Reformation Day

I asked my students here at Handong a question yesterday. What is significant about the date October 31? The Korean Fall Thanksgiving had been celebrated weeks ago. Another festival was soon to come next week, but October 31, what's special about that day? Many of the students had a puzzled look on their faces.

I then added to the month and day the year 1517. Now, a few faces brighten! One student spoke softly, "Martin Luther." (That's often the way an answer initially comes, first tentatively and then, after a word of encouragement, with more confidence).

"That's right! What did Luther do on October 31, 1517?"

"He nailed that paper to the church door."

"Correct! And, why did he nail that paper on which he had written those 95 statements, the 95 Theses, to the church door in Wittenburg, Germany? Why would you post a list of thesis statements -- you know what a thesis statement is -- its a statement of your main point -- Why would Luther post a list of 95 statements of truth that he was declaring were very important? Was it so that everyone would read them and take them to be true on their face?"

At this point in the class, some of my more perceptive students were beginning to catch on. They realized that I was giving them an historical example of the foundational practice upon which our classroom lessons and discussion are based. And, while they were not previously aware of the process of calling for a disputation that was the common practice in Luther's day, they surmised that his posting of the 95 Theses was an invitation for others to examine Luther's ideas and to engage in a debate.

By posting his 95 Theses, Luther was calling into question the authority of the church to use the practice of purchasing indulgences as a means for obtaining forgiveness of sins as well as challenging many other teachings and practices on the grounds that they were contrary to Holy Scripture. Luther was doing what my students hear as an admonition at the conclusion of each of our class sessions. He was: Questioning everything and seeking to hold on to the good!

To read Luther's 95 Theses go here

What is the Call on Your Life?

On Wednesday this week, I was given the privilege of addressing our Handong students, both Korean and International, who gather for a weekly English chapel service. My theme was "Tearing Off the Mask".


prof. Schulten from younghoon Mok on Vimeo.

Be Ready to be Interrupted

I've been slowly re-reading Bonhoeffer's Life Together over the past few weeks, and just encountered this admonition:

We must be ready to allow ourselves to be interrupted by God. God will be constantly crossing our paths and canceling our plans by sending us people with claims and petitions. We may pass them by, preoccupied with our more important tasks, as the priest passed by the man who had fallen among thieves, perhaps -- reading the Bible. When we do that we pass by the visible sign of the Cross raised athwart our path to show us that, not our way, but God's way must be done.

I've only been here a little more than two months, but I've already developed plans and even, in many cases, such a tight schedule that when something interrupts, I'm quickly put-off. I wish I could say that I've acquired a deeper mindfulness of others while among my brothers and sister here in the East, but sadly my German-rootedness (not rudeness, but rooted-ness) still seems to be quite dominant in my fixing objectives for each day that too often leave little room for anything or anyone who is not "on the schedule."

Life is not smoother when you allow for interruptions -- you may find yourself walking across campus (as I did yesterday) only to hear your name being called by a student running up to you from behind. He then follows on closely the entire way to your office all the while throughout the course of your journey peppering you with questions about his future interests in international human rights advocacy.

Then, continuing his inquiries, he remains engaged in conversation with you for nearly as long as you had thought it would take to complete the composition of the exam you are scheduled to give to your Survey of American Law students later in the week. So, rather than completing that exam-writing task you had on your personal docket for the afternoon, you pray you have encouraged your young aspiring human rights advocate and hopefully have offered him some helpful advice.

Many of my good and faithful friends back in the States frequently remind me that: "You need to say 'no' more often." And, while I will grant the wisdom of that rebuke when it comes to requests for my participation in administrative task forces, academic committee-work or even some ministry invitations (usually delivered on short-notice), I'm finding that when I seek to be fulfilling the call to teach, I need to be evermore mindful of brother Bonhoeffer's instruction: Allow yourself to be interrupted.

Near Disaster . . . Averted

I've recently found that for me there are two things that definitely do not mix -- a microwave with its control panel labelled in Korean and watching a classic comedy film on your laptop across the room. Here's the scene, I had placed a packet of Orville Redenbacher's Gourmet Popping Corn (that I'd picked up last weekend in Daegu at the only Costco in this part of the country) in the microwave, punched a few buttons that I believed would provide sufficient time for the packet to pop, and then walked over to my laptop and searched out "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" on YouTube.

It's quite amazing how engrossed a person can get into British humor! The film clip ran only 10 minutes, but that was more than enough time for my LG microwave to consume and nearly catch on fire that bag of Orville Redenbacher's! I had thought all would be well since the buttons I pushed had set the timer for only 6 minutes, 30 seconds. In my past experiences trying to pop corn in this particular microwave, I had pushed some buttons and it had taken a total of more than 6 1/2 minutes just to partially pop the packet.

What I did not realize, however,(its a terrible thing when you can't speak or understand the language of those around you; it is even worse, though, when you cannot read that language) was that the buttons I had pushed before set the microwave to half power. What I had just pushed set the same amount of time but activated the maximum power that little LG can muster! While the bag was being microwaved, my attention was drawn deeper and deeper into Pythonesque witty banter, and my hoots and howls of laughter were evidently drowning out any beeps or bells that the microwave was emitting.

It was not until I smelled the smoke and sensed that the room was filling with a denseness that I finally ran over to fling the microwave's door open, snatch the smoking bag just before it burst into flames and throw it into the sink where I doused it with water for a good three minutes. Once I was sure the bag was thoroughly extinguished, I opened windows in both back and front of the apartment (in spite of the cool fall temp's) and placed an oscillating fan on high in the middle of the room in a futile effort to exhaust the smoke that, by this time, had saturated the apartment and was beginning to infiltrate my neighbors' units.

Thankfully, no one else was around on Saturday night except the lone hermit who inhabits my room. Everyone else had much more interesting things to do than watch Monty Python on YouTube. Needless to say, I did not eat any popcorn while watching the remainder of the film. Instead, I was thankful that I was not cleaning up a much better mess, and even more grateful that my near disaster had been graciously averted.

[For your enjoyment I've included one of the best scenes from the film. WARNING: DON'T put any popcorn in the microwave!]