“‘The time has come,’ he said. ‘The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news’.” (1:15)
Repentance is a religious attitude and decision, moving the axis of attention from this world to the heaven. Today we don’t regard some specific area in space as the heavenly kingdom mentioned in the Gospels. We already mentioned the heaven is the “kingdom of God”. What the kingdom of God is near means the heaven comes near to us. And then that heaven is not a heaven in astronomical physics, and then it is evident that the direction we should turn toward could not be the astronomical heaven either.
It seems for us to have gotten an answer already. Repentance means that we turn around and pay attention only to the kingdom of God, where comes near, that is, to God. “Repent” means that someone could pay attention to God’s sovereignity, not to his own achievement or human civilization or competion. It is the essence of Christian faith as well as Christian spirituality.
It seems so simple and easy to pay attention to God, but it is not. We cannot believe in God automatically. Even we try to believe without any condition it is impossible to do that. Of course it is possible to have faith like moving the mountains superficially. Look. I heard some church in Seoul has a special early morning service both in spring and in fall just like some event. It is amazing that more than five or seven thousand people gather to pray in the early morning. People who attend at the prayer meeting seem to have a simple breakfast at the church. I could say it is such a passion. I feel envious. But it is regretable to have a parking disaster in that town every morning. What kind of relationship does exist between this kind of religious phenomena and attention only to God? Of course this is not an issue the third person could analyze, but if one tenth of energy out of such passion could be exploded as a power for social change in Korean history, I feel a little disappointed.
We are a little bit drifting away now. Let’s get back to the point. The reason why it is so hard to get back to God is that we cannot pay attention to His sovereignity with our hearts, which are always full of something else. Therefore it is a focal point to empty your heart. Of course we used to say to empty our heart. But without understanding what it really means to empty our heart, we just easily use this kind of expression. People could imagine that it means living without any greed. But it is impossible for us not to have greed. Maybe we could pretend, but realistically it is impossible. Of course this is not for all, but generally speaking it is true.
So in order to empty our heart, we should come back to God. Without His spirit, we cannot empty our hearts. Only in case when the spirit of life controls our hearts, we could also control our desire. It is evident even without sophisticated thinking. The person who knows best does not pay attention to the least. The person who had tasted 100 % fruit juice does not want to drink 10 % jucie. It means that only the person who knows an Absolute life of God could empty his heart.
Today I feel like drifting away a little bit from the topic.
Repentance could start when we can recognize God’s sovereignity as His existence. We should learn about Him in order to recognize Him. For this point of view, it is necessary for all the laypeople to study theology not as a theory but as true realization of spriritual substance.
Lord, we like to pay a whole attention only to you. Amen!
Repentance is a religious attitude and decision, moving the axis of attention from this world to the heaven. Today we don’t regard some specific area in space as the heavenly kingdom mentioned in the Gospels. We already mentioned the heaven is the “kingdom of God”. What the kingdom of God is near means the heaven comes near to us. And then that heaven is not a heaven in astronomical physics, and then it is evident that the direction we should turn toward could not be the astronomical heaven either.
It seems for us to have gotten an answer already. Repentance means that we turn around and pay attention only to the kingdom of God, where comes near, that is, to God. “Repent” means that someone could pay attention to God’s sovereignity, not to his own achievement or human civilization or competion. It is the essence of Christian faith as well as Christian spirituality.
It seems so simple and easy to pay attention to God, but it is not. We cannot believe in God automatically. Even we try to believe without any condition it is impossible to do that. Of course it is possible to have faith like moving the mountains superficially. Look. I heard some church in Seoul has a special early morning service both in spring and in fall just like some event. It is amazing that more than five or seven thousand people gather to pray in the early morning. People who attend at the prayer meeting seem to have a simple breakfast at the church. I could say it is such a passion. I feel envious. But it is regretable to have a parking disaster in that town every morning. What kind of relationship does exist between this kind of religious phenomena and attention only to God? Of course this is not an issue the third person could analyze, but if one tenth of energy out of such passion could be exploded as a power for social change in Korean history, I feel a little disappointed.
We are a little bit drifting away now. Let’s get back to the point. The reason why it is so hard to get back to God is that we cannot pay attention to His sovereignity with our hearts, which are always full of something else. Therefore it is a focal point to empty your heart. Of course we used to say to empty our heart. But without understanding what it really means to empty our heart, we just easily use this kind of expression. People could imagine that it means living without any greed. But it is impossible for us not to have greed. Maybe we could pretend, but realistically it is impossible. Of course this is not for all, but generally speaking it is true.
So in order to empty our heart, we should come back to God. Without His spirit, we cannot empty our hearts. Only in case when the spirit of life controls our hearts, we could also control our desire. It is evident even without sophisticated thinking. The person who knows best does not pay attention to the least. The person who had tasted 100 % fruit juice does not want to drink 10 % jucie. It means that only the person who knows an Absolute life of God could empty his heart.
Today I feel like drifting away a little bit from the topic.
Repentance could start when we can recognize God’s sovereignity as His existence. We should learn about Him in order to recognize Him. For this point of view, it is necessary for all the laypeople to study theology not as a theory but as true realization of spriritual substance.
Lord, we like to pay a whole attention only to you. Amen!
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