A Light in the Darkness, A city on a Hill - End-of-year Reflection 1 Peter 1:1 2:12; 3:8 5:11. 28/12/2008 HPC Evening

Transcription

1 A Light in the Darkness, A city on a Hill - End-of-year Reflection 1 Peter 1:1 2:12; 3:8 5:11 28/12/2008 HPC Evening [Introduction] When we drive, every few minutes it s important that we check our rear-view mirror just to give ourselves a perspective of what s behind us. In our Church life, we need to do the same pause and reflect before we go forward. Tonight s service, literally, is the last service of We don t have a lot of people here, some of them are on holidays already, some have gone to the PY camp, but it is a good opportunity for us as a small group to reflect and pray. Rather than a normal sermon, I am going to give a more self-analysing type of reflection. I ll base it on 1 Peter, but I m not planning to go into great detail of this letter. You may be wondering, Wow, we ve just read the whole letter, it s going to be a very long sermon!! Don t worry, I m not going to do that to you, especially considering this is the last service of the year!!!!!!! During the week, as I read 1 Peter I ve done some reflecting on my personal life, ministry here at Hurstville, and our church s vision based on this letter. My hope is that you can also do the same - during your holidays in January read a letter, it can be 1 Peter or another, then set aside some time to reflect on your personal relationship with God, your work, and your service at church or in the community. A warning: There s some stuff you might not agree with that s fine. Not meant to discourage, but to point out things to stimulate your thoughts. I m trying to be as honest as possible, but my understanding is limited. A discussion, rather than a monologue. So throughout the reflection I m going to stop and you can ask me questions or make comments. [Responding to 1 Peter] My reflection is mainly based on 1 Peter 2:9-12, where Peter exhorts his readers, But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belong to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us. Isn t this a great passage? Peter has summarized almost everything about our Christian life - Our life before and after Christ, our calling, and how to live a good life. A wonderful summary!! I m sure you re all very familiar with this passage. So tonight let s focus on how we can apply it to our own context. A self-analysing reflection: It s important to do this after my first year in full time ministry My question: why am I here to do this ministry? Is this where God really wants me to be? What about you? I d like you to reflect on some similar questions: Why am I here at HPC? Is this place where God really wants me to be? Maybe youʼve never even thought about this? Are these valid questions to be asking now as we end 2008? For me, I think it s important to look back over my own journey with God and to reflect on my own Christian life firstly I came from a Communist, pagan society with a very broken worldview. I was converted in a traditional, a 1

2 very conservative Presbyterian church in the American heartland with the remnants of the old puritan society. Omaha is a small town, with lots of nuclear-families (9 kids), religiously-oriented, white-centric. Even though it was completely different from Shanghai, for me it was good to see a radically, contrasting worldview practically lived out. Next, God brought me to Australia where I was lead to a Chinese church located next to Oxford Street, a trendy, very post-modern, new-age type of community. This church doesn t really know how to deal with the world outside it s walls. It felt like a little protected bubble. Then we came to HPC, a traditional Anglo- church that seems to be finding it hard to reach its own people (how many new Anglo families have we seen come through our doors and stay this year?). But at the same time having many Asians coming through the doors. It seems that the church feels a bit nervous about this change and is still figuring out how to respond to the new migrants. My first full-time year at HPC has been a challenge: juggling two balls evening service and the international ministry. It seems that they belong to two totally different cultures: Evening service represents a post-christian culture. The International ministry pre-christian culture. Over the year I ve found it a real struggle to handle these two fronts at the same time. I wonder, should I be seeing these two as one? Are these ministries compatible or should I be treating them as completely separate and different? I m starting to see that these two ministries the Evening Service and Int. ministry are to be one. God has called all of us to be missionaries and in His grace, He s bringing the world to our very front yard. Hurstville is our mission field whether we like it or not. The suburb has changed and we need to respond. This is my passion and the reason why I feel God has called me to be here to help the existing institutionalised, traditional church to be passionate and fully engaged in reaching the people. You might not agree with what I ve just said, but keep it in your mind as we continue and you can comment later on what you re passionate about for HPC. [Exegete the Bible] Tim Keller, the pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York. A model thousands of worshipers in the midst of NY Embraces Baptists, Pentecostals, as well as Presbyterians, immigrant neighbourhoods as well as Manhattan. He considers three things as he preaches: exegeting (interpreting, expounding, pulling apart) the Bible, exegeting culture, and exegeting ourselves. I d like to base our reflections around these three subjects: studying the Word to know God, learning from our past and the community around us to know the culture, and finally knowing thyself - we need to study ourselves to know our church and individuals. For me, having shifted from at least three worldviews throughout my life (China, USA and Australia) I m convinced these three components are very important to think through as we seek God s will. While studying the Bible at college and church has been foundational to my Christian growth, it s not enough. I ve realised we must have a clear understanding of what s happening in our culture and what s happening inside people s minds in order to preach the gospel in a powerful and convincing way. Studying the Word to know God: My favourite verse from 1 Peter 1 For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God. For, ʻall men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord stands forever. (1:23-25) God s Word is alive. God s word doesn t change through the ages. We have the word of God no matter what culture or what people-groups we re reaching His truth never fails. This is what we cling to and live by. We can trust the Word of God is what changes people. Through His words, God restores sinners. We ve been born again by His powerful word - not of perishable seed, but of imperishable. Our new life is from God Himself. We ve been given a spiritual new birth. This is true conversion. What a great comfort that God s truth never changes. Reflection: But studying the Bible well doesn t necessarily mean that we know God personally. The point here is that we must be born again. The Word will transform us from the perishable into the imperishable. - Are you born again? 2

3 - Do you know God personally? Itʼs not about mere learning, just coming to church out of tradition. We need to be applying Godʼs word in our everyday life. - How have you been applying what youʼre learning? - And what does it practically look like in your daily life? Our actions and attitudes reveal that we have taken God s word into our hearts. In order to do this, there are two more things we must do: know the culture and ourselves. [Exegete the culture] This year I ve learnt quite a lot about the Australian culture through people at HPC: the first generation of immigrants, shipwrecks around the Victorian coastline, the maker of Vegemite, the first postman in Hurstville fascinating! I m convinced that in order to serve you here at HPC I need to know your backgrounds and heritage. Within HPC, we have at least three groups representing different cultural societies: traditional society, modern and post-modern society. We worship together and fellowship together. We love each other but sometimes I found we do complain and blame each other when things don t turn out our way. One crucial step to avoid issues like this is that we need to take time to understand one another our different cultures, philosophies, art, lifestyle, etc. how they do church. Use some examples of what you ve noticed in HPC: - how people treat the minister ( Rev, wear suit and tie, expect visitation (trad) vs. moderns who come to church on Sunday, public/private divide vs (p/m) F.B, poking minister, wanting to be good mates) - how people like church to be organised (trad) enjoy programs, rosters, routine, familiar, duty vs. p/m who hate being a slave to the roster, don t respond to the s, more spontaneous, get involved when I feel like it - how people communicate (trad) writing and sending letters, vs. blogs, FB (very intimate) and SMS - how we present the gospel (trad) see the gospel as the Universal Truth, ek. Has the authority to preach the gospel and call people to repent, moderns use science, rational arguments, philosophy, apologetics to prove the Bible, vs. P/m who like to live out the gospel, being authentic, genuine, more practical rather than theory. - How we do church traditional like the organ, order of service in exactly the same way because this is safe and uniform, top-down authority v/s PM who like spontaneous, congregation involvement, no organ or anything traditional - Here are a few characteristics of a traditional society: walking into a small town, we see a pub, a block filled with church buildings, and a Chinese restaurant. - Example: a country church in a small town o Church is institutionalised o With its authority o A central location o The pastor is well-respected in the community o Churches occupy an important place in the fabric of life school, community associations, charity, and hospital. o People are Christianized problem: christianised by the culture, not regenerated or converted with the Gospel. o Church sets the moral standard for the society. o church language is also used by the society. o Evangelism: the claim of an objective and universal truth, people come to the church. o Result: only win those who are traditional and conservative it is a shrinking market. The characteristics of a modern society: o Enlightenment: self-confident, proud of its achievements o Feeling in control of its own destiny o Self-contained and arrogant / produce tunnel vision and a stubborn reluctance o Modern secular version of the ancient Tower of Babel o Reason, rationality, human autonomy o Evangelism had to confront the challenges of humanism and rationalism. In so doing it was itself influenced, more than it realized, by the modernism it combated. o For example, when we argued for the reliability of biblical texts, we use modern scientific criteria to define their consistency and inerrancy. o Don t believe in supernatural things no mystery, not divine revelation 3

4 o Individual life: public and private lives are separated. Religious faith therefore is marginalized. It became a private matter, for like-minded ones to pursue, you can impose your views on the public sphere. o Religion can enhance your life-style, or a feeling, but can t be claimed as public truth. o Evangelism: individual s subjective application of truth. The characteristics of a post-modern society: o 80s popular worldview o labelled as pessimistic wishful thinking, or nihilism with a smile o they realized that modern technology didn t solve any problem, rather, advanced technology probably created as many problems as they were solving nuclear, industrial pollution, environmental issues. o Human beings are progressively destroying themselves. o So we doubt everything scepticism o Whatever popular is true. o Whatever works for you is true o No propositional certainty o Everyone entitled his point of view. o Post-modern slogan celebrate diversity. o There is no grand story to inspire a people, no explanation of everything, o In this way, Bible can t be the Truth to define personal or universal meaning and purpose of life. o Concerns the immediate rather than with the long term. o History is meaningless and the future is too scary and unpredictable to contemplate. o Unpredictable world requires a rapid response the Internet. o Paradox: anonymous yet intimate. o Internet dating: invent yourself, create personalities never be sure whom you re dealing with, yet you are free to communicate the most intimate details of your life: facebook, blog, Youtube, etc o The church has been pushed out to the fringe of the social stage. The church has to follow the terms of the secular society if it wants to get back on stage. o They serve as therapists for example, as celebrants of ceremony in Europe: baptism, wedding, and funeral. Challenges: o These phases do not happen in order. They re not sequential. They exist side by side. And the tensions created by these conflicting worldviews impact the way we do church. o We have a mixture of all these generations at our church. It s a beautiful thing to see the young with the old worshiping together. The challenge is how to recognise the cultural differences and work with each other without compromising the gospel. o What makes it even more complicated is that we are living in an internationalised community. I ve described these societies mainly in a western world. But what about our Asian friends here in Hurstville. We must be aware that Japan, South Korea and China have experienced the impacts of modernity and post-modernity within a much shorter time period but they are still deeply rooted in their own ancient cultures. o Eg. Our Asian friends tell us they love the organ, stained-glass windows and formality of the service (traditional), but they are very rational and scientific in their approach to what they believe (modern) but also they re relational and hunger for community (postmodern but also something from their own ancient culture). Purpose: o We must read more about philosophies, worldviews to know the culture. o I agree with Tim Keller, the relationship of Christians to culture is the singular current crisis point for the church. We need to address these issues in order to survive. [Exegete Yourself] Now that we ve exegeted our culture at HPC we can start to dialogue and respect one another. When we have disagreements it s important to look for answers from God s Word. By doing so, we ll start to read the bible in a new light as we seek insights in different cultural contexts. We must be equally skilled in exegeting both Scripture and culture, so we know what to apply. 4

5 On top of these two principles, the third one is to know ourselves. We need to understand where we are now. Change happens as we understand our current situation. Take a moment to think about the situation at Hurstville: We are in a post-christian Western society even though our church building is geographically located in the centre of Hurstville, we ve lost the role in society that we used to have. In general many young people have stopped coming to church. Religion is irrelevant to them. How many young non-churched Anglos have we converted in the past 10 years? The culture of our community, at the same time, is increasingly becoming more pre-christian eastern immigrants who ve just landed have no background at all about Christianity, they don t know anything but they are curious about the church culture, and they want to come here to improve their English in order to survive in a new country. They re open to the gospel at least open to approaching the church on their own initiative. Also, the change in the community is unpredictable. It comes rapidly and without warning. In Hurstville, in the past 30 years, people from different countries have arrived, Greek, Italian, Vietnamese, people from Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, then Hong Kong, now most are from China. 5 years ago, most of them were students, but now the majority are skilled migrants with family and kids, some of them are even loaded with cash. Meanwhile, many Anglos have moved out of Hurstville area. Just look at our own member directory, how many people are living in Hurstville? Not many. We have also seen many young families moved out of the city. So facing this cultural change, how should we respond? I can see four types of responses: Not responding at all. Just letting the church be the church A big emphasis on tradition, rejecting any direct attempt to influence society at all. The attitude becomes that it s too hard to change the culture because we fear that when the church tries to change the world, it might end up becoming just like the world. We are comfortable to just be a small sub-community. We know we are chosen and going to heaven. All those pagans who are not willing to repent are doomed at Judgement Day. Focusing on evangelism the more people are converted, the more the society will be changed. We will change culture one heart at a time. E.g Luke the gay friend. just convert him! Using Christian worldview to conquer other worldviews - hostile to culture, believe the major problem is secularism. The world no longer believes the absolute truth. So we need to promote Christian worldview in all aspect of life, get Christians into the world, in position of power, therefore to redeem the culture. E.g. Phil Kayser Being relevant the traditional church doesn t engage in people s lives, only condemns them to hell but doesn t take the time to meet people where they re at. Therefore, we now need to step out of the church, to meet people s need, focusing on issues like social justice, human rights, etc. being more involved in the society. The risk becomes watering down the Bible for the sake of cultural engagement. You probably can identify with all these responses. Here I am not making a judgement which one is right, or which one is wrong. All four responses have their own merits. We need Christian tradition, Christians in politics, and effective evangelism. And we, as the church, need to contextualize ourselves into the surrounding culture. But it would be harmful if we only take one single approach. Just simply bundling them all together is not sufficient either. So what should we do? I hope that by now you are convinced that we are at a time when the fundamentals of ministry strategy are undergoing a dramatic change. I want to ask you a question in three year s time, what will HPC look like? Imagine by that time, our new building project is complete, we own a much bigger space at the very centre of Hurstville. - What role do you as individuals as well as our church play in this community? - How will you be involved in reaching this society? - If the church is required to change, how can you be one of the change agents? Redeemer Presbyterian Church in NY can be a good model for us. HPC, comparing with other community church, has its own uniqueness. Hurstville is becoming the South centre in Sydney metropolitan area. HPC, therefore, will be more like a city church than a suburban church. 5

6 As Keller argues, the strategy is very simple: more Christians should live long-term in cities. I also want to argue that we must be committed to staying at Hurstville for the long-run. Hurstville is such a strategic location to reach the un-reached. You don t have to live here, but let s get excited about the fact that our church is strategically located where there are lots of people. Think how exciting it is that we can go to a church where we will always meet non-christians and have the chance to freely bring the Gospel to them. Imagine how depressing it would be if you only get to preach to the converted. Simply staying in Hurstville is not enough, we should present a dynamic counterculture. Jesus says in Matt 5 that you are the light of the world, a city on a hill. Our church is to be the city on the corner shining out the light to the world around. How we live should be radical and counter-cultural. For example how we live as families, husbands and wives, what s our view on marriage and sex. Even though our Christian worldview is totally counter-cultural and we might get laughed at or dismissed by Non Christians, when we truly live out what we believe with joy and conviction this is the most powerful way to flesh out the gospel. It is encouraging to hear from the Internationals that HPC has the reputation of being hospitable, loving and genuine. People talk about this at English school and then they find us. E.g those two women at our house But we still have great potential. The new migrants are generally still at the window-shopping stage. Many people come in and are curious and might hang around for a week or two but then leave and don t commit. Why don t they stay? How can we make our church more like home for them? Being a dynamic counterculture is still not enough. We need to serve sacrificially. We must commit radically to the good of the city as a whole. Peter here exhorts us, Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us. Serving is a sacrifice that requires us to go the extra mile. Eg. Hosting lunch, developing relationships, hospitality all these things mean we sacrifice our own time with family and friends but it has been a way that we ve gotten to know the new migrants and shown them our lives by opening our homes for them. Thinking about 2009 we have the opportunity to commit to the good of the city as a whole through the Jesus All about Life campaign. At the planning day we heard some great ideas about how we can be more involved in the community. The challenge is - do we know what the needs really are in the Hurstville area? - Are we aware of what people need in the surrounding suburbs? Let s try to find out now what is happening around us so we can practically, specifically and strategically love our community. In this way let s pray that Christ s sacrificial love will overflow into the neighbourhood around us. Closing So here are some of my thoughts and reflections from the first year of ministry serving at HPC. I ve really enjoyed the time here it s been a challenge but also a great joy to be part of this mission. I admit that meeting new people from different cultures and backgrounds isn t easy for all of us but I ve found this experience to be exciting and interesting. I think this is a good way to reflect to look at the Bible, look at the culture and then look at ourselves. My encouragement for you in these last few days of 2008 is to spend some quiet time with God exegeting yourself - how have you grown in your relationship with God this year? - Where is He prompting you to serve, even if it means a big sacrifice of your own time, resources and comforts? - How have you been a light in the world to those around you in your family, work place, school and neighbourhood? 6