Author: peterjang73

Soojin has had an opportunity to get closer to someone lately at our church. Usually, she’s somewhat reserved as she’s a bit … afraid of what others’ perception is of her. However, Soojin told me that this sister doesn’t seem to possess any negative feelings towards Soojin. In fact, I know she doesn’t. So Soojin has been more open towards her each time she saw her and encouraged her. For the first time, Soojin called her this week.

I don’t know what they talked about but she was then very determined to make a meal for her and wanted me to deliver it. You don’t know or understand how determined she can be if and when she sets her mind on it. So she made her recent new recipe of version of Mapo Tofu. It’s got loads of tofu and mushrooms. Let’s not forget that she’s a health freak. So she finishes it and wanted me to deliver it to her but then it turns out that our Wednesday meeting wasn’t at Formosan Church like it has been but instead it was at our church. Upon hearing this, the sister tells me to just give it to some other people that she sees regularly and they can give it to her. I agree and relay that to Soojin.

Remember how I mentioned that she can be very determined?! She was insistent on my delivering it to her personally. That same night. Even after church as we hung out at Teahouse to pre-celebrate Eric’s b-day , others (incl. PS) tried to convince me to just give it to them to have it delivered. However, I saw Soojin’s side of things and understood (at least better than others) why she so insisted on delivering it. Korean Christians are old school when it comes to visiting people. There’s even a Korean word (shim-bang, ie. visitation) for it. One of the many things that I believe Korean Christians have been doing right is visiting people personally, as in face to face time. They go to where the person(s) lives, and at their home, they pray for the person(s).

Sure in Korea, distance is shorter, but I feel that as we yield to the excuse of “long distance”, that personal touch of visitation and praying for each other in person has been lost. That I think is an awesome Christian art. So for me, it wasn’t an ordeal for me to drive out further, to see where the sister lives, and to pray for her there, at her home. We need to bring that back.

American culture may seem nice at first, keeping the distance, but at the heart of it, it only asks for one thing: alienation. Christ told us to meet together, and where two or more are gathered in His name, there He is with us. So despite others’ thinking that it’s waste of time and resources (mainly gas), Soojin and I think otherwise.