Today Pastor Choi talks about the power of God (dunamis) that is promised to every disciple of Christ. Dunamis is God’s majestic power that created the heavens and the earth.  The same power sustains every living creature.  It is the power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead.  The sermon reminds the congregation that dunamis is available to God’s children through the Holy Spirit.

dunamis

Following is a summary of the sermon:

Dunamis (the power of the Holy Spirit)        Part 1 of 2

Acts 1:8
But you will receive power (dunamis) when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

Introduction

Let me tell you a story of Jesus’ disciples in Mark 9:  one day, when Jesus was away, a father brought his son who suffered from epilepsy.  He asked the disciples to cure his son but they couldn’t.  Thankfully, Jesus showed up in the nick of time and healed the boy.  Puzzled and embarrassed, the disciples later asked their Master in private, “Why couldn’t we drive out the evil spirit?” Jesus answered: This kind can come out only by prayer and fasting (Mark 9:28-29).

The 21^st century church in America faces the same dilemma as the disciples: We the Church of God have a great task before us: that is, to transform the lives of people in the name of Christ, yet we are unable to carry it out due to the lack of power in the Body of Christ.

Contents

Reality Check: Let us do a reality check with the following five questions.

1.   What’s the spiritual state of today’s Church?

A: Many a church (including Methodists) are dying (losing members left and right).  Like a drowning man, the Church of God gasps for God’s truth and God’s power.  We also witness the lack of God’s power in the lives of believers today.  Even though we proclaim the truth of God saying, “The Kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power” (1 Corinthians 4:20), we don’t see the realization of it.  Paul’s prophecy on the last days seems fulfilled: we have a form of godliness yet deny (or lack of) its power (2 Timothy 3:5).

2.   How well do we know what the power of God is?

A: Very little.   Few of us actually realize let alone experience what God’s power is.  We don’t know how majestic God’s power is that created the heavens and the earth.  We also are ignorant of God’s sustaining power of the universe.  We seldom read or hear about God’s miracles, signs, and wonders in today’s Church.  Worst of all, many of us are Bible illiterate.  We don’t spend time to get into God’s word.  Many Bibles at home collect dust.  Even the pew Bibles in the church rarely get opened.  The danger and the sad consequence of this reality is that the ignorance of the Scriptures leads to an error and misunderstanding in God’s power both in knowledge and in practice like the Sadducees in the 1^st century: (concerning the resurrection) Jesus replied, “You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God.”

3. What is the Power of God?

A:  Dunamis is the power of God.  Let me begin with a definition of dunamis: it is the Greek word for power/strength/ability.  The English words such as “dynamic” and “dynamite” are originated from dunamis.

The word “power” appears 335 times in the Bible (NIV).  In the New Testament alone 117 times in the form of “dunamis.”   Dunamis mostly refers to God’s majestic power.

What is dunamis?  It is the power that solely belongs to God [majestic power]: “power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise belong to God” (Revelation 5:12).  It is the power of God that created the heavens and the earth and anything in between and underneath [creation power].  It is the power that sustains them all.   It is the power that is greater than any mortal or angelic powers.  Actually, we cannot even compare God’s power to any other powers in the world, both visible and invisible.  It is the power that wows and awes us (E.g. standing before Grand Canyon or looking into a night sky with many stars).   It is the power that performs all the miracles.  It is the power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead.

4.  Does God want His Church and His children in the 21^st century to experience the power of God as the Early Church did in the 1^st century?

A: Absolutely.  God wants every child of God in every generation to experience and live by God’s power.  When we become a believer in Christ, God starts working on us in some areas such as love and self-discipline.  He also wants us to experience God’s power in our daily lives.  In other words, God’s power, like love and self-discipline, is an integral part of our Christian life experience: For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline (2 Timothy 1:7).  He wants us to lead a triumphant life both individually as well as in the life of the Church.

5.  Is God’s power still available for us?

A: Yes, definitely.  Not only does God want us to have His power in our lives, but He also makes it available to us.

In fact, God’s majestic power has been in operation for ages.  It still is. It still creates life on earth.  It still upholds the entire universe.  It still wows and awes us.  It still is the greatest power we can imagine.  It will be that way forever.

The good news is this: God shares His divine power with us freely and graciously.  In fact, He is delighted to share His mighty power with His people.  How does He do that?  He does so through the Holy Spirit.  By sending us His spirit and by having the Spirit dwell within us, God makes His divine power available to us 24/7.

Why does God do that—sharing the divine power— through His Spirit?   Because, He loves us.  His promise to send us the Helper and the Comforter was fulfilled at the first Pentecost 2,000 years ago.  From then on, the Holy Spirit—the Giver of dunamis— has been with us, worked with God’s people, and demonstrated God’s mighty works in the Church (the Book of Acts is all about the Acts of the Holy Spirit).

The real question for us all is this:  Why, then, don’t we see such God’s power demonstrated in our Church and in the lives of believers anymore?  The more important question is: “How can we experience dunamis in our walk with God?”  I am going to talk about those things next time in two weeks.

Let us pray.

Today Pastor Choi talks about how the Bible treats women.  Quoting Edith Hamilton who said the Bible is the only book up to the 20^th century that treats women as equal as men, Pastor Choi points out how Jesus treated women in the Bible.  He urges all God’s people to follow Jesus’ examples.

  Women in the Bible

Following is a summary of the sermon:

Women in the Bible                                         John 8:1-11

John 8      New American Standard Bible (NASB)

The Adulterous Woman

8 But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives.² Early in the morning He came again into the temple, and all the people were coming to Him; and He sat down and began to teach them. ³ The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman caught in adultery, and having set her in the center of the court, ⁴ they said to Him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in adultery, in the very act. ⁵ Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women; what then do You say?” ⁶ They were saying this, testing Him, so that they might have grounds for accusing Him. But Jesus stooped down and with His finger wrote on the ground. ⁷ But when they persisted in asking Him, He straightened up, and said to them, “He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.” ⁸ Again He stooped down and wrote on the ground. ⁹ When they heard it, they began to go out one by one, beginning with the older ones, and He was left alone, and the woman, where she was, in the center of the court. ¹⁰ Straightening up, Jesus said to her, “Woman, where are they? Did no one condemn you?” ¹¹ She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “I do not condemn you, either. Go. From now on sin no more.”

Introduction

Happy Mother’s Day!

Today’s sermon is dedicated to the mothers of our congregation for all the things they have done for their children over the years.  Abraham Lincoln said it right: “All that I am, or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother” (brainyquote.com).  Their love, prayers, and tender care are forever appreciated.   Originally, I was going to speak about mothers in the Bible.  Then, I decided to extend my attention to the women in the Bible instead.  So, this morning you’re going to hear a sermon on the women in the Bible.  More specifically, how the Bible treats women.

Contents

Question: is the Bible a good influence or a bad one when it comes down to women’s status in our society?  Some believe that the Bible, particularly the Old Testament, is a bad influence.  For instance, in Texts of Terror, Professor Phyllis Trible depicts the women in the Old Testament as victims.  Quoting the stories of four women in the Hebrew Scripture (Hagar, Tamar, the daughter of Jephthah, and unnamed concubine), she sees God as the one who smites, strikes, and imposes suffering on women (I disagree that it was God who made women suffer.  It was people who did that).  In the past 50 years in America, the Church and its century old practice of male dominance and male preference were rightfully criticized by the feminists who fiercely promoted women’s equality with men.  It improved people’s attitude towards women.  More people began to treat women as equal to men, thanks to the education.

Let me refine my question a little bit: “Is the Bible itself a bad influence against women or is it the people responsible for that abuse?”  I believe it is the people who misuse and abuse God’s Word to justify their deeds.  I don’t see God or His Word at fault, because God always treats men and women equally.  He doesn’t show favoritism.  He is the fairest of all.   It is the society, the culture, and the people in it that historically favored men over women for centuries; both in the West and in the East.

E.g. 1.  Korean culture under the Confucian teachings (during Joseon Dynasty: 1392-1897 A.D.) was very unfair to women—one example, a widow should remain forever a widow, while a widower could remarry.

E.g. 2.  My mom, the second eldest of five children in her family, always wished to have been a boy.  Simply because, as a girl, she was not educated beyond the 2^nd grade while all her three brothers went into a higher education.

Today a bias and practice against women still continue in some parts of the world.  For instance, some cultures practice honor killings (“Honor killings are acts of vengeance, usually death, committed by male family members against female family members, who are held to have brought dishonor upon the family—wikipedia ‘honor killings’).  Another instance, in China there is a serious shortage of women today due to the years of son-preference birth practice among the parents.  Now, some worry that such a disparity between genders will cause a problem: less women for men to marry may lead to a war.

Here’s another view on women in the Bible.  Edith Hamilton (a German-American educator and author who was “recognized as the greatest woman Classicist”—wikipedia) once said, “The Bible is the only book in the world up to our century which looks at women as human beings, no better or no worse than men.”  Her view resonates with mine and with the Bible.  Let me explain what the Bible says about women.

In the beginning, God created woman as a helper for man.  Not just a helper but a divine helper—that is uniquely designed and provided by God alone.  The partner God has created and appointed exclusively for man:  The Lord God said, “It is not good (literally, evil) for the man to be alone.  I will make a helper suitable for him” (Genesis 2:18).   The meaning behind “ezer (helper suitable)” is this: man is stuck in a pit and cannot get out by himself.  Woman comes to his rescue and throws him a rope to pull him out.

Man needs woman and woman needs man.  They complement each other.  Without the other, neither side is complete.  They are partners for life.  Equal partners.   Furthermore, without women, humanity will be in a big trouble, because there will be no procreation and no future for humanity.

Do you know how many women are listed in the Bible?  Hundreds of them.   First, there are 188 women whose names are recorded in the Bible, from Abigail to Zipporah.  See how many you can recognize: Eve, Sarah, Hagar, Rebekah, Leah, Rachel, Tamar, Zipporah, Miriam, Rahab, Deborah, Hannah, Ruth, Bathsheba, Esther, Jezebel, Mary of Nazareth, Elizabeth (mother of John the Baptist), Anna (prophetess) who prayed in the Temple day and night waiting for the coming of Messiah, Mary and Martha of Bethany, Mary Magdalene, Dorca, Lydia, Priscilla, and many more.

Next, there are other women who remain unnamed in the Scriptures: the wife of Noah, the wife of Lot, the wife of Potiphar, the wife of Job, the daughter of Jephthah, the unnamed concubine (who was senselessly murdered by thugs), the mothers who lost their babies to Herod’s sword while Jesus’ family escaped to Egypt, the Samaritan woman, the Syrophoenician woman, the woman whose hemorrhage problem was healed by Jesus, the woman who was caught in the middle of adultery and brought before Jesus, the women who cried for Jesus on His way to Calvary, and so on.

They were queens, prophetesses, leaders, slaves, prostitutes, wives, widows, sisters, daughters, daughters-in-law, mothers, and mothers-in-law.  Oppressors and victims.  Young and old.  Good ones and bad ones.  Except a few bad ones such as Jezebel—the evil queen who worshiped Baal and persecuted/killed God’s prophets, most of them encountered God and were touched by God’s grace.   Working together with God, they left their footprints in the history of God’s people and their salvation journey.

Women’s status makes a huge progress in the New Testament.   All thanks to Jesus!   He brings a lot of good things about women.  For instance, Gospel stories show a high number of references on women.  Historically, the way Jesus treated women has laid the foundation for the western culture to treat women as equal to men.  Jesus became our role model when it comes down to how we think of and treat women.  Even today His story still gives us a fresh perspective on women.

I am going to briefly point out three ways how Jesus treated all the women who had encountered Him.

1. He treated them equally as He did with men.  He treated each woman with respect.  He liberated and affirmed them.  He never disgraced, belittled, reproached, or stereo-typed women.   E.g. No sign of degrading the woman in John 8.  The Samaritan woman at the well in John 4.
2. He acknowledged their worth and value as co-heirs of God’s Kingdom and co-workers for God’s Kingdom.  Women were always an integral part of Jesus’ ministry.  He worked together with them (they ministered to the physical needs of Jesus and His disciples).  For the next two thousand years, the gifts women brought to the Church have been the true blessings to the Church.
3. Jesus looked at woman as a soul housed in a female body.  Never as an individual who is inferior to man (a soul housed in a male body).  We ought to practice as Jesus did, that is, to look at individuals, male or female, as precious souls in God’s sight.

Conclusion

Thanks to all women for their divine partnership with men.  Thanks for all the contributions they have made in our human history.  Let us follow Jesus’ examples.  Let us continue working for God’s Kingdom treating each other with respect and equality.

Amen.

Today Pastor Choi lays out all the opinions on Jesus (that are found in the Bible) 2,000 years ago in Israel.  He also presents three outrageous claims that Jesus has made for Himself: He and God are one.  He has authority to forgive sins on earth.  He has risen from the dead.  Pastor Choi also introduces people’s understanding of who Jesus is today.  Then, he urges the congregation to make up their minds and declare their own confession on Jesus.

     Who Do You Say That Jesus Is

Following is a summary of the sermon:

Who Do You Say Jesus Is?     Matthew 16:13-20

Matthew 16:13-20  (NASB)

Peter’s Confession of Christ

¹³ Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, He was asking His disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?”¹⁴ And they said, “Some say John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; but still others, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets.” ¹⁵ He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” ¹⁶ Simon Peter answered, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” ¹⁷ And Jesus said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. ¹⁸ I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. ¹⁹ I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven.” ²⁰ Then He warned the disciples that they should tell no one that He was the Christ.

 Introduction

Last January, as pastor of the church, I designated this year to be the year of knowing Jesus.  I handed out scrolls that contained eighteen different Scripture verses pertaining to our goal of knowing Jesus.  I encouraged you to look at the verse everyday as often as you can as a reminder.  I also told you that I would preach six sermons on knowing Jesus.  I am doing sermon number 3 today.  

I hope and pray that we all have been making a progress of knowing Jesus so far.  As for my progress, I have kept a journal to record any new insights about Jesus.  As of today, there are over twenty things that I have discovered anew about my relationship with Him: who He is and what He expects of me, and so forth. 

Let me share a couple of them with you.  First, I discovered that to know Jesus means to love Him; to love Him means to keep His commandments (John 14:21).  So, keeping His commandments is a sure sign that I know and love Him.  In other words, if I don’t keep His commandments, that means, I don’t love Him.  If I don’t love Him, no matter how strongly I claim that I know Jesus personally, it doesn’t count.  The next thing I learned about Jesus is this: To know Him means that I recognize Him (Amos 3:2) both in public and in private without shame or fear.  For instance, saying grace in a restaurant for the meal shouldn’t be a struggle.

So, here we go folks, the sermon number three: who we say Jesus is, to us and to the world.

Contents

Have you noticed one thing in the past couple of months?  Welcome to the season of presidential election again!  They don’t leave us alone, do they?  We begin to hear about candidates from both parties.  We also hear about how many dollars some candidates have raised, their stances on certain issues, who the front runners are, and so forth.  By the way, how do they know who’s leading and who’s trailing?  By polls, right?  So, for the next year and a half, we will hear plenty polls on candidates from various sources such as CBS, NBC, CNN, and so forth. 

Did you know that Jesus once did a poll on Himself?   We can see that in today’s text.  One day Jesus was curious to know what the people said about Him.   So in their private setting, He did an informal survey.  He asked His disciples: Who do people say that the Son of Man is?  One answered, “Some say John the Baptist.”  Another disciple said, “Others say you are Elijah.”  Another chipped in saying, “They consider you Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

Then, Jesus turned to them saying, “Who do you say that I am?”  Peter, one of the twelve disciples, hit the bull’s eye!   He said, “You are the Christ,the Son of the living God” (v. 16).   He called Jesus the Christ—the anointed (three offices were anointed in the Old Testament tradition: kings, priests, and prophets).  Christ had all three offices in one.  Calling Peter blessed, Jesus told him that it was God in Heaven who revealed to him the true identity of Jesus.  No humans could give that understanding.  Only God could. 

By the way, we must consider other opinions on Jesus at the time that were not included in today’s text: First, the famous doubting Thomas called Him, “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28).  Some religious leaders called Him a trouble maker (Luke 23:2), a Samaritan (John 8:48); or worse a demon or even insane (John 8:52, 10:20).

So you heard it all: several opinions on Jesus that existed 2000 years ago; from John the Baptist to prophets; from the Messiah to a demon; from God to a lunatic.   Today, like the first century, we too have a wide spectrum of understanding of who Jesus is.  Some believe that He is equal to God.  Others consider Him a prophet.  More others think that He is a good moral teacher such as Confucius or Socrates (e.g. M. Ghandi).  Even worse, some consider Jesus a myth, a non-historical figure.  How about Jesus an insurance policy for heaven?  E.g. My Sunday School lesson: What if Jesus were in Hell?  Would you follow Him there or would you rather stay in Heaven having nothing to do with Him?  It sure makes you think twice about your true motive in believing Jesus, doesn’t it? 

Before you say anything about Jesus, you must consider some outrageous claims Jesus has made about Himself.  I am going to present three claims that He has made.  First, He said, “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30).  He made Himself equal to God.  He even said, “He who has seen Me has seen the Father;”(John 14:9).   He said that He was with God before the creation of the world.  He claimed that He was older than Abraham (John 8:58) to the point where the Jews wanted to stone Him.  Next, He claimed that He has authority to forgive sins on earth (Mark 2:10).  Once again this is unthinkable in the Jewish mind where they consider God alone has that authority; no human beings, not even Moses, nor Abraham, can forgive someone’s sins.  Thirdly, He has risen from the dead.

Now, who do you say Jesus is?  Whatever you say about Him, one thing you don’t want to do is this: sitting on the fence.  For instance, you don’t want to say that Jesus was a good moral teacher while you reject His claims, because no good moral teacher makes a false claim about himself.  Let’s listen to C.S. Lewis: “I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say.  A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher.  He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell.  You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronising nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us.  He did not intend to. … Now it seems to me obvious that He was neither a lunatic nor a fiend: and consequently, however strange or terrifying or unlikely it may seem, I have to accept the view that He was and is God (Lewis, C. S., Mere Christianity, London: Collins, 1952, pp. 54 – 56).

Make up your mind today, because your confession of who Jesus is makes a world of difference in your walk with God, in your worship and services, and in your daily life.  E.g. If your life as a believer is boring and your commitment to the Lord is mediocre, it is a direct outcome of your fuzzy confession of Jesus.  Even Jesus doesn’t like that attitude:  He said to the church in Laodicea, ¹⁵ ‘I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot; I wish that you were cold or hot.¹⁶ So because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of My mouth (Revelation 3:15-16).   If you take Jesus as He claims to be, the Son of the living God, the Messiah, the Lord of the world and your personal Savior, your walk with God will be revolutionized, because He means everything to you.   

Conclusion

So, this morning declare your confession on Jesus.  Ask yourself: who do I say that Jesus is?  Who is He to me?   Do not delay.  Don’t be half-hearted, either.   Let me tell you what mine is.  To me, Jesus is the God incarnate, the Son of God, the Messiah, my Savior and Lord.  To Him, I give my life and undivided allegiance.   What is yours?    May God reveal true Jesus to you as He did to Peter. 

Let’s pray.