Here's a good article I came upon while doing some research on Youth ministries. The original can be found here
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I asked my five-year-old son to explain love using a story. When he didn't understand the question, I told him to go in his room and pick out a book for me that was about love. He returned empty handed with a big smile. "It was a trick question, wasn't it?"
"What do you mean?"
"You were tricking me. They’re all about love." We went back to his room where he handed me one book after another.
"This boy loves his dog, this mama cat loved her kittens, I love the earth (he had handed me a science book), Jesus loves me (a Child’s Bible)."
Jane Austen once said there are as many types of love as there are moments in time. As Christians, we define love, true love, as a participation in the loving relationship of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We quote the first letter of John: "God is love!" We also point to the reality of sin, recognizing that love can be separated from God, bringing shame and painful isolation. True love is everlasting, sustaining, and honored in commitment and covenant.
In our postmodern world, students are constantly bombarded with the message that love is the end-all-be-all of life; but it’s a skewed perspective on love. When we separation love from God, we discover that pleasure, intensity, and radical giving and receiving leaves us feeling unfulfilled. We become bored, waiting impatiently through life, insatiable for more pleasure, more intensity, and more radical experiences.
Our role is to help kids learn a Cristocentric approach to love, founded on biblical principles and using the trinitarian nature of God as a model.
"Love your neighbor as yourself." (Matthew 19:19)
Four high school teens were driving around the strip malls and businesses near the airport, soliciting ads for their high school musical. They approached a business front marked "Dry Cleaning" and tried the front door. Finding it locked, they rang the bell. An oriental woman answered; behind her two young oriental girls peered out. The kids explained their business and were promptly sent on their way.
"I remember now," one of the boys said on the drive to the next store front. "My brother told me the dry cleaning place is actually a house of prostitutes."
Three of them laughed uproariously at the thought of a brothel ad in the program for "The Sound of Music."
A fourth student painfully looked back toward the house. Later, over sundaes, she told them what she knew about child prostitution and the sex trade of children. Commercial sexual exploitation of children is a multi-billion dollar industry drawing one million children worldwide. Most of the children are ages 13 to 18, although some younger than five have been documented. One study found 60 to 70 percent of child prostitutes in Thailand were HIV positive. Poverty, illiteracy, and abuse define their much of lives.
The girls they saw were taken to prayer. News of them went to parents, and finally to police, who admitted frustration that locations would simply move and the girls would be deported back home where little resources were available to provide an alternate life.
Agape. We’re called by God to love our neighbor. A love that’s spiritual (God’s Spirit in us) and selfless. A love revealed by Jesus. A love that acknowledges the distinct reality of what is other than us, and loves it for its sake, not our own. It’s the love of the Good Samaritan and the Ancient Mariner blessing creation unaware. It’s denied when the dignity of life is denied.
"No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends." (John 15:13)
They spent hours together walking the park at the school picnic. He poured his heart out about the pain in his life, a mother who might move, his best friend and girlfriend now in a relationship, and a failing grade in biology. She listened and understood, returning home that night sure a true friendship had begun. The next day in school he didn’t even return a hello.
Postmodern reality includes a painful search to find others who respond as we believe they should. A few become part of a tribe, a group of friends who live by a code of confidentiality and reciprocal kindness. Some find a companion to share life’s sorrows and joys. Many struggle with how to respond to their desires for connection, particularly in a culture that models almost exclusively just the sexual expression of that desire.
Philia is the ancient Greek word for friendship. Desire is part of the relationship. We choose our friends; we desire to be with them and delight in what we share. Tolerance is balanced with similar convictions and interests. Openness is balanced with a respect for what’s private to each individual. Mutual dependence is balanced by enabling the independence of each other.
Men, with rooms filled with trophies and certificates, often form friendships with teammates, coworkers, and other men equal in ability and achievement. Women, with rooms filled with photos and memories, often form friendships based on the level of emotional confidentiality they can share. But each friendship is unique, growing through a gradual unfolding of self-revelation, and seasoned by culture and time.
Postmodern seekers long for Koinonia, fellowship in community, a relationship with others who (try, yet sometimes fail to) share a common morality of what relationships and friendships mean. We desire to share with others a love of God and mission in the world. We tolerate our differences while sharing in a life of the Spirit. Some of us battle being too large and not being able to name the people with whom we worship. When we form small groups to build community, we can become exclusive and fail in our mission to reach out to the outcast. Only in opening ourselves to the movements of the Holy Spirit can we truly share a Philia love in our midst.
"…that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us." (John 17:21)
Eros, again returning to ancient Greek, is desire, a power that inclines us to pursue the whole, which we are not. It’s a hunger within us for self-completion in the desired or loved object. While it can be expressed in sexual desire, that’s not the only expression of Eros.
Some Christian writers in history falsely separated Eros and Agape. They described God’s love for us as wholly selfless—God is unchanged whether or not we return it…that part is true. God doesn’t need us to be complete. Human love, on the other hand, always includes a selfish element (even a martyr awaits a heavenly reward). We are incomplete without God. We’re created for community. It’s only when we make a gift of ourselves to another that we come to understand who we are.
Other Christian writers start with God’s love for the Son, the Son’s love for the Father, and the loving relationship of the three persons of the Trinity. With this starting point, God’s love is not selfless, but mutual. In his last supper discourses, Jesus describes his mission of love; "I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you loved me may be in them, and I in them" (John 17:26). It is male and female together (Genesis 1:27), humans in a loving relationship, which are the image of God. Eros is a desire to share in the loving relationship of the Father, Son, and Spirit. This desire for mutuality impels us to work for justice, solidarity, and a civilization of love, which is indicative of the postmodrn mindset.
One of our teen leaders approached me during an out-of-town conference. She was disillusioned and frustrated. The year before, she’d spent three weeks in the third world on a mission trip. She’d become dramatically aware of the difference even a small amount of money can make in the future of one child, one family, and one village. Her friends were filling conference time with shopping—spending hundreds of dollars on clothes and shoes and music. She felt their desire to consume material goods was blinding them to any benefits of the conference.
The advertising industry has learned to tap into Eros. They profit when people believe they’ll find self-completion or some sense of happiness when their products are used. Much of this manipulation involves the sexual element of Eros.
When this teen leader returned from the third world, she wanted to stay connected with the poor of the world. This desire compelled her to use her money to help them share in good health, a full stomach, and the joys of a God-inspired life. The teens who were shopping wanted a connection to their peers and their community. Both experiences could be described as the wings of Eros lifting them to share in the loving relationship of the Trinity. But Eros only lifts us so high. Prayer, commitment, and living in God’s covenant can carry us into intimate unity with God. Separated from God, Eros becomes twisted, a justification to overpower and subjugate others, or a rationalization to pursue only selfish goals.
"Let him kiss me with kisses of his mouth! For your love is better than wine…" (Song of Songs 1:2)
Pope John Paul II has described the ecstasy experienced in the sexual union of a husband and wife as a foretaste of the ecstasy we’ll experience when united with God in eternity. The sexual aspect of love is often given the name Venus. When placed in the context of the love of the Trinity, sexual love becomes ordered. For a Christian, commandment and covenant structure how our sexuality is to be expressed in all our loving relationships.
A sixteen-year-old recently shared: "We were sitting in the movies together, our first date. We had gone to see Matrix Reloaded. Part way through the movie his hand reached out and embraced mine. I was thinking, ‘how romantic’ when Neo and Trinity, the two main characters, left the dance floor and began a nine-minute, very explicit sexual encounter. I didn’t want to seem a prude, but as he held my hand and the scene continued, I started to feel so embarrassed."
In our postmodern world, the ideal of love is rejected by many; and it’s so very hard to live by, even for Christians. Many people jump into a sexual relationship assuming shared values, then later find that they define a loving relationship very differently from their partners. Others find it impossible to be faithful, giving way to the barrage of sexuality divorced from spirituality.
Love in a postmodern world requires patience and dialogue. Each song, movie, television show, and advertisement is an opportunity to introduce the Triune God. Every discussion of friendship, dating, and love becomes an opportunity to invite the postmodern world to share in the loving relationship with God.
Sunday, March 27, 2005
Saturday, March 26, 2005
Good Friday
If we consider how utterly undeserved [the crucifixion] was, we call it grace; if we consider the cost, we call it atonement; if we consider the effect, we call it new life, redemption, sanctification.
Austin Farrer, A Faith of Our Own
It's Good Friday already! Wow, time flies, and yea, there were calls for me to write more here. Guess I'm adopting a policy of writing less unless I feel I can write something substantial or interesting here. No point writing for the sake of filling up space, right?
Pondering upon Good Friday, I was reminded of the movie, Passion of the Christ yet again. As one of the best done and researched movie about Christ, it tells us of the time Christ got arrested, the unfairness of His trials, the tearing of his flesh as the thorn-filled whip graced it and finally, the how a man, welcomed on a donkey a week before, had turned into a public enemy. And so much more, that they even chose to release a murderer, instead of him.
Overzealous may not seem an extreme word to describe their faith, and perhaps they really wanted to serve God. But was their zealousness tempered by the want of political power, the need for public adoration and the way they think they're actually preserving God's laws? That is, until a certain man calling himself Jesus Christ came about breaking their laws and called them their religiousity, "White washed tombs"
Christ died and rose again 3 days later. Christ came as a revolutionary, but yet, many misunderstood Him as someone who would wage a war. And when Christ gave the sermon on the mount, many were left stunned, dumb founded and amazed. Here was his chance to raise an army that could actually overthrow the oppresive Roman Empire, and there he was exalting the weak and saying that theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Has he gone cuckoos? Who was he actually? I'm sure the disciples were as equally dumbfounded by their leader.
And, reading thru Sivin Kit's blog, which had a link to thoughts on the Cruxification of Christ, I would like us to ask ourselves. Have we taken God's grace for granted? Have we been too numbed to the pain of the Cross? Has our lives been too preoccupied with our wants, our insecurities and our hurts, so much so that we miss out on what does God actually wants us to do for the moment?
I don't claim to have the answers, and well, I've none. To tell the truth, I struggled with issues of self-image, anger & depression between last year's Good Friday and this. But yet, I'm taught again and again, that God's in control. I've promised myself not to look at situations from a point of whether others would like me or for that point, hate me(and after all, it's all insecurities. And when the facade drops, would they still like you?), but from a point of where could I be God's blessing to others. Life isn't about being selfish, scared or even about running away. But know, and believe that God's in control..
Looking back, time did pass us by fast. Last Easter, there we were, Alvin, Dwong, Mel, Charis and me. Going for a hang out session after our finals,and following it up with the Good Friday service at FGA. And now, it's another Good Friday! Boy, I'm another year older too..
On less serious stuff, I might be changing over to Digi postpaid this weekend. Running Crossroadz requires me to call more often than I would have needed to previously. And Digi's Optimum plan does look good in the long term, and well, Maxis' plan 75 does not allow us to carry forward our remaining credit. So then, goodbye Maxis! And salut Digi!
Guess dat's it, have a blessed Easter!
Austin Farrer, A Faith of Our Own
It's Good Friday already! Wow, time flies, and yea, there were calls for me to write more here. Guess I'm adopting a policy of writing less unless I feel I can write something substantial or interesting here. No point writing for the sake of filling up space, right?
Pondering upon Good Friday, I was reminded of the movie, Passion of the Christ yet again. As one of the best done and researched movie about Christ, it tells us of the time Christ got arrested, the unfairness of His trials, the tearing of his flesh as the thorn-filled whip graced it and finally, the how a man, welcomed on a donkey a week before, had turned into a public enemy. And so much more, that they even chose to release a murderer, instead of him.
Overzealous may not seem an extreme word to describe their faith, and perhaps they really wanted to serve God. But was their zealousness tempered by the want of political power, the need for public adoration and the way they think they're actually preserving God's laws? That is, until a certain man calling himself Jesus Christ came about breaking their laws and called them their religiousity, "White washed tombs"
Christ died and rose again 3 days later. Christ came as a revolutionary, but yet, many misunderstood Him as someone who would wage a war. And when Christ gave the sermon on the mount, many were left stunned, dumb founded and amazed. Here was his chance to raise an army that could actually overthrow the oppresive Roman Empire, and there he was exalting the weak and saying that theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Has he gone cuckoos? Who was he actually? I'm sure the disciples were as equally dumbfounded by their leader.
And, reading thru Sivin Kit's blog, which had a link to thoughts on the Cruxification of Christ, I would like us to ask ourselves. Have we taken God's grace for granted? Have we been too numbed to the pain of the Cross? Has our lives been too preoccupied with our wants, our insecurities and our hurts, so much so that we miss out on what does God actually wants us to do for the moment?
I don't claim to have the answers, and well, I've none. To tell the truth, I struggled with issues of self-image, anger & depression between last year's Good Friday and this. But yet, I'm taught again and again, that God's in control. I've promised myself not to look at situations from a point of whether others would like me or for that point, hate me(and after all, it's all insecurities. And when the facade drops, would they still like you?), but from a point of where could I be God's blessing to others. Life isn't about being selfish, scared or even about running away. But know, and believe that God's in control..
Looking back, time did pass us by fast. Last Easter, there we were, Alvin, Dwong, Mel, Charis and me. Going for a hang out session after our finals,and following it up with the Good Friday service at FGA. And now, it's another Good Friday! Boy, I'm another year older too..
On less serious stuff, I might be changing over to Digi postpaid this weekend. Running Crossroadz requires me to call more often than I would have needed to previously. And Digi's Optimum plan does look good in the long term, and well, Maxis' plan 75 does not allow us to carry forward our remaining credit. So then, goodbye Maxis! And salut Digi!
Guess dat's it, have a blessed Easter!
Sunday, March 13, 2005
It's been nine years
The news of Anjeet's funeral still stayed fresh in my mind. Anjeet, a friend from secondary school, my fellow Young Enterpreneur and also, the hot punjabi chick that got the attention of the indian guys and beyond.
She was also my fellow HELP institute friend, although we had different degrees, with mine, the ever crazy Bachelor of Economics from University of London, and hers, hmm, American Degree Program I suppose.
And it was a shock to hear her death. It's so soon, so fast and she's too young to die. After all, she just got married last year. And well, frankly speaking, her funeral was another of those gathering for all of us since the times of form 5. Most of us hardly met, except in our own comfortable groups, people we hanged out with.
And what an irony, cause, just 3 weeks before that, the reason why we met was to celebrate Wei Hoong's wedding. 9 years. It has been too long. Too long since we last sat down and thought about life. Life that swept us by, from childhood dreams, to realisation of the harshness of the real world.
It was good too, to be able to meet up with the girl I once had something for. Wei Mun was, in every sense, everybody's dream girl. She was smart, witty, pretty and well, most importantly, kind. And the thing is, she did not had to flirt to gain attention. I was anxious to see how she had turned out to be, yet, well, a bit worried on what she might think of me after all these years. Good thing was well, it went better than expected.
The guys that went around labelling me a loser, well, they came for the wedding too. The whole bunch of them, minus a couple of others. Some still held the air of aloofness with them when you greeted them. 9 years on, and well, it's a pretty sad sight to see this happening. Though, others warmed up and were able to joke about things. Guess that they've grown up huh?
And well, my gang. My group of friends. Some of them whom I walked home from school almost everyday. Others, we sat around the football field in the middle of the night at 3 am, just looking at the stars. There was our favorite mamak spot around ss3. The times we sat around, trying to pick up some songs off Sukhwinder. The times we got excited meeting chicks from some girls school. And yea, those Americans too.
The times we spent making fun of Abdullah. Ah, I'm surprised to remember sneaking into Sunway Lagoon a number of times with Jack. And there we were, 2 guys, just hanging out on the suspended bridge in the evenings. Looking, pondering and well, trying to make meaning out of life. Jack's now a self-made millionaire a few times over. And nope, he didn't get help from his dad, who was a newspaper editor.
The funny thing? Jack and me both had something for Wei Mun once. And he was with me in my sorrows and in my countless depressing poems. Perhaps life wasn't that bad if you took out that element. But then, what would life be, without the pains and the joys?
I guess, I'll be the last one out of university and to work in a proper job. True, you could say working as a waiter at Chili's and as a trainee Engineer are proper jobs too. But yet, there you are, not fighting for a living. Here, the real world awaits. With my God behind me too, I guess.
Looking at my bunch of friends, many of them still looked the same, with perhaps a difference in a wrinkle or two. Some thinner and some horizontally blessed. But yet, our topics of conversation has changed. It's not so much about the latest movie we've seen (though we do that to people we meet often) nor even jobs and pay and perhaps degrees, that was when the first of us graduated. But no, it's more about anxiously finding out how each other had been. Who cares about how popular we were back in secondary school? Life is indeed fragile and fast moving, why bother holding grudges?
Many first came out working believing that money and success up the corporate ladder represents everything. Some still do. But yet, for those who've been there, they've realised that the rat race does not nescessarily equate to happiness.
And as I look upon myself, making my first strides towards the working world, I keep asking myself, 'Would I give up my dream, my God given dream for money, fame or love?' And I would tell myself, no. Not even love. I want to love God more, I want to serve God more, and I know I'm a pretty stubborn guy. Kudos to my Pastor for putting up with me. She helped instill confidence in a guy that would just sit in the corner of church. Ask Jeff that, and he'll tell you more, right Jeff?
As I end this writing, I want to have more reunions. More catching up with the rest of '96 batch of Seaportians. It's quite hard to just meet up when someone gets married or dies. And well, this is a community I wouldn't want to give up on.
God Bless~!
She was also my fellow HELP institute friend, although we had different degrees, with mine, the ever crazy Bachelor of Economics from University of London, and hers, hmm, American Degree Program I suppose.
And it was a shock to hear her death. It's so soon, so fast and she's too young to die. After all, she just got married last year. And well, frankly speaking, her funeral was another of those gathering for all of us since the times of form 5. Most of us hardly met, except in our own comfortable groups, people we hanged out with.
And what an irony, cause, just 3 weeks before that, the reason why we met was to celebrate Wei Hoong's wedding. 9 years. It has been too long. Too long since we last sat down and thought about life. Life that swept us by, from childhood dreams, to realisation of the harshness of the real world.
It was good too, to be able to meet up with the girl I once had something for. Wei Mun was, in every sense, everybody's dream girl. She was smart, witty, pretty and well, most importantly, kind. And the thing is, she did not had to flirt to gain attention. I was anxious to see how she had turned out to be, yet, well, a bit worried on what she might think of me after all these years. Good thing was well, it went better than expected.
The guys that went around labelling me a loser, well, they came for the wedding too. The whole bunch of them, minus a couple of others. Some still held the air of aloofness with them when you greeted them. 9 years on, and well, it's a pretty sad sight to see this happening. Though, others warmed up and were able to joke about things. Guess that they've grown up huh?
And well, my gang. My group of friends. Some of them whom I walked home from school almost everyday. Others, we sat around the football field in the middle of the night at 3 am, just looking at the stars. There was our favorite mamak spot around ss3. The times we sat around, trying to pick up some songs off Sukhwinder. The times we got excited meeting chicks from some girls school. And yea, those Americans too.
The times we spent making fun of Abdullah. Ah, I'm surprised to remember sneaking into Sunway Lagoon a number of times with Jack. And there we were, 2 guys, just hanging out on the suspended bridge in the evenings. Looking, pondering and well, trying to make meaning out of life. Jack's now a self-made millionaire a few times over. And nope, he didn't get help from his dad, who was a newspaper editor.
The funny thing? Jack and me both had something for Wei Mun once. And he was with me in my sorrows and in my countless depressing poems. Perhaps life wasn't that bad if you took out that element. But then, what would life be, without the pains and the joys?
I guess, I'll be the last one out of university and to work in a proper job. True, you could say working as a waiter at Chili's and as a trainee Engineer are proper jobs too. But yet, there you are, not fighting for a living. Here, the real world awaits. With my God behind me too, I guess.
Looking at my bunch of friends, many of them still looked the same, with perhaps a difference in a wrinkle or two. Some thinner and some horizontally blessed. But yet, our topics of conversation has changed. It's not so much about the latest movie we've seen (though we do that to people we meet often) nor even jobs and pay and perhaps degrees, that was when the first of us graduated. But no, it's more about anxiously finding out how each other had been. Who cares about how popular we were back in secondary school? Life is indeed fragile and fast moving, why bother holding grudges?
Many first came out working believing that money and success up the corporate ladder represents everything. Some still do. But yet, for those who've been there, they've realised that the rat race does not nescessarily equate to happiness.
And as I look upon myself, making my first strides towards the working world, I keep asking myself, 'Would I give up my dream, my God given dream for money, fame or love?' And I would tell myself, no. Not even love. I want to love God more, I want to serve God more, and I know I'm a pretty stubborn guy. Kudos to my Pastor for putting up with me. She helped instill confidence in a guy that would just sit in the corner of church. Ask Jeff that, and he'll tell you more, right Jeff?
As I end this writing, I want to have more reunions. More catching up with the rest of '96 batch of Seaportians. It's quite hard to just meet up when someone gets married or dies. And well, this is a community I wouldn't want to give up on.
God Bless~!
Wednesday, March 02, 2005
Slow Cooker Christianity
I was brought to realisation that Christianity is indeed a slow process of being Christ-like in nature. And sure enough, it's more of a marathon run instead of a 100 meter race.
Back then, I used to believe that it's all about jumping around for Christ when there's a praise song, that it's all about how big the church/CF could ever grow, that it's all about being gung-ho about our Christianity. I even reduced my listening to Hillsongs and mostly talked about Christianity and salvation to my friends. It became so bad, that at a point of time, I couldn't maintain a decent conversation on any other topics other than Christianity and Politics.
Slow Cooker Christianity. This writing certainly has been a slow cooker one too. Slow Cooker as in, nowadays, most churches are targeting hype and the buildup of emotions in concerts to reach out. And at times, they tend to lose focus of the big picture. Is Christianity a thing you get high on every camp and concert? Or is it something more than that?
Slow Cooker Christianity because I believe God's still moulding me and shaping me. Yea, true, you might say I'm oversensitive. But then, there was so much scars from hurtful remarks and actions. I guess I've to learn to love. And love myself, God and the people around me.
And as I looked at 1st Timothy and 1st Corinthians, about the requirements of an overseer and also on love, I find that there are many things I've to learn. I need to learn to be temperate, gentle and not quarrelsome. And on the aspect of love, I need to learn to not behave rudely, not be provoked, thinks no evil, bear all things, believe all things and endure all things. That's the magnitude of love, agape love in the bible.
And if you look at 1st Corinthians 13, you'll find that love is mentioned sandwiched between spiritual gifts and also prophecy and tongues. This is God's love, beyond those we see on the LCD plasma TVs and all.
Yea, and well, I believe that something new God's teaching me is to invest in other people's life. Invest in building a community instead of trying to grow a large youth group.
It's not easy, to run the race. It's never easy to be moulded by God in a certain way. After all, it's always much easier to sit back and let things be the way they are.
Help me God on these issues.
God Bless~
Back then, I used to believe that it's all about jumping around for Christ when there's a praise song, that it's all about how big the church/CF could ever grow, that it's all about being gung-ho about our Christianity. I even reduced my listening to Hillsongs and mostly talked about Christianity and salvation to my friends. It became so bad, that at a point of time, I couldn't maintain a decent conversation on any other topics other than Christianity and Politics.
Slow Cooker Christianity. This writing certainly has been a slow cooker one too. Slow Cooker as in, nowadays, most churches are targeting hype and the buildup of emotions in concerts to reach out. And at times, they tend to lose focus of the big picture. Is Christianity a thing you get high on every camp and concert? Or is it something more than that?
Slow Cooker Christianity because I believe God's still moulding me and shaping me. Yea, true, you might say I'm oversensitive. But then, there was so much scars from hurtful remarks and actions. I guess I've to learn to love. And love myself, God and the people around me.
And as I looked at 1st Timothy and 1st Corinthians, about the requirements of an overseer and also on love, I find that there are many things I've to learn. I need to learn to be temperate, gentle and not quarrelsome. And on the aspect of love, I need to learn to not behave rudely, not be provoked, thinks no evil, bear all things, believe all things and endure all things. That's the magnitude of love, agape love in the bible.
And if you look at 1st Corinthians 13, you'll find that love is mentioned sandwiched between spiritual gifts and also prophecy and tongues. This is God's love, beyond those we see on the LCD plasma TVs and all.
Yea, and well, I believe that something new God's teaching me is to invest in other people's life. Invest in building a community instead of trying to grow a large youth group.
It's not easy, to run the race. It's never easy to be moulded by God in a certain way. After all, it's always much easier to sit back and let things be the way they are.
Help me God on these issues.
God Bless~
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