Bad Messiah

Recently, I watched Dune: Part Two. It was a visual feast and a masterpiece of film. I thoroughly enjoyed it. The Dune books were written by Frank Herbert, who is an atheist. And you can see it in the movies--there is a deep cynicism and hostility towards religion throughout the films. One of the main villains is the Bene Gesserit. They sound like the Jesuit order--this is not by accident. The Bene Gesserit is a shadowy, quasi-religious order of powerful women, who propagate a prophesy of a Messiah who would rise and liberate the Fremen from oppression. But as you watch the movies, you find out that the Bene Gesserit use this prophesy to manipulate and control the geo-politics of Dune. Not unreasonably, readers have seen the Dune novels as a rejection of the very idea of a Messiah. But I think Frank Herbert is expressing the deep heartache of a failed Messiah. There have been so many bad Messiahs in world history. There have been so many would-be Messiahs, who started out good, but ended up bad.

In the Dune novels, the Messiah-figure is Paul Atreides. Especially in Dune: Part One, he starts out as pure-hearted and noble, and you’re cheering him on as he fights against the evil Harkonnen. But as Paul rises to power, he becomes more and more twisted by vengeance and hatred. At first, he resists the temptation to use the unrestrained violence of religious zealotry, but eventually he gives in as circumstances become dire. So that by the yet-to-be-released third movie, which will be based on Frank Herbert’s second novel, Dune Messiah, Paul becomes a dark and evil ruler, who slaughters billions of people to maintain his power.

Jehu (bowing), as shown in the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III, which is an important extra-biblical evidence for the biblical account.

When you read the biblical books of First and Second Kings, you have a series of heroic kings who start out well, full of promise and devotion to God, but eventually, they give into corruption, moral decay, and tyranny. This is the story of Solomon, Jeroboam, Joash, Hezekiah, and in particular, Jehu. Jehu is the only king in northern Israel who is explicitly anointed as king. He is literally a Messiah-figure--“Messiah” comes from the Hebrew word for “the anointed one.” At first, Jehu shows humility and pledges himself to obey God. But by the end of his reign, he becomes an idolator who ruthlessly crushes all rivals with indiscriminate violence.

What are all these stories telling us? King Jehu in the Bible, the Dune novels, Game of Thrones (Daenerys is a female-Messiah who turns evil in the end)--they all point to the universal human longing for a true and righteous Messiah, who will possess, both heroic strength to smash evil, and, at the same time, lowly weakness to rescue sinners. The claim of Christianity is that this paradoxical Messiah has come in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. He has come and will come again.

I recently preached on the life of King Jehu from 2 Kings 9-10. You can listen here:

Mini-book review: Get Married

Brad Wilcox, a sociologist at the University of Virginia, starts his book, Get Married, by documenting the dramatic decline in the US marriage rate. During the pandemic, for the first time in US history, there are more adults who are “single with no children” than “married with children.” This trend will only accelerate as young people are the most disaffected about marriage.

This will have a profound impact on society. Marriage is the foundational institution for well-being: marriage strongly correlates with higher income, with emotional well-being and happiness, and children growing up in an intact home are the least likely to be abused and the most likely to flourish.

Brad Wilcox includes several interesting statistics:

   • conservatives are more likely to get married than liberals

   • conservatives are significantly happier than liberals -- largely due to differing marriage rates

   • Asians are the most pro-marriage ethnic group in America; and not unrelated, they are also the wealthiest

   • sharing bank accounts and last names significantly lowers the odds of divorce

   • regular church attendance lowers the divorce rate by about half

And finally, I thought the most interesting statistic was the fact that divorce is contagious in social groups. According to a study done by the NIH, if your friend gets divorced, that more than doubles your odds of getting divorced. Even one degree removed, if a friend of your friend gets divorced, that increases your odds of divorce by 33%. In other words, divorce happens in social clusters. This makes sense. God is a social being, and human beings are created in his image. The data on marriage and happiness is another indicator that human beings were meant for deep relationships, the deepest of which is marriage.

Mini-book review: Dominion

I recently read Dominion by Tom Holland (not the Spider-Man actor but the historian). It's a history of Christianity by an agnostic/atheist. He makes a really interesting argument. He says all contemporary debates in the West are actually versions of Christianity battling each other for supremacy. Each side of any cultural fight (gay rights, women’s liberation, etc) is premised on the Christian values of universal human dignity and lifting up the weak, which would have been utterly unintelligible in the pre-Christian world. It's a really interesting argument. Holland basically says that even though Christianity seems like it's in decline in the West, it's actually so ascendant and victorious, that people can only think within Christian paradigms now. It made me strangely happy to read this book.

Postscript: Tom Holland has been attending Saint Bartholomew the Great, one of the oldest churches in London. He recently spoke about a spiritual experience with a cancer diagnosis and a desperate prayer for healing.

Sin separates; the church gathers together

The US Surgeon General, Vivek Murphy, has declared that loneliness is the greatest health crisis facing America today. There are a slew of new books raising the alarm about how deeply disconnected and isolated modern society is — The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt, Generations by Jean Twenge, How to Know a Person by David Brooks. The CDC conducts large-scale studies of how people spend their time. Time spent with friends has plummeted in last decade, especially for young people.

The modern world is a deeply lonely place. This is the aftereffects of sin. Sin fosters conflict and separation. In CS Lewis’ haunting book, The Great Divorce, disagreements and arguments drive the inhabitants of hell further and further apart, until each person lives utterly alone, miles away from their nearest neighbor. This is the trajectory of modern culture. What then can be done?

In a world where sin separates, the church gathers together. Jesus’ final prayer in John 17 was that the church might be “one.” This is what human beings were created for — that we would no longer be many, but one. The only other place in the Bible where human beings are described as “becoming one” is Genesis 2:24, the seminal verse on marriage.

Just as husband and wife are to be “one flesh,” so also the church is to embody such love and depth of friendship that the members are one. And when the church holds together and avoids the ever-present temptation of conflict and break-up, we become a beautiful witness to the world. “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). This is the great mission of our lives — to keep the unity of the church. May God fill us with his Spirit and help us.

Washington DC Trip in June

I am really honored to be invited to speak at the Blackstone Legal Fellowship, which is a summer internship program for about 200 Christian students from law schools throughout the nation. The various speakers, including Rosaria Butterfield and Robert P. George, will address the challenges of maintaining a Christian witness in today's legal landscape. I will be the sole pastor and non-specialist speaker on the roster. My talk will be on a biblical theology of marriage, which is a topic I'm particularly passionate about. My talk will be on June 10.

My family will be joining me and we plan to make a vacation of it and visit the sites and monuments. I'm especially excited to stand on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and look out on the national mall. Please keep our trip in your prayers and please pray that my talk will strengthen and encourage these future leaders about the beautiful vision for marriage in the Christian Scriptures.

Heaven is a Feast

In last Sunday's sermon about the siege of Samaria, we looked at how the story concludes with a joyful feast after a long and terrible famine. This is the image of salvation given to us in the Bible. Jesus repeatedly evokes this image in his parables on the Kingdom of God.

The essential element of a feast is that it is communal. It's the people that makes the feast so joyful and festive. We all eat alone at times. But there's something special and wonderful in gathering together with good friends to share a meal. This is why we gather together as a church each Sunday. The Christian life is not a solitary endeavor, but a communal project. Which makes each Sunday a small taste of heaven.

Image: catered lunch from this past Sunday

Baptisms

This past Sunday, Steven and Emilia Cheung were baptized. It was a beautiful celebration of God's grace and goodness in their lives. The congregation pledged to assist Jen and Steven in their parental responsibilities to raise Emilia in the nurture and discipline of the Lord. This was a wonderful reminder that the church is a spiritual family, and that the children of the church grow up with many spiritual uncles and aunts watching over them. As Christians, we are not alone, but we belong to the family of God. This is a wonderful comfort and encouragement for our lives.

The gospel is for families

The gospel is not just for individuals, but whole families. You see this pattern in the New Testament where entire households come to faith in Christ together. You also see instructions for believers to teach their children faith in Christ. This is God’s beautiful design — that salvation should come, not just to individuals, but to entire families.

This past Sunday, my sons, Judah and Noah, each gave their testimonies before the church and were confirmed in their faith. This was a special joy for Christina and I. Our hearts were full of thanksgiving and praise. My mom, Haesook Chae, also became a member of the church. It was a wonderful time of celebration and fellowship for the church.

A Vision for Imago

At our last congregational meeting, we discussed how the whole of the Christian life is love. Love is not a solitary activity, but only a community effort since we need others to receive our love. And love is not mere sentiment, but action and meeting the practical needs of others. Ultimately, God is love (1 John 4:8). One of the reasons for our name is that we might imitate God, particularly his love.

The vision for our church is we want to be a community where we love one another deeply. Jesus said, “the world will know that you are my disciples when you love one another” (John 13:35). The modern Western world is the most prosperous and technologically sophisticated time in human history. But we are also the loneliest and most isolated. San Mateo recently declared a public health emergency of loneliness. Human beings were built for connection because we are made in the image of God. The church is where we begin to heal and be restored as we embrace and care for one another as brothers and sisters in Christ.

You can listen to a sermon on this vision of the church as a community of love here:

Sharing the Gospel in the Bay Area

"And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard?" -- Romans 10:14

One of the great challenges of the Bay Area is the subtle but very clear disapproval of evangelism. And so, Christians are often afraid of giving offense. However, the very purpose of the Christian life is to participate in the growth of the Kingdom of God (Matthew 28:18-20).

Here are some practical steps to doing evangelism:

1. Let people know you are a Christian.

2. Be a good friend and a good worker, so that you have the credibility to share Christianity.

3. Pray for open doors and opportunities. You will be surprised how God answers your prayers.

4. Finally, take courage and share Christ with a friend!

Here is a final thought. If you believe the Bible, then you believe your unbelieving friend is going to hell without Christ.  Even though they may disagree with you, they will greatly respect you if you care about them enough to tell them they are lost without Christ. Take courage! Maybe this is the very reason you are their friend -- that they might be saved through you.