Kairos Spiritual Formation Podcast: Recent Episodes
Alex Tang
Join me in a continuing dialogue on everyday Christian spirituality, spiritual formation and transformation, spiritual direction, theology, Christian education, biomedical ethics, Star Trek, postmodern parenting and science fiction. I enjoy reading and watching movies. I write and preach in churches, speak in conferences and lead retreats. My other vocation is as a paediatrician and a medical educator.
Palm Sunday sermon. 2024. John 12: 20-50. The main theme of this passage revolves around the necessity of self-sacrifice and the paradox of life through death. Jesus introduces the concept that true life and fruitfulness come through dying to oneself, echoing the larger theme of his own death and resurrection. He is preparing his followers for the reality that following him means embracing the path of self-denial and sacrifice, which leads to eternal life. The introduction of Greeks seeking Jesus foreshadows the spread of the Gospel beyond the Jewish community to the Gentile world, emphasising the universal scope of Jesus' mission.
Can life be revived from dead, dry bones? Can our dry life be revived? Some lessons from the Prophet Ezekiel.
John the Baptist is the herald of the beginning of Jesus' ministry. The Glory of the Lord has returned!
What does it mean that God is consuming fire? The author of the book of Hebrews gave some pointer.
One of my challenges as a Chinese Christian is to decide whether I am a "banana", "mango" or "durian" Christian. There are many dilemmas and landmines as we seek to follow Christ while practicing our culture. Here are some of my own reflections about the Chinese New Year.
Mary's song or Magnificat in Luke 1 is a hymn sung by Mary (after she discovered that she was pregnant) when she met Elizabeth who was also pregnant with John the Baptizer. This wonderful hymn magnified God (hence Magnificat). It not just reveals Mary's faith in God but also revealed Mary's character.
Dr Timothy Sng of Marketplace Ministry Malaysia's interview; allowing me to share my calling, work, and ministry.
How do we become brave and courageous when we grow older? Joshua 1:9 offers us some guidelines.
The Christian holy day of Pentecost, which is celebrated on the seventh Sunday after Easter, commemorates the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles and other followers of Jesus Christ while they were in Jerusalem celebrating the Feast of Weeks, as described in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 2:1–31). In Christian tradition, this event represents the birth of the early Church.
Watch this on YouTube https://youtu.be/zusWMWOuqPc
Jesus' Parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man. A discussion on death and life after death.
Of the three major events at Easter: Cruxification, Resurrection, and Ascension, most churches pay more attention to the first two. Ascension is important because it is the culmination of the first two events and offers proof that Jesus is the Messiah.
Watch on https://youtu.be/Gg9mc79vd_M
The Patriarch Joseph ruled Egypt through seven years of fruitfulness and seven years of famine crisis. What are some of the marketplace leadership lessons we can learn from him?
In these dark times, how does one have hope? The prophet Jeremiah lived during such dark times when the Babylonians were at his gates. This exposition of Jeremiah 32:8-12 shows us how to have hope in times of hopelessness.
How do we complete our faith journey well? How do we end well? There are many challenges and obstacles in our way. Four principles to guide our journey.
This lecture was presented to the "Towards Vaccine Equity amidst COVID-19 Surge in Asia' online consultation organised by the Christian Conference of Asia on July 20, 2021
Shema GII Spiritual Formation Center organised an excellent online retreat on Death, Dying, and Grief. This is one of the sessions on "Dying" in which I am invited to speak. I spoke in English which was interpreted by Grace Emilia into Bahasa Indonesia. Talk followed by an interesting Q&A session
Some Christian considerations on suicide from the biblical and theological perspectives and what are some of the things we can do for people who are suicidal.
Beyond Easter: Truth and the Resurrected Christ. A meditation on the disciples' encounter with the Risen Christ on the road to Emmaus
John 11: 21-27
21 “Lord,” Martha said to Jesus, “if you had been here, my brother would not have died. 22 But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask.”
23 Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”
24 Martha answered, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”
25 Jesus said to her, “I AM the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; 26 and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
27 “Yes, Lord,” she replied, “I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, who is to come into the world.”
Intentional and purposeful living. Talk delivered to Monash CSJB Christian Fellowship on 02 March 2021
There are some concerns about Covid vaccines. This talk seeks to address some of these concerns
What does Jesus means when he said "I AM the gate to eternal life"? Exploring this concept with glimpses of Celtic Christianity.
What does Jesus' statement that he is Light of the world mean to us? How do we experience light is a time of darkness?
1. Children of light (Eph. 5: 8-10; 1 Thess.5:5)
2. Walking in the light (1 Jn.1:7; Isa.2:5)
3. Being in the light (1 Jn.2:9)
4. Dancing in the kingdom of light (Col.1:12-14)
Why do you work? What is the marketplace? Does it matter where we work? This sermon explores the theology of work especially in the marketplace in light of the present COVID-19 pandemic, and its socio-economic effects on work and the marketplace.
Kairos Spiritual Formation
www.kairos2.com
The Five Solas| Alex Tang |Kairos Spiritual Formation
31 October is Reformation Day. What are we celebrating? What are the five solas?
Sola Gratia
Sola Fide
Solus Christus
Sola Scriptura
Soli Deo Gloria
saved by Grace alone
through Faith alone
in Christ alone
according to Scriptures alone
for the glory of God alone
Exploring the seven 'I AM' statements in the Gospel of John.
Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty. (John 6:35)
Seven essential ingredients in the Bread of Life
1. Forever Young (Eternal Bread)
2. Keeping in Touch (Spiritual Bread)
3. EnJOY your Makan/Food (Physical Bread)
4. Freedom from Fear and Anxiety (Emotional Bread)
5. Rich Dad, Poor Dad (Financial Bread)
6. One Anothering (Social Bread)
7. Sharing Good News (Sharing Bread)
Jesus' identity is often questioned. In this sermon we shall examine how Jesus sees himself who will allow us to see ourselves in the light of his revelations.
"God's work is church work. My secular job is to earn money so I can do God's work"
For those Christians working in the marketplace or other places, do you feel that your work is second-rate compared to those work that carries the name 'Full Time' workers (such as pastors, pastoral staff etc)? Do you feel that in your innermost being, if all things being equal, you should give up your job and go 'full time'?
Watch it on YouTube
https://youtu.be/JBb3jZ7C-FI
Ageing and the Pilgrim Soul: Four movements of the Holy Spirit at the later seasons of life.
You may watch the video at
https://youtu.be/TeQ2YI_9334
Discernment is a difficult process of finding God's will. A discernment framework is often needed.
Video is available at
https://youtu.be/wQkM4lRYWUk
The Christian holy day of Pentecost, which is celebrated on the seventh Sunday after Easter, commemorates the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles and other followers of Jesus Christ while they were in Jerusalem celebrating the Feast of Weeks, as described in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 2:1–31). In Christian tradition, this event represents the birth of the early Church.
The term Pentecost comes from the Greek Πεντηκοστή (Pentēkostē) meaning "fiftieth". It refers to the festival celebrated on the fiftieth day after Passover, also known as the "Feast of Weeks" and the "Feast of 50 days" in rabbinic tradition. In Judaism the Festival of Weeks (Hebrew: שבועות Shavuot) was a harvest festival that was celebrated seven weeks and one day after the first Sabbath of the Feast of Unleavened Bread in Deuteronomy 16:9 or seven weeks and one day after the Sabbath in Leviticus 23:16. The Festival of Weeks was also called the feast of Harvest in Exodus 23:16 and the day of first fruits in Numbers 28:26. In Exodus 34:22 it is called the "firstfruits of the wheat harvest." The date for the "Feast of Weeks" originally came the day after seven full weeks following the first harvest of grain. In Jewish tradition the fiftieth day was known as the Festival of Weeks. The actual mention of fifty days comes from Leviticus 23:16.
Our imagination is God's gift for our enjoyment and to enhance our creativity and appreciation of the greatness of God’s creation. It is possible for us to pray using our imagination. This type of prayer is also known as contemplation, contemplative prayer, “imaginative prayer,” or Ignatian prayer. While Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) is not the first to use it, he recognized that it is a powerful form of experiential prayer if used appropriately. He had made it the central form of prayer in his Spiritual Exercises.
One of the ways to pray this prayer is to imagine ourselves being part of a scene from the Bible. Here, we must be passive rather than active participants. We are not here to be a Hollywood director or an avatar in a virtual world. Our desire is to imagine ourselves to be present at the scene to see and note what is going on. We are with our imagination use our fives senses in order to better appreciate what is going on in the scenario. We are not to create characters or change the happenings.
In the twelfth century, Guigo II. A French Carthusian monk developed lectio into a four step exercise:
Reading/Listening (lectio)
Read out a short passage of Scripture. When we read aloud, we become both proclaimer and hearer of the Word of God. As you read, listen for the word or phrase that speaks to you. What is the Spirit drawing your attention to?
Meditating (meditatio)
Repeat aloud the word or phrase that attracts you. Make connections between it and your life. What is God saying to you by means of this word or phrase?
Praying (oratio)
Now, take these thoughts and offer them back to God in prayer, giving thanks, asking for guidance, asking for forgiveness, and resting in God’s love. What is God leading you to pray?
Contemplating (contemplatio)
Move from the activity of prayer to the stillness of contemplation. Simply rest in God’s presence. Stay open to God. Listen to God. Remain in peace and silence before God. How is God revealing Himself to you?
Centering prayer is a method designed to deepen the relationship with Christ and to facilitate the development of contemplative prayer by preparing our facilities to cooperate with this gift. It is an attempt to present the teaching of earlier times (e.g., The Cloud of Unknowing) in an updated form and put a certain order and regularity into it. It is not meant to replace other kinds of prayer; it simply puts other kinds of prayer into a new and fuller perspective. During the time of prayer, we consent to God’s presence and action within. At other times our attention moves outward to discover God’s presence everywhere else. Unlike New Age or Buddhism meditation, Centring prayer is not emptying our minds but stilling or quietening our minds so that we can listen to Christ. It is Christ centered.
Lamentations is a grief process. We lament during this pandemic at the end of our way of life and the uncertainty of life to be after the lifting of the Movement Control Order (MCO). Pandemics have the power to destroy the old world and allow a new world to come into being. The destruction of Jerusalem and Judah by the Babylonians had a similar effect on the world of the Prophet Jeremiah.
The Breath Prayer
Breath is life. Since the first human became animated by the breath of God, breathing is essential to being alive. When our breathing stops, our life ends. Our breathing thus is an intrinsic component of being alive. Jesus is God incarnate in a human body. Our bodies are now the temple of the Holy Spirit. The physical bodies in which our soul and spirit embody are Christ’s body on earth. So our bodies are sacred. Our breaths are sacred too as it is a gift of God, a means of grace, and a means of life. We pray with our minds using language. We can also pray with our bodies. The breath prayer is one of the early forms of prayer, started once we draw our first breath as a newborn baby. However, the breath prayer that we are using nowadays was formulated by the Desert Fathers and Mothers in the second to third Century C.E. Desert Fathers and Mothers were people who left the cities to go into the wilderness of the deserts of Syria, Palestine, and Egypt to be close to God. They were often solitary and committed their lives to prayer. From them came this tradition of prayer by being aware of our breathing. By intentional breathing slowing and still ourselves, we seek the presence of God. This is a form of wordless prayer, a contemplative type of prayer.
This sermon is an exploration of faith in the midst of sickness. It is based on Job 2:10b.
Job has faith in the midst of his sickness and there are many lessons we can learn from him. Ultimately it is about God’s Grace in the midst of sickness.
Some points to note are:
1.We are not alone
2.Everybody dies
3.Pray and take your medications
4.Suffering is a choice
5.Trust and hope in dark times
6.When nothing makes sense
7.Knowing God
A short conversation with my grandchildren about pretensions. Why do we pretend to be somebody else?. About our true and false self.
More on this episode may be read here
https://bit.ly/2HZKjoX
More on conversations with my grandchildren here
https://bit.ly/3a9BMMb
Sermon preached at Holy Light Church (English), Johor Baru, Malaysia on 23 February 2020.
Monsters, Dreams, and Daniel-7
An exploration of dreams and exposition of Daniel chapter seven with a modern-day thought experiment on Daniel 7.
Using the Powerpoint with this sermon will be helpful. Download here
https://bit.ly/37Od4Q5
Visit Kairos Spiritual Formation
www.kairos2.com
Conversation with my grandchildren.
Episode 2: Seeing and Looking
Visit Kairos Spiritual Formation website
www.kairos2.com
Transcript available here
https://bit.ly/320MXE1
Conversations with my grandchildren
Episode 1: Hello little one
Visit our website Kairos Spiritual Formation at www.kairos2.com
Transcript available at https://bit.ly/39Htb2W
Fear and the Coronavirus
There appear to a climate of fear in people of many countries which are far from the epicenter of the 2019 nCoV epidemic in Wuhan and Hebei provincial, China. Even though there are only a handful of patients in their country and most of these have been to the epicenter, or being in contact with people from there, the state of fear of being infected by the corona virus remain high. People scan the news media frequently (sometimes every few minutes) to see the latest tally of infected cases and death as one will follow the Olympics medals tally. Fear is visceral and irrational. One will rather believe the latest rumor or fake news than follow reputable websites or official announcements. Fear leads to mass hysteria, like hoarding of food, and of toilet papers!
To deal with our fear of the outbreak, let us ask ourselves a few questions.
Firstly, what are the facts? The virus outbreak started in January 2020 and have since infected confirmed cases and cause the death of more than a 1,000 people. It is contagious but the majority of people who were infected had mild symptoms like, fever, cough, and runny nose. Some has abdominal pain and diarrhea. This is common to any virus infection. Only about 2.4% died from respiratory complications. The majority of death occur among the elderly with other medical ailments such as diabetes, kidney failure, heart conditions, and lung problems. All but two of these deaths occur in China itself. Not exactly a pandemic (WHO is reluctant to labor it an epidemic), a worldwide outbreak. And, not exactly, an end of the world scenario. People are not dying in the streets. Why the fear?
Secondly, can we control the event? Obviously not. An epidemic that is happening thousands of miles away are way beyond our control. Even the China health authorities and WHO cannot control the outbreak. What they are doing is try to contain the outbreak and they are doing a good job in this. The China authorities worked hard in quarantine a city (something no one had done before), limiting travel, building quarantine hospitals (within 10 days!), and sharing information. This is a new virus and by sharing the newly sequenced genome, the Chinese scientists has enabled the rest of the world to quickly work to understand the virus and to create a vaccine.
Thirdly, can we do anything about it? Again, no. What we can do in our little part of the world is to maintain our personal hygiene and trust our own healthcare services to do their job.
Finally, if we have not control over and we cannot do anything about the outbreak, then what we do with our fear? We can submit to our fear of the outbreak and live in a constant state of stress. Or we can submit to the One who in in control and can act on the situation. Jesus gave us some good advice in Matthew 6:25–34 (NIV)
Do Not Worry
25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?
28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will b
How do we redeem time? Psalm 90:12 gives us some clues.
Psalm 90:1–17 (NIV)
1 Lord, you have been our dwelling place throughout all generations. 2 Before the mountains were born or you brought forth the whole world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God. 3 You turn people back to dust, saying, “Return to dust, you mortals.” 4 A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night. 5 Yet you sweep people away in the sleep of death— they are like the new grass of the morning: 6 In the morning it springs up new, but by evening it is dry and withered. 7 We are consumed by your anger and terrified by your indignation. 8 You have set our iniquities before you, our secret sins in the light of your presence. 9 All our days pass away under your wrath; we finish our years with a moan. 10 Our days may come to seventy years, or eighty, if our strength endures; yet the best of them are but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away. 11 If only we knew the power of your anger! Your wrath is as great as the fear that is your due. 12 Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom. 13 Relent, Lord! How long will it be? Have compassion on your servants. 14 Satisfy us in the morning with your unfailing love, that we may sing for joy and be glad all our days. 15 Make us glad for as many days as you have afflicted us, for as many years as we have seen trouble. 16 May your deeds be shown to your servants, your splendor to their children. 17 May the favor of the Lord our God rest on us; establish the work of our hands for us— yes, establish the work of our hands.
We redeem time by
1.Resting
2.Ceasing
3.Feasting
4.Embracing
What do Rat, Virus, and Horse symbolize? This sermon offers a perspective on what is happening in January 2020 and how are Christian to respond to these events.
One Sick Woman and One Dead Girl
The key to living by faith is
1.Faith is believing in a Person
2.Faith cleanses us
3.Faith is a way of life
Even wonder about how deep and wide is God's love for us. The Prophet Hosea gave us an powerful model.