We are taught that we must become upright people who, in God’s sight, are blameless and fully keep His commandments. “In the time of Herod king of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah; his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron. Both of them were righteous in the sight of God, observing all the Lord’s commands and decrees blamelessly” [(Modern Translation: “When Herod was king of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah of the division of Abijah, and his wife Elizabeth also came from the family of Aaron. They were righteous before God and faithfully kept all the Lord’s commandments and regulations without fault”)] (Luke 1:5–6). While meditating on this passage, I would like to draw out the lessons given to us: (1) The author of Luke’s Gospel, Luke, first wrote to Theophilus about John the Baptist’s parents. The father’s name was “Zechariah” (meaning, “The LORD remembers...
Jonah’s God (2) [Jonah 1:7-17] We Koreans seem to be good at lying. When I watch the Korean dramas, I don’t know why people are lying so much. Even if it is a lie that cares for a loved one, a lie is a lie. But I don’t know why it is called 'a good lie'. Especially I don’t understand why they keep on denying after their lies got exposed rather than acknowledging their sin of lying. Maybe it is because they think that people are unwilling to forgive them even though they confess their lies honestly. So what they do is they keep on denying the fact that they lied until people find that they lied. For example, the Korean politicians keep on denying their lies even though those lies get exposed (I am sure not all the Korean politicians are like this). The reason is because they may think that even they confess honestly, it is difficult to avoid blame. So it seems that some...