Title: Why Everyday Life is Heaven
Contents
Why everyday life is heaven
Amos 8:11-12, Colossians 1:13-23
Sunday, July 18, 2010 Sermon
11 That day is coming. This is what the Lord God says. I will send a famine in this land. People will be hungry, but that's not the hunger they suffer from lack of food. People may say that they are thirsty, but it is not thirst from lack of water. Because they will not hear the word of the Lord, people will starve and thirst. 12 In those days people will wander from sea to sea to find the word of the Lord, and wander from north to east, but they will not find it.
13 The Father delivered us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his Beloved Son. 14 In the Son we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. 15 The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 In him all things were created. Everything in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether kingship or dominion or power or authority, all things were created by Him and for Him. 17 He is before all things, and all things exist in him. 18 He is the head of the body, the church. He is the Source, the first to rise from the dead. This is so that He may be supreme among all things. 19 It is pleasing to God to dwell in him all the fullness, 20 and he made peace by the blood of his cross, through whom all things, earthly and heavenly made it
21 In the past, you were far from God because of your evil deeds, and you were enmity with God in your heart. 22 But now, through the death of Christ, God has been reconciled to you in His natural body, and has set you before Him as holy, blameless, blameless. 23 Therefore, you must stand firm, firmly grounded in the faith, and not depart from the hope of the gospel that you have heard. This gospel was preached to all creatures under heaven, and I, Paul, became a minister of this gospel.
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At the heart of the Lord's proclamation is the saying, "The kingdom of heaven is already among us." It can be said that everyday life is heaven. Let's think about it today.
Two impressions of America
I remember two things that impressed me when I first came to America. One thing was that people passing by smiled a lot, and the other was that seminary students don't talk about special experiences as much as Korean seminarians.
Thinking about it now, it's shameful, but it took a long time for me to break the wrong habit of judging and rigid stereotypes, get it corrected, and I had to go through a lot of conflict. In doing so, there are important discoveries. It was that these unusual beliefs and vocations were well connected with everyday life, and that it made a connection that made everyday smiles.
This was a very important discovery for me. Because our daily life is the best way to see our faith, and it is no small thing to be able to laugh and share kindness and joy in our daily life. And it was that this bright daily life was connected with the frame of faith of the church.
Daily life and emergency
This is not to say that Paul's special experience is wrong, and much less to say that it is unnecessary. Only that we were transferred to a new world through the death of Jesus Christ on the cross means that our whole life has become that way, and that by speaking of a certain special experience, our faith can make an error that separates it from our daily life. Such a special experience is meaningful in that it becomes a turning point toward a new everyday life. In that sense, the center of faith is not the emergency, but the daily life.
silence (silence)