Recent rains and floods caused a lot of property, roadways and farming damages in the Northeast. Complaints from all directions are swiveling in our local community rapidly. One of my colleagues has to drive additional hour daily to work because of roadway blockages. Sometimes, he may have to turn back home if there are newly blockages. Manager at my working place even told me that her family members were having stomach problems in the past few days, suspecting it was due to their well water overflowed by recent rains. I still remember last winter; there were a lot of complaints about “snow” accumulation. The bulletin board from a local First Baptist Church even posted a sign saying “Whoever was praying for snow, please stop now!” I think now we can change it to “Whoever was praying for rains, please stop now!” Or, please send it to “Wherever is suffering from drought”

Chinese learned man, Confucius, once said to his disciple “過猶不及 (Overshoot and shortfall problems are two sides of one coin)”. It emphasizes the concept of a “just right and proper” balance (中庸之道, 恰到好處) in daily living. Essentially, it indicates that anything is overdone or done incompletely / insufficiently would be a problem. For example, over-eating would cause obesity and on diet improperly would cost one’s health. How to maintain a right balance in everything we face with is always a challenge to most of us, I think.

In the Gospel of Mark, there is a phrase that was commented by our Lord Jesus to a Pharisee’s challenging question (Mark 12:28 – 34) – “You are “not far” from the kingdom of God. 你離　神的國不遠了”  The “Not Far” is an interesting adjective to describe the condition of the Pharisee. You can interpret it either positively or negatively. From the positive side, the Pharisee has known how to enter the kingdom of God because of his knowledge. On the negative side, however, he has NOT entered the kingdom of God yet (不及).

Last Friday’s joint small group meeting, we were asked to share our youthful aspirations and “how far” had we achieved. Some of us said they had achieved their aspirations already. Most of us were struggling – had either abandoned or changed our original aspirations. It is good to set an aspiration for our life and then pursue it. However, it is even more important to set a goal that is eternally valuable. Wealth was my youthful aspiration due to my family condition. Since then, it has become a constant struggle in my life until I met our Lord. I realized that all the “true wealth” is in Him – peace and joy. In recent small group study, the teaching from Apostle Paul to the young Timothy once again reminds me:

But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. 然而敬虔加上知足的心便是大利了‧因為我們沒有帶什麼到世上來，也不能帶什麼去‧(1 Timothy 6:6 – 7)

My dear brothers and sisters, let’s examine our self daily: are we “far from this world” or “far from our Lord”?  Let’s encourage each other to be persistent in following Him closely – aspire to be mature in Him (作大人):

Brothers and sisters, stop thinking like children. In regard to evil be infants, but in your thinking be adults.弟兄們、在心志上不要作小孩子．然而在惡事上要作嬰孩．在心志上總要作大人。(1 Corinthians 14:20)