Category: religion

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stay-at-home dads are safe from hell…i think

Update: Folks, please keep your comments respectful or they will be deleted.  This post is not intended to bash MD or MH and not an invitation to such.

I’ve gotten my share of emails the past couple weeks asking for my thoughts about Stay-at-Home Dads – primarily because of some recent teaching from Pastor Mark Driscoll at Mars Hill Church in Seattle.  I didn’t listen to the entire sermon but did manage to catch a glimpse of the video re: that specific section indicating the stay at home dads would be subject to church discipline. 

I have immense respect for Mark and Grace.  Minhee and I are still feel very grateful that when we were checking out MH about 8 years ago during our transition between churches, they showed much care to our family.  Grace actually prepared food for Minhee and the family for several meals after the birth of our 2nd child.  It wasn’t Korean food but hey, no one’s perfect. We weren’t living in any form of community at that time and so, this was incredibly meaningful to us.  On a side note, Minhee hates it when I write about other pastors.  I’m sorry, honey.  I’m not dissing other pastors but trying to address the issues… Continue reading “stay-at-home dads are safe from hell…i think”

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faith and money [3]: control or controlled?

I read once that a person spends about 80% of their time awake engaged with MONEY:  earning it, spending it, and dreaming about it.  And so while money is a tool for us to use, if we’re not careful, it’s easy to see how the “love of money” can grow to become an idolatrous force in our life.

Richard Foster wrote in his book, Money, Sex, and Power:

Just the very act of letting go of money, or some other treasure, does something within us. It destroys the demon greed.” If you’re enslaved by greed, you will not lead others with integrity.

He goes on to say that if we don’t learn how to control money, money has such a seductive element that it will control us.  This marks the distinction between money and mammon.  Money – when it controls us – becomes godlike and thus, mammon in our lives.  And so, we have to ask the question:

Do you control money or does it control you? Continue reading “faith and money [3]: control or controlled?”

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faith and money [2]: what is money?

The basic lesson that all people need to learn about money is that it is a tool as a medium of exchange.  Money has a purpose in our society.  In this post, I want to simply cut and paste a good defintion of money that explains what it is.  In the next post, I’ll expand on the idea that money is neutral in the eyes of Scripture.  It is neither inherently evil or good.  Simply, money is what it is.  But because it is neutral, one must choose how to use money.

And while some Christians are misled in thinking that money is the root of all evil, the Bible and Jesus makes a distinction between money [tool] and mammon [lust].  Continue reading “faith and money [2]: what is money?”

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in the middle of nowhere for a retreat

After 8 days of complete isolation, I’m on my way back home to Seattle.  I’ve been away in the middle of nowhere which I’ll share more tomorrow or so.  It’ll be good to come back home…I’ve missed Minhee and the kids so much that it was driving me a little insane.  But it was also good to be completely isolated in this small town in the middle of nowhere.  No TV, no internet, no radio…nothing…minus two cheating incidents of “borrowing” some bandwidth outside a Quizno’s shop Dairy Queen to post the last blogpost and to tend to other matters.

I did a lot of thinking about the past and future, more thinking about my calling as a pastor, working on projects on a friend’s farm, praying, some reading, working on the poverty organization, and lots of this: Continue reading “in the middle of nowhere for a retreat”

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arrived and learning in haiti

The title of this post was supposed to be the title of a post that I was going to publish yesterday.  I was scheduled to fly out to Haiti on Monday to spend some time with connections, shadow and learn from some organizations for research for our poverty organization, hang with kids at orphanages, and learn about how the food crisis has significantly impacted the people of Haiti.  But because of the multiple storms that have hit Haiti and the surrounding countries – including the current “Ike” storm – I had to make a gut and prayerful decision to postpone my trip to another time. 

I have yet to step foot in Haiti but I have heard so much about its beauty and depravity.  Continue reading “arrived and learning in haiti”

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do you prefer a christian president or not?

Here’s a simple question that I have been asked numerous times in light of the upcoming Presidential election:

Do you prefer a Christian president?

Obviously, we need to reframe that question since I can’t recall a recent candidate for the Presidency without some sort of Protestant or Catholic “faith” background [Romney incl]. Nowadays, when someone says that they’re a Christian, I’m inclined to ask in a tasteful manner, “What kind of Christian?”

Meaning…what does it mean [to you] to be a Christian?  How does one live out their faith in Christ?  Obama and McCain are both Christians but yet, they see some things very differently and we can assume on some level that their faith helps inform their decisions.  Doesn’t it? Continue reading “do you prefer a christian president or not?”