Sunday, November 7
The Lord’s Day
Minute for Mission: Stewardship Commitment
Ed (Sun) Kiel was about six years old when he, his two older brothers, and their parents immigrated to Denver, Colorado, from Korea in the early 1970s. His father, the Rev. Nathaniel (Ung Nam) Kiel, was a Presbyterian pastor who sensed God’s calling to ministry for Korean immigrants in America. Ed remembers clearly that their parents had only $40 as they made their long trip to the United States. At church that first Sunday, Ed watched his mother place the precious $40 in an offering plate. Ed carried this memory with him as he grew up a Christian man. His parents also taught their sons the importance of tithing as an essential spiritual discipline. Ed is now an elder and treasurer of Bethany Presbyterian Church in Bloomfield, New Jersey, and he shared this story with the congregation during a stewardship Sunday a few years ago. He has become an important pillar of the church and a faithful steward of all that God has given him.
Ed is a successful lawyer and a partner in a law firm. His brother Samuel is an anesthesiologist, and his brother Paul is a practicing patent lawyer. Once Mrs. Kiel (Grace Yun Keuk) was approached by a Korean American journalist who wanted to write a story about her family. The journalist was curious about the way Grace and her husband raised their sons in a challenging immigrant context such that they all became successful. Grace answered that she attributes the well-being of their family to God’s grace through her daily prayer in the pre-dawn services that are part and parcel of Korean first-generation churches.
Ed Kiel’s father founded the Korean Presbyterian Church in Denver and the Korean United Presbyterian Church in Bloomfield, New Jersey. Now retired, at eighty-one the Rev. Nathaniel Keil is busy with mission work through a Christian seminary in Kazakhstan.
— The Rev. Dr. Kevin Park, associate for theology/stewardship, General Assembly Mission Council
Prayer
God of abundant grace, thank you for good stewards around us and for their testimonies. Help us to become more generous stewards. Give us courage to risk your gifts for others. Redirect our many conflicting desires so that you will become our greatest desire. We pray this through the name of your chief Steward, Jesus Christ. Amen.
Sunday Lectionary and Hymns
Hag. 1:15b—2:9
God of Grace and God of Glory
PH 420, HB 358
Ps. 145:1–5, 17–21
Your Faithfulness, O Lord, Is Sure
PH 251
O Lord, Thou Art My God and King
HB 5
or
Ps. 98
New Songs of Celebration Render
PH 218
2 Thess. 2:1–5, 13–17
O Christ, the Great Foundation
PH 443
Luke 20:27–38
O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go
PH 384, HB 400
Daily Lectionary
Ps. 19, 150 and Ps. 81, 113
Joel 1:1–13
1 Cor. 14:1–12; Matt. 20:1–16
