Willie J. Jennings - "A Request to Remember" (November 11, 2001)

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Woman	The third lesson is from	0:16
	the Gospel According to Saint Luke, the 20th chapter.	0:17
	Some Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection,	0:22
	came to him and asked him a question.	0:26
	"Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man's brother dies,	0:29
	"leaving a wife but no children,	0:35
	"the man shall marry the widow	0:37
	"and raise up children for his brother.	0:39
	"Now there were seven brothers.	0:42
	"The first married and died childless,	0:44
	"then the second and third married her.	0:47
	"And so in the same way, all seven died childless.	0:49
	"Finally, the woman also died.	0:53
	"In the resurrection, therefore,	0:55
	"whose wife will the woman be?	0:58
	"For the seven had married her."	1:00
	Jesus said to them,	1:03
	"Those who belong to this age marry	1:05
	"and are given in marriage,	1:08
	"but those who are considered worthy of a place in that age	1:10
	"and in the resurrection from the dead,	1:13
	"neither marry nor are given in marriage.	1:15
	"Indeed they cannot die anymore	1:19
	"because they are like angels and are children of God,	1:21
	"being children of the resurrection.	1:26
	"And the fact that the dead are raised,	1:28
	"Moses himself showed in the story about the bush,	1:30
	"where he speaks of the Lord as the God of Abraham,	1:34
	"the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.	1:37
	"Now he is God not of the dead, but of the living,	1:40
	"for to him, all of them are alive."	1:45
	This is the word of the Lord.	1:48
Congregation	Thanks be to God.	1:50
	(footsteps)	1:59
Man	Again from the Gospel of Luke,	2:26
	the 23rd chapter,	2:30
	the 39th verse.	2:33
	One of the criminals who were hanged there	2:36
	kept deriding him and saying,	2:39
	"Are you not the Messiah?	2:43
	"Save yourself and us!"	2:46
	But the other rebuked him, saying,	2:50
	"Do you not fear God,	2:54
	"since you are under the same sentence of condemnation?	2:57
	"And we, indeed, have been condemned justly,	3:03
	"for we are getting what we deserve for our deeds,	3:09
	"but this man has done nothing wrong."	3:16
	Then he said,	3:22
	"Jesus.	3:26
	"Remember me	3:28
	"when you come into your kingdom."	3:31
	The Word of God, for we the People of God.	3:37
Congregation	Thanks be to God.	3:41
-	This is a strange request	3:46
	made at a strange time.	3:51
	The request is made by a famous	3:55
	or should we say infamous man	3:57
	who hung on the cross next to Jesus.	4:00
	That man, whose name we do not know,	4:06
	was a criminal convicted of his crimes	4:10
	and was now being tortured to death.	4:15
	But in this gospel story,	4:19
	this man does important work.	4:22
	He ends the senseless speculation about Jesus	4:27
	and the endless ridicule of Jesus as he hung on the cross.	4:33
	His words are quite eloquent.	4:40
	On the cross, dying, this man summarizes his own life,	4:44
	and he concludes that he has reached	4:51
	the bitter end he deserves.	4:53
	"But this Jesus", he announces,	4:57
	"has not reached the end he deserves."	5:01
	And he ends this eloquent and powerful	5:06
	disruption of ridicule with a simple request.	5:09
	"Lord, remember me,	5:16
	"when you come into your kingdom.	5:21
	"Lord, remember."	5:24
	There are few requests in scripture more powerful,	5:29
	more coded, if you will, than the request to remember.	5:34
	It is a request	5:41
	found in the mouths of people both great and small.	5:42
	It is found in the mouths of prophets, priests, and kings.	5:48
	And surprisingly, stunningly,	5:54
	the request to remember	5:57
	is again and again spoken by God.	6:00
	God remembers.	6:08
	God remembers.	6:11
	This we know without a doubt.	6:16
	In the unfolding drama of scripture,	6:18
	the issue is never really about God's ability to remember.	6:21
	The issue is about	6:29
	our ability to remember,	6:33
	the ability of God's people, Israel, to remember,	6:36
	specifically how they remember	6:41
	and what they remember,	6:46
	and the things they do that help them remember.	6:50
	The work of remembering is important work, crucial work.	6:59
	Indeed you could say that much of our life	7:06
	is shaped, governed, and even ruled	7:11
	by how we remember.	7:17
	My dear wife, who is a stunning marriage	7:21
	and family therapist, she has to be she's married to me,	7:24
	she teaches couples the fine art of selective remembering.	7:31
	Husbands and wives need to learn	7:38
	the fine art of selective remembering.	7:41
	Now let me give you a little tidbit of advice.	7:46
	My wife charges money for this but I'll give it to you free.	7:50
	If you want to slip a few dollars in my hand at the door	7:54
	at the end of service, you can do that.	7:57
	(audience laughter)	7:59
	I'm not kidding	8:00
	(stronger laughter)	8:01
	Here it is.	8:08
	Married couples must learn how to remember	8:10
	the good things they have done for one another.	8:15
	They must allow those good memories	8:20
	to become advocates for patience and appreciation,	8:23
	but not turn good memories	8:29
	into demands that dictate behavior.	8:34
	Isn't that right?	8:38
	(audience laughter)	8:39
	A wise couple, a wise couple,	8:42
	also knows how to remember	8:45
	the bad things they have done to one another.	8:50
	They know how to remember their mistakes	8:56
	and learn from them.	9:02
	They also know what mistakes	9:05
	to remember lightly or slightly,	9:10
	and sometimes to not remember at all.	9:16
	What destroys a good marriage	9:26
	is remembering badly.	9:32
	What destroys a life	9:37
	is remembering badly.	9:41
	My friends,	9:45
	our lives are haunted	9:49
	by the voices and actors of our past.	9:52
	Our parents, our teachers, our friends, lovers, enemies.	9:56
	We dance with them throughout the song of life,	10:02
	and if we are not skilled in remembering,	10:07
	those voices, those actors distort our present	10:12
	and damage our future.	10:18
	Remembering rightly is not an ability	10:23
	Americans have in abundance.	10:26
	As a nation, we remember our past	10:30
	in either insanely heroic ways	10:35
	or in depressingly grotesque ways.	10:39
	We don't know how to remember with skill.	10:42
	That's why a nation like ours needs its poets,	10:51
	its artists, and especially its musicians.	10:55
	One of the gifts we have in this country that may someday	11:02
	help us learn how to remember is the blues.	11:06
	That's right, the blues.	11:13
	Nations need the blues	11:18
	because the blues is about artfully weaving together	11:21
	painful memories with memories of great ecstasy.	11:26
	Blues singing tries to hold together	11:31
	the multiple complex memories of our lives	11:36
	without allowing them to destroy us.	11:40
	But the truth is no nation, even nations with the blues,	11:45
	no nation remembers well,	11:52
	remembers rightly.	11:56
	The technical term is ideological deployment, propaganda.	11:59
	Nation states remember the past	12:06
	only to justify the present.	12:09
	Only to justify their actions now and into the future.	12:13
	Nation states remember only to establish their distinction	12:20
	or their domination of other nations.	12:25
	No nation gets it right.	12:30
	All turn memory against itself.	12:35
	The world truly awaits a ruler	12:40
	and a holy nation that remembers rightly.	12:45
	But we know.	12:53
	We know that God has been about the business	12:56
	of trying to create just such a nation.	13:01
	God's holy workings with Israel in the drama of scripture	13:05
	was to teach them how to remember.	13:11
	God is exquisite at remembering.	13:16
	Not only does God remember the details, the events,	13:22
	the places, the people, the words,	13:28
	the promises made, promises broken, and promises kept.	13:33
	But God also remembers who we are.	13:40
	God remembers as the psalmist tells us	13:45
	that we are grass.	13:48
	We are grass.	13:51
	Fragile.	13:53
	God remembers that at our absolute best	13:55
	we still make mistakes.	13:59
	God remembers that we wither, that we become frail,	14:02
	and that we die.	14:08
	God's desire in remembering is not hidden to us.	14:13
	God teaches us to remember	14:20
	in order that we might see him at work	14:24
	in our past, our present, and our future.	14:27
	God tells us to remember that we might be changed	14:31
	by the divine presence in our midst working with us.	14:37
	Sisters and brothers, Jesus	14:45
	was God's remembering.	14:51
	Jesus was God remembering.	14:55
	God in flesh remembering.	14:59
	What brought Jesus to the cross	15:03
	next to this criminal, this thief,	15:05
	was God's remembering.	15:08
	God remembered Israel, God remembers us.	15:10
	God remembered that even at our best,	15:16
	we make mistakes.	15:22
	God remembered that we become frail and we will die.	15:25
	But the miracle of the cross	15:34
	and the gift of the resurrection	15:37
	is that God in Jesus remembers us even after death.	15:40
	Our past mistakes need not consume us.	15:47
	Our fragility need not destroy us,	15:53
	and death no longer means our memories will come to an end.	15:57
	This is what our life together as the church teaches us.	16:05
	The work of remembering is holy work, good work.	16:10
	What do you remember?	16:18
	What do you remember?	16:21
	Do you remember that Jesus died and rose again?	16:25
	Do you remember that your life,	16:30
	your very life is hid in Christ?	16:33
	Do you remember that the past belongs to Jesus?	16:37
	The present is also his,	16:43
	and your future is found in Him.	16:45
	We must let our lives become signs	16:51
	of remembering rightly.	16:57
	We must become people who follow Jesus	16:59
	all the way to the cross,	17:03
	remembering God's promise to raise us from the dead.	17:07
	Only then can the church be that holy nation	17:13
	that remembers rightly.	17:18
	My sisters and brothers,	17:24
	the world cannot remember rightly.	17:26
	We cannot forget this.	17:32
	It can only teach us to remember selfish successes	17:35
	or fatal failures.	17:42
	That man that hung on the cross next to Jesus got it right.	17:45
	He realized that the deeds of a lifetime	17:52
	are too much for us to interpret,	17:56
	too complex for us to organize.	18:00
	The deeds of our lives bring us	18:05
	to places of despair, of doubt,	18:11
	and even death.	18:15
	Our memories fail.	18:17
	We forget the good	18:21
	and we remember only the bad.	18:24
	We cannot remember rightly.	18:27
	What is crucial is that God remembers.	18:31
	This God remembers	18:37
	that our mistakes are never final,	18:40
	our faith is fragile,	18:45
	and his desire to have us with him is eternal.	18:49
	This man on the cross	18:57
	made the right request	19:01
	and so should we.	19:05
	Lord, remember me	19:08
	when you come into your kingdom.	19:12
	Amen.	19:17

Item Info

Title:

Willie J. Jennings - "A Request to Remember" (November 11, 2001)

Description:

Sermon start time: (Part 1) 3:45. Sermon end time: (Part 1) 19:19.
Reflecting on the thief crucified with Jesus, this sermon asserts that humans always fail to remember rightly and that it is God's remembrance of us, both honestly and graciously in Christ, that is our hope; the sermon calls hearers to pray like the thief for God to remember us. (Abstract created by Duke Divinity School staff.)
Key quotation: “Our memories fail. We forget the good and we remember only the bad. We cannot remember rightly. What is crucial is that God remembers. This God remembers that our mistakes are never final, our faith is fragile, and his desire to have us with him is eternal.”

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4gb1xz0z

Date:

November 11, 2001

Speaker:

Jennings, Willie J.

Liturgical Calendar:

Ordinary Time

Biblical Book:

Luke

Chapter and Verse:

Luke 23:39-42

Subject:

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 CS-1093
ref10343_vvm
uachapelsermaud
duke:320712
dcrau001737
ark:/87924/r4gb1xz0z
e37c0b57-f90d-4425-88ac-7b036377afc8

Digital Collection:

Duke Chapel Recordings

Source Collection:

Duke University Chapel recordings

Language:

English

Location:

United States
North Carolina
Durham (N.C.)

Format:

Provenance:

The Duke University Chapel Recordings were transferred to the Duke University Archives beginning in 1970.

Rights:

Limited Re-Use

Educational Use Permitted

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