You're Not Alone

From INHERITANCE Issue #1 - Spring 2009

I never really knew my father. In fact, I haven’t had contact with him for 18 years. So aside from his name, I never knew the father who sired me — with whom I share half my genetic makeup. Traditionally, Asian families give most value to the firstborn son of the patriarchal line, lavishing them with the utmost care, the attention, and ultimately, the INHERITANCE of the family line.

As I am the firstborn son, as was my father, grandfather, and countless generations before him, I am the last in a seemingly long line of Tsengs dating back to the Han Dynasty in China. You could say that the family’s future and wealth lie on me, even though I have barely enough to spring for an iPod.

Yet I tell you, I have riches beyond any paltry dynasty. I carry a family name to which the royal family of England would bow. More importantly, I carry an identity that money cannot buy, an identity I share with you, my brothers and sisters.

Bound by our Heavenly Father, our Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit, we share an INHERITANCE more powerful than any of your respective families combined.
But INHERITANCE is more than money and power.

With it confers the responsibility, dreams, and passions that have been passed down with it — a hope for our world. A father would not give his son his estate and wealth to squander and to rot, but to build and to prosper.

As such, our Father has called us to go and use our gifts and talents so that others may be given what we’ve received, freely and without motive, so that the world may know His name.

It may be hard to remember this at times. It’s hard to think about ministry when you’re knee-deep in finals. It hurts when your parents opt for SAT school over summer missions. And it’s certainly difficult to live up to the standards that our families have set for us, excelling in education and society, while living up to our calling. Yes, I am a Christian. Yes, I am an Asian American. But can I truly be both?

Our culture is important. Our parents have not spent generations suffering racial injustices and overcoming adversity and opposition on children who will not acknowledge their effort with success. In fact, God gave us our culture and parentage. It was He who decided that you would be born into your family; and you can be assured it was for a reason. 

We have inherited forgiveness and grace from our Father. We have inherited our struggles, culture, and values from our families. It is time to combine those identities, and forge something new from the ashes. It is time to stop acting as individual churches, isolated and individually focused, and start creating an identity of unity for Christ. It is time to stop shrugging off responsibilities of one identity for another and start making them mutually beneficial, living in Christ with our culture and injecting our culture with Christ. It is time to stop tiptoeing around a race bowed before idols and money, and proudly proclaim our true identity in one voice — a unified, culturally-sensitive, Christian identity to present the world with God’s gift of redemption and hope for mankind.

It is on this premise that INHERITANCE magazine was founded.

We’ve been given so much and some of us don’t even know it — from divine forgiveness to security to loving families, regardless of how strict or overbearing they are. In all this is a love that can never be taken away nor bargained for. But there is another gift that all of us have, passed down and grown with each generation — a community of support and fellowship. What our parents, grandparents, and ancestors have spent years building up, they now pass on to us. From acquaintances, to friends, to churches, and finally, to a community, we now possess the tools to bring together Asian American churches, fellowships, small groups, high school clubs, and countless others who share our cause for Christ.

To overcome the separation caused by distance and silence, INHERITANCE magazine will be a place to connect and converse, reminding us that we are all one in the same cause. It’s time to draw from common wisdom and realize we’re not alone, nor are we defenseless. And for anyone who would wish to speak out, inheritance is there for you as well. I cannot speak for everyone else, but I am tired of separation, especially after our parents collectively built the churches we attend. To say I attend EFC, Passion, FCBC, Evergreen, Sarang, Newsong, etc.; is it meaningless to merely say I am an Asian American Christian? Does that name have no power anymore? Did it ever?

I’d like to be able to say it does, should I ever meet my father again. If our paths were ever to cross, over a cup of coffee, and should he ask what kind of man I had become, I would like to say, “I’m an Asian American Christian.” I would like him to immediately recognize the impact of that statement, not because of my accomplishments or what knowledge he has of religion, but by the identity and power behind that title. I’d like him to realize that while I’ve been deprived of my earthly father, I’ve gained an eternal family that is strong, unified, and will live forever with our Father in heaven, even after this world has run its course. Then I would ask if he would like to meet my Father and family, if he would like to become a part of it.

“Welcome to our INHERITANCE.”