Alright, so here I am to blog about the message we received from my boy Stuart… first of all, it was awesome!  I thought it was really great that he was able to pass along experiences and a message he heard all the way out in Sydney, Australia, and bring it back home to Seattle, WA.  There were two main points which really spoke to me and my group.  1.  The idea of how as a generation, we are being more and more about “Public Passion,” rather than “Private Devotion.”  2.  What type of examples/habits/characteristics are we passing down to our children?  Basically, how are we impacting the next generation?So to begin, with the first point.  It’s sad, but true.  You see it on T.V., church environments, Presidential campaigns, etc.  It’s all about the “feeling,” or “emotional connection,” with these charismatic/sensational speakers (which I am guilty of as well).  One thing that I am afraid of is how does that impact the objective Word of God?  As a church body, I am beginning to see how the art of evangelism is spreading like wild fire and there is so much emphasis on spreading the “Gospel” (which is what we are suppose to do), but we need to ask ourselves as well, “What type of messages are we sending and how deep are we going?”  The concept that continually comes to my mind is that we (as a church body, not just SCAC) may expand horizontally, but have we become vertically challenged?  As a business person, I understand that when something expands too fast, it may not receive the adequate resources needed to help it “grow” upright and properly.  In fact, the culture of today really scares me.  This post-modern MTV generation (Btw, they use to actually play music!) is something that I just can’t relate to anymore.  It’s all about “feelings and emotions” nowadays… subjective, rather than the objective truth that “it’s not about us.”  Christianity is NOT ABOUT US, but yet we so often make it.  I am guilty of this as well, therefore, I say these things not in judgment, but more so as a cry for help.  We need to do our part and make sure that we are looking that the objective parts of life.  The fact that life is meant to be good, that God has plans to prosper and not to harm you, and that He loves you more than you can imagine (Job 40)… however, I find that so many of us get trapped in the subjective nature of life… nobody cares about me, I am not beautiful enough, I can’t make a difference in the world… those statements to me are all based on subjective feelings.  As human beings, feelings and emotions are natural and I am not saying you should disregard them, but what I am saying is that we need to learn how to control them, we can not let emotions control us.  We can start to learn how to control them by first building a stronger foundation within us, and that starts with our private devotion time.My second point, I’ll keep it short.  Basically, in my mind, Stuart was asking us “what type of difference maker do you want to be?”  Whether you accept it or not, your life does have influence on other people.  This influence may be positive or negative, you decide… but Stu brought that concept into a family/generational environment which I don’t think I’ve ever thought about (considering that we are all fairly young w/o families to worry about).  For those of you who knows about my background, I had to choose to be the turning point in my family, I’ll leave it at that.  Also, I think that question of what are we passing along to our children is so valid.  So often we say “man, I hate this about my mom or dad,” but yet we see that exact same trait within ourselves.  It’s like that “man in the mirror” syndrome.  Anyways, I really enjoyed hearing what Stuart had to say about the landscape of our generation today and challenging us to be more of a positive influence in that environment.  Great job Stu!  Bringing the fire from a different country! - Steven Kwan

Alright, so here I am to blog about the message we received from my boy Stuart… first of all, it was awesome!  I thought it was really great that he was able to pass along experiences and a message he heard all the way out in Sydney, Australia, and bring it back home to Seattle, WA.  There were two main points which really spoke to me and my group.  1.  The idea of how as a generation, we are being more and more about “Public Passion,” rather than “Private Devotion.”  2.  What type of examples/habits/characteristics are we passing down to our children?  Basically, how are we impacting the next generation?

So to begin, with the first point.  It’s sad, but true.  You see it on T.V., church environments, Presidential campaigns, etc.  It’s all about the “feeling,” or “emotional connection,” with these charismatic/sensational speakers (which I am guilty of as well).  One thing that I am afraid of is how does that impact the objective Word of God?  As a church body, I am beginning to see how the art of evangelism is spreading like wild fire and there is so much emphasis on spreading the “Gospel” (which is what we are suppose to do), but we need to ask ourselves as well, “What type of messages are we sending and how deep are we going?”  The concept that continually comes to my mind is that we (as a church body, not just SCAC) may expand horizontally, but have we become vertically challenged?  As a business person, I understand that when something expands too fast, it may not receive the adequate resources needed to help it “grow” upright and properly.  In fact, the culture of today really scares me.  This post-modern MTV generation (Btw, they use to actually play music!) is something that I just can’t relate to anymore.  It’s all about “feelings and emotions” nowadays… subjective, rather than the objective truth that “it’s not about us.”  Christianity is NOT ABOUT US, but yet we so often make it.  I am guilty of this as well, therefore, I say these things not in judgment, but more so as a cry for help.  We need to do our part and make sure that we are looking that the objective parts of life.  The fact that life is meant to be good, that God has plans to prosper and not to harm you, and that He loves you more than you can imagine (Job 40)… however, I find that so many of us get trapped in the subjective nature of life… nobody cares about me, I am not beautiful enough, I can’t make a difference in the world… those statements to me are all based on subjective feelings.  As human beings, feelings and emotions are natural and I am not saying you should disregard them, but what I am saying is that we need to learn how to control them, we can not let emotions control us.  We can start to learn how to control them by first building a stronger foundation within us, and that starts with our private devotion time.

My second point, I’ll keep it short.  Basically, in my mind, Stuart was asking us “what type of difference maker do you want to be?”  Whether you accept it or not, your life does have influence on other people.  This influence may be positive or negative, you decide… but Stu brought that concept into a family/generational environment which I don’t think I’ve ever thought about (considering that we are all fairly young w/o families to worry about).  For those of you who knows about my background, I had to choose to be the turning point in my family, I’ll leave it at that.  Also, I think that question of what are we passing along to our children is so valid.  So often we say “man, I hate this about my mom or dad,” but yet we see that exact same trait within ourselves.  It’s like that “man in the mirror” syndrome.  Anyways, I really enjoyed hearing what Stuart had to say about the landscape of our generation today and challenging us to be more of a positive influence in that environment.  Great job Stu!  Bringing the fire from a different country!

- Steven Kwan

posted 2 years ago