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Welcome to another episode of Jubilee Life Coaches Blog. I am Coach Brian. I have been a pastor for over 30 years, and lately I have been working as a Christian life coach. I bring a balance of Christian counseling and reformed theology to our worldview. Today's episode is about a brain scientist who spent his life studying compassion and found out he had been on the receiving end all along. Catch the big fish with a wide net. Let the little ones go. They are small and weak, and we feel sorry for them. Professor Na Hungshik read that fishing rule to his audience in Korea, and they clapped. He laughed and said they clapped louder for the fish than they did for him. Then he told them what that rule does to the sea. Professor Na is Professor Emeritus of Physiology at Korea University College of Medicine. His field is the brain. In a short talk on the Korean program Sepachi, he asks a simple question: why do we help other people at all? From the point of view of the selfish gene, helping others makes no sense. And yet, the human brain does it every day. It feels pity, it serves. Sometimes it even gives up its life for someone else. He tells the story of Phineas Gage, a railroad foreman in 1848, who survived an iron rod through his head. In the classic account, the kind man became coarse and selfish. The damage was in his frontal lobe. Now, historians tell us the real story is a little more hopeful than that. But Professor Nod's point stands: something in the brain makes us human toward one another. I love the way he looks at this. As a reformed Christian, I am not threatened by brain science. Science studies God's order, it is not the order itself. When a scientist finds compassion wired into the brain, I see the image of God. Bent by sin, yes, but not erased. Then Professor Na says something that made me stop. He describes kindness as a relay. A gives rice to hungry B. Later, B gives rice to C with some meat on top. And he asks, who benefited most? Then he says, every answer is wrong. A, B, and C will all leave this earth. We are only carriers, he says. The real owners are the gene and the meme. Well, I think he is half right. We are not our own. Paul said so long ago, you are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body. That's 1 Corinthians 6, verses 19 and 20. So the real question is not whether we belong to someone, it is to whom. A gene cannot know my name. A meme does not grieve when I am gone. But a faithful savior bought me, knows me, and keeps me. When I know that, I can give without counting what comes back. Now here is my favorite part of his talk. In college, Professor Na taught at a night school for working boys in Seoul. Middle school was not yet free in Korea. These boys shined shoes and sold newspapers instead of going to class. Fifty years later, the club held a reunion. About 200 people came. Half were former students, half were former teachers. And he said no one could tell who was who anymore. Everyone had gray hair. Every year, those former students take their old teachers out to dinner. One of them told him that as a boy on the street, he carried a weapon in his jacket. In his angriest moments, he pictured his teacher's face, and he left it there. Then Professor Na said something quiet. He feels he is the one who was served. He does not feel that he gave. Scripture asks a question that sits right under his story. What do you have that you did not receive? 1 Corinthians 4, verse 7. Here the gospel goes one layer deeper. In his relay, A comes first. But who gave to A? Before any of us handed rice to anyone, someone handed grace to us. We love because he first loved us. 1 John 4 19. You know what? I suspect many of us in ministry find giving easier than receiving. Receiving feels like weakness. Brene Brown put it this way: Until we can receive with an open heart, we are never really giving with an open heart. Before he finishes, Professor Na offers a practical word. Kindness needs a cool head. A wide net that spares the small fish sounds kind, but if we keep taking only the biggest fish, the sea gets poorer. Good feeling without good thinking can hurt the very ones we want to help. So here is his advice. When you are alone, keep growing with a cool head. When you are with others, bring a warm heart and work together. When I heard that, I thought of Paul again. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Philippians 2, verse 4. Notice that little word also. Paul does not ask us to neglect our own growth. He asks us not to stop there. So let me leave you with this. When did you last receive help and what happened inside you as you let it in? Think of someone you once served. What did they give you that you did not expect? And if a part of you finds giving easier than receiving, what might that part be protecting you from? Well, that's it for today. Thank you so much for joining us today. Now, don't forget, we are freed in Christ to live. Now let us live to free others. This is Jubilee Coach. Until next time, Godspeed.