Yesterday someone asked me questions on death. I personally believe that Jesus is coming soon, and I will be resurrected if I were to die before His return. I believe it is not so bad to take a long nap with a hope of resurrection. We should not be afraid or mystified about death. The Bible tells us that the dead know nothing. It is very comfortable to fall asleep at night. As long as we can fall asleep in the glorious hope of resurrection, it is a real blessing. Let’s find a verse in the book of Revelation, chapter 21:1
“Then I saw a new Heaven and a new earth, for the first Heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea.” Revelation 21:1.
It says there is a new Heaven and a new earth. Do you understand that? This sinful earth is not a new Heaven or a new earth. Water and air are abundant on this earth. Yet we see people go to the store to buy drinking water from the fountain or bottled water. When I first heard of buying water I just could not comprehend that. Eventually will we have to buy air too?
The water and air on this earth are polluted. What about our minds? They may be polluted worse than water and air. It is so sad to see some young people leave their parents on Jeju island and never visit them at all. I also heard that in these days many single people do not want to get married and married couples do not want to have babies for their own comfort. We are witnessing this kind of situation in the world and it must be a sign of the times that the end is near. But the Bible gives us hope that there will be a new Heaven and new earth.
“And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.” Revelation 21:3
This is God’s promise to us, so do not doubt this. In this new earth there will be no more tears, no worries or sickness. I want you to know that our destiny is guaranteed. That is our hope. I was in China for 7 years and very often I traveled by train for about 30-40 hours to Harbin. Once I was traveling with college students from Korea to Harbin. Riding on the train for that long distance, if one could afford to travel first class, that would be a very comfortable journey. But we travelled by coach. The Korean train seats are adjustable, but the train in China had seats that were hard and upright. I asked the students, “Are you sure you will make it?” And they all replied
in unison “No problem!” I knew the journey was not going to be comfortable and easy on this train. The young people thought that if an elderly man like me could endure the long distance it should not be a problem for them. After traveling for about 10 hours I started to notice these young people become very restless, moving from side to side trying to find a comfortable spot. (Laughter).
“It is that far!” commented one youngster.
“Yes, it is. We have only travelled one third of our journey,”
I told him. “One third of the journey, you mean we have 20 more hours to go? Oh, no!” they replied and then they went back to sleep. As the journey continued, these young people became more restless, they would lean on each other; some slept on the floor of the train, and anxiously hoped to arrive at their destination sooner. Ladies and gentleman, traveling like this can be very uncomfortable, but when we know that there will be someone waiting for us at the destination, that is very comforting. That’s why we can endure the long journey as if it is a short while. That expectation makes our journey much easier. If our life’s journey gets harder and harder, we may get sick and eventually die, ending up at a tomb site or cemetery. Wouldn’t that be a sad ending? But we know that there is a new Heaven and a new earth and our God is waiting for us. With this hope life is bearable.
I want you to have this hope of eternal life. When we were young everything seemed to be plentiful, even the stars in the night sky. I don’t see that many stars in Korea nowadays.
Once we were traveling inland in Mongolia and the shepherds were herding their lambs to earn their living. They live in tents, and at night we gazed up into the sky and it seemed to me that
there were more stars there than in the sky over the Korean peninsula. (Laughter)
Even stars don’t like complicated and noisy places.
As a young person, we asked, “What is a star?” Elderly town people would tell us stories that stars were something good to eat. Sometimes we would see meteorites and we wondered where the meteorites would drop and how we could go after them to see if we could taste them. But in school we learned that these stars are humongous objects and some can be bigger than the earth.
As we study the Bible we learned that there are inhabitants on some of these planets with streams flowing, flowers in bloom and people living there. Some day we will be there. In the past, as I looked up at the sky and gazed at the stars, I did not think much of anything. If we have hope in our heart, our life will be more meaningful and sustainable. I want you to live with hope in your mind.
Today I am going to talk about Heaven.
“That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the people stood on the shore.
Then he told them many things in parables, saying:
‘A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up.
‘Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop–a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. He who has ears let him hear.’” Matthew 13:1-9
The Heaven Jesus was talking about in this parable is like a farmer sowing seeds in the field. Here we see four different types of fields. In the first scenario the seeds fell along the path, the wheat, rice or corn seeds, and the birds will find them soon and eat them up.
The second scenario is the rocky field. There is dirt that is shallow and rocky. The farmer sows the seeds on the rocky field. Since the field is rocky, roots will have a difficult time to grow deep, and if there is no rain for 10 days they will wither away.
The third scenario is a field with thorns. On this field we find many weeds. The seed that fell among the thorns may grow up quicker because it’s shady. It will be pale and thin like bean sprouts, because of the lack of sunshine. And they can’t bloom either so they will not bear fruit.
The fourth scenario will be seed that was sown on good soil. If we fertilize it well, it will grow and produce a crop in abundance. Jesus explained in Matthew 13:18-23
“Listen then to what the parable of the sower means: When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is the seed sown along the path.
The one who received the seed that fell on rocky places is the man who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. But since he has no root, he lasts only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, he quickly falls away. The one who received the seed that fell among the thorns is the man who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke it, making it unfruitful. But the one who received the seed that fell on good soil is the man who hears the word and understands it. He produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.” Matthew13:18-23.
This parable of the sowing seeds on different fields represents the four different kinds of human hearts. The seeds represent Jesus’ words and gospel. The gospel is Jesus Himself.
First of all, the one who has the heart waxen hard as the rocky path won’t be interested in Heaven, faith or church. Do we find anyone like this around us? Yes, we sure do find a lot of them. They don’t even try to listen to our message. At the train station we pass the tracts to people but on the way back we find the tracts all in the trashcan. That tells us that their hearts are hard as rock and even fingertips can’t get in. I noticed that the Chinese are rather open minded to accept the gospel message. But Koreans are not as accepting as the Chinese.
The second part of the parable is the rocky field. People have thin ears so if someone tells them, “If you believe in Jesus you will get healthier, have better business and go to Heaven later on,” then everyone happily hears that and follows right away. They think if they believe in Jesus everything will be fine, but some unexpected things happen even though they attend church. Then they think,
“I must be doing something wrong,” and turn away from the church. Once I was talking to a Korean Chinese man who lives in China.
“Are you a Christian?” I asked. He answered, “Well, I attended church for a while when I lived in the city of Dong-Book.”
“Why not now?”
“Well, about six months after I began attending church my cow suddenly died, so I thought I was in the wrong place, and I stopped attending.”
Here is another example. Once I studied the Bible with two different women at the same time. One Sabbath they both were on the way to the church and one lost her hand phone and the other almost had a big accident because her skirt got caught in the bus door and she was dragged a little way down the road by the bus.
The woman who lost her hand phone thought, it might have happened because she attended church, and quit coming to church. But the woman who had her skirt caught said, “I am not quitting church because it must be Satan who is interrupting me.” And she is still attending church faithfully. She is an active worker in that church today. We should follow her example and shouldn’t be like the kind of seed that was sowed in the rocky field.
The third one is a thorny field. These men are greedy people. They want to go to Heaven yet also want to have success, honor, wealth and fun on earth. This is a thorny field. He just attends church, but nothing has changed over 10 years. The farmer knows that he only planted corn or potatoes, but unwanted weeds grew. No one wants to pluck out weeds under the scorching summer heat, but if you leave them alone you know what will happen? The weeds will take over the whole field and you will have nothing to harvest. We can apply the same scenario to the principle of believing in our Jesus Christ. For instance, to stop drinking and smoking is
not easy, and we learned that is not good for our health, and also the believers shouldn’t do such things, so we should adjust our habits and change for the better. If we do, we will grow.
There isn’t any good field from the beginning. When you remove weeds, corn and beans will grow better. Weeds are found almost in every field. Even though it is a hard thing to do, we should be temperate ourselves and change our habits.
If you spend time reading the Bible and pray then you will be fruitful and harvest 30, 60, 100 times more crops than watching TV and being unproductive.
A wretched young man in his 20s who lived in Northeast China, thought he was strong, as he knows kung fu and he is good at the sword and knife so he often demonstrated his skill. Later he accepted Jesus as his personal Savior and his heart and his life were changed totally. The old habits are gone and now he is one of the church leaders.
His family and his friends saw his transformation, they were so impressed so they decided to join him. When we change our life, our neighbors will notice and say, “That couple always fought before, but I see them get along well. Honey, why don’t we join them in going to church?” That kind of thing will happen. So we will be blessed and yield 30, 60 or 100 times more. I want all of you to be a good field. If you remove the weeds in your heart, you will become a good field.
Some may say, “Church members are no different than others. They are greedy and quarrel as much as others do.” But who ever listens to the words of Jesus, they will become one of those four fields. Please choose to be a good field. That is the way we will experience Heaven on earth.
Would you like to know the second kind of Heaven? He told them another parable:
“The kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all your seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and perch in its branches.” Matthew 13:31-32
Do you know what a mustard seed is? When Asians eat cold noodles we put the yellow spicy paste on top of the noodles. That is mustard sauce. Mustard seed is very small. Let me ask you, “Between the daikon radish seed and Chinese cabbage seeds, which one is bigger?”
Answer: Daikon radish seeds are bigger.
“Yes, I can tell you are a gardener.” The people who live in the city have never seen those seeds. So they usually think cabbage seeds are bigger because cabbage looks bigger than daikon. The size of the mustard seed is almost the same size as cabbage seeds.
But they grow like a tree.
Heaven is just like a mustard seed. In the beginning when we study the Bible, we can’t tell if it makes an impact in our life immediately. To experience Heaven is not like receiving a degree from Seoul University or that you have found a new job where the pay is four million dollars. But when you receive His words into your heart no one can tell the blessing you have received or that it will be a help to you.
Mustard seeds are so tiny and when it starts to grow it doesn’t seem like a big deal. But it has a life of its own, so it will grow to be a big tree. When the seeds drop there will be more trees and it will spread.
Even the Great Wall of China will wear down as time passes by, because it is an inanimate object.
I know a young lady who always attained good grades in school and her parents were very proud of her. She participated in sport activities. One day there was a heavy downpour of rain in her village, and the dam breached and water came rushing down and flooded the village. Villagers quickly tried to repair the dam by placing stones in the breach and she went to help them. The moment she picked up a stone she twisted her back. She had to go through surgery.
The surgery went wrong, and she became a quadriplegic. She could only nod with her neck and that was it. Her schoolteachers, friends and parents all came to visit her and felt sorry for her. But she was an optimistic person, and instead of feeling sorry for herself, she comforted her friends and said, “Don’t cry for me, I know I am bedridden, but I know I will be able to run and play when I go to Heaven.”
She could move her neck so she rolled on her stomach and practiced writing and drawing with a pencil using her lips. After practicing for about two months she managed to write letters and sent them to prisoners in jail.
In her writings to the prisoners she wrote these words, “Dear sir, many have thought you are a dangerous man, so society locked you in jail. But I don’t believe you were that way from the beginning. You must have some reason why you did what landed you in jail. Please be courageous. There is a God and He loves you. You may change your life at any time. I am writing this letter to you holding my pencil in my lips.”
Because of her letters many prisoners were converted. She is now 30 years old and she never stops writing and she writes at least 20 letters every week.
There was another friend of mine. He had a head on collision with another vehicle. The steering wheel hit his side and he was paralyzed from the waist down. Since the accident he has been in a wheel chair. He received monetary compensation of $50,000.00
from the insurance company.
After that incident he felt worthless and all he did was drink. When he was drunk, he would whine and cry saying, “I want to die. What’s the use of living as a cripple?”
Let us examine these two individuals and their cases. The young man’s situation seems to be far better than the lady who was quadriplegic. He can write using his hand and ride in a wheel chair.
But why are these two individuals’ outlooks on life so different? The difference is one has the mustard seed in her heart and the other doesn’t.
When all things are going well and we are healthy, we can’t tell much difference between the believers and non believers. We all get up in the morning and eat three meals a day. We all sleep at night and go to work the next day.
Life is so unpredictable. We may face tragedy, lose our job or someday face death. It can be a very lonely experience. We feel that the whole world has abandoned us. Nothing can comfort us at this hour, neither parents, relatives nor money in our savings account.
But even in the desperate situations, and if we have hope in Heaven and believe in Jesus, we will be comforted. Heaven starts as a small mustard seed in our hearts. My wish for you is
to keep this hope and truth in your heart, called the tiny mustard seed.
The third scenario, Heaven is like this:
“The kingdom of Heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.” Matthew 13:44
Now the kingdom of Heaven is like hidden treasure in the field, and let’s pretend we have one hundred million dollars. Where would you keep it? The bank must be the safest place, but this
parable was told 2000 years ago. There were no banks at that time. If someone found precious gems, where could they find the safest place to hide them? Put them in a pot and bury them in the field where no one ever knows except that person. He will not tell his son just in case he decided to dig and take the precious gems for himself and run away.
The pine mushroom pickers told me this story. When they go out to collect mushrooms they won’t even tell their own son, where they find those pine mushrooms. The picker will get up before dawn, and climb up to where the mushrooms are all by himself to harvest and bring the mushrooms home. (Laughter).
The story I just told you has happened before and could happen again today. There was a man who buried his treasure in the field and did not tell anyone. War broke out all of a sudden and the owner of the treasure had to flee in a hurry, and he thought after the war he would return to retrieve the hidden treasures.
Unfortunately he was killed during his escape, so the buried treasure is not known to anyone except the deceased man.
As time passed by, the owner of the land has changed hands a few times. A poor farmer rented this field to plant some crops. One day as he was plowing the land something struck his plow. At first he thought it had to be a rock so he tried to dig it out.
To his surprise he saw it was a treasure chest underneath the plow. He opened the chest box and guess what he found? The chest box was loaded full with precious gem stones. If this were to happen to you what would you do? Would you dig it out right away? But the Bible tells the story that the farmer did not do that. It says, “He hid it again.”
Why? The poor farmer thought of what he should do with the treasure that he had found. If he were to buy land and a house then the villagers were going to wonder where he got so much money all of a sudden. He might be called a thief from the land owner.
This poor farmer was wondering who the real owner of the hidden treasure was. If the owner sold the piece of land to him then he is certain that the present landowner did not bury the treasure in that field. So the poor farmer decided to buy this piece of land with the hidden treasure. He marked that place where the treasure was buried.
The poor farmer went home and told his wife, “Honey, let’s buy the piece of land that I rented to plant our crops.”
“Do we have the money?” asked the wife
“We will sell our house and borrow some too.” he replied.
“Are you crazy?” answered the wife.
His wife could not understand his obsession of buying this piece of land. He could not reveal the secret to her because he feared that she might tell her brother, when she asked her brother for money to purchase this property. The conversation went something like this.
“Why all of a sudden do you want to borrow such a big amount?” asked her brother.
“We want to buy some land.” She replied.
“Can you pay me back?” questioned her brother.
“Of course we can.” She replied with confidence.
“How could you pay me? I know you don’t have money?” said her brother.
So when her brother will not loan her the money what will she say to him to convince him that she needs the money?
She might say something like this, “My brother, this is a secret, there is a chest of treasures hidden in that piece of land that we want to buy.”
If she said this, then this news will spread fast. That is why he couldn’t tell anyone. His wife looks at him with a strange look, and she questions herself, “Is he crazy or something?” The whole village and even the owner of the field might have thought he is crazy.
The poor farmer was not concerned about what other people would say about him, because he knows what is hidden in that field. He gathers the money and hurries to the landlord and says,
“Let me buy this field, please.” “No, I am not selling that piece of land” said the landlord. The landlord has enough money so there is no reason for him to sell it in a hurry. The poor farmer negotiates again. “What if I buy the land for double the amount you are asking?”
“OK, you’ve got the deal.” the landlord said. The landlord thought to himself, “You silly man, this piece of land is not worth that much.”
Now that he has sold it, it is very clear that the treasure doesn’t belong to him. Anyway, after lots of back and forth negotiation, the farmer purchased that property. Now the hidden treasure is completely in the poor farmer’s possession.
We plowed our “life” field for 20, 30, 40, 50 or 60 years. And we noticed this “field” is tiresome and hard work, and one day we found Heaven. Then what would you do? The Bible suggests we should do as the poor farmer has done. The farmer did not plow the field to find the hidden treasure. His intention was to plant and harvest his crops for his own living. He happened to find the treasure by chance. One day, we will find our hidden treasure; Heaven, Jesus Christ, and everlasting life. What would you do now?
Do what this farmer has done. No matter what kind of sacrifice it may take, be like this wise farmer. He sold everything…. We need to change our lifestyle, for example, stop drinking or smoking and start anew.
If it were necessary to sacrifice your life for Him, would you be willing to change your old habits for Heaven? I think we should be able to do that for a better future.
Who will enter into Heaven? As we read these verses it doesn’t say in order to inherit Heaven one must be a good person or have done many good deeds. Which means the one who knows the value of the field, the value of Heaven will enter into Heaven. So I wish that you will make a wise decision like this farmer.
Today I have shared with you three different types of fields: I wish for you to be the good soil, so you can yield 30 or 60 times more harvest in return. Also that Heaven is like a mustard seed which can grow into a big plant even though it was small.
And I said even though you have the hope of Heaven in your heart, yet no one may know that you have it. But when you are in a desperate situation and no one can comfort you, the hope
of Heaven will comfort you.
The one who does the things as this wise farmer did will enter Heaven. He who wants to go to Heaven and knows the enormous value of the hidden treasure, which is Heaven, will inherit it.
Before I finish this lecture I would like to tell you a story:
Today we have the choice to freely worship God. But in ancient times, if Romans believed in God, it was a matter of life or death. North Korea is like that even now. Three of my friends went back to North Korea and were killed.
They received the gospel message when they were in China and decided to go to North Korea to spread the gospel of hope. I did not hear from them so I was searching for them and later
I was told that they had been killed. My conscience bothered me and sometimes I questioned, “Did their sacrifice occur because of me? I introduced them to the gospel and they died at a young age trying to spread the good news.” There were times I felt very sad. However, It was comforting to know that we will meet again when Jesus Christ returns. We will be there in Heaven for an eternity.
In the period of the Roman Empire, the emperor was adored as a god. If anyone believed that the carpenter, Jesus, was God, then they could be killed instantly.
But the strange thing was no matter how many believers the Romans killed, the number of believers increased. If they killed 10 believers then there were 20 more new believers, if they killed 100 then there were 200 and if they killed 1000, there were 2000 more.
When we study Christian history, when Christians were persecuted, the gospel spread more quickly. But now, South Korea has become a developed country with freedom of religion and it
has become a very comfortable place to live.
The Roman emperor noticed later that many of the Roman soldiers had converted to Christianity. So the emperor sent out a public notice. “Our country is in danger. Find the followers of Jesus among the soldiers and execute them.” That notice arrived at the camp of Armenia in Northern Soviet union. So the commanding officer gathered all the soldiers and announced, “We received a public notice from the Great Emperor. If any Christians are among us come forward.” As he commanded, 40 soldiers came forward.
When the commander looked at them they were the ones whom he really trusted. He really did not want to kill them because they were very earnest. And they bravely fought with him during the war.
Why would you think the soldiers became followers of Jesus? The Roman soldiers who fought many wars knew more about how worthless and vain their lives were.
But as they observed the Christians’ life, they noticed Christians could even sing at the place of martyrdom. As they were watching the Christians the soldiers were deeply moved and converted to Christianity.
The commander pleaded again, “I don’t want you to throw your life away for this kind of unimportant silly matter, why don’t you think this over one more time. I will wait till tomorrow to ask the same question.”
So he called them again.
“How is it now? Have you changed your mind?”
“No, we want to be followers of Jesus.”
“Then I can’t help it.”
So he commanded that they plunge into the frozen icy lake without any clothes and stay in the water. Only their necks were above the water.
The sun was setting and the river was frozen, it was so cold and their necks were getting squeezed and choked. He set a bonfire and shouted towards the frozen river, “Whenever you want to give up, come out here.” But all he heard was the sound of singing. As the darkness approached and the temperature dropped the soldiers kept singing, “Even though we perish we 40 brave soldiers will not denounce Jesus.” They were singing this song together.
The commanding officer couldn’t understand what he was seeing.
‘What is this to believe in Jesus? How are they not afraid of death?’ The night got darker and finally he heard a cracking sound of ice. Finally one soldier gave up and walked out of that frozen river. “I give up,” he said.
“Very good” he answered. He let him change his clothes and sat him by the fire. But yet the sound of song did not cease. “We 39 soldiers won’t be afraid of death.”
The commanding officer watched them silently and he acted strangely. He took off all his clothes and gave them to the soldier who had just come out of the river, and he filled the spot the soldier left.
“Now, we are 40 again. Let 40 of us sing together.” Next morning, on the surface of the frozen river, there were 40 heads, all frozen to death. Why did they do such things? They knew the value of Heaven. Since we know that life is short and it will pass away quickly, we should do as the farmer did. Heaven is waiting for us. And there will be no pain or tears but everlasting joy and happiness. Remember the mustard seed in us and be good soil. May we be faithful to the end.
