Naeane Church Sunday Message — The Eighteenth Sunday After Pentecost
Sunday Message — The Eighteenth Sunday After Pentecost
The Holy Spirit Turns the Burden of the Holidays Into a Place for the Gospel
Text: 1 Corinthians 12:12–27
Today I want to preach on this: the Holy Spirit turns the burden of the holidays into a place for the gospel.
This week we had a major holiday. People go back to the hometowns they've missed, see their parents, their relatives, their siblings. My own parents have passed away, and my siblings are all scattered, so I'm now in the position of the one who waits, not the one who visits.
But whether I look back on the old days or on now, when we meet like this, the first hour or two is truly good. It's a joy — because we've met after months, after years, in some cases after decades. But after a little while, as we start trading this word and that, most of it is self-promotion. I did this, I did that. That's how the relatives talk.
And parents, and the older folks, ask, how did things turn out for you? Did this work out? — and mostly they already know their children's and relatives' situations. And what comes out is, see, that's exactly why you've got that problem. What doesn't come out easily is, let me pray for you, take heart. Because that isn't inside us, what comes out instead is, so how'd it go? Did you get married or not? Are you making decent money? — and then the complaints begin.
Actually, it isn't complaint. Most of what's said is objective fact. They're stating facts — but hidden inside the words is complaint, and to the one hearing it, it grates. And then it piles up and up. Just an hour ago these were the parents and siblings and relatives I'd waited months to see — and an hour later, inside, hurt and irritation and anger rise up, and I think I'd better get going, and I just leave.
So in a way, the closest family community, the closest circle of relatives, becomes an enemy in a single moment. So I quietly looked back on my own memories. There's something that always shows up in the newspaper at holiday time. Bad things keep happening — a knifing here, the most traffic accidents of the year, the most incidents of violence. In fact, the time when the most violence occurs is exactly this. Because the rest of the year, people don't gather.
So on this eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost — now not before the holiday but after it's all over — I want to preach on how to settle my heart now, and what attitude to carry in ahead of time when the next holiday, Lunar New Year, comes.
As always, five questions. You may misunderstand and wonder why I always do it in question form. First, it's to protect myself. If I don't do it in questions, then as I preach I end up nagging, and nagging turns into scolding and rebuke, and the one hearing it can't help but feel guilty. So to protect myself and to protect you, I answer five questions — making myself, in a way, the clinical case study. Even so, given my habit of several decades, as I answer those questions something uncomfortable may still come out. When it does, I hope you'll call Jesus is the Christ to protect yourselves, and pray for this pastor as you receive it.
One. How Did I Fight the Spiritual Battle This Week?
Last week's sermon theme was that the Spirit sets us free from the craving to be recognized.
When the holidays come now — long ago, at Chuseok and Lunar New Year, I lived in a communal setting. There was a leader over us who would make sure to assign work then, or keep us from going home. Because if you went home, there'd be ancestral rites — and thirty, forty years ago, in the '80s, that was even more intense. But this time, since it became a habit, and since there's no one coming to visit anyway — and even if they would, they're kept from it — I go to a certain church in Seoul for its gatherings.
And this time, going there, I discovered something. I've gone there now for four years running. In the old days my craving to be recognized was so strong. Why? Because if, by my own standard, our church had reached a certain size, the craving for others' recognition wouldn't have been that strong. But since it hadn't reached that level, I'd go to a big church and think, hey, I'm a pastor too, and I've grasped something in the Word — and the wish to be recognized would come roaring to life.
So a little while after meeting someone, what would come out? My own bragging. It came out to a degree I couldn't control. Year one, year two, year three went by like that. But because I'd drilled Jesus is the Christ so much, it kept getting pushed back. And coming to know that the craving to be recognized completely ruins me, I kept fighting.
This time, going there, I could see how much I'd changed. As Scripture says, made new day by day — my, I really have changed a lot. So I didn't deliberately go over to those people, didn't deliberately try to be recognized, didn't wander around wondering whether anyone might praise me — I saw myself just sitting quietly. In that church there's a coffee shop in the basement where everyone gathers, and in the old days I'd have gone. But I didn't. Because I know that if I go there, that craving comes alive — so I forced myself not to.
But with one person, I got caught. There's a certain ordained deacon, and he said, ah, Pastor, hello, coming over gladly since he hadn't seen me in a while. And I greeted him — ah, good to see you — but already, inside me, a discriminating heart appeared. It's in there. He's only an ordained deacon, not an elder — I could just brush him off. It didn't erupt all at once, but it welled up quietly. He may have noticed, or not. But afterward I felt it: ah, I'm discriminating against him. And I felt, ah, this too, when I'm not on guard, not paying attention — it just pops right out.
So even then, I called Jesus is the Christ. For the two days I was there, from morning to evening, that inner thought of wanting to be recognized — just like this week's message — kept surfacing. But it isn't a thought. Since you're educated people I say "thought," but there's a spirit that makes the thought surface. That spirit is alive, already inside here. It came in back in Genesis 3, and it activates. So I kept calling.
Follow me and confess. Jesus is the Christ.
On this point I know it more keenly than you, to my shame — and I can't help but keep calling. Because if I follow to its end the whisper of that spiritual being that rises endlessly inside me, it'll clearly take over even my behavior. I'm so keenly aware of it that I have no choice but to call, to guard myself.
Two. How Deeply Did I Come to Know Genesis 3:1–5 and 3:15 This Week?
In Genesis 3:1–5, I see the satan who had been outside. The satan makes himself god, divides person from person, divides God from human. And that came inside. From Genesis 3. All the garbage that was outside came in here — and it doesn't just rot; it rots and keeps operating. That's the problem of Genesis 3:1–5 — alive and constantly moving. I came to see how very serious this is.
And when you trace it all the way up, it's just one thing: I am god. You are god.
I watch a lot of YouTube these days — the sort about national pride. But not the baseless kind; the kind with some grounding. There's one channel I watch often; it's logical. On it, foreign scholars, when they look at Koreans, say that Koreans' individual sense of self-as-god is, compared with other countries, too strong, too vigorous, too energetic. Everyone is god, so everyone lives declaring themselves somebody.
So I thought: ah, I was born and am living in the Korea where the Genesis 3:1–5 self-as-god is at its most vigorous. These days they say that once this year passes, Korea will reach the era of forty thousand dollars per capita. A nation of fifty million people at forty thousand dollars — there aren't many like that in the whole world. Most are small city-states at seventy, eighty thousand; but fifty million people at forty thousand is a formidable nation. And that's without even being unified with the North. So this is an age when self-as-god lives all the more vigorously.
Especially now, at Chuseok, everyone gathers. And gathered, what is it all? Everyone is somebody. Now even the parents aren't the center — I am the center. From the parents' side they're children, but those children all live vigorously, all are gods. It's a family of gods, and with strength to spare, everyone comes out. So within the closest circle there are bound to be countless fights.
So God, in Genesis 3:15, knew that self-as-god has its limits. When we die, how does that solve anything? Dragging self-as-god along keeps dividing person from person. It divides even further — dividing the spouse within the home, dividing the children, dividing a person from himself. A fight breaks out even inside oneself. So the mental problem is serious.
What I lived with for decades was this: inside me, I attacked myself. You're inferior. You're a guilty sinner. Being ruled by that for decades — for sixty years — I couldn't do anything with myself. So God, knowing the human being was in that state, in Genesis 3:15, to overcome the god within me, gave a name — not the god within me, but a new name that God gives.
Follow me and confess. Jesus is the Christ.
The Old Testament doesn't end with God letting the human being be ruined — right there, He always gave a way. Genesis 3:15. So the one who takes hold of that name comes to be answered; the Spirit of God works so that when he looks at the world, normal eyes open; he isn't bound to the past but has clear eyes that see the present; and all authority to rule the world is restored. The only question is how much he's called that name — that only changes the height and breadth and depth. What matters is whether he calls the name or not. That's why Genesis 3:15 is the most important thing in the Old Testament, and I always read the whole Old and New Testaments against that backdrop.
Three. Explaining Today's Text, 1 Corinthians 12, Through the Lens of Genesis 3:15
Genesis 3:15 means we have to call the name Jesus is the Christ. Why call it? You call it to the degree you know why you need to. You can recite it like a chant; you can keep calling it.
Yesterday my wife and I were talking, and the story came up of when I once planted a church in Pohang. There's a district there called Yanghak-dong, and a huge temple called Hwanghae-sa, and another called Okcheon-sa. Hwanghae-sa is, in church terms, like a place where people pray fervently in tongues, and it stood right above Yanghak Elementary School. Sometimes at dawn I'd go up there and pray. But the people there chant only Gwanseeum-bosal, Gwanseeum-bosal. The place looks magnificent, but all they do is chant that one thing. And yet, doing only that, they say their problems get solved.
There's also a place called Guin-sa, somewhere in North Chungcheong Province — the head temple of that Hwanghae-sa. Go there and you can't even imagine it. Climb and climb and there's temple after temple. I went all the way to the top, with some pastors. There, countless people go in for a week, a month, staying and eating and chanting. And even chanting like that, they say miracles happen.
If I connect this in the same vein, it's admittedly awkward, but a thought can come: can it really work to call just that one name, Jesus is the Christ? Don't be deceived by that. A whisper comes: hey, that's just a chant of yours — what pastor calls something like a chant? Yes, it's like a chant. But once you pass a certain stage it's fine, so keep calling.
Now, coming back to this side — the Old Testament, rising up against the backdrop of Genesis 3:15, always cries out one thing: the Christ is coming. He has to come for you to escape the self-centered god within you, for what's bound to the satan to be loosed, for the deliverance from having to live gripped by the spirit that brings every trouble and affliction into life. That name is Genesis 3:15.
Holding onto that name and coming along, in the end, in the New Testament — Matthew, Mark, Luke, John — He came.
Follow me and confess. Jesus is the Christ.
He came, and He is the one called Jesus, and He is the Christ. He died, rose, ascended, and is at the right hand of God, and because He accomplished it all, at last He sent the One promised even in the Old Testament — the Spirit. So He dwells in all the disciples' hearts, and you and I too, by believing that name in John 1:12, have the Spirit here now.
But cross over into Acts, and that Spirit comes upon three thousand, four thousand, five thousand disciples and at last acts — and that action reaches out to the whole world. That's what Acts 1 through 28 is: a record centered on the process of spreading to the world. And then, how the individual churches were faring and being answered — that's recorded from Romans on, through the rest of the letters.
But today it's 1 Corinthians. In Acts 13 there was Paul, preaching the gospel to the whole world. On his first and second journeys he crossed into Europe and came to Corinth, preached the gospel, and planted a church. That was around AD 50 to 52. He planted the church and taught there for over a year and a half. And teaching didn't mean teaching theory — it meant teaching, just as with you and me, until this basic covenant was planted in their hearts: Jesus is the Christ, I am a child of God, every problem is finished, Satan, go, filled with the Spirit, world evangelization.
Then Paul left for another region. But not long after, word of trouble began to reach him. There was a problem in the church. I'm of Paul, I'm of Apollos, I'm of Peter — three factions began fighting endlessly. So, having no choice but to set it right, the letter he wrote is 1 Corinthians.
Today we're looking at 1 Corinthians 12. Its content is this: hey, you're fighting — from now on, open your eyes to a certain vision. What vision? That the church is one body. He uses the body as a metaphor. Look at our body — if the hand claims to be somebody, and the foot claims to be somebody, and the eye claims to be somebody, and they fight one another, it's useless. But seen as the whole body, each is an important part. So from I'm the somebody, open your eyes; from now on, shift your heart to the vision of the whole church community. That person is needed for one part of the community, and that one for another — so shift the eyes of your heart to the community's vision. That's Paul's counsel. And he asks that the Spirit give the wisdom for those eyes to open. That's the short of today's text.
Four. The Part I Want to Explain in Detail
When the Corinthian church received this letter around AD 55, it already had the basics in place. Perhaps more formidable basics than you and me. And having the basics doesn't mean having only knowledge — it means having experience.
Follow me and confess. Jesus is the Christ. I am a child of God. Every problem is finished. Satan, go. Filled with the Spirit. World evangelization. They didn't just chant this — they carried it into life.
But going along like that, a problem arose. Even flowing along well, a problem arises. So for us too, a problem arises on that very foundation. Among the many problems inside a church, a fight breaks out. Why does it break out? Here's why.
I've said I've been to Corinth. It's the most important commercial region on the Mediterranean, set between two seas. In those days the nation ruling the whole world was Rome, and among the nations Rome ruled, the largest cities were: first Rome, second Alexandria, third Antioch, and fourth, Corinth. Its population was four hundred thousand — a metropolis. People from all over the Mediterranean gathered there to trade and exchange information.
And another reason people from all over had to gather there: on the mountain were many major temples. Not just one. Last time I mentioned the temple where people had sexual relations with priestesses to solve their problems — the temple of Aphrodite — but there was also a temple of Zeus. Great temples dominated the city, and people came. So how many must have come.
But out in the world, gathering to trade with people, everyone clusters with their own kind. The rich, the not-so-rich, the upper class, the lower class, leaders — and there were slaves too. Among slaves, some were still in that status, and some had been freed. All kinds of people. But out in society everyone clusters with their own, and the upper class deals only with the upper class, so back then discrimination didn't much come to mind.
But the place where the problem gets most serious is the church. What sort of people made up the Corinthian congregation? Jews, Greeks, and Romans, all mixed in. Someone you'd do well to know, like Gaius, was of the very top tier, with the most money. But below that, most were of the lower class, and there were still-unfreed slaves too. All mixed together. And these people had to live out their faith inside the church.
Out in the world, since the upper class clustered together, they scarcely saw the lower class or slaves. Back then the prejudice, the discrimination, the I'm privileged didn't much show. But come into the church, and every day what you see is those very people. And since everyone is called a brother, the discriminating spirit that had been hidden or latent inside erupts. I'm somebody, I've got money — why am I here with that slave? Why is that one here? They're not even human, God doesn't even acknowledge them, aren't they beings under judgment? — that comes alive.
But since you can't openly display it, what do you do? You gather into factions. I acknowledge Paul. I acknowledge Apollos. I acknowledge Peter. And you crowd to one side. So they fight. And underneath the fight is that discriminating spirit, the latent spirit come alive and bursting out. So a church can't help but have all kinds of problems. I used to wonder why churches fight — of course they can't help it.
So what Paul answers is this. What operates inside you is a discriminating spirit, a spirit ruled by prejudice. From now on you have to replace your self-centered god. Replace it with what? With the spirit of the church community. Trace that discriminating spirit all the way up and what's there is self-centeredness. I'm god. Dividing everything for my own benefit alone.
And this is exactly like the scene this Chuseok. An hour ago it was the father I'd missed, my brother — and just ten minutes later, a strange remark comes in. And you go back to the old days, why did you do that, the casual jabs begin, and already discrimination and irritation rise inside. And right at that moment, my brother, my parent — the very same part of one body — but the eyes turn, and they look like an enemy.
So what the apostle Paul is saying is: not your self-centered god, but by the Spirit in the church community — the Spirit who sets you up as an evangelist — change your heart and see from that center. That is Paul's word.
Five. How Will We Apply This Word to Our Lives?
First, let's confess it together. Jesus is the Christ. I am a child of God. Every problem is finished. Satan, go. Filled with the Spirit. World evangelization.
Our church too is flowing along on this base. When I said the Corinthian church had turmoil, it doesn't mean the church was all ruined, or that it's no longer God's place. Flowing along, when a new problem arises, you solve that problem and move on — it's a process. We're flowing along like this too, so how do we apply today's word?
You too met a lot of family and relatives this week. As I said in my first point, I went to another church, and already the sense of privilege popped out inside me. I'm a pastor — why is that person like that? But I didn't display it openly, because I keep breaking it. There was a quiet stirring, and I didn't express it. He doesn't know, because I only sense afterward what's quietly alive. So I'd catch it — my, that just popped out in an instant — and bind it quickly. And at that church, for two days, I deliberately avoided the spots where that heart would come alive, sitting alone quietly in a coffee shop. So it wouldn't drift the wrong way.
So now, what has to change is this: I am the center of the world; for my benefit alone; if I'm in a good mood, everything's okay; if I'm in a bad mood, everything's a no. All of this kills me, and kills people. It kills even the spouse I love most, in an instant. The one I loved most, with whom I've been through all of life's joys and sorrows — in a single moment becomes an enemy, and I fling them away. Why? Because, deep at the very bottom, my god keeps making me that way, moment by moment.
So from now on you must renew yourselves by the power of the Spirit. How? By changing from the self-centered god within to the mind of an evangelist. By the Spirit. The Spirit set me up as an evangelist. The Spirit set me up as the evangelist entrusted with the gospel for my whole household, and, whenever I enter some group or organization, as an evangelist who prays for the whole of it. This is the concept we have to change.
But the theory is easy. Ah sure, just change it — no. I'm god, so how do I change? I don't change either. You have to keep doing Jesus is the Christ.
Follow me and confess. Jesus is the Christ.
So that spirit inside me that endlessly tries to divide people, endlessly tries to absolutize only me, endlessly tries to look down on others — that ungovernable spirit — you have to keep pushing it out with Jesus is the Christ. You have to weaken its power. Only then does the Spirit within me open up: ah, I should pray for this whole community; I should pray for the region where I live. Whatever household I've come from, whatever group I've come from — He sent me as an evangelist who prays with the whole of it in view. As the field of vision widens like this, it becomes global. This doesn't happen by theory — you have to keep calling that name, endlessly.
Let me share one last thing. When I was in the military, having gone as a chaplain, I had no choice but to be responsible for forty-five hundred men. Not just my own regiment, but even people at another regiment's outpost, because it was the front line. But a person is a strange thing. Forty-five hundred men come inside here. Four thousand, five thousand come in.
When I used to look at a president — inside that person, fifty million Koreans are held. The same human being, and yet in one person fifty million are held; a division commander in the military holds twelve thousand; I experienced holding four thousand. Holding them, I'd see: this unit should do this, that unit turned out that way, so that one would be like this — it lives and moves. The very same human being.
But after it was over, I saw: alone, there was only me. In all the world, just one person. In Scripture Paul says, are you not one body? — become an evangelist who holds the whole church in his heart. Go beyond the god that says just me.
So, everyone — for this word to keep coming alive in you and me, we have to do Jesus is the Christ. So that what's inside me keeps getting pushed back. Before receiving something new, I have to first clear the heart, and clearing has to keep happening. So pray for this whole church, pray for the whole of your household, and whenever you enter some group, be sent as an evangelist for the whole of it and pray; and when you read the newspaper, pray with the whole globe in view.
Being changed into these eyes doesn't happen on its own — it depends on how deeply, again, you call Jesus is the Christ. This week too, may that word be fulfilled in you and me, so that the Spirit opens your eyes to that and you experience Him being with you.
Closing Prayer
Let me pray.
Father, thank You. We thank You that, drawing on the name Jesus is the Christ, You bring us, little by little, out of the self-centered god.
Today too, the Spirit has set us up — out of the self-centered god — as evangelists who pray for the church community, for the home, for our relatives. Let us hold all those groups and gatherings in our hearts and pray, and let us cut off the problems that surface in the name of Christ, that we may see God change things completely.
In the name of Jesus, who is the Christ, we pray. Amen.
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