Overturn of value(6)

But many who are first will be last, and the last first."(Mark 10:31)

I would like to supplement the last paragraph of yesterday’s meditation that the principle operating the world is not the reality to be grasped but the teaching of the Bible is. The thing to which we have to give first priority is what the reality (German- Wirklichkeit) is. The money we generally give utmost value is basically nothing but the means of exchange for goods and services. A village in a foreign country does not use currency that is issued from their own country but the currency made from their own village. It means they don’t want to come under the rule of their country’s economy. Yes. Money cannot guarantee its reality in the face of a person who neglects the power of money.

Besides money what could be the reality. Probably it is almost none. Everything on earth is only relative. Nothing absolutely rules human life. Despite this reality, the fact we are ruled by these relative things might prove that our life is not founded on the ultimate reality.

Then what is the reality? The ancient Greek philosophers said it were atom, fire, water and idea while the oriental philosophers disagreed. The people like Whitehead said that ‘process’ is the very ‘reality’. Such opinion of philosophers has a sense. However, it is hard to say that the ultimate reality is revealed by these things. The absolute reality including all these things is the very God.

If we identify this God we are the first though we are living in the place of the last. Do not regard such answer as something negligible. As the matured children who establish different relationship with their parent, we will be able to do away with the fixed idea about God and understand the implication of the first and the last when we have become spiritually matured. I pray that the word of the Lord may be the ultimate reality in our entire lives.

Overturn of value (5)

But many who are first will be last, and the last first."(Mark 10:31)

Many of you may think the contents that have explained earlier with a subtitle, ‘overturn of value’ don’t have the sense for the real flowing too much into ideal way. It is because ‘the first’ and ‘the last’ are so clearly dividing in the reality of today. There is no community without such division.

I heard a story from an intimate friend. Some of residents in Susunggu of Daegu city which can be compared to Gangnam of Seoul don’t leave this region. The reason is that they are not able to associate with the peoples of other region. Precisely speaking, they don’t have ability to associate with others. “When I shifted to other place the strangeness of people caused me difficulty to live.” It is a kind of privileged consciousness and a sense of ‘Like attracts like.” Of course they don’t have problem in their personality. Simply they feel inconvenient with other people for they have been bound in upper-class life.

All ordinary people are helpless. I also often have the same experience. Please allow me to speak about tennis that I favor. When I go to tennis court we assemble a team according to order and play. Generally we play with people in same level. However some insists to play with us despite his poor play skill. I enter into a court with him smiling but with murmuring ‘How bad lucky today.’ This murmuring doesn’t go keep continue but stop right after.

Despite human nature and social system are all the same if the gospel of Christianity insist changing the value of the first and the last, as I mentioned the above, it is fit to hear that Christianity doesn’t have the sense of the real. You don’t need to worry about the teaching of the Bible. It is because the operating principle of world is not the real but the teaching of the Bible.

Overturn of value (4)

“But many who are first will be last, and the last first." (Mark 10:31)

If possible I want to get down from the seat of pastor. It is not because of valueless of pastor’s work or bareness for this. It is because staying one position so long time is risky for my spiritual pilgrimage. At the slight slip I may be bound at the position of pastor. Everything goes like this. At the moment of fixing and stopping we are surrounded by the spirit of death.

The status of the Korean pastors today similar to a person riding on a tiger, as a Chinese proverb says. They are unable to get down for it is running too fast to stop. They are captured by a thought to be a religious exemplary person and feels a sense of pressure to teach others. We are helpless for Korean Church structure but for personal we have to give our best effort to escape such mannerism as earlier as possible.

The starting point is rightly the overturn of value. It is to think a status of pastor low. It regards pastor’s work as not much important thing. The fact is so. It differs little from other occupations. When we overturn our status we can truly open our heart to the Holy Spirit, the spirit of life.

I would like to go a little further as I have spoken already. There are quite numbers of aged people in Korean church to enter the seminary. It is very specific phenomena. What is more, those who are failed in their worldly living become a pastor after studying theology thinking that there is no other way except theology. A person was received a pastor ordination at 70 years old, the age to be retired. I’m not criticizing the entire cases.

According to Luther and Calvin all kinds of occupations are the calling. There is no distinguished point between a secular vocation and a religious vocation. Do live with a secular vocation. There is no specific point to be praise by the Lord even to be a pastor.

Overturn of value(3)

“But many who are first will be last, and the last first." (Mark 10:31)

Why is hegemony struggle still prevailing in churches where all the members are expected to have a harmonious relationship among themselves as a body of Christ and having equal position in Jesus the head of the church, and different from the world that encourages competition as a principle of life? The simple answer to this question is that, the overturn of value, the title of our serial meditation has not taken place yet.

The real motive that drives us to be church leaders is mostly the passion to serve the Lord. However, the desire to receive human recognition could also be more pronounced than the desire to serve the Lord. We think the place which is the center of public is more important and desirable than the place unattractive to public. We also regard that holding a higher position guarantees the greater honor. If such idea is not so strong in the mind of the people, competitive struggle to be elders of church may not take place. This naturally happens because our value system is more inclined to the secular world. It also means that for us, overturn of value has not happened yet.

Overturn of value means to completely change the value of high status and of low status. For example, the status of church cleaning in-charge is higher than the status of an elder who assumed to have great responsibility. Can it be practically possible in the church? Of course not. No matter how much we try to bring about social and religious harmony, in religious community human discord is bound to happen. Though there are such personal limitations, we basically need proper understanding of theological spirituality and real value system of man.

Overturn of Value (2)

“But many who are first will be last, and the last first." (Mark 10:31)

How can the first switchover to the last and vice versa in the church? It is possible only when they change their mind for the value of position, which is called overturn of value. Firstly, it is better to raise a question as to how supremacy is exercised practically.

Generally speaking, pastor occupies the topmost rung of the church hierarchy. There are pastors who insist on their qualification and ability as vital criteria for one to mediate between God and man. It is not an exaggeration to say that the arbitrary decision and activities of a pastor is one of the important factors for the sickness of a church in Korea. So you can imagine well how the people who founded a church without a pastor.

However, nowadays, the supremacy of pastor has been considerably reduced. Except a few Churches, pastors now have become mere nominal heads of the churches. Real supremacy rests on the collective efforts and responsibility of the church elders who exercise their power through meetings and implementation of their resolutions so passed in a more practical manner. The elders generally get the hegemony of the church in a power struggle with a pastor. It is a helpless situation for a pastor that he will have to hold his position temporarily at the mercy of the church elders and the general public. On the contrary, the elders normally stay in their positions for life time. The power struggle between a pastor and the elders will be intensified and pastors will be gradually relegated. I would like to omit the reasons for this.

The male supremacy in Korean church shows its strength more evident than any other phenomena. Female is completely excluded from church political structure. The fact that a female pastor cannot even be invited as a pastor in-charge is a clear evidence of their exclusiveness in matters of church politics. Fixed idea and prejudice of the members are the reasons for not allowing the female to hold the position of a pastor in a church. However the responsibility of female believers is also great in the healthy growth of a church.

How can we change such supremacy so designed? How can it be truly happened that the first become the last and the last become the first? Can you see any symptom of changes in you and your society? If not, we are still overhearing the Lord’s word in vain.

Overturn of Value (1)

“But many who are first will be last, and the last first." (Mark10:31)

The content and phrases of the above verse is found repeated in Matthew 19:30, Matthew 20:16 and Luke 13:30. This repetition signifies that this phrase was well-known to early Christian community. The authors of gospels properly allocated such well-known epigrams in the Scripture according to their method of writing.

The meaning of “Many who are first will be last, and the last first" is very clear. Those who are advancing now will be dropped behind someday and vis-a-vis. The epigram ‘blessing in disguise’ would be relevant to this case.

This particular text does not say about the way of living. The mode of living can be managed by learning the ethics of the world and the art of living. We can learn other spiritual teaching from the Scripture. Of course it is related to the world but clearly it has different dimension. The dimension used to transcend the world, reveal it and hug it. Let us slowly enter into its deeper level.

The text today is a warning for the leaders of early community. They exercised a sort of supremacy over other people. According to Paul’s letter to Corinth, there were many sects in the church. The prevalent sects made Cephas, Apollo, Paul as their luminaries and even there was the Christ sect. The emergence of sects was the result of relentless struggle for supremacy.

In Korean church, today, such thing frequently happens. Such incidents even lead to a physical combat and there witnessed the frequent occurrences of a big and a small hegemony struggles. The church leader should seriously accept the Lord’s word which says, “Many who are first will be last, and the last first.” The leader who does not know how to step backward destroys a community.