God Cheers the HKBTS Family on

In the past half a year, my heart has always been filled with joy. Recently, a group of students with one accord told me, “President, since the school year began, we have noticed that you have looked very happy, very relaxed.” I said, “Yes I am! Our teachers are good. Our students are good. Therefore, I am happy!” I am happy. Yes, I do feel relaxed because throughout this half a year, I have witnessed God working in the Seminary. He loves us, receives us cordially and cheers teachers and students on at HKBTS.

God Receives Us Cordially  He Cheers Our Teachers on

From June 1 to 13, I was in Los Angeles and San Francisco, visiting our alumni and the local churches in the area. I felt deeply God’s love and support as I was so cordially welcomed by the pastors and ministers there. Returning to Hong Kong, I was soon immersed in the two-day Faculty Retreat. At the retreat our teachers and I got together for two discussion sessions, sharing our thoughts on future strategies and plans for the Seminary. We spent time going through individual items in great detail and were able to reach a consensus. We came away from this year’s retreat with a strong sense of community and hospitality. In such a safe and accepting environment, we could open up and share our opinions frankly and sincerely. There was an atmosphere of mutual trust as we practiced cordial hospitality as a group. After the meetings, we shared meals together where we continued our discussions. Sharing food and drink certainly facilitated the smooth interflow of ideas and allowed us to experience cordial hospitality as we gathered around a table to share a meal. We felt such warmth and intimacy — it was quite special for us to break bread or share rice together. Feasting together increases the possibility of deep fellowship and creates a sense of real family.

Throughout these two days of our Faculty Retreat, we had in-depth discussions in which we not only achieved consensus but also enjoyed such an open and honest fellowship together as brothers and sisters in the Lord. The Faculty Retreat further affirmed our trust in God as our teachers bonded together and worked as a lively, productive team. I am excited that the Lord has cheered our teachers on!

God Receives Us Cordially    He Cheers Our Students on

From August 19 to 21, we had our Spiritual Formation Camp for Students at Cheung Chau just before the beginning of the school year. The theme for the camp was “From Entering…to Returning to God….” The camp’s aim was to allow students to be silent in front of God before their studies and to find renewal.

In this three-day camp, there were three main sermon sessions with our teachers Eric Kwong, Clement Shum and Brian Lam each delivering messages. During the camp, there was a workshop led by Dr. and Mrs. Peter Chang who instructed our students to jot down sermon notes and their thoughts and responses. Students listened attentively and were touched and stimulated by the couple’s lives and busied themselves taking notes as they had been instructed.

It was apparent that our teachers put their hearts into their messages and got involved in the activities while the students listened with open hearts to what God was saying to them through the speakers. In the sharing meeting on the final day, everyone made good use of the time and shared enthusiastically what they had learned and experienced in God’s presence. There were also times during the camp in which talking was forbidden so that we could experience the joy of silence. At meal times, it was strictly forbidden to talk so that we could experience silent peace and joy. As we ate together, we savored the sweetness of the Father’s presence as the head of our family. Since we are one family, as long as we can be together, we partake of the sweetness of his banquet.

Together teachers and students experienced God’s joy and peace throughout the camp. I talked with students, asking them why they were so happy. They answered that their hearts had been touched by God and they had experienced God’s presence. I was excited for our students because God cheered them on!

God Received Us Cordially    He Cheers Our Spirituality on

On August 26 in the Opening Convocation Ceremony, I delivered a message titled “The Unity of Cordial Hospitality.” I pointed out that cordial hospitality is a biblical teaching and explained how it must be a central part of God’s will for HKBTS. Cordial hospitality is not optional but is essential in our spiritual lives. I quoted Hebrews 13:2 to encourage our faculty, students and staff: “Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it.” I admonished them to entertain one another and to become a community of unity and love. I shared with them my dream that HKBTS will go in this direction.

After school began, I give regular reports of HKBTS’s “family news” in the morning chapels. This includes talking about the Seminary’s future plans, sharing our teachers’ study plans, introducing our teachers’ recent publication, talking about how students are getting along in their studies and encouraging students to share the Seminary’s burdens and challenges. For example, the Drainage Services Department plans to build a large scale sewage collection system and pumping station next to our Seminary, and the Seminary must negotiate with the Government. I also encourage our students to display the virtues of a good steward –– thrifty, conservation of the environment and good financial management. I urged them to take responsibility to bear the burden of stewarding “the HKBTS’s household duties.” Although I have not spelt out the notion of family, I have discovered that we relate increasingly to one another more like a family as we learn to protect and help one another. It is clear that the atmosphere of cordial hospitality has been growing at the Seminary. One thing that has touched my heart is that a newly-arrived teacher did not wait for us to play host to him but rather took the initiative to invite each of the teachers to eat with him. This made us feel ashamed. The atmosphere of cordial hospitality has infected us, and we are aware that the spiritual life of our HKBTS family continues to grow stronger.

From this school year onward, we intend to offer mentorship program to our students as they develop disciplined spiritual lives. Besides, having our two chaplains who are responsible for the care of year one students and the graduating classes, each of our teachers will bear the responsibility of being the abba and amma of the other students. They will meet with a student individually for an hour each month, offering him / her spiritual guidance. After the meeting hour, some teachers may give students an assignment to provide further guidance.

Apart from that, this year we have requested our graduating students to deliver a message in the morning chapel. To ensure that students can be built up spiritually at the morning chapel, we will make it a policy for students to attend. When we announced these new arrangements and “family rules,” our students surprised us by responding with a simple “Yes!” Our students’ teachable spirit exceeds my expectation and has delighted me. God allowed me to see how he cheers us on in our spiritual lives!

God Build up the “HKBTS Family”    and Cheers Us on

Not only are our hearts happy, but the hearts of our teachers and students are also happy because God has blessed us with his special mercy. He has entertained us and has taught us mutually to entertain one another. Practicing cordial hospitality gives us a sense of home-coming. The Lord who modeled cordial hospitality when he was on earth says to us, “My family is your family.” This same master also urges us to say to our guests, “Our family is your family.” It is apparent that family and cordial hospitality are inseparable.

Our home is the most personal place where we welcome others. The home is the place that provides stability, rest and provision. It provides healing and also nurtures an intimate relationship and an unswerving spirit.

The openness of a family can transcend barriers of culture, background and social, economic and class boundaries. An open, accepting family enables someone who is lonely, sick and dead-tired to take a breath and feel restored to health and able to reclaim to strength and vigor. When a person feels needed, loved and protected, then that person has found a home in which to settle down. This is a kind of life transformation and resurrection.

In this modern day world, it is increasingly hard to find a healthy family. In such a frantic age, those families that manifest Christ’s love can especially be a blessing to guests visiting the family. By living with a family that practices cordial hospitality, the guests can experience Christian love and share God’s abundant joy. As we eat, wash dishes and pray together in such a family, we will naturally taste a kind of love that spreads and emits from the family.

Cordial hospitality revealed throughout the family often involves the sharing of food. Since people tend to eat in haste, nowadays, they cannot experience the joy of feasting together. Within any community which practices cordial hospitality, feasting together takes on great significance. Feasting together provides the opportunity to show mutual respect, acceptance and equality. There are no exceptions to this principle in biblical stories about cordial hospitality. Jesus practiced cordial hospitality through feasting with such unlikely people as tax-collectors and sinners. As we reflect on feasting, he continues to challenge communities that insist on the practice of birds of a feather flock together. When strangers and the host feast together, the accepting and intimate relationship exhibited will breed an equality relationship that transcends social boundaries.

In fact, a relationship of cordial hospitality is one of equality. It is not unilateral but bilateral. This relationship is bilateral as the guest brings along a present and as the host has his own needs met. The host who practices cordial hospitality can also experience joy and surprise from the guests. Sometimes the guests serve the host. For example, a poor man can make use of his limited resources to reciprocate the host’s hospitality. Meanwhile, in entertaining the guests, the host can get in touch with his own needs, his poverty, his weaknesses and his dependence on others. The person who practices cordial hospitality comes face to face with his own needs and realizes that we all have needs although they take different forms. The starting point of cordial hospitality is in the act of penitence: “I am not here to help others; instead, we are helping one another.”

A seminary is God’s family, a spiritual home; it can be a wonderful place where a person can be nurtured. God is the host and we are his guests, blessed with his bountiful grace. However, in the seminary, we also have the opportunity to welcome other people on behalf of our host. We can prepare a place for strangers or travelers and cheer them on their journey. When we learn to practice and serve in this way, our cordial hospitality begins to reflect God’s tender welcome and warm reception. Cordial hospitality is what those who follow Christ should certainly practice. In fact, every facet of our lives should permeate with such welcoming spirit. We will then become more deeply spiritual as we live lives worthy of the Gospel of Christ, able to love strangers and even open to our enemies.

Beginning in January this year, we have gradually made a great effort to grow in God’s love and become members of the HKBTS family.

The Seminary has become our spiritual home. This home is safe and stable: a place of rest, a place of provision and a haven where our lives can be nurtured and receive healing. It nurtures intimate relationships and unswerving spirit grounded in the Lord. In such an environment, we eat together, wash dishes together, engage in lively conversations, pray and experience the love of a genuine Christian family. Therefore, we are neither lonely, nor tired and neither weary nor afflicted with illness. Instead we are able to revive our lives with new strength and vigor and feel contented to have found a place where we can settle down. We tell our guests in accordance with the instructions of our master, “This is our home and our home is also you home.”

In the Council Meeting of the Baptist Convention of Hong Kong held in September, I said with the faith granted by the Lord, “HKBTS has revived, been rehabilitated and is now healthy and strong because God has been in our midst to cheer us on!” In fact, HKBTS today is healthy and strong because the spiritual wind has blown and the dry bones have come to life (Ezekiel 37). God has promised: Rivers of living water will flow out of the hearts of believers and they will bear new fruit of life (Ezekiel 47:12; John 7:38-39).

Nov 2009