Dancing With God

Trinity 1-3, Purpose of Men

Isaiah 43:18-21, Romans 12:1-2

Why Were You Born?

Genesis begins with the creation story. It says that God is the Creator of everything and human beings are created by God. We need to remember it in order to build a right relationship with God. Why is that?

When I went to college, one of the first classes I took was ‘Systematic Theology.’ The professor had his PhD degree in Germany, and he told us to read the German Philosopher, Martin Heidegger’s book, “Being and Time.’

It is Heidegger’s major book that profoundly influenced 20th century philosophy, particularly existentialism, hermeneutics and deconstruction. The book was not easy to read, especially for a college freshman. Most of the students read the book and wrote 5 pages book review without understanding the book. But I still remember one thing that the book said, “We are beings thrown into the world.” In other words, we were born to this world without our choice.

Is it true or is it not true? We didn’t intend to be born but our births were given. In the Christian world, we did not create ourselves but we are created by God. According to Heidegger, most people live as if they were born by themselves until they face death. Once they recognize that they could not avoid death, they feel anxious and question themselves, “Why am I here?” “What is the meaning of my life in this world?

Heidegger said that we exist only within a limited time and we cannot control our being and time. The only thing that we can do is to seek the meaning of our existence so that we can be free from anxiety. Our life is a journey to seek the meaning of our being in this world.

The Purpose Of Men

If we exist by ourselves, then we can find the meaning of our existence in ourselves. But since we are created by God, the reason of our existence is not from us but from God, the Creator. Let’s say that I built a table. Then, people do not ask the table, “Hey! What is purpose of your existence?” Rather than asking the table, People would ask me why I made the table. I know the purpose of the table because I made it.

It is the same that since God created us; the purpose of our existence should come from God. God knows the purpose of human beings, and God said the reasons in the Bible. There are two reasons for creating human beings.

First, God created us to take care of His creation. Genesis 1:26 says, “Then God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” (NRSV)

This verse suggests that humanity is the image of God in the dominion over the rest of creation. God created the heavens and the earth, fish, flowers, animals and God said it was good. Then God created human beings to have dominion over His creation. Hebrew word for ‘Have Dominion’ is rada. It means "care giving and nurturing" but not exploitation. God asked us to take care of His creation. So, God gave us dominion over the creation in behalf of God, and therefore we represent God to His creation.

Second, God created us to praise His glory. Isaiah 43:18-21 talks about God’s new creation. Since God’s creation was corrupted by human sins, God declared that He would renew his creation and said at verse 21, “the people whom I formed for myself so that they might declare my praise.”

Isaiah said that God created human beings that they may praise God’s glory.

‘Praise God!’ is our reason to exist.

Therefore, the last psalm, Psalm 150 ends with praising God’s greatness.

1 Praise the LORD! Praise God in his sanctuary; praise him in his mighty firmament!

2 Praise him for his mighty deeds; praise him according to his surpassing greatness!

3 Praise him with trumpet sound; praise him with lute and harp!

4 Praise him with tambourine and dance; praise him with strings and pipe!

5 Praise him with clanging cymbals; praise him with loud clashing cymbals!

6 Let everything that breathes praise the LORD! Praise the LORD!

Verse 6 says that it is not only human beings but all of God’s creation should praise God. All creatures are made to praise God’s greatness. It is interesting to compare the first reason with the second reason.

When God told us to have dominion over His creation, we take care of all of His creation in behalf of God. When we praise God, we praise His name in behalf of all of His creation.

On one hand, we represent God to His creation, and on the other hand we represent His creation to God. So, we are the mediator between God and His creation: we take care of His creation and we worship God.

Third, God created us to be a blessing. During the Bible study, we studied on Genesis and we learned about God’s promise to save His people. In order to save his people God called Abraham and said “you shall be a blessing.” (Gen. 12:2) Page

All of the Bible stories are about God’s saving efforts through the people He called. God called Judges, Prophets and Priests to save His people. God sent His beloved son Jesus to save His people. God called disciples, deacons, elders, missionaries and Christians to save His people. All of God’s calling is about saving His people and blessing them.

In the Old Testament, God said ‘you shall be a blessing,’ and in the New Testament, Jesus said, “you are the salt and the light of the world.”(Matt.5:13-14)

Either way, it is the same that God calls us to be part of His salvation plan for the world.

Dancing With God

‘Destiny’ is another word for ‘the purpose of men.’ Louis Savary is a Jesuit professor in Spirituality. He said “our destiny is where God’s mystery and our mystery intersect.” Destiny, goal or mission of our life is not fixed but it was like dancing with God. It is well expressed in “the Creation of Adam”, a fresco painting by Michelangelo. This is part of the Sistine Chapel's ceiling, painted in 1512.

There are many paintings of the creation of Adam, but the uniqueness of this painting is that God and Adam stretch out their hands for the creation. This painting indicates that God created us not like a robot that moves as programmed, not like animals that live by instincts, but according to His own image and invited us to join His ongoing creation. God created us to be His partner by His grace, and called us to reflect His glory in this world. That is our destiny, the meaning of our life in this world.

I like this story that happened in a college. At the end of a semester, a college professor asked if there were any questions.

A student held up his hand and said half-jokingly, “Sir! I have a question. What is the meaning of life?”

Everyone laughed. They knew it was an impossible question and that the student was teasing. But the professor, well into his seventies, didn’t laugh. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small mirror.

Then the professor said, “When I was a small child, during the war, we were very poor and we lived in a remote village. One day, on the road, I found scattered broken pieces of a huge mirror on the ground.

I tried to find all the pieces and put them together, but it was impossible, there's probably a million little pieces, so I kept only the largest piece.

By scratching it on a stone, I made it round. I began to play with it as a toy. And I became fascinated by the fact that I could reflect light into dark places where the sun would never shine…

As I became a man, I grew to understand that this was not just a child’s game but a metaphor for what I might do with my life. I came to understand that I am not the light or the source of light. But light, like truth, true understanding or knowledge is there, and it will only shine in many dark places if I reflect it.”

Christians are like the mirror. We are not light, but we can reflect God’s light.

We are not a blessing, but we can reflect God’s blessing to people.

When we take care of God’s creation, when we love people and when we worship God, we can reflect God’s love and grace.

Let’s remember that we are made wonderfully and beautifully so that we can reflect God’s love and grace in this world.

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Rest in God's Refuge

The Dream

Chuang Chou was a famous Chinese philosopher during the third century BC. One day, he dreamed that he became a butterfly and was happily flying over to the sky. When he woke up, he wondered if he had a dream of being a butterfly or the butterfly had a dream that he was Chuang Chou. Which one do you think is real, Chuang Chou or the butterfly?

Let me share my daily life.  I wake up each day; take a shower and dress up for the day. Then, I prepare my kids for school, do this and do that, go to work, meet people, and come back home at night.

Each time, I am aware of what I am doing and the decisions I make for the day. This daytime I, is about who I am, and who represents me, my identity to other people. Since I work a lot during the day, I go to sleep at night to rest.

As I fell asleep, another I pop up! Another I pop up in a dream, and this other I is busy in the dream doing something weird, crazy, funny, fantastic, creative or dumb things. While we call the daytime I as I or ego and I in the dream called the Dream I. So, the daytime I is the owner of the world of consciousness during the day and the dream I is the owner of the world of unconsciousness during the night. Which means, all people have two "I's" daytime I and dream I.

Daytime Jonah

The book of Jonah has only four chapters, but it has one of the most interesting stories. The story is about Prophet Jonah, who disobeyed God's word and was swallowed by a big fish, but still lived and finally carried out God's mission.

Some scholars believe that the story happened literally as the Bible said but others argue that even though the story carries Gods' word, it is not real. I do not want to argue if it is real or not. I do not want approach it with the general Biblical interpretation. Instead, I will try to see the story from the perspective of dream interpretation.

Chapter 1 says that God told Prophet Jonah to preach to the city of Nineveh. It was a great city of the Assyrian empire and its population at that time was more then 120,000. Niniveh was a wicked city worthy of destruction, but God wanted Jonah to preach to the Ninevites so that they would repent otherwise the city would be destroyed.

But the Assyrians were the people who destroyed Northern Israel. They were the enemies of the Israelites. Prophet Jonah, who was an Israelite and had patriotic mind, did not want their enemies to be saved. His patriotism was stronger than his desire to follow God's words.

So, verse 3 says that rather than going to Nineveh, Jonah ran away from the Lord and headed for Tarshish, which was the opposite direction of Nineveh.

Jonas' daytime I had a certain value or belief. If God says something against his value, the daytime I was willing to run away from God to avoid the conflict.

Obeying to God's words seemed like betraying his people. So, running away from God was the daytime I defense mechanism.

Nighttime Jonah

The story continues to say that Jonah took a ship to go Tarshish to flee from the Lord, but the storm came and threatened the ship. Then, Jonah confessed to the people that because of his disobedience, God caused this storm. So the people threw Jonah into the sea, and God sent a big fish to swallow Jonah.

Chapter 2 is Jonah's prayer when he was in the belly of the big fish. Jonah prayed at verse 2, "... out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and you heard my voice. According to the Old Testament, sheol is a place where the dead people go. Being in the belly of a big fish was like being buried in a grave. It was dark, cold, lonely, scary and starving. There was nothing he could do but simply ask God for help.

According to the dream symbols, under the sea is the place of unconsciousness, where we are not aware and in the belly of the fish is the center of the depth of the unconsciousness. Since this is a place where one can be more receptive rather than proactive, it is a place where one can hear God's voice. It seems a scary place, but it is also a place of God's refuge where we can reconnect with God. It is a place where a dream is created.

Have you ever questioned why Mary had an angel's visitation for that I the annunciation but Joseph had it in his dream? Women are more receptive than men during the day. So women could hear God's message. Men have a strong ego during day time to deal with their daily social life, so they could not hear God's voice. When men sleep at night, they become more receptive and become ready to hear God's voice. So, a dream is the best way that God talks to men. Number 12:6 says "...when there is a prophet among you, I, the Lord, reveal myself to them in visions, I speak to them in dreams.

Jonah had a strong ego and didn't listen to God when he was awake, but when he was swallowed by a big fish, he became receptive to God's voice. He repented, and swore that he would follow God's command.

Back to daytime I

Morton Kelsey, a Jungian psychologist and an Episcopalian Priest, says, "A dream is a way to listen to God". God talks us through a dream, but most people negate the dream and do not remember it.

Jonah experience God in the belly of the big fish and he committed himself to follow God's command, but once he came back to earth his ego still controlled his life. He was not happy to follow God's commandment.

So, chapter 3 said that she went to Nineveh and preached as God commanded, but he went through the city in just one day and preached quickly. It required 3 days to visit the city, but Jonah quickly finished his business without much concern (Jonah3:4).

It is like a guy who loved drinking. He went to see a doctor. His doctor said that he should stop drinking otherwise his kidney would fail. He said that he had to drink and the doctor said that if he drank just a couple of wine, it would be what fine. So this guy prepared a big cup that could hold a bottle of wine and drank it, told himself that he followed the doctor's advice.

Jonah was like that. He pretended to be following God's command, but he did not like to follow God's words. So chapter 3-4 describe Jonah's inner conflict between hispariotism and obeying God's word, between his consciousness and he's unconsciousness, between his daytime "I" and his inner "I".

We like to love people us Jesus said. But like Jonah, we love people who loved us. We love our family but not others. We love our community but not others. We love our country but not enemies. Always, we put a certain boundary consciously or unconsciously, and we love people who are within the boundary we created in our lives. We believe that we love people as Jesus said but denied that there are some people we really do not care about. Since our daytime "I" denies to see the uncomfortable truth, it is oppressed. But the truth is revealed in a dream, on the dream challenges us to move beyond our limits.

Rest in God's refuge

In Hebrew, the word dream is "chalom", and its meaning is to be made healthy or strong. Morton Kelsey says that dreams are gifts from God. God gave us dreams to make us healthy and strong. A dream is supposed to be God's refuge where we can rest.

Modern dream science has discovered that all people dream at night whether they remember or not. When people were deprived of their dreams, they become emotionally disturbed and anxious. Dreaming is not an option, but a human condition to keep our physical and psychological heath.

And understanding our dreams is our choice to grow spiritually.

Although, understanding our dreams is not the only way to improve our spiritual growth, it is one of the better ways to understand ourselves, to maintain our spiritual health and to understand God's guidance. Dreams do not tell us the truth directly. Most times, dreams talk to us indirectly through symbols. Therefore we need to interpret our dreams carefully with an open mind.

Remember that God gave us dreams as a gift, for our psychological and spiritual well- being.

Sing On Dance On!

Sing On, Dance On!
Music by Mark Weston

Sing on, dance on, join in celebration; 
praises we bring to our Lord, God and King. 
Sing on, dance on, shout with  acclamation, 
praising, rejoicing with all living things. 
Praise to the Lord, the Almighty, the king of creation. 
Sing on, dance on, join in celebration, 

O my soul, praise him, for he is our health and salvation! 
Sing on, dance on, shout with acclamation. 
All you hold here, now to his temple draw near;
join us in glad adoration! Alleluia! 

In all things we see God's glory, through all things his beauty share. 
Thankful for the gifts God gave us, mindful of his loving care. 
Sing on, dance on, join in celebration; 
praises we bring to our Lord, God and King. 
Sing on, dance on, shout with  acclamation, 
praising, rejoicing with all living things. 

Praise to the Lord! O let all that is in us adore him! 
All that has life and breath, come now with praises before him!
Let the amen sound from his people again;
gladly for ever adore him. 

Sing on, dance on!
Sing on, dance on! 
Praise to the Lord!