Worship Wars, St. Francis and me... in Hong Kong

  The wise man built his house upon the rock, house upon the rock, house upon the rock... the wise man built his house upon the rock, and the rain came tumbling down!

I  found out last night that one of the professors at the seminary (a fellow Westerner) was furious that I used a children's song (with gestures yet) at the seminary chapel service last week.

What a shame.  I know at least some of the students loved it.  There was a direct Biblical link -- St. Paul telling us not to be ashamed of giving your all in service of the Gospel. I used the song as a way to tell about the children of Hong Kong and China who are awaiting the pastors and church leaders and families trained and strengthened through this seminary, to share the ROCK of Jesus' life and teachings with them...   And I had a pretty good illustration in St. Francis of Assisi who consistently got in trouble with the church hierarchy for his choice in happy music, spontaneous handstands, and jokes, to the point of the early Franciscans being nicknamed the "jugglers of God." 

 "Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven."  -- Jesus, quoted in Matthew 18:3-4

 

  

The World is Her Oyster... or is it?

There's a wonderful English expression, "the world is her oyster" , which means that you are free and confident and adventurous enough to open up that which the world offers, and to find the pearls awaiting you.

I first just wanted to show you some pictures I took today of a couple of the beautiful children of our students at the Lutheran Theological Seminary of Hong Kong.

This little girl, for example, who is totally loved by her parents, and there's her brother, absorbed in learning new things about the world around him and the Slinky (made in the USA and sold in China :) which really does still walk down steps just the way it used to when I was a kid.

The third photo is of our newest father-to-be, whose first child is expected in the next few weeks.  We are teaching him the culinary secrets of Wisconsin brats (also made in the USA and sold in grocery stores here in Hong Kong :)

But I also need to tell you about some of the children in my classes at the Primary School this week.  It was a tough day.  Teachers were obviously stressed.  The first grade class with a high number of special needs kids was especially demanding.  I saw a couple of sharp pencils go flying through the air.  The songs I had chosen for them seemed too wild, and they danced around, rather than singing with the song.  (I am not a trained special ed teacher.  Make that, I am not a trained teacher, period!) One  boy, a 4th grader, was sobbing uncontrollably in the hallway. Several of the 6th graders, who have reportedly gone through 6 years of daily English lessons, did not seem capable of answering the most basic English questions during our small group time.

What breaks my heart is that there are a number of obviously bright children, eager and willing to learn... but how will they? Children of wealthier families are attending English & Mandarin-speaking schools, hiring private tutors,  and going to music and science camps.  

Meanwhile, I suspect, but I do not know, that some of the most difficult children in the Primary School do not have regular medical care, they do not have loving fathers in their home, they do not have the kind of  support and care that tells them they can grow up and do anything, become anything.  The world is not their oyster.

As Christians, how do we live the breaking in of a new power, which says that all children are precious, and the pearl of great price is not auctioned off for the smartest, richest, savviest bidder, but something hidden and secret, and yet available to us when we look for it, track it down, pry it open, claim it.   For all God's children, not just the wealthy and "advantaged" ones.

What do you think? How do you make a difference in educational opportunities for children where you live?

"Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls..."

    --- Jesus, quoted in Matthew 13:45

Multi-media Worship

We got to worship with the Nepalese Church again on Sunday.  Wayne preached, one of his students translated, and the singing and praying transported us to another world.  Since we don't understand the Nepalese language, we didn't know if they were praying "in tongues" or just praying, but there was a distinct whoooosh of the Spirit.   

Singing and praying and preaching was followed by dancing and jamming (the congregation includes a number of recovering drug addicts who are pretty great musicians, too bad yours truly didn't recharge my camera battery)... and delicious Nepalese food which even the kid (yes, our 17 year old was along for the occasion) enjoyed immensely.

May God be gracious to us and bless us
and make his face shine on us
so that your ways may be known on earth,
your salvation among all nations.
May the peoples praise you, God;
may all the peoples praise you.
                                                       -- Psalm 67:1-3

Lutheran Primary School Days Resume!!!

My weekly English language and Bible classes have resumed at the Lutheran Primary School.

Today I got to teach the two first grade classes separately (an attempt to put them together last time was an exciting disaster) so I first got to teach the group of 12 boys, most of them with special needs, and then the somewhat larger group of more "typical" first graders, although this group too has at least one student who is completely non-verbal and mostly enjoys turning the classroom sink faucets on and off.

It was fun!

Last time I had introduced them to God's name (since the English part of the lesson was "My name is") and I think in another few, um,  months they will be very solid on God's name is "God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit."  I have them make a modified sign of the cross as we say the words.  I wonder what they are really thinking as we do this :)

Then I started teaching them the song that was a huge hit with last year's first graders: "God made the world".  They loved it when I modified the song to ask each one their name (for example, Wing-Wing) and had everyone sing: "God made Wing-Wing, God made Wing-Wing, in my Bible book it says that God made Wing-Wing." It's got a catchy tune to it, and Wing-Wing and each of the other kids I called on was all smiles when she or he was serenaded.  We'll try and make sure each one gets a turn in the coming weeks.

Then it was on to the Second Graders, who swarmed me with great shouts of "Pastor Christa!".  This may be because they remember the colored pencils, sesame ice-cream, and sticker treats I gave them last year, but that's ok 'cause I'm a big believer in teaching God's Word in a way which reflects Psalm 119:103

"How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth."

Anyway, it was very sweet to MY taste to be back in school with them.  Thanks to all of you out there supporting us with funds and prayer.  Make that, prayer and funds, 'cause that's the order we need it in, teachers and students alike :)

By the way... one of the Lutheran Theological Seminary students told me recently that she became a Christian believer during her Christian Primary School days here in Hong Kong.  Her family was not Christian and she ended up at a Buddhist High School, but something in those early school years clicked for her, and she has since helped bring several of her family members to hope and freedom in Christ as well.  So who knows what the Holy Spirit may be up to with and through the teachers and kids of the Lutheran School at Ma On Shan??!!?

Teacher, Preacher, Cook

She preaches, she translates between Chinese and English, she cleans the candle wax off the altar... and she makes a mean red bean cake for after-church dessert.  What's not to like about this woman?

Meet Josephine, one of the students at the Lutheran Theological Seminary of Hong Kong, who has also graciously agreed to tutor me in Cantonese.  

She was  the preacher at tonight's worship service at Tao Fung Shan. As a woman personally acquainted with the chasm between academic Christianity and people of the local church communities, the chasm between the rich and the poor, she aptly pointed out that the poor man hoping for crumbs under the table of the rich man in Jesus' famous parable (Luke chapter 16) would never have had even that chance here in Hong Kong... the rich man's guards would surely have escorted the poor man away well before he got so close.

We don't usually even SEE each other, we rich and we poor of the world. 

But Josephine opened up that story for us tonight, and we were convicted... and given great hope that we can live lives differently, in Jesus Christ, who is both the poorest of the poor and the richest of the rich.

It's cool having a Cantonese tutor who's also a preacher.  And who feeds me red bean cake from time to time, too!

There was once a rich man who wore expensive clothes and every day ate the best food. ²⁰But a poor beggar named Lazarus was brought to the gate of the rich man's house. ²¹He was happy just to eat the scraps that fell from the rich man's table. His body was covered with sores, and dogs kept coming up to lick them.                       -- read the rest of this story in Luke 16:19ff

All Creatures Great and Small: The MacLeHose Trail Stage 4

Yesterday Wayne & I hiked another segment (stage 4) of the MacLehose Trail.

Hiking these sharp little hills was a challenge.

What we had planned on as a 3 hour hike, and what the sign at the start informed us was supposed to be a 5 hour hike, actually took us 7 1/2 hours.  

We only encountered 3 other hikers the whole day. Maybe most people realized that it's still too hot in Hong Kong for climbs like these.

Two water bottles each was not enough.

We encountered hundreds if not thousands of butterflies... 

climbed hundreds if not thousands of steps...

 

Among other things, we saw the biggest spider either of us had seen in our entire lives.  In fact, Wayne walked right into its web which was spun over the path, but high enough so that he only tore the bottom part of it... but then I was afraid to go under it (I was following Wayne) because I was afraid it was mad and would jump on my head... I summoned up energy I didn't know I had to run very quickly under the web, after taking a couple of photos for the benefit of you, my loyal blog readers.  (Since you can't really tell from the picture, let me tell you, the spider was about as big as the spread of my hand).

You can see the landscape was breath-taking.

And at the very end of the trail... a field of golden lilies.

To be utterly honest, we would have preferred finding a taxi, or a vending machine with ice cold water. 


How many are your works, O LORD!      In wisdom you made them all;
    ... teeming with creatures beyond number — living things both large and small...     --Psalm 104

3 Worship Services + 2/3 Blessing + 6 Continents = 1 Family of God

After practicing, practicing, practicing my Cantonese for Sunday's liturgy, I was ready to lead worship with gusto on Sunday.... only to stumble and stutter who knows what language into the microphone.  For a grand finale, I stood up to give the closing blessing... and promptly forgot one whole person of the Holy Trinity (All were blessed in the name of the Father and the Spirit only... so, my good theologian friends... did the congregation  receive a whole blessing or only two thirds of a blessing?) It reminded me painfully of my earliest days as a seminarian, when I would garble the invocation and forget whole parts of the liturgy.

Afterwards, instead of giving me their usual lovingly exaggerated compliments, "Oh your Chinese is getting so good!",  my kind Chinese parish members instead said, " Oh, you are working so hard on your Chinese!"

Indeed.

But here's an amazing thing I realized on Sunday night... this weekend I worshiped with people from all six (inhabited) continents!  At the prison worship on Saturday we had prisoners from South America and Africa, on Sunday morning we had lots of folks from Asia and one from North America (yours truly) and on Sunday night (at Amazing Grace in Kowloon Tong) a couple of Germans and an Australian couple joined in with the mostly Filipina congregation, to make the intercontinental worship complete.


In God's house we need not be segregated by our language abilities, or lack thereof.

⁷Understand, then, that those who believe are children of Abraham. ⁸The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: "All nations will be blessed through you." ⁹So those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.   -- Paul writing to the Galatians, chapter 3