessels; do not gather just a few. And when you have come in, you shall shut the door behind you and your sons; then pour it into all those vessels, and set aside the full ones.'" v. 3,4.

She started pouring oil. And it kept coming out! It only stopped when she had filled in the last vessel!

And then Elisha said, "Go, sell the oil and pay your debt; and you and your sons live on the rest." v. 8

It seems she brought vessels as much as she could that was available. What if she just brought a few? Then she couldn't have gotten as much oil. And if she had brought more, then I believe that she could've gotten more oil! We shouldn't limit our faith and God is good to us.

God does not forget us. He remembers and helps us in a very practical way.

The Calling of Elisha

1Kings 19:21 “So Elisha turned back from him, and took a yoke of oxen and slaughtered them and boiled their flesh, using the oxen’s equipment, and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he arose and followed Elijah, and became his servant.”

God tells Elijah to appoint Elisha as the next prophet in place of him. As soon as he hears from God, Elijah departs from where he is to seek Elisha. At last when Elisha was found, the 1 Kings tells us that Elijah “threw his mantle on him.” The book does not mention that Elijah said anything. That is all he did. Put a mantle on Elisha. This action itself did not need any explanation in words, because this action was a symbolic act of calling one to ministry as a prophet.

Elisha understood that meaning. Elijah did not have to explain in words what this meant. Elisha had to make a choice. 1 Kings 19 gives a hint that Elisha had a pretty decent living, if not wealthy. When Elijah found Elisha, he was plowing in the field with 12 yoke of oxen. Doesn’t that tell us something?

Well when Elisha was put on with a mantle, he knew he would have to give up what he had in order to serve as a prophet. And you can see his hesitation and dilemma in 1 Kings 19:20 where he asks Elijah, “Please let me kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow you.”

Friends, when God asks for you, we need to be willing to give up what we have in order to follow Him. Also, God does not want us to hesitate. He wants a firm decision, at this moment. Elijah said, “Go back again, for what have I done to you?” He is asking Elisha to make a personal decision.

This was Elisha’s response: “So Elisha turned back from him, and took a yoke of oxen and slaughtered them and boiled their flesh, using the oxen’s equipment, and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he arose and followed Elijah, and became his servant.”

God's house and my house

1Kings 6:38 And in the eleventh year, in the month of Bul, which is the eighth month, the house was finished in all its details and according to all its plans. So he was seven years in building it.

1Kings 7:1 But Solomon took thirteen years to build his own house; so he finished all his house.

One of the greatest achievements of Solomon was that he built the temple of God. If you read the description of temple in 1Kings 6 you can see how awesome the temple must have been. Solomon put in a lot of effort and work to build the house of God. It was not an easy task and surely it was not a job you can finish in a short period of time. In fact, the last verse of chapter 6 tells us that it took 7 years to build the temple of God.

The next verse, which is chapter 7 verse 1, starts with the word “But.” And it says that it took 13 years for Solomon to build his own house (compared to the 7 years for the Temple of God. 7 is a symbol of completeness in the Bible though). I kind of wondered at why the verse would start with the word “But,” when you can also start the verse with other words such as “And” or “Then” or “Next” or “After that.” The author chose to start the verse with the word “But.” The Bible does not mention or indicate whatsoever that building your own house for a longer period of time than the length of time spent in building the God’s house is wrong. It does not say that Solomon was wrong in doing so. We don’t know what Solomon’s intention was.

Whatever Solomon’s motive or the intention was, I imagined to myself what mine would have been if I were Solomon. It is easy for us as selfish humans to value mine over God’s. After all if you really think about it, everything you have is from God. We should always be able to put God’s things first over my own personal agenda. We should always learn to set our priorities straight.

My Father's House

Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And He found in the temple those who sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the money changers doing business. When He had made a whip of cords, He drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and the oxen, and poured out the changers' money and overturned the tables. And He said to those who sold doves, "Take these things away! Do not make My Father's house a house of merchandise!" John 2:13-16

Temple is a place for people to come and meet God. Temple is a place where God dwells. So when you come to a temple you come and worship! But during this time of Passover, the temple lost its function and it turned into a market for personal profit! Think of how sad God would have been when He was waiting for His people to come and spend time with Him, but instead they were only interested in making money for themselves.

We spent the last quarter studying about the temple(or the sanctuary). As a reminder, God tells us that our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. Our body is a place where the Holy Spirit can dwell. It is sacred and important. The above text tells us how important it is for us to take care of ourselves. God wants to dwell among us. He wants to spend time with us. We need to practice in thinking Godly things, not worldly things. It's important for us to make sure that we gain on Godly matters, not selfish personal matters.

Acts 1:9-11

After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight. They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. “Men of Galilee,” they said, “why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.” Acts 1:9-11

So, back when we were in California, my wife had to go back to Korea for about a month. As much as I love her, I didn't want her to go, but just have her stay at my side all the time. Hey, but the good news was that, she would be coming back in about a month's time. We had bought a round trip ticket so she would come back for sure.

As I was thinking about this, I thought about the disciples when they saw Jesus rise up back to heaven. Jesus had been crucified and resurrected. The disciples were glad to have Jesus back yet He couldn't be with them forever. Jesus' mission was done on earth and He had to return back to heaven to finish the whole mission. Jesus went back to heaven in front of the eyes of the disciples. But the angels showed up and promised that Jesus is coming back! 

Jesus promised to come back. Just as I knew that Hyemi was going to come back from Korea, the promise of Jesus told by the angels stands true! All we have to do is believe in Jesus and wait for His coming! I think Jesus loves us so much that He wants to come back right away, but there is still unfinished business so we have to wait just a little bit more, but He will come soon!

The Just Shall Live by Faith

For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, "The just shall live by faith." Romans 1:17

One of the biggest questions we have in life is the matter of life after death. What happens when we die? Or another similar question would be “What is salvation?” 

People tried to solve these questions for ages and many believed that we had to work out our salvation. We needed to appeal to God by showing our efforts. Martin Luther was one of them. 

As Luther was working up the stairs on his knees on the Stairs of Pilate to seek the peace of God, the above text just suddenly came up in his mind, which triggered the Great Reformation: The Just shall live by Faith.

Friends, it is only through our faith and belief in Jesus that can save us. That's what the Bible teaches us. So don't you worry about being saved, but have your faith in Jesus and you can be saved.

Jesus came down

"And she brought forth her firstborn Son (Jesus), and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn." Luke 2:7

Water flows down to the lower part. That is the law of gravity and it is its nature. Water does not flow to a higher side but to the lower side. Another thing we can notice is that flowing water is vital and fresh. There is no life in a still water.

When we think of Jesus, He came ‘down’ to us. This is amazing because Jesus is nothing like water. He is the Creator Himself and the Ruler of the Universe. He made the law of gravity. He does not need to come down but stay wherever He wants to be. Yet He humbled Himself and came down to us like water. He came down to the lowest part of the earth in the form of a baby and that wasn’t just it. He had no place to rest, so He was laid down in a manger. But because of His humble sacrifice He brought life to us. We are graced by the flowing sacrifice of Jesus and thus we were give life again.

We want to learn this humility of Jesus Christ. We need the heart of Jesus.

Blind Man

As Jesus approached Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging. When he heard the crowd going by, he asked what was happening. They told him, “Jesus of Nazareth is passing by. ”He called out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Those who led the way rebuked him and told him to be quiet, but he shouted all the more, “Son of David, have mercy on me!” Jesus stopped and ordered the man to be brought to him. When he came near, Jesus asked him, “What do you want me to do for you?”

“Lord, I want to see,” he replied.

Jesus said to him, “Receive your sight; your faith has healed you.” Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus, praising God. When all the people saw it, they also praised God.

Above is a passage found in Luke 18:35-43. A friend of mine in Korea blogged about this passage and it really caught my interest. Here we see a beggar, not only that, he was a blind beggar. It's a double disadvantage that he had lived with all his life. It really bothers to wear a pair of glasses due to my bad eyesight. But imagine how awful it would be if you are blind. 

When this man hears that Jesus is coming, he calls out as loud as he can to get the attention of Jesus. He is stopped, but he does not give up. He shouts out louder! As he gets the attention of Jesus, his forever wish is granted, to see. Jesus mentions that it was his "faith" that has healed him. 

It is interesting to note that a man who could not see called out to Jesus. What about the rest? It must have been easier for the healthier people to spot the Savior, yet most kept quiet. They just tended to what they do and just observed, but not call out to Jesus. And I wonder which side is blind, spiritually. It was probably the necessity to be healed that made the blind man "see" Jesus. 

How do we look to Jesus? Are we blind spiritually? Do we take things for granted? Jesus is in our lives and I pray that we get to see and accept Him in our lives and may we be changed toward His goodness.