James Choung's Blog, page 2

Does God speak to us?

When the folks at Explore God asked me to come down to Texas for an interview, I jumped at the chance. They seemed like a thoughtful, intelligent and authentic crew that wanted to give people a chance to explore who God is in a relevant way. They didn’t want pat answers, but wanted something that rang with truth and sincerity.

When I sat down for the interview, they threw great questions at me — ones that made me stop and think. I gave it my best shot, and here’s a final edit of what they came up with titled, “Does God Speak To Us?”

Mother’s Day Revisited

Mother’s Day often reminds me of sentimentalities like carnations, brunches, and heart-shaped chocolate. But did you know that the day is rooted in faith and justice?

This American holiday is a relatively new one. By 1861, Julia Ward Howe was already famous for her Civil War song, “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” But during the twelve years after writing that song, she witnessed the horrible carnage of that war. And it got to her. She was already an activist who fought for a woman’s right to vote. So she took one more step: she called for a day that would honor peace and motherhood in her Mother’s Day Proclamation of 1870. Here’s an excerpt:

We will not have great questions decided by irrelevant agencies,

Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage, for caresses and applause …

Blood does not wipe out dishonor,

Nor violence indicate possession.

As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil at the summons of war,

Let women now leave all that may be left of home

For a great and earnest day of counsel.

Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.

Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means

Whereby the great human family can live in peace,

Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar,

But of God.

The holiday was to be celebrated on June 2nd, but it never took off. Later, however, Ann Reeves Jarvis gathered West Virginian women to keep honoring the holiday to reunite and reconcile families that were on opposing sides of the Civil War.

After she died, her daughter, Anna Jarvis, took up her mother’s cause. She convinced the superintendent of Andrew’s Methodist Church, where her mother served the Sunday school for 20 years, to hold a memorial in her mother’s honor and for peace. So on May 10, 1908, the first Mother’s Day celebration was held with 407 people, complete with arrangements of carnations — her mother’s favorite flower.

By 1909, 46 states were holding Mother’s Day services, and in 1914, President Woodrow Wilson made it a national holiday.

So, the holiday started with Christian women who were justice advocates fighting for a woman’s right to vote, who were also tired of bloodshed and sought for peace, who also helped families reconcile with each other, and through this holiday, followed an old, old biblical command to “honor your father and mother.” Not too shabby, eh?

Next year, I hope (though probably to no avail) that Hallmark pulls these themes — peace, justice, reconciliation and faith — back together for a series of Mother’s Day cards. In that way, we’d remember afresh what holidays — “holy days” — were set apart to be.


This article was originally posted at releasetheape.com.

Telling Stories

I just came back from Q Los Angeles, and my brain is full of ideas and thoughts and dreams — it’ll take a month to unpack it all. But I know already what I want to do first.

I want to learn how to tell a better story.

I know the idea of stories has been around the block a few times, even in evangelical neighborhoods. But still, stories have tremendous power. The best stories tell us what the world is like, and point to how the world could be. At Q, Bobette Buster, a creative consultant to some of the biggest names in Hollywood, said that if you tell your story, then it can lead to courage and healing. But if you bottle it up, then they’re like ticking time bombs, ready to explode in destructive ways in the world around us. (Aren’t the recent events in Boston yet, among other things, another example of this? Or perhaps the wrong story believed?) We need stories to make sense of our world, and to help us picture a better one. No wonder storytelling, especially in movies, is a multi-billion dollar industry.

We need stories to live.

Now, when I talk about telling stories, I don’t just mean sitting on a stool, and weaving together a good yarn of a tale for a night at the bar. Instead, we need to know how to tell our own story — why our hearts bleeds for something — and then, embody that story. In fact, according to Howard Gardner in his book on the greatest 20th century leaders, Leading Minds, the only common trait they have is the ability to tell their story and live it out.

So if you want to lead a movement, you’ll need to be a master storyteller.

For the Christian, I want to up the ante. Nancy Duarte, communications guru and author, also taught that we all carry the greatest story ever told. We live in a greater story, a bigger story. So she challenged: can’t we just take the time to learn how to communicate it well?

Here am I, clocking in.


From September 26-28, I’ll be a main speaker and a workshop leader at the Aprentis conference in Wichita, KS which has a similar theme: The Story of God & Us. Beau Crosetto, who hosts releasetheape.com will also be coming to help me lead the workshop. The conference is limited to 600, and they’ve been full at the last two conferences, so if you want to go, register soon.


This article was cross-posted at releasetheape.com.

The Legacy of the Immigrant Church

First of all, like the new look of the site? A good friend of mine said that the previous iteration looked “like crap,” which then got me into a competitive spirit: I’ll show him! … of course, in the most humble way possible. So, a few weeks later — what do you think?

Now, onto the meat of why I’m writing: A few months ago, we hosted a series of 8-minute talks at the Urbana 12 Pan Asian North American (PANA) Lounge. Twenty-four leaders from the church, academic and parachurch gave their big idea — and we had a great time. But now with some months’ perspective, I think, now, that we may have been onto something bigger than we thought: we may have created the only online repository of Asian American Christian thought ever captured on video. (Before you hate, let me know if that’s not true!)

I wish I can take all the credit for coming up with that idea. But I can’t.

It was Joe’s idea.

Joe Ho is the next national director of InterVarsity’s Asian American Ministries. That’s right: my current job. He’s really a great fit for it, and I’m excited for its next season of ministry.

Now, I wasn’t intending on introducing him to you on this blog. But I just had a chance to review his PANA talk, and it’s amazing. (The staff he supervises call his drops of wisdom — “Ho Bombs.”) I really could’ve put any video from the PANA Lounge “repository” up on this site, but perhaps this can be a gateway video to the others. (Don’t I sound like a dealer or a pusher? Still, you can find the entire list here — and we’re still posting more.)

He counters the prevailing wisdom that the church is in decline, and asks us to look elsewhere for where the Kingdom may abound. In it, I think helps us redeem the legacy of the immigrant church — that they did their job, and now it’s time to do ours.

Now just press play. And watch out for bombs.

Calling It Out

Photo courtesy of New York Daily News

I had to write about the recent rash of racism theme parties on college campuses at releasetheape.com. Here’s an excerpt:

I’m not really into dressing up in costumes. Not my thing. Halloween does nothing for me. I’m just not one of those guys who will go out of his way to do it.

So then I really don’t get why these things are so popular on college campuses:

Racist theme parties.

Three years ago, a fraternity hosted the Compton Cookout to “celebrate” Black history month at the University of California, San Diego. That story made it to the New York Times. More recently, a Penn State sorority dressed up in sombreros and fake mustaches for a Mexican-themed Halloween party last year, holding up signs like, “I don’t cut grass. I smoke it.” And just a few weeks ago, a Duke fraternity threw an Asian-based rager, with “Herro Nice Duke Peopre” in the email invite. All made national news.

But I’m sure there are many, many more.

One website posted an entire list of recent Duke University parties with racist and sexist themes. I only kept what’s happened in the past three years (and took out the sexist ones as well) and this list is way too long to stomach.

Pilgrims and Indians, Pi Kappa Phi, requesting the attendance of “hot natives” and “pocahotness” November 2011
Hunters and Hunter, unnamed Duke sorority and fraternity, October 2010
South of the Border mixer, cohosted by SAE and Pi Phi, 1994
“Thinking we should make that fence down south a little taller? Pissed about a certain group of easterners f—ing up the curve in Econ 51?… Well it’s time to get over your fears and join the brothers of Pi Kappa Alpha for a truly unique tour of the world.” Pi Kappa Alpha, January 2010
Invitation sent to “BabyGurlz,” KA, March 2010
Rapper’s Delight Party, formerly known as Ghetto Fabulous Party, ATO

Why does this happen in mostly white fraternities and sororities? You don’t see the non-white Greek system doing these kinds of things. And more pointedly, why is this happening on elite educational institutions? The Ivies are not exempt. If you think about it, these students will become the future business barons, government officials, and cultural icons of America. Shouldn’t this cause us to worry? Why does this go on? …

Check out the rest of the article at releasetheape.com.

Generational Worldviews

Here’s a video of my talk at Biola University’s Chapel on February 11, 2013. I talked about the primary spiritual question of each generation, which is also covered in my second book, Real Life. It also covered a way to share the message Jesus came to teach in a way that would be relevant today to all generations, which is discussed in my first book, True Story.

Recognizing God’s voice

This is an excerpt from my latest post at releasetheape.com.

I love our church. We’re small, and we meet in our home. And we’ll often just sit and listen to hear what God might be saying to us. Some will share visions. Others, dreams. Still others will share Bible verses that are apt for the moment. Through it all, it becomes clear that one word from God is worth a thousand sermons.

Isn’t that what prophets do? Figure out what God is saying for the moment? I haven’t seen anything else motivate a community more than a word that everyone knows is from God.

So how do you know if God is speaking?

Though there are many times when it’s difficult to discern God’s voice, much of it often uses common sense — given that the Spirit actually lives within us as a community. When I’m discerning whether or not God is speaking through a person or a community, I’m usually asking these five questions …

Check out the rest of the article at releasetheape.com.

The starry host

Two weekends ago, I had a spontaneous urge to go to the Griffith Observatory. But by the time I checked the website, I read that I would miss the first show at the planetarium, and only the first show allowed kids under five. Clearly, I’m not a planner.

So a few days ago, when the summer-like temps seduced their way into Southern California (my apologies to, well, the rest of the country!), I packed my entire family into our beat-up Civic and headed north to Los Feliz. I didn’t foresee how busy the parking lot would be, and we barely made it to the planetarium’s first showing with literally minutes to spare.

The room darkened. We settled back in our theater seats. My heart was glad, knowing it was my kids’ first time in a planetarium. (I’m also a nerd.) And the domed ceiling gave way to a tapestry of stars.

We miss what’s up above, because we’re too enamored by what’s below.

Tapestry is an apt word to describe the night sky. Ancients used other words like firmament or canopy. In a time unpolluted with man-made lights, the sky was stuffed full of stars, as if a paintbrush was dipped into a bucket full of stars and spread across an inky black curtain. All of those stars gave the sky the look of a thick, dark blanket, dotted with pinholes, keeping the earth warm and cozy. I had a couple of chances to see the sky like that: once on Mt. Rainier, and the other in the mountains between Kazakhstan and China.

Both times filled me with awe.

But now, because many of us live in cities that give off its own light, we can’t see the sky as it was made.

It made me think: sometimes we don’t notice the majesty of creation, because we’re blinded by our own creations. We miss the vast heavenly array, because we are fine under our incandescents, halogens, and flourescents. We miss what’s up above, because we’re too enamored by what’s below. What we create often keeps us from seeing who has done the creating from the beginning. What we make of the world often keeps us from the acknowledging the Maker of the world.

Sometimes, we just need to unplug, disconnect, hang up, shut down, and just plain turn off some things, so that we can find things like awe, wonder, and worship again.

What is one way you can unplug this week? Consider a week-long fast from all non-work internet activity, including social media. Or a week-long fast from movies, music or a particular form of media. Let us know what comes of it.

Real Life: Kindle edition for $4.99

Here’s another way to participate in Urbana ’12: not only can you watch it streamed live, but you can also participate in the Book of the Day. At Urbana, the Book of the day is heavily discounted: the lowest available price anywhere.

But even if you’re not at Urbana, you can get the Book of the Day pricing on Kindle editions. (Look for the “December” edition on the book’s Kindle edition page). So, until December 31, you could get my book Real Life and six other great InterVarsity Press books, each for only $4.99!

Here they are (and if you’re getting this on email, you won’t see the links. Click here to get them.):

Real Life by James Choung (aff link)
Western Christians in Global Mission by Paul Borthwick (aff link)
Go and Do by Don Everts (aff link)
The Dangerous Act of Worship by Mark Labberton (aff link)
Making All Things New by York Moore (aff link)
Small Things With Great Love by Margot Starbuck (aff link)
What Jesus Started by Steve Addison (aff link)

Enjoy!

Urbana 12 PANA Lounge

If you’re at Urbana ’12 this year, you won’t want to miss what’s happening at the Urbana Pan Asian North American (PANA) Lounge.

The PANA Lounge will be split into two. On the social side, we’ll have space to hang out, snacks, a photo booth, and a “Genius Bar” for free consulting on Asian North American ministry. And check out Shin Maeng‘s art installation as well!

On the content side, we’ll present 24 eight-minute talks on the latest and greatest ideas in Asian North American ministry in the first part of each afternoon. The middle part will generally spotlight various Asian North American artists and creatives, while the last part will host various ethnic gatherings. There’s even an intimate concert with Jason Chu, and an open mic on the last afternoon! Here’s the full schedule, and click the talk’s title to jump straight to the video:

Friday, December 28

1:30 – James Choung, “Redeeming Our Gifts”
1:45 – Peter Cha, “Preparing for the 2040 Reality”
2:00 – Linson Daniel, “Dismantling the South Asian North American Dream”
2:15 – Tracey Gee, “Asian North American Women in Leadership: The Power of Leading from the Inside Out”
2:30 – DJ Chuang, “Step Up, Speak Up and Live It Up”
2:45 – Arul Karunanidhi, “A Hindu, a Muslim, and a Christian walk into a room…” (Video won’t be posted)
3:30 – Artist Spotlight on Authors: James Choung and Tracey Gee
5:00 – South Asian Gathering

Saturday, December 29

1:30 – Ken Fong, “Unbelievable”
1:45 – Lisa Espineli Chinn, “Why Asian North Americans are Specifically Positioned for Global Missions”
2:00 – Jimmy Quach, “Asian North Americans Changing the World Through Entrepreneurship”
2:15 – Sarah Shin, “Asian North Americans Christians and the Arts”
2:30 – David de Leon, “Is the Filipino Worth Dying For?”
2:45 – Jason Chu, “From Yale to YouTube: A New Asian North American Vision”
3:30 – Artist Spotlight on Poets: Jason Chu
5:00 – Filipino Gathering

Sunday, December 30

1:30 – Helen Lee, “Confessions of a Tiger Failure”
1:45 – Joe Ho, “The Legacy of the Immigrant Church”
2:00 – Anna Lee-Winans, “The Power of Asian North Americans in Academia”
2:15 – Christian Chin, “Asian North American Christians: Imitators or Originators?”
2:30 – Alice Atkins, “Culture and Scripture: What the Hmong taught me about the Bible”
2:45 – Sara Chang, “Adopted Twice”
3:30 – Asian American / Transracial Adoptee Gathering
5:00 – Hmong Gathering

Monday, December 31

1:30 – Ken Kong, “Organic Ministry Among Our Immediate and Extended Families”
1:45 – Billy Vo, “Angry Asian Man, Honorary White or Another Way?”
2:00 – Erin Kawaye, “The Brokenness of Brokenness”
2:15 – Nate Lee, “The Moral Model Minority”
2:30 – Dora Yiu, “Raise Your Voice: Asian North American Women & Activism”
2:45 – Greg Hsu, “Asian North Americans: Divided by God?”
3:30 – Open Mic
5:00 – Southeast Asian Gathering

Updates will happen through the @InterVarsityAAM Twitter feed, so make sure you follow that. And you don’t have to be Asian to come, so check it out! Hope to see you there!