醉翁樓交學費. . . + 後現代 (I)

sigh, tonight we went for a dinner at 醉翁樓. Under the pressure of the waitress we ordered the recommended 盤菜:



Don't order it--is a mixture of all leftovers that will cost you $38.... sigh!!!

Going back to last night's seminar 「後現代與靈性生活」 by 余達心牧師.

It was a pretty good one. 牧師 reminded me that I'm seeing mySELF too big--even bigger than God himself. It's like sitting on God's throne, replacing He himself.

At the end of the seminar he used three books as a conclusion:
1. Golden Booklet of the True Christian Life by Calvin.

There are two main points Calvin wanted to bring out: 1. "Self-centered" is a serious sin--and we need to learn hwo to surrender ourselves to God, and this is going to be a life-long practise. 2. "self-sacrifice"

2. Life together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer

This book reminds us the true meaning of fellowship -- practise 為他人活, and this needs to be started from worship.

At the end, 牧師 talked about a sad true story:

A friend of him had a baby and the entire family was filled with joy because of that. The baby was named "Thomas" because the father wanted the baby to become a great theologist like Thmoas Torrance. After 40 days of the birth of the child, however, he died.

Soon after the child passed away, 牧師 received a letter from the father. The letter says the child doesn't need to be a theologist now, since he has achieved what all theologist want to achieve:

"Visio Dei--vision of God".

The story ends here.

And truely, all we who believed in Him want to see him face to face one day, and be able to stand before him.

Taking a look back to myself.... it seems like I'm still seeking what I should be doing for my life.

But what if my starting point is my ending point? Do I still need to seek anymore? I mean, if I started to "see him face to face" by committing myself to him through whatever situation he puts me in, wouldn't that solve all my questions of "where's God's calling" etc?

It's not easy to do what I say... ai ya!


As a "preface", Dr. Yu quoted a poem written by Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach. He recited the last paragraph of the poem:

Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.

Quoted from wikipedia.com, the above poem "depicted a nightmarish world from which the old religious verities have retroceded, is sometimes held up as an early, if not the first, example of the modern sensibility.".

(to be continued...)