David G. Bradley - "Christ the Pattern" (April 2, 1967)
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
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- | Let us bow our heads. | 2:09 |
Even on this day | 2:16 | |
when we remember the power and the joy | 2:17 | |
of the resurrection, | 2:19 | |
we also remember that, in this week, | 2:21 | |
we have not lived in the light of that resurrection. | 2:23 | |
We have thought and lived as if He were dead. | 2:29 | |
We have been afraid. | 2:32 | |
We have been dismayed. | 2:33 | |
And as we have faced ourselves | 2:36 | |
and our neighbor and the world, | 2:38 | |
we have sinned and fallen short of the glory | 2:41 | |
of that resurrection morn. | 2:45 | |
So, at this time, we stopped to hear again, | 2:48 | |
who we are, | 2:51 | |
and to stand in faith before the one | 2:53 | |
who has created us and given us this life, | 2:55 | |
to seek, to grasp once again, | 2:59 | |
what it truly means to live in Jesus Christ. | 3:02 | |
Jesus said, "I am not come to call the righteous, | 3:07 | |
but sinners to repentance." | 3:10 | |
His call is our invitation to confession, | 3:13 | |
to honesty, and to renewal. | 3:17 | |
Therefore, let us offer unto God, | 3:21 | |
our corporate prayer of confession. | 3:24 | |
Let us pray. | 3:27 | |
O most merciful Father, | 3:29 | |
who will us not the death of any sinner, | 3:32 | |
but rather that he should return unto thee and be saved. | 3:35 | |
Comfort us who agree by the weight of our sins. | 3:40 | |
We confess to thee, | 3:44 | |
that we have been slow to believe the good news | 3:45 | |
made known in Jesus Christ. | 3:49 | |
We confess that, like the disciples of old, | 3:51 | |
we have not expected great things to happen to us. | 3:55 | |
We have doubted the power | 3:59 | |
of Christ's resurrection in our lives. | 4:01 | |
Forgive us for believing that the triumph of right | 4:04 | |
is too good to be true. | 4:08 | |
Restore us through thy pardoning grace | 4:10 | |
to a childlike faith. | 4:14 | |
We pray in Jesus' name. | 4:16 | |
Amen. | 4:19 | |
Let us continue in silent individual prayers | 4:21 | |
of repentance and confession | 4:25 | |
for God's forgiveness and renewal. | 4:28 | |
Let us pray. | 4:31 | |
Hear these words from holy scripture, | 4:50 | |
that offer hope and assurance to those of a contract heart. | 4:52 | |
Jesus said, 'I am the resurrection and the life. | 4:59 | |
He who believes in me, | 5:02 | |
though he die, yet shall he live. | 5:04 | |
And whoever lives and believes in me shall never die.' | 5:07 | |
As a father pities his children, | 5:13 | |
so the Lord pities those who fear him, | 5:15 | |
who is like unto God, | 5:18 | |
who pardons iniquity, | 5:20 | |
and passes over transgression. | 5:21 | |
This is the message which we have heard of him | 5:25 | |
and declare unto you, | 5:28 | |
that God is light | 5:30 | |
and in him is no darkness at all. | 5:31 | |
If we walk in the light, | 5:34 | |
as he is in the light, | 5:35 | |
we have fellowship one with another, | 5:37 | |
and the blood of Jesus Christ | 5:39 | |
cleanses us from all sin. | 5:42 | |
I declare unto you, | 5:46 | |
in the name of Jesus Christ, | 5:47 | |
you are free of your sins | 5:49 | |
and able to live | 5:51 | |
and to affirm his light. | 5:53 | |
Let us unite our hearts together | 5:59 | |
in the prayer of all Christians. | 6:01 | |
Our Father, who art in heaven, | 6:04 | |
hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, | 6:07 | |
thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. | 6:11 | |
Give us this day our daily bread, | 6:16 | |
and forgive us our trespasses | 6:19 | |
as we forgive those who trespass against us, | 6:21 | |
and lead us not into temptation, | 6:24 | |
but deliver us from evil. | 6:27 | |
For thine is the kingdom, | 6:29 | |
and the power and the glory for ever. | 6:31 | |
Amen. | 6:35 | |
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Let us hear the word of God | 10:46 | |
as it is contained in the Epistle to the Colossians, | 10:48 | |
3:5-17. | 10:51 | |
"Put to death, therefore, | 10:58 | |
what is earthly in you. | 11:00 | |
Immorality impurity, passion, | 11:02 | |
evil desire, and covetousness, | 11:06 | |
which is idolatry. | 11:09 | |
On account of these the wrath of God is coming. | 11:11 | |
In these you once walked | 11:15 | |
when you lived in them. | 11:17 | |
But now, put them all away. | 11:19 | |
Anger, wrath, malice, | 11:21 | |
slander, and foul talk from your mouth. | 11:25 | |
Do not lie to one another, | 11:29 | |
seeing that you have put off the old nature | 11:31 | |
with its practices | 11:34 | |
and have put on the new nature, | 11:35 | |
which is being renewed in the knowledge | 11:37 | |
after the image of its creator. | 11:40 | |
Here, there cannot be Greek and Jew, | 11:43 | |
circumcised and uncircumcised, | 11:47 | |
barbarian, Scythian, | 11:51 | |
slave, free man, | 11:53 | |
but Christ is all and in all. | 11:56 | |
Put on then as God's chosen ones, | 12:00 | |
holy and beloved, | 12:03 | |
compassion, kindness, | 12:04 | |
loneliness, meekness, | 12:07 | |
and patience | 12:10 | |
for bearing one another and, | 12:11 | |
if one has a complaint against another, | 12:13 | |
forgiving each other, | 12:16 | |
as the Lord has forgiven you. | 12:17 | |
So you also must forgive. | 12:20 | |
And above all these put on love, | 12:23 | |
which binds everything together in a perfect harmony. | 12:27 | |
And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts | 12:31 | |
to which indeed you were called in one body. | 12:35 | |
And be thankful. | 12:39 | |
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, | 12:41 | |
as you teach and admonish one another in all wisdom, | 12:44 | |
and as you sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, | 12:48 | |
with thankfulness in your heart unto God. | 12:52 | |
And whatever you do, | 12:56 | |
in word or deed, | 12:58 | |
do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, | 13:00 | |
giving thanks to God the Father through Him." | 13:03 | |
Here ends the reading of the lesson. | 13:08 | |
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(papers rustling) | 16:32 | |
The Lord be with you. | 16:38 | |
Let us pray. | 16:42 | |
O mighty God, | 16:52 | |
who art the giver of every good and perfect gift, | 16:54 | |
receive and hear we ask, | 16:59 | |
these are prayers of thanksgiving. | 17:01 | |
O Lord, our Father, | 17:08 | |
on this day, we would offer unto thee | 17:11 | |
our thanks for the beauty of earth, | 17:13 | |
which now has created | 17:16 | |
and given unto us for our use | 17:18 | |
For beauty, O Lord, | 17:22 | |
wherever our eyes have seen it, | 17:23 | |
in the heavens or on the earth, | 17:25 | |
in the blossoming of flowers, | 17:28 | |
in the greenness of grass, | 17:31 | |
in a world, awakened by the coming of the spring sun. | 17:33 | |
For beauty that is heard, | 17:38 | |
whether in the voice of man | 17:40 | |
or in the music of manifold instruments, | 17:43 | |
whether it be in the song of a bird | 17:46 | |
or in the laughter of a child, | 17:48 | |
we give thee our thanks. | 17:50 | |
For the beauty that is neither seen nor heard, | 17:54 | |
deeper than our flesh, | 17:57 | |
higher than the stars, | 18:00 | |
the grace of lasting human affection, | 18:03 | |
of forgiveness freely given, | 18:06 | |
and of hospitality boldly offered by our neighbors, | 18:10 | |
we offer thee our thanks. | 18:15 | |
For all the beauty, O Lord, | 18:18 | |
we bow our hearts gratefully on this day | 18:19 | |
and in reverence, | 18:22 | |
and for him in whom life became | 18:24 | |
a great redeeming grace on this day, | 18:26 | |
we offer thee our thanks. | 18:30 | |
We remember also with thanks, O Lord, | 18:34 | |
every triumph of the spirit, | 18:37 | |
every resurrection of life from death, | 18:40 | |
of hope from despair, | 18:44 | |
of love from hate, | 18:45 | |
and we give thee our thanks. | 18:47 | |
For all the joys, | 18:50 | |
which the beauty of thy world creates, | 18:52 | |
for that joy men know in the creation of beauty themselves, | 18:55 | |
for all the joys of truth, | 18:59 | |
and for that joy men know | 19:02 | |
in the struggle with mystery and with the unknown, | 19:04 | |
we give thee thanks. | 19:07 | |
For the joy of hands at work | 19:10 | |
or at prayer or at play, | 19:11 | |
for the joy of the seeing eye | 19:14 | |
and the understanding heart | 19:16 | |
and the creative spirit, | 19:18 | |
for the joy of struggle and for the joy of rest, | 19:21 | |
for the joy of deeds, | 19:24 | |
and the joy of the dreams out of which they came, | 19:26 | |
for all these joys and others, | 19:30 | |
such as any of us who are willing may know, | 19:32 | |
we give thee thanks. | 19:35 | |
Through Him who first made this | 19:37 | |
a time of joy and celebration. | 19:39 | |
O God, if we give thee thanks for bread and meat, | 19:43 | |
for the shelter of house and warmth of clothing, | 19:47 | |
for daily work and for thoughtful friends, | 19:51 | |
for reasonable margins of security and comfort, | 19:54 | |
and yet have no pain of heart, | 19:58 | |
no anguish in the midst of our ease, | 20:01 | |
that even now our brothers and sisters, | 20:04 | |
thy sons and daughters, | 20:07 | |
are in our world, in our city, | 20:08 | |
starving, homeless, hopeless, | 20:13 | |
with no sign of human caring, | 20:16 | |
fearing tomorrow, sometimes, more than death. | 20:19 | |
Then leave us, we ask, without thy blessing | 20:22 | |
until we learn again in the ways of mercy. | 20:26 | |
Deliver us, O God, | 20:30 | |
from the gross sin of indifference, | 20:31 | |
and sanctify to us | 20:34 | |
that which we enjoy, | 20:37 | |
that by the courage and kindness, | 20:40 | |
which thou alone can give. | 20:43 | |
We may be unable to share it with the world. | 20:45 | |
O God, who has set the solitary in families, | 20:52 | |
and given us happiness in one another, | 20:55 | |
we give thee thanks | 20:57 | |
that the deepest joys of our life can be those | 20:59 | |
and that we may share with others. | 21:02 | |
We give thee thanks for the enrichment | 21:04 | |
and the support of love and marriage, | 21:07 | |
and parenthood, | 21:09 | |
for the blessings of friendship, | 21:10 | |
and for the claims of duty and responsibility | 21:12 | |
that quicken our humanity. | 21:16 | |
We lift up our hearts and our prayers | 21:20 | |
in intercession for those who are lonely, | 21:22 | |
for the bereaved, | 21:26 | |
for those who are torn away from those that they love, | 21:28 | |
for those who live in countries that are at war, | 21:32 | |
and especially for those | 21:38 | |
who have created loneliness for themselves | 21:39 | |
through pride and fear, | 21:43 | |
who have cut themselves off from their neighbors, | 21:45 | |
and also for, from thee. | 21:49 | |
We pray, O Lord, | 21:53 | |
for those who are strong | 21:54 | |
and who have not learned to share their strength, | 21:56 | |
for those who are impatient with the problems of others, | 21:59 | |
and for those who have all the answers | 22:03 | |
and refuse to listen to any of the questions, | 22:05 | |
We pray O Lord for all those who are bitter in spirit, | 22:11 | |
inflicting pain on others | 22:14 | |
because they are hurt or bewildered, | 22:16 | |
for those who are seeking recognition | 22:19 | |
by outrageous conduct and sarcastic speech, | 22:21 | |
for all those who seek revenge on society | 22:25 | |
by refusing to cooperate, | 22:28 | |
and we pray for ourselves, O Lord. | 22:31 | |
We pray for words | 22:34 | |
to restore self-respect and to awaken hope, | 22:35 | |
for sensitiveness to know the time to speak | 22:41 | |
and the time to be silent, | 22:44 | |
for the courage to be frank, | 22:46 | |
and for the ability to speak the truth in love. | 22:48 | |
And we ask, O Lord, for freedom. | 22:53 | |
For freedom from self, | 22:56 | |
and for such commitment to Christ | 22:58 | |
and the meaning of his resurrection, | 23:01 | |
that we will be liberated to be perpetual intercessors | 23:03 | |
living for, and with, other people in this thy world. | 23:08 | |
These in all things, O Lord, | 23:14 | |
we ask in the name of Jesus Christ | 23:17 | |
who came, | 23:20 | |
who lived among us, | 23:21 | |
who died for us, | 23:23 | |
and who rose again to offer us life eternally. | 23:25 | |
Amen. | 23:30 | |
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- | O God, our Father, | 33:18 |
we thank thee for the privilege of giving | 33:20 | |
without which our lives would be impoverished, indeed. | 33:23 | |
We pray for grace to give well, | 33:27 | |
to help without patronizing, | 33:31 | |
to assist without weakening, | 33:33 | |
to share without diminishing the self-respect of others, | 33:37 | |
with these gifts, | 33:42 | |
for the work and the witness of this community, | 33:43 | |
we offer our prayers for the one church | 33:46 | |
of Jesus Christ throughout all the world. | 33:49 | |
In his name, we pray. | 33:52 | |
Amen. | 33:55 | |
(papers rustling) | 34:07 | |
(papers rustling) | 34:11 | |
- | The topic I have chosen for my sermon this morning, | 34:34 |
or the title, "Christ the Pattern," | 34:38 | |
I am sure to modern ears, | 34:40 | |
both young and old, | 34:42 | |
sounds just a bit old-fashioned. | 34:43 | |
This is also true in my own case, | 34:48 | |
partly because my theological training | 34:50 | |
included strong injunctions | 34:53 | |
against taking seriously the idea | 34:55 | |
that a Christian should follow the Jesus way of life. | 34:57 | |
At the time I was in seminary, | 35:03 | |
Sheldon's book, "In His Steps," was still in vogue, | 35:05 | |
and its rather thin humanism was very much in disrepute. | 35:08 | |
Actually, I chose this title for these very reasons, | 35:13 | |
that it does refer to the old-fashioned idea | 35:17 | |
of making Christ the pattern for our lives. | 35:20 | |
And, also, because I'm not so sure, as I once was, | 35:23 | |
that the Jesus way of life is all wet | 35:26 | |
as a meaningful approach to the Christian life. | 35:29 | |
Like a great many others, | 35:34 | |
I recently have been reading | 35:36 | |
Joseph Fletcher's provocative book, "Situation Ethics: | 35:37 | |
The New Morality." | 35:41 | |
Also, like many others, | 35:43 | |
I find very much in it to agree with | 35:44 | |
and not too much to disagree with, | 35:46 | |
though I am puzzled by the stress he places | 35:48 | |
on a non-biblical idea. | 35:51 | |
The idea that the only law binding on a Christian | 35:53 | |
is to love God in one's neighbor. | 35:56 | |
He sounds a bit too much like a Hindu here for me, | 35:59 | |
but my purpose in referring to Fletcher | 36:02 | |
is not to discuss his ideas so much | 36:04 | |
as to use some of them for a starting place. | 36:07 | |
Since he is a typical exponent | 36:09 | |
of current relativism in the area of ethics, | 36:11 | |
I could not agree more with his opposition | 36:16 | |
to two approaches to ethical living. | 36:18 | |
The first of which is that happiness | 36:21 | |
is the test for ethical decisions. | 36:23 | |
I agree with him that personal happiness | 36:26 | |
is not a truly Christian basis for making ethical decisions. | 36:29 | |
Happiness too easily becomes not only a warm puppy, | 36:34 | |
but also no exams, no classes, no responsibilities, | 36:38 | |
nothing that is frustrating to one's personal wishes | 36:43 | |
and selfish desires must be tolerated | 36:46 | |
if one is to be happy. | 36:49 | |
I also agree with his opposition to legalism | 36:52 | |
as an approach to Christian ethics, | 36:54 | |
or rather, I agree that legalism | 36:56 | |
never has been a truly Christian approach to ethics. | 36:59 | |
That is to say Jesus and Paul | 37:03 | |
were in strong opposition to the legalistic strain | 37:07 | |
of the Judaism of their day. | 37:09 | |
But Judaism, itself, was nowhere near as legalistic | 37:11 | |
as many Christian interpreters would have it be. | 37:14 | |
But, in spite of Fletcher's attempts to be scientific, | 37:18 | |
by including case studies | 37:22 | |
as an approach to ethical decisions, | 37:23 | |
in spite of his stress on a method | 37:26 | |
which accepts the context of a situation as determinative, | 37:28 | |
as opposed to the legalism of hard and fast rules, | 37:32 | |
which cannot be altered, | 37:34 | |
he still leaves the average Christian up in the air | 37:36 | |
about how to go about getting ready | 37:39 | |
for a situation before he is confronted by it. | 37:41 | |
In spite of Fletcher's fresh emphasis | 37:45 | |
upon how a new day is here | 37:46 | |
and how we must find new ways to meet | 37:48 | |
this age of atoms, pollution, and speed. | 37:51 | |
In spite of his call for heroic dedication | 37:54 | |
to some kind of new morality, | 37:57 | |
there still remains the question, | 37:59 | |
where do I begin? | 38:01 | |
There is an axiom of biblical interpretation, | 38:04 | |
which assumes that the Bible is relative for our day, | 38:07 | |
not because it is the Bible, | 38:11 | |
but because the people in the Bible | 38:13 | |
and the people of the day are very much the same. | 38:15 | |
Not to overlook at profound corollary | 38:19 | |
that the God of the Bible is also the same today | 38:21 | |
as he was in biblical times. | 38:24 | |
That is to say the messages of Amos, Isaiah, | 38:27 | |
Moses, Jeremiah, Jesus, and Paul, | 38:30 | |
all had to do with persons and their personal problems. | 38:33 | |
Hate, love, fear, kindness, and good will | 38:38 | |
are all human emotions and qualities | 38:43 | |
which have not changed over the millennia. | 38:45 | |
Though there is, today, much stress | 38:49 | |
in many areas of thought, | 38:51 | |
upon the great differences | 38:53 | |
between our atomic age and all previous ages. | 38:55 | |
This stress runs counter to our basic axiom | 39:01 | |
about the relevance of the Bible. | 39:04 | |
It is true that Amos' day was one of ox carts, | 39:06 | |
and Jesus' day was one of Roman roads, | 39:09 | |
and our day is one in which skillful engineers | 39:11 | |
can do marvelous things | 39:14 | |
with modern materials and equipment. | 39:16 | |
Yet, I spent last week in the Los Angeles area, | 39:20 | |
where it was necessary for me to travel | 39:23 | |
as much as a hundred miles daily | 39:25 | |
through rush hour traffic | 39:27 | |
on the marvelous freeways | 39:29 | |
that crisscross the San Fernando Valley. | 39:30 | |
Several times, I found myself longing | 39:33 | |
for one of those good old Roman roads, | 39:35 | |
especially when the traffic plugged up and stalled, | 39:38 | |
or when some driver, | 39:41 | |
not yet fully converted to Christianity, | 39:42 | |
wove in-and-out of traffic, | 39:45 | |
endangering not only his | 39:46 | |
but the lives of many others as well. | 39:48 | |
In a recent book by Konrad Lorenz, | 39:52 | |
the anthropologist, entitled "On Aggression," | 39:54 | |
the author offers a most compelling analysis | 39:57 | |
of the reasons why man is a wolf to his fellow man. | 40:00 | |
To read his description | 40:05 | |
of the survivals of animal behavior and man, | 40:06 | |
and of how man can be far more beastly than any beast | 40:09 | |
is both frightening, and, at the same, | 40:12 | |
as Lorenz himself points out, | 40:14 | |
hopeful because his analysis may help us | 40:17 | |
to see ourselves in a more clear light. | 40:20 | |
But, the fact remains | 40:22 | |
that man is a beast all too often, | 40:25 | |
and he is as much a wolf to his fellow man today | 40:28 | |
as he was in the time of Amos or of St. Paul. | 40:31 | |
If it is true that in our Atomic Age, | 40:35 | |
we have 10 times or 1,000 times | 40:39 | |
the knowledge and know how of men in New Testament times, | 40:41 | |
it also is true that we have 10 times or 10,000 times | 40:44 | |
the capacity to harm, destroy, pollute | 40:49 | |
our atmosphere and world and torment our fellow man. | 40:53 | |
Ratios of one to one, | 40:57 | |
10 to one, 10 to 10, | 40:58 | |
or 10,000 to 10,000 are all equal. | 41:00 | |
They're all equal to the ratio of one to one, | 41:03 | |
or of one, or to repeat. | 41:06 | |
The Bible is relevant to our day because | 41:09 | |
it treats the same human problems | 41:11 | |
that continue to plague mankind. | 41:13 | |
Now, one of the fascinating problems | 41:18 | |
that one meets in reading the letters of Paul | 41:20 | |
is that he so seldom quotes the words of Jesus | 41:22 | |
when he is offering advice to the first Christians | 41:26 | |
on how to meet ethical problems. | 41:29 | |
Instead, he does something most interesting. | 41:31 | |
He continually refers to the pattern of Christ | 41:34 | |
as the example to follow. | 41:37 | |
Although, a large proportion of Paul's letters | 41:40 | |
have to do with ethical problems and recommendations | 41:42 | |
on what the Christians should do about them. | 41:45 | |
He almost never quotes teachings of Jesus, | 41:47 | |
or, at least, ones that we find in the Four Gospels. | 41:50 | |
Yet, again and again, | 41:53 | |
Paul will use such phrases as "Do this in Christ," | 41:54 | |
"as is pleasing in Christ," "as Christ did," and so on. | 41:59 | |
Paul seemed to feel that | 42:04 | |
if one followed the pattern of Christ, | 42:06 | |
he did not need to worry about following the law of Moses, | 42:08 | |
just as Joseph Fletcher opposes the legalism | 42:11 | |
of much Protestant ethics. | 42:13 | |
But, there appears to me to be a radical difference | 42:15 | |
between the negative opposition to law | 42:18 | |
by Joseph Fletcher and other contemporary ethical teachers, | 42:20 | |
and the positive emphasis of which Paul offers us. | 42:24 | |
If I read Fletcher rightly, | 42:29 | |
he is saying that all the 10 Commandments | 42:32 | |
have much to commend them, | 42:34 | |
they should not be considered always binding | 42:35 | |
in every situation. | 42:37 | |
There are times that it might be right | 42:40 | |
to break any one of the 10 Commandments, | 42:42 | |
if the situation and the commandment | 42:44 | |
of love for a neighbor require it. | 42:46 | |
Such obvious illustrations as mercy killings, | 42:48 | |
legalized abortion, | 42:51 | |
the realization that a married couple | 42:53 | |
who find life together to be hellish should be divorced, | 42:55 | |
even though this would be contrary | 42:58 | |
to religious law and so forth, | 43:00 | |
are the sort of thing he is referring to. | 43:02 | |
Although, what I'm about to say | 43:05 | |
is a caricature of Fletcher's position. | 43:06 | |
Any enemy undoubtedly would expect | 43:08 | |
a much more sophisticated response to his ideas. | 43:10 | |
On my part, I find myself thinking | 43:13 | |
of the 10 Commandments a la Joe Fletcher follows. | 43:16 | |
"Thou shalt, normally, not kill. | 43:19 | |
Thou shalt, normally, not steal. | 43:23 | |
Thou shalt, normally, not commit adultery," | 43:26 | |
and so on. | 43:30 | |
Now, the Apostle Paul also opposed the legalism | 43:32 | |
in ethics of his day. | 43:35 | |
But to my mind, he was much more positive in his approach. | 43:37 | |
In his letter to the churches of Galatia, | 43:41 | |
he tells them that they recalled a freedom, | 43:43 | |
but warns them of the dangers | 43:46 | |
of taking this freedom without responsibility. | 43:47 | |
"Do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh," | 43:51 | |
he says, "But through love, | 43:54 | |
be servants of one another | 43:56 | |
for the whole law is fulfilled in one word. | 43:58 | |
You show love your neighbor as yourself." | 44:02 | |
He then goes on to contrast the way | 44:05 | |
of man's animal nature, | 44:07 | |
his aggressive carnal life, | 44:09 | |
the sort of thing that Lorenz talks | 44:10 | |
about in his book, "On Aggression," | 44:12 | |
with the way of those who follow the pattern of Christ. | 44:14 | |
Now, the works of the Fletcher's plane. | 44:18 | |
And here, it almost appears | 44:20 | |
as though he is describing some of the students | 44:22 | |
at a neighboring, at a neighboring institution. | 44:23 | |
Immorality, impurity, licentiousness, | 44:27 | |
idolatry, sorcery, enmity, | 44:29 | |
jealousy, anger, selfishness, | 44:31 | |
dissension, party, spirit, | 44:33 | |
envy, drunkeness, carousing in the light. | 44:35 | |
I have warned you, as I warned you before, | 44:38 | |
that those who do such things | 44:41 | |
shall not inherit the kingdom of God, | 44:42 | |
but the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, | 44:45 | |
patience, kindness, goodness, | 44:48 | |
faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. | 44:51 | |
Against such there is no law. | 44:54 | |
And those who belong to Christ Jesus | 44:57 | |
have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. | 44:59 | |
How Paul says, | 45:04 | |
"Against such virtues as love, joy, | 45:06 | |
peace, gentleness," and so forth. | 45:10 | |
There is no law. | 45:12 | |
Now, some of you, there are who will say, | 45:15 | |
"But that's in the Bible. It's old stuff." | 45:18 | |
And, obviously, as being spotted by a man who is over 30, | 45:20 | |
you older rat things | 45:25 | |
don't want us doing anything interesting, | 45:26 | |
and you label it as bad. | 45:28 | |
This is true. | 45:30 | |
At least that what I have quoted is in it, | 45:31 | |
is from an old book called the Bible, | 45:33 | |
and is proclaimed by a man who is too old to be trusted, | 45:35 | |
if I understand what some of the leaders | 45:39 | |
of protest movements are saying. | 45:40 | |
Fortunately, most of the current crop | 45:42 | |
of protest leaders soon will be over 30, | 45:45 | |
and will pro force lose their audiences, | 45:48 | |
or they will have to raise the age of credibility. | 45:50 | |
Actually, even Paul was not so new | 45:55 | |
in his use of Jesus Christ as a pattern for living. | 45:58 | |
Across the hellistic world of his day, | 46:02 | |
the form of ethical instruction was common. | 46:04 | |
For hundreds of years, | 46:07 | |
Socrates had been held up as the prime example | 46:09 | |
of the truly wise man and, | 46:12 | |
by different schools of philosophy, | 46:16 | |
which though disagree with each other, | 46:17 | |
did agree on Socrates as the pattern | 46:19 | |
of the sophos, or the wise man. | 46:22 | |
The Jewish philosopher, Philo Judaeus, | 46:26 | |
had a generation before Paul, | 46:29 | |
identified the Hebrew patriarchs, | 46:31 | |
Abraham, Isaac, | 46:33 | |
Jacob, and Joseph, | 46:35 | |
with the four historic virtues. | 46:37 | |
In fact, the same approach to ethical instruction | 46:39 | |
of having somebody as a pattern to follow | 46:42 | |
is followed by Buddhist | 46:45 | |
and Confucianist and Muslim believers. | 46:46 | |
I am of myself of the opinion | 46:51 | |
that New Testament studies, all too often, | 46:53 | |
have focused all too much | 46:56 | |
on the words of Jesus in the gospels, | 46:58 | |
and have often failed to note | 47:00 | |
that each gospel presents Christ | 47:02 | |
as a pattern in the eyes of each author. | 47:03 | |
Each is a portrait of Christ | 47:07 | |
in which his words are illustrative | 47:08 | |
rather than normative. | 47:10 | |
Paul may very well be closer | 47:12 | |
to the original gospel tradition | 47:14 | |
about Jesus than we realize. | 47:16 | |
But what everyone thinks about Paul's call | 47:19 | |
to imitate Christ, | 47:21 | |
there still remains the question | 47:23 | |
as to whether someone today | 47:24 | |
might actually come up with a better way. | 47:26 | |
As I sometimes suspect my friends and ethics | 47:29 | |
to be searching, | 47:31 | |
to be striving for a new morality, | 47:32 | |
as though the old one were done away with. | 47:35 | |
Looking for a new morality, | 47:38 | |
using the phrase of Fletcher's subtitle to his book. | 47:40 | |
Since I am, this morning, defending an old-fashioned way, | 47:44 | |
I would like to refer briefly | 47:48 | |
to two recent attempts to replace the pattern of Christ | 47:49 | |
with a newer pattern. | 47:52 | |
Obviously, because I assume we would all disavow them. | 47:54 | |
One attempt was made in the Germany of Adolf Hitler, | 47:58 | |
the youth to whom he appealed | 48:02 | |
and whom he enrolled in his Hitler-Jugend movement, | 48:03 | |
where young people fed up with the rules | 48:06 | |
and control of three institutions. | 48:08 | |
The authority of the parents in the home, | 48:11 | |
the demands of the pastor in the church, | 48:13 | |
and the discipline of the school teacher. | 48:15 | |
Like the red guards in the China of today | 48:18 | |
hit their youth were told | 48:20 | |
that they could follow a new pattern of the Superman, | 48:22 | |
and walk away from all such control by their elders, | 48:25 | |
and be free to persecute and kill Jews, | 48:28 | |
to hate the lesser breed of non-Germanic peoples. | 48:32 | |
And so on. | 48:35 | |
In a similar vein, down in Italy, | 48:37 | |
Benito Mussolini made a dramatic appeal | 48:39 | |
to the Italian youth | 48:41 | |
calling upon them to renounce the authority | 48:43 | |
of the home in the church. | 48:45 | |
He said that he would give them a new pattern of life, | 48:46 | |
a pattern in which there would be something | 48:50 | |
as Italian youth to live for, | 48:52 | |
something to fight for, | 48:54 | |
and something to die for. | 48:56 | |
And they cheered him to the echo. | 48:58 | |
Now, I will not recount the history | 49:01 | |
that followed Hitler and Mussolini. | 49:03 | |
Now, it is just possible | 49:07 | |
that the New Testament and its teachings | 49:09 | |
are too radical for persons in our day. | 49:11 | |
I have no quarrel with anyone who says | 49:15 | |
that the 10 Commandments are not adequate for our day, | 49:17 | |
but that was true, | 49:20 | |
both in the Judaism of Jesus' day | 49:21 | |
and also in Jesus' own teachings. | 49:23 | |
When he called up on men to serve God absolutely, | 49:25 | |
not merely by following the teaching of men of old, | 49:28 | |
you all know of how he said, | 49:31 | |
"It has been said to you by the men of old, | 49:33 | |
but I say unto you." | 49:36 | |
And one of the ways in which the early Christians | 49:40 | |
translated Jesus' call to obedience into a way of life, | 49:42 | |
was this very reference to Christ the pattern, | 49:47 | |
to refer to Jesus' own career, | 49:51 | |
his own absolute obedience to God's will. | 49:53 | |
When I first began studying the Bible in any formal way, | 49:57 | |
my Greek professor in college, Dr. Claude Douglas, | 50:00 | |
once called the passage on love in 1 Corinthians 13, | 50:03 | |
a portrait of Christ. | 50:06 | |
I was puzzled by this at the time, | 50:09 | |
being somewhat of a literalist. | 50:11 | |
I couldn't figure out how this in any way | 50:12 | |
was a description of Jesus. | 50:14 | |
But now I think I can see how | 50:16 | |
it is a poetic description by Paul, | 50:18 | |
of his view of the character of Christ. | 50:20 | |
Or putting it differently, | 50:24 | |
if we want to know what Paul had in mind | 50:26 | |
by making Christ the pattern for one's life, | 50:28 | |
you might try reading 1 Corinthians 13, | 50:31 | |
while substituting your own name for the word love. | 50:35 | |
I would do so right now, | 50:39 | |
except that I'm afraid it would be a bit too painful. | 50:41 | |
It would make me actually too self-conscious | 50:44 | |
to read that "Dave Bradley is long-suffering | 50:47 | |
and kind in all the rest." | 50:49 | |
But I do recommend that you try this for yourself, | 50:52 | |
using your own name | 50:55 | |
to see what it might mean to follow Christ | 50:56 | |
as the pattern for your life. | 50:58 | |
(coughs) Where, then, does one begin | 51:01 | |
in order to follow Christ as the pattern for one's life? | 51:03 | |
I have time only to list three considerations | 51:07 | |
to think about in relation to the call of Paul | 51:10 | |
to serve God in Christ. | 51:12 | |
First, is the obvious need to know about Christ. | 51:14 | |
And this means reading one's New Testament, | 51:17 | |
and reading there about how Christ was held the pattern | 51:21 | |
by the earliest Christians. | 51:24 | |
Second, both in the words of Jesus, himself, | 51:26 | |
and also in the letters of Paul, | 51:29 | |
we find that to serve Christ is actually to serve God, | 51:32 | |
to be obedient to God | 51:35 | |
as absolute Lord of one's life | 51:38 | |
as Jesus did. | 51:39 | |
And, finally, | 51:41 | |
as opposed to the ethic of happiness of our day, | 51:43 | |
Paul emphasized that one does not please oneself | 51:46 | |
if he follows Christ. | 51:49 | |
In Romans 15, the first following we read, | 51:51 | |
"We who are strong ought to bear | 51:55 | |
with the failings of the weak | 51:57 | |
and not to please ourselves, | 51:59 | |
that each of us please his neighbor | 52:02 | |
for his good to edify him | 52:04 | |
for Christ did not please himself." | 52:06 | |
For my closing prayer, | 52:11 | |
instead of actually giving a prayer, | 52:13 | |
I would like to read a brief portrait of Christ | 52:15 | |
as the pattern for one's life, | 52:17 | |
from Paul's letter to the Christians at Philippi. | 52:19 | |
Shall we stand. | 52:23 | |
"Have this mind among yourselves, | 52:29 | |
which you have in Christ Jesus, | 52:31 | |
who though he was in the form of God, | 52:33 | |
did not count equality with God | 52:36 | |
a thing to be grasped, | 52:38 | |
but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, | 52:39 | |
being born in the likeness of men. | 52:43 | |
And being found in human form. | 52:45 | |
He humbled Himself and became obedient under death, | 52:47 | |
even death on a cross. | 52:51 | |
Therefore God has highly exalted Him | 52:53 | |
and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, | 52:56 | |
that at the name of Jesus, | 52:59 | |
every knee should bow | 53:01 | |
in heaven and on earth and under the earth, | 53:03 | |
and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, | 53:06 | |
to the glory of God the Father." | 53:10 | |
Amen. | 53:13 | |
And now, may the blessing of God the Father, | 53:15 | |
and the fellowship and communion of the Holy Spirit | 53:18 | |
rest upon and abide with each one of you. | 53:21 | |
Amen. | 53:25 | |
(bell tolling) | 53:29 | |
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- | I'm not sure. | 56:34 |
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