- Duke University Chapel service of worship, May 13th, 1979. (church organ music) (tender organ music) ♪ Lord Jesus Christ He brings a glow ♪ ♪ On once into leaf, bush and bough ♪ ♪ My spirits have, with Christ reborn ♪ ♪ At last my truth is in a shrine ♪ ♪ Until I wish to sing thy grace ♪ ♪ A source to me in merchant grace ♪ ♪ They shone my faith with prince on high ♪ ♪ That we will know thy name of Christ ♪ ("Praise My Soul, the King of Heaven" by Henry Francis Lyte) ♪ Praise my soul, the King of Heaven ♪ ♪ To His feet your tribute bring ♪ ♪ Ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven ♪ ♪ Evermore His praises sing ♪ ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ ♪ Praise the everlasting King ♪ ♪ Praise Him for His grace and favor ♪ ♪ To His people in distress ♪ ♪ Praise Him, still the same as ever ♪ ♪ Slow to chide and swift to bless ♪ ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ ♪ Glorious in His faithfulness ♪ ♪ Fatherlike He tends and spares us ♪ ♪ Well our feeble frame He knows ♪ ♪ In His hands He gently bears us ♪ ♪ Rescues us from all our foes ♪ ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ ♪ Widely yet His mercy flows ♪ ♪ Angels help us to adore Him ♪ ♪ We beheld Him face to face ♪ ♪ Sun and moon bow down before Him ♪ ♪ Dwellers all in time and space ♪ ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ ♪ Praise with us the God of grace ♪ ♪ Amen ♪ 

- Be seated. 

- Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and gave His son to be the propitiation for our sins. Remembering God's love, let us offer our prayer of confession. Oh Lord, our God, we confess to you and ask that you will drown our transgressions in the sea of your infinite love. With sorrow and contrition we acknowledge our faults and failures. Our failure to be true, even to our own accepted standards, our self-deception in face of temptation, our choosing of the worst when we know the better, oh Lord, forgive. Our failure to apply to ourselves the standards of conduct we demand of others. Our blindness in the suffering of others, and our slowness to be taught by our own. Our complacence toward wrongs that do not touch our own lives, and our oversensitivity to those that do. Our slowness to see the good in others, and see the evil in ourselves. Our hardness of heart towards our neighbors' faults and our readiness to make allowance for our own. Our unwillingness to believe that you have called us to a small work and our neighbor to a great one. Oh Lord, forgive. 

- Amen. 

- If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Amen. We are moving into the summer period of chapel services. Singers are invited to join the Duke Chapel Summer Choir. Rehearsals are held at 9:30 Sunday morning in the chancel and all who are interested in participating are welcomed. Let us pray. Oh Lord, open our hearts to the reading of thy word that we may hear thee speak. Amen. From the Book of Acts, "When Saul reached Jerusalem, "he tried to join the body of disciples there. "But they were afraid of him, "because they did not believe that he had been converted. "Barnabus, however, took him by the hand "and introduced him to the apostles. "Barnabus described to them how Saul had seen the Lord "on his journey to Damascus and heard His voice. "And how he had spoken out boldly "in the name of Jesus in Damascus. "Saul now stayed with them, "moving about freely in Jerusalem. "He spoke out boldly and openly in the name of the Lord, "talking and debating with the Greek-speaking Jews, "but they planned to murder him. "And when the brethren learned of this, "they escorted him to Caesarea "and saw him off to Tarsus." And, from First John, "My children, "love must not be a matter of words or talk, "it must be genuine and show itself in action. "This is how we may know that belong to the realm of truth "and convince ourselves in His sight, "that even if our conscience condemns us, "God is greater than our conscience and knows all. "Dear friends, if our conscience does not condemn us, "then we can approach God with confidence "and attain from Him whatever we ask "because we are keeping His commandments "and doing what He approves. "This is His commandment: "To give our allegiance to His son, Jesus Christ, "and love one another, as He commanded. "When we keep His commands, "we dwell in Him and He dwells in us. "And this is how we can make sure that He dwells in us, "we know the spirit which He has given to us." May God add His blessing to these readings from His word. (church organ music) ♪ Holy, holy, holy ♪ ♪ Holy is our Lord ♪ ♪ Holy, holy, holy ♪ ♪ Holy is our Lord ♪ ♪ We will always lift you high ♪ ♪ And perform thy song ♪ ♪ Left on Earth we hold on ♪ ♪ All that grace is thine ♪ ♪ Holy, holy, holy ♪ ♪ Holy is our Lord ♪ ♪ Holy, holy, holy ♪ ♪ Holy is our Lord ♪ ♪ All the sound is over now ♪ ♪ This is what I love ♪ ♪ Holy, holy, holy ♪ ♪ Holy is our Lord ♪ 

- Will you stand for the reading of the gospel. From the Gospel of John. "I am the real vine and my Father is the gardener. "Every barren branch of mine, He cuts away. "And every fruiting branch, He cleans "to make it more fruitful still. "You have already been cleansed by the word "which I spoke to you. "Dwell in me as I in you. "No branch can bear fruit by itself, "but only if it remains united with the vine. "No more can you bear fruit "unless you remain united with me. "I am the vine, you are the branches, "he who dwells in me as I dwell in him bears much fruit. "For apart from me, you can do nothing. "He who does not dwell in me is thrown away "like a withered branch. "The withered branches are heaped together "and thrown on a fire and burned. "If you dwell in me, "and my words dwell in you, "ask what you will, and you shall have it. "This is my Father's glory "that you may bear fruit in plenty "and be my disciples." Amen. (church organ music) (choir singing) 

- I would like to use a scripture which Krister Stendahl used last Saturday at Baccalaureate. In the name of God, who loves us as father and mother and friend, amen. When we were discussing the glorious Easter service in this chapel, a student who was out of town bemoaned the dreariness of the service of worship she attended. There was no joy, no hope, no affirmation. Rather a dull, drab, boring service. We are indeed fortunate to have this chapel as a place where we can worship. The incredibly beautiful music alone left no doubt in our minds that Easter is indeed a day of celebration. A time to rejoice that Christ is risen. We responded with joyful hearts that Jesus, our Lord, is alive. Christ is risen. Christ is risen, preach boldly as Paul did. And as First John says, "Let us not love in word and speech, but in deed and truth." And then from the gospel, "Live boldly as disciples who continue the work of the Christ in this world." Soon after Easter, someone was reflecting on conversation he had just had, one which Christians have had in various forms down through the ages. What difference does it make that you celebrate Easter? That you affirm that Christ is risen? Folks have always looked at the church with some skepticism, suspicion, and sometimes with good reason. The protagonist in this particular conversation repeated the hackneyed, "I'd rather buy a used car from an atheist than from one of you Christians. I don't know what happens in your services of worship, but it certainly doesn't seem to make any difference when you move out of that building." Cynical. Certainly the person has had a bad experience which he universalized. If we hear such comments when we are uneasy about the witness of the church, we squirm or feel guilty, or become defensive, and so sometimes miss the truth that may be found in such conversation. The lectionary lessons for this day all reflect the unity of our worship and our life in the world. The unity of our devotion and our action. The story of the vine and the branches is in the section of John's collection of Jesus' farewell discourse to his disciples. Using the parable allegory, Jesus is reminding his disciples the critical importance of their remaining in community with Him, perhaps preparing them for living in this world without His physical presence. And it describes for us, not only the impossibility of our living separated from the source of our life, but that also those of us who are disciples will bear fruit with the very stern warning that those who do not will be cast out, cut off. Our source of life is to be found in relation to Jesus in the community of faith. There is no ambiguity, no choice. We cannot live in isolation and separation, nor do we choose between a life of piety or a life of action. Just as the branch bears fruit, we live out our lives in the world in deed and in truth. We will not be alive if we are not related to the source of our life. And if we do not live responsibly, we will be cut off, cast out. These are stern words, hard words. And notice that it is God who does the cutting off and casting out. And even those branches which bear fruit will be pruned so that they will bear more fruit. Now this means that we are invited into the Christian community without the promise or the expectation that it will be an easy life. That there will be no correction, no expectations placed on us, or there will be no standing over against us. For we are still human beings struggling together, trying to understand what it means to be disciples of Jesus, the Christ. The image of the vine and the branches is so familiar to us that we may read it too quickly and not hear what it is saying. When we try to go it on our own, alone, we are not nourished. We are without the life-giving resource by which we are sustained. We cannot be Christian and live in isolation. Reflect what it means to live separated from the vine. When we are separated, we may be physically alive, even respected by the community, but dead in the most horrible sense. Such death is described by Dorothy Surly as death by bread alone. It means being terrified of our aloneness, and yet wanting to be left alone. Being without friends, yet distrusting and despising others. Exploiting others and then being exploited. Forgetting others, and then being forgotten. Living only for ourselves and then feeling unneeded. Neither crying for another or being cried for by another. How horrible is this death by bread alone, and such is what happens within us when we look upon others not as a gift or a blessing or a stimulus, but as threat, danger, competition. It is the death which comes to all who try to live by bread alone, separated from the vine. It is a purposeless, empty existence devoid of genuine human relationships and filled with anxiety and silence and loneliness. During a recent meeting in Raleigh, two of our United Methodist bishops referred to a critical problem facing the Church; that of folks trying to live responsibly as Christians, yet separated from the Christian community. A condition which is being nourished by media evangelist who seduce people into believing that they are living responsibly as Christians, yet are connected with the vine only through the media. Now certainly the Church affirms the immense value that the media provides for those who are, because of illness, or age, or some other reason, are confined to their home. And these people, together with the community of faith, can work creatively so that it becomes possible for them to be present with the community, connected to the vine, even in their absence. Now we are amazed at the gullibility of many people who blindly respond to the emotional pitch of some of these evangelists who plead for them to send money immediately in order that God's word may continue to be communicated. Some of these tax-free corporations exploit the rich and the poor, receiving an unbelievable amount of money which is used without any accountability or responsibility to the body of Christ. These people are usually blatant egotists, glorifying themselves and not God. One of our recent Duke graduates works on a small-town newspaper and was pleased without responsible reporting, which is helping expose one such evangelist. This particular evangelist receives 98% of his three million dollar a year income as a result of his appeal to folks to send money to keep his program on the air. At one time, when he made a most desperate and frantic plea for people to send money immediately, otherwise they would not be on the air next week, he was in the process of buying a $230,000 house. The news story said, somewhat redundantly, in an exclusive neighborhood. Where else do you find a home of that price? An analysis of the use of the contributions showed that of each $10 sent in, $3.55 was in fact used to buy TV time. And one-half of a penny was donated to some unspecified charity. But the rest of the money was used for his well-being, to fill his ego needs, to buy bumper stickers which glorified him. And also with the money he had bought eight homes surrounding his boyhood home, plus many other, grander dwellings. snd he owned over $100,000 worth of various kinds of vehicles including two Cadillacs and a Rolls-Royce. In defending his obvious personal wealth, this man said that he wears fine clothes and drives expensive cars and lives in general luxury because wealth is a sign of God's approval of his ministry. He said that when people were walking to Jerusalem, when people were walking to Jerusalem, Jesus was riding on the back of a jackass. And said, if there had been Cadillacs back then, he was certain Jesus would have been riding in one because Jesus was always first-class. How easy it is for us to be amused and to ridicule such charlatans, to laugh at the absurdity of such claims, to be prophetic in our judgment against what appears to be most irresponsible and unloving actions. Yet when we are honest, we know that, while we work with more sophistication and finesse, we can deceive ourselves and make decisions which are just as absurd and distant from God's intention for us and our community. God may not cast us out, but we will be pruned. Just recently a divinity school professor made an ecumenical congregation most uncomfortable, and we don't like to be made uncomfortable. When talking about Jesus' temptation, he reminded us of some of the temptations which we succumb to. One of his illustrations described how the black preachers began preaching in the storefronts, working in secular jobs to pay for the rent and for the light, and the heat. But soon, they became successful and the storefront was full, and they decided that this was not an appropriate place to worship God. But instead of directly addressing the congregation, saying they need a better building, he asked one of the leaders of the church if he or she had heard people talking about how crowded it was in the store, how difficult it was to worship in this place, and that's all that's necessary. The next thing you know, this congregation is in a million dollar structure and have saddled future generations with the debt, while the starving black children stand outside looking in the windows. The congregation was uncomfortable. This is the same man who once, when he was asked to take one of our guest preachers out to dinner, selected a cafeteria saying he could not in good conscience spend chapel money to eat at one of those expensive restaurants. We in the chapel struggle to understand what it means to live responsibly as a Christian community. To keep attention of the life-giving nourishment which is necessary for the branches to relay, be related to the vine, the source of their life and also to be obedient as we live out our lives in this world as disciples of Jesus, the Christ. Notice that our responsible living in the world grows out of our life of faith. Unless we live in relation to the vine, we die. Unless we, as branches, bear fruit, we are cut off. Since we, as a chapel, are not a church, most of you who worship here are in a covenant relationship with a specific Christian community. The community which is the primary place for your worship and nurture and the locus for your moving from it to love in deed and truth. And for us to be responsible certainly means providing opportunities for people who worship here regularly to be involved in a community of faith, a community where they are known by name, loved and pruned, and are sent into the world. The people who claim this chapel as their church are usually the people who are in the choir, who usher, or who belong to one of the ongoing Christian communities. Certainly too, our ministry involves preaching the word of God boldly, as Paul did. What more important pulpit in this area to proclaim the good news of the gospel. The good news which comes to us as nurture, as forgiveness, as hope, but also as the pruning word of justice. One of our colleagues said it seemed easier for us to make our prophetic statements about situations far-removed from the campus, like in South Africa, than to be relevant to the dehumanizing situations which confront us daily within our community, such as the blatant exploitation of another person as a sexual person, our destructive competitive spirit, our University, which at times seems more like a country club than a learning community, and the very specific expressions of our sexism and racism within this community. Now, any time we address a dehumanizing situation here in our community or in the larger community, and again we have no choice, it's both. When we preach boldly and live boldly, we will find, as Paul did with his preaching, we will soon be in confrontation with power. Misused, destructive power. Whether economic or political or in the form of power of personal charisma, of peer pressure or ambition. To preach boldly, to live boldly, takes courage and humility with the sure knowledge that in such boldness there will be the pruning, and then maybe the persecution. Such courage and commitment is nourished only as we are in the community of faith, only as we are branches living in relationship with the vine. For the covenant service which John Wesley developed and is used by many, many churches today, the scripture lesson he chose was from the 15th chapter of John, that of the vine and the branches. Hear now, just a selection of the covenant he asked people to make. "Christ has many services to be done. Some are easy, others are difficult. Some bring honor, others bring reproach. Some are suitable to our natural inclinations and our temporal interest. Others are contrary to both. In some, we may please Christ and please ourselves. In others, we cannot please Christ except by denying ourselves. Yet the power to do all these things is assuredly given to us in Christ, who strengthens us." Christ is risen, preach boldly. Christ is risen. Let us not love in word and speech, but in deed and truth. Christ is risen, live boldly as disciples who continue his work in this world. Amen and amen. (church organ music) (choir singing) 

- Let us affirm what we believe. We believe in God, who has created and is creating, who has come in the truly human Jesus to reconcile and make new, who works in us and others by the spirit. We trust God, who calls us to be the church, to celebrate life and its fullness, to love and serve others, to seek justice and resist evil, to proclaim Jesus crucified and risen, our judge and our hope. In life, in death, in life beyond death, God is with us, we are not alone, thanks be to God. Be seated. The Lord be with you. 

- And with you. 

- Let us pray. Most gracious God, our heavenly parent. We thank thee for the turn of time, for endings and beginnings, for new seasons, new eras of life, new possibilities. Thou, oh Lord, hast made goodness. Help us to pursue it. Thou hast made truth. Help us to seek it. Thou hast made beauty. Help us to receive it. Thou hast made love. Spread thy love through our hearts and lives. Be present with us as thy holy spirit, so that in finding truth and beauty and goodness and love, we may find the life which thou hast given in abundance. We pray this day, oh Lord, for those persons in special need. For those with inadequate money to provide housing and utilities and food. For those who are in pain. For those who are lonely. Those who face tragedy. We pray for the hungry. We pray for the distressed. We pray for those who have lost friends, family, or loved ones. Not only do we pray that we may have sympathy with them and be able to serve them, we pray also for the special presence of thy peace and hope. We remember also, those whose work we assume will be given. Those whose service we presume upon. We pray for those on this campus, the police, the maintenance people. For the workers of the dining halls, for the nurses and orderlies and receptionist. We pray for those whose daily work sustains our living. Make us more sensitive to the interactions of life among all of us. We may truly appreciate these usual, ordinary modes by which we help one another. We are richly blessed, oh Lord, with resources, with goods, with opportunities. Make us conscious of our responsibility for the careful use of the resources thou hast given to us. Make us thoughtful and wise and generous. Now, oh Lord, impress the message of this morning upon our hearts. Help us in the light of the resurrection of Jesus Christ to live boldly, to bear fruit so that we may show our love for thee and our love for one another. And all of these prayers we make in the name and the spirit of Jesus Christ, who taught us when praying to say, "Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name. "Thy kingdom come. "Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven. "Give us this day our daily bread "and forgive us our trespasses "as we forgive those who trespass against us. "And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. "For thine is the kingdom, the power, "and the glory forever. "Amen." (inspiring organ music) (uptempo organ music) (choir singing) (church organ music) (choir singing) 

- Oh Lord, out of the richness of thy grace thou hast given to us, and we give these, our offerings, to thee in the spirit of love and of dedication, amen. (church organ music) (choir singing) 

- And now, unto God who is able to do immeasurably more than all that we can ask or conceive, by the power that is at work within us. To Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus from generation to generation, world without end, amen. ♪ God be with you till we meet again ♪ ♪ By His counsels guide uphold you ♪ ♪ With His sheep securely fold you ♪ ♪ God be with you till we meet again ♪ (church organ music)