Christmas in Korea is pretty amazing

OK, so I'm kind of over this whole blogging thing, but I just had to share the story of my Korean Christmas. It all begins on a chilly Dec. 24.

I got up at 9 a.m. and put on the Santa Claus suit I bought at Alpha for 30,000 won. I wore it to Kids Club, which is an English school in Sangnamdong where some of my friends work. They had asked me to come be their Santa on Christmas Eve. From 10:30 to 11:30, I was dashing from kindergarten class to kindergarten class handing out presents. The kids were in shock -- they don't see many foreigners, and their teachers are all significantly smaller people than myself. Plus, the whole Santa thing. Some of them asked me questions, like "Where are your reindeer?" When I told them they were on the roof, they begged their teacher to let them go see.

After Kids Club, I ate some lunch and bought a Christmas cake to take to work. The next stop was my school, where I wore the suit and helped the kids make Christmas cards for their families. My kids are older and know me well, so they didn't fall for the whole Santa thing, but they still thought it was pretty hilarious to have Santa Claus for a teacher for a day.

My missionary friend Arianne picked me up after work and drove me to the orphanage in Masan. We brought the kids ice cream and sang songs, then ate some cakes that they had been given. I had wrestled for a while with the whole idea of giving them ice cream: Should I really be giving these kids so much sugar right before bedtime? But the cakes they had easily outsugared my gifts. Guilt assuaged. I have to imagine, though, that some serious visions of sugarplums were dancing in some heads that night.

From Masan, Arianne brought me back downtown and I went to Mujur, the club in the basement of Hotel International. The best live band in Changwon plays there -- a group called RED from the Philippines. They had asked me a week or so ago to come and be their Santa. They handed me a big red bag full of toys and treats to hand out to the crowd. A group of my friends met me there, and outside of our table, there wasn't another Westerner to be found. But the place was PACKED with Koreans and they ate up the Santa routine. I seriously think I had my photo taken 30 times that night. I did the gift-giving, and shook hands and said "Merry Christmas" to everyone, and got up to dance when the band played Christmas music. It would have been quite embarrassing and scary if I hadn't been hiding behind the beard. That makes everything easier.

My cluster of foreigner friends had trickled away by about 1 a.m., and I was sitting by myself. But, as I told them when they left, "Santa Claus is never alone," and before long I was sitting at a table with a bunch of amazing guys from the Philippines. They were traveling in Korea and had been a little sad at the prospect of spending Christmas away from their families. But William, Edwin, Ed and Cesar and I spent the rest of the night dancing, singing and talking about life in the Philippines and the U.S. I was very lucky to have met them, and they kept calling it "the best Christmas ever."

I got home at 3 a.m. and crashed. The alarm went off at 7 and I dressed again -- no Santa suit this time -- for breakfast at my friend Carrie's apartment. Many of my closest friends were there, except Gretchen, who was too sick to get out of bed. Poor Gretchen was battling some horrific stomach thing that had made her "more sick than I've ever been" for the past 3 days. The rest of us had fun though, sitting around, talking, eating French toast and exchanging presents. Carrie gave us each a cute coffee mug to use for drinking coffee while we ate. It was pretty awesome.

After that, I zipped home, changed into some nice clothes and went to the church. Arianne had asked for my help with the Christmas service, and it was a wonderful service. Not polished and perfect like back home, of course; this was definitely a Christmas service of the people. We didn't really know what we were doing, and microphones wouldn't work and music stands tipped over and babies and little kids crawled and squealed across the stage randomly. But it was a beautiful service, with some of the Korean families in the church getting up to sing songs together. All of us foreigners got up and sang "The 12 Days of Christmas" for the Koreans at the end. It was sweet.

My friends Dani and Regina gave me a 3D puzzle of my favorite TV show, "Pucca," and when I got it out after the service all the kids in the church crowded in to help put it together. Before long, I had completely lost control of my puzzle and I was just watching them do it. Some of those kids have amazing English, and some have none at all, but they are all adorable. We finished the puzzle and ate some homemade Korean food for lunch, and then most folks broke off to go to a party at the home of a couple I know in the church.

I was a little drained, so I went home for an hour or so. After some text-message urging, I decided to head over to Nancy and Henry's. They had homemade pumpkin pie and whipped cream; they were watching Christmas movies. It was heavenly. Gretchen texted me to say she felt much better, so I met her at a department store nearby and brought her to the party as well. A handful of us went out to dinner, and then I put the Santa getup back on and took my laptop back to Nancy and Henry's so we could watch "A Charlie Brown Christmas" on it. There wasn't much of a crowd left there, but we had a blast watching a holiday classic and Nancy and Henry got a kick out of my outfit.

After that, it was back to Mujur, which was very sedate. My friend Erica met me there along with her friend Doug, and we watched the band play for 3 hours with energy and joy even though there were only about 10 people in the bar watching. I love those guys.

About 2:30 it was time to go home again, and I called Mom and Dad to wish them Merry Christmas before going to bed. This morning -- Christmas night in America -- I called the rest of my family. Now here I sit among the detritus of wrapping paper, discarded Santa clothes and unplugged Christmas lights, thinking, Christmas really must be all in the heart. Otherwise how would it be so easy to carry with you anywhere you go?

One more thought about politics before I go back to happy things

My good friend Matt, a diehard Broncos fan, used to root for Denver to lose every game a couple seasons ago. Why? Back then, Jake Plummer was the Broncos' quarterback, and Matt knew that as long as Plummer was running the offense, his team was doomed to good-but-not-great-itude. He also knew that coach Mike Shanahan would never realize this unless the team totally tanked. In the end, he got his wish; the Broncos got really bad and Plummer was traded. (They haven't gotten much better since then, but I guess the future is bright or something.)

This is exactly how I feel about the Republicans this year. I admit it -- I wanted Obama to win in a landslide. Not because I like the guy -- I distrust and disagree with him on a lot of topics, most notably gay marriage and abortion -- but because the GOP needed to be sent a message.

These jokers have co-opted Christians all over the country, and now it's almost like Rush Limbaugh was made an apostle. If you go to church, you vote Republican. And what did the church get out of this exchange of trust? Did the party back true Christian values against all odds? Uh, no. We got a decade of compromise, power-grabbing and pork-barrel spending. That's because the Republicans know they can appeal to the evangelicals as their "base" even though they have failed to represent us. They've failed to represent anything, really. Except themselves.

And now that failure has come home to roost. All that back-patting and home-state lily-gilding brought us a disgusting national debt. Genuflecting at the altar of Wall Street brought us a colossal credit disaster that exacerbated a cyclical recession. If the party had actually delivered on the hopes invested by Christians everywhere, the worst that could happen is they'd lose the next election, but they'd sleep at night knowing they fought for what's right. Instead, they're booted out of power and they know it's their own fault.

Maybe now the folks who run that party will get the train back on the tracks. Remember what you stood for. Remember what it was like to stand for something. And then deliver on it, even if CNN and Stephen Colbert make fun of you for it.

If not, maybe a new entity will emerge that Christians can get behind, to which we can give the support and trust of which the GOP proved unworthy.

In the meantime, we've got four years of Democratic rule. That thought doesn't excite me, but it won't keep Jesus from reaching anybody's heart. That can only happen if we choose to be bitter and depressed and discouraged. Look up, open your eyes and fight on.

I find your lack of faith disturbing.

I'm at work now, waiting for my first class of the day, and entertaining the occasional student who drops by to talk, so this post will be brief. But important. Important to me, anyway, because I've gotta get this off my chest.

America. You're bringing me down. I've been lucky enough to have some good friends, people working hard on both sides of this election, and people who firmly believe in candidates from each party. Great. Good. But the way you guys talk about this election makes me seriously ill. Ill enough to where I chose not to vote this time. That's right. I sat this one out.

To my conservative, Christian, Republican-voting friends: Did you seriously think John McCain was gonna accomplish anything for Christ in the next four years? What did George W. Bush get you? Are we any closer to being a Godly nation than we were when Bill Clinton was in office? I like tax breaks as much as the next guy, but God isn't calling our nation to a trickle-down economic model. He's calling us to our knees, and piling up a golly-gojillion dollars in debt is not the way there.

To the blue staters: You guys holler about the McCain campaign being too negative -- and it was -- but be aware of your own words, especially in victory. I read one message from my close Facebook friend that said "I'm so tired of the Republicans calling people dumb. They had their eight crappy years." Do you not see the hypocrisy in that comment?

The deal is, like it or not, this election was between two people who truly wanted what they believed was best for their country. You can disagree, you can say their ideas would have bad results, but what's with all the slinging words like "stupid" and "evil" and "hate" around? Let's save those for when they're truly deserved, like describing the KSU athletic department.

God's in control here, guys, and nothing ever takes Him by surprise.

Happiness is:

No time to write a real post -- I'm off to church. But you guys have got to see this picture:


These are a few of the kids at Ae Ook Won, the orphanage I volunteer at in Masan. After the lessons they always draw and write on the whiteboard. Yesterday they drew me in my usual "Funny 10" shirt. (And cargo shorts, even though it was chilly yesterday and I wore jeans.)

Now if this doesn't make you want to come over here, then I just can't help you.

It's just too bad that ol' No. 10 officially lost its magic, as the Jayhawks got stomped by Texas Tech. Normally I'd be a little sullen over losing 63-21 at home. But this is a glow that doesn't fade!

Passion Seoul

Now, I'm writing you from the free Internet room at a fantastic little hostel here in Seoul. The keyboard setting is goofy, so this will be short. Today, I went to Passion Seoul.

Maybe you've heard of the Passion World Tour. (I hadn't. But I'm a million miles from the loop.) It's put together by Louie Giglio, who I actually had heard of, thanks to the Sunday evening Bible study led by the worship leader at my church in Colorado Springs.

Anyway, the experience was beautiful for three main reasons.

1. Seoul. It's my first trip to the big city, and the town is amazing. The conference itself was held at the Olympic Park, which is a memorable sight. I was standing there on the plaza eating lunch with all the other conference-goers, and looking around I could see all the venues that were built for the 1988 Olympics. It occurred to me that this was my first trip to an Olympic city. And it was so cool just to imagine what it was like to be there 20 years ago, among all those people from all over the world, celebrating peaceful competition.

2. Music. The conference featured Chris Tomlin, Matt Redman and the David Crowder*Band. All talented musicians whose songs I've sung before in church. There were a ton of foreigners at the conference, but the majority of the people there were Koreans, a good chunk of them university students. And to be among such a diverse group singing praise songs to God is a powerful thing. There were two points that the leaders actually sang the songs in Korean, so I got to hear thousands of people singing "How Great Thou Art" and "How Great Is Our God" in Korean. I love that feeling -- hearing the melody of a familiar praise song with words from another language, sung so heartfelt and beautifully by people for whom these words are native.

3. God. (Saving the best for last.) I went into the weekend praying, and asking others to pray, that God would give me some guidance and direction about the next step in my life. I love it here in Korea, and I love teaching, and I really have no idea what I'm going to do when my time here is up. I've got dreams, and I'm just not sure which one to follow, and I really prayed that God would show me which was from Him.

Guess what? He didn't. But He gave me something better instead. In the morning session, pastor Francis Chan spoke about grace and how difficult and important it is to see it for what it is -- a free gift from God that I can do nothing to earn. At the close of his message, he challenged all of us to "do nothing" -- to experience and accept the free gift of grace without acting on it, without trying to weave a proper prayer or make promises to God, but just to be silent and accept it. He talked about the prodigal son and how he had intended to become a slave to his father just to gain his acceptance, but the father welcomed him home as a son. God gave me this sense of Him walking up behind me and just wrapping his arms around me. It broke through my defenses and I was blown away. And the more overwhelmed I was by this image of grace, the tighter I felt Him holding on.

Then, in the evening session, the final part of the day, Louie Giglio talked about asking God to "use my life to make the name of Jesus famous on this earth." The image of that father, blanketing the son with unearned and limitless love, came back to me. I want others to come to experience that, and I want God to use me to bring that about. And I don't really worry now about exactly how, where or when He does that. He'll get me to where I'm supposed to be to make that happen. For now, I need to keep that thought in mind -- God, use me to make the name of Jesus famous in this generation.

OK, I'll post again.

This is too cool not to tell anyone, and I'm not real sure anybody over here can completely understand it. So, here ya go, world.

I wanna tell you about what an amazing God I know. I went to the orphanage in Masan today, like every Saturday, and I brought some materials to make crafts. I wanted the kids to make nametags so I could start learning their names.

I also decided I could teach them "Jesus Loves Me," the Sunday school song, and try to kind of make the connection between the "me" in the song and the name on their nametags. I looked up the song on Google to get the Korean version, so maybe I could teach them that as well. I figured maybe then they'd have a song they understood in their native language as well as in English. But then I realized that I don't have a printer, and I didn't have time to copy down the words by hand, so I figured I'd save it for another day.

These kids rock, as I've said before, and after we reviewed some of our lessons from before (numbers, relatives, colors) I introduced the song. First, I had them read the words off the board. Then, I tried teaching them the tune --

They heard me singing the chorus, "Yes, Jesus loves me," and recognized the tune immediately. Right away, in unison, this whole room of Korean kids starts singing the Korean language version of "Jesus Loves Me." At the top of their lungs. All ages -- tiny 3-year-olds and preteens, screaming these lyrics:

예수 사랑하심은 거룩하신 말일세
우리들은 약하나 예수 권세 많도다
날 사랑하심 날 사랑하심
날 사랑하심 성경에 써있네

Yesu saranghashimun
Garuk hashik marilse
Woolideuleun yakhana
Yesu kwanse mandoda

Nal saranghashim
Nal saranghashim
Nal saranghashim
Seonkyun-e seo-it ne

My romanization is terrible, but at least you can get an idea of what it sounded like. The chorus literally says, "He loves me, He loves me, He loves me, it's in the Bible, yes."

Here's group of kids on the other side of the world. They're far from their families -- the ones that have families at all. They don't have TV or video games or expensive schools and tutors to teach them. But they know Jesus loves them, and they know it sure enough to yell it for the whole world to hear.

Think about that, and how big and awesome and loving God is. Then remember that Jesus loves you, too.

Horsey Ride, and other stories

There are some amazing people in Korea.

Today at church, I met two more of them -- teachers from South Africa, Dani and Regina. Gretchen and I spent the whole day hanging out with them. We went to lunch at Jino, then goofed around in one of Changwon's numerous gorgeous parks. I ran through the fountain. The girls rode toy horses. Afterward, we sat and chatted about faith and education and everything else that matters to us. Then we went to the mall and ate Korean food.

Here is the horsey ride part of the story. Why am I not in it? I'm holding the camera. And learning how to work Windows Movie Maker. Duh. That is, however, my finger at about the 19-second mark.