David G. Bradley - "Christ the Pattern" (April 2, 1967) / Duke Chapel Recordings / Duke Digital Repository

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Let us bow our heads.

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Even on this day

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when we remember the power and the joy

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of the resurrection,

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we also remember that, in this week,

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we have not lived in the light of that resurrection.

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We have thought and lived as if He were dead.

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We have been afraid.

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We have been dismayed.

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And as we have faced ourselves

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and our neighbor and the world,

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we have sinned and fallen short of the glory

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of that resurrection morn.

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So, at this time, we stopped to hear again,

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who we are,

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and to stand in faith before the one

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who has created us and given us this life,

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to seek, to grasp once again,

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what it truly means to live in Jesus Christ.

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Jesus said, "I am not come to call the righteous,

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but sinners to repentance."

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His call is our invitation to confession,

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to honesty, and to renewal.

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Therefore, let us offer unto God,

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our corporate prayer of confession.

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Let us pray.

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O most merciful Father,

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who will us not the death of any sinner,

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but rather that he should return unto thee and be saved.

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Comfort us who agree by the weight of our sins.

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We confess to thee,

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that we have been slow to believe the good news

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made known in Jesus Christ.

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We confess that, like the disciples of old,

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we have not expected great things to happen to us.

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We have doubted the power

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of Christ's resurrection in our lives.

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Forgive us for believing that the triumph of right

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is too good to be true.

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Restore us through thy pardoning grace

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to a childlike faith.

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We pray in Jesus' name.

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Amen.

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Let us continue in silent individual prayers

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of repentance and confession

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for God's forgiveness and renewal.

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Let us pray.

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Hear these words from holy scripture,

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that offer hope and assurance to those of a contract heart.

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Jesus said, 'I am the resurrection and the life.

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He who believes in me,

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though he die, yet shall he live.

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And whoever lives and believes in me shall never die.'

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As a father pities his children,

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so the Lord pities those who fear him,

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who is like unto God,

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who pardons iniquity,

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and passes over transgression.

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This is the message which we have heard of him

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and declare unto you,

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that God is light

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and in him is no darkness at all.

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If we walk in the light,

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as he is in the light,

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we have fellowship one with another,

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and the blood of Jesus Christ

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cleanses us from all sin.

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I declare unto you,

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in the name of Jesus Christ,

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you are free of your sins

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and able to live

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and to affirm his light.

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Let us unite our hearts together

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in the prayer of all Christians.

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Our Father, who art in heaven,

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hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come,

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thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

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Give us this day our daily bread,

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and forgive us our trespasses

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as we forgive those who trespass against us,

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and lead us not into temptation,

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but deliver us from evil.

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For thine is the kingdom,

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and the power and the glory for ever.

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Amen.

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Let us hear the word of God

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as it is contained in the Epistle to the Colossians,

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3:5-17.

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"Put to death, therefore,

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what is earthly in you.

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Immorality impurity, passion,

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evil desire, and covetousness,

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which is idolatry.

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On account of these the wrath of God is coming.

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In these you once walked

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when you lived in them.

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But now, put them all away.

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Anger, wrath, malice,

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slander, and foul talk from your mouth.

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Do not lie to one another,

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seeing that you have put off the old nature

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with its practices

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and have put on the new nature,

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which is being renewed in the knowledge

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after the image of its creator.

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Here, there cannot be Greek and Jew,

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circumcised and uncircumcised,

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barbarian, Scythian,

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slave, free man,

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but Christ is all and in all.

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Put on then as God's chosen ones,

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holy and beloved,

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compassion, kindness,

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loneliness, meekness,

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and patience

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for bearing one another and,

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if one has a complaint against another,

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forgiving each other,

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as the Lord has forgiven you.

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So you also must forgive.

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And above all these put on love,

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which binds everything together in a perfect harmony.

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And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts

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to which indeed you were called in one body.

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And be thankful.

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Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly,

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as you teach and admonish one another in all wisdom,

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and as you sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,

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with thankfulness in your heart unto God.

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And whatever you do,

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in word or deed,

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do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus,

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giving thanks to God the Father through Him."

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Here ends the reading of the lesson.

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The Lord be with you.

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Let us pray.

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O mighty God,

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who art the giver of every good and perfect gift,

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receive and hear we ask,

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these are prayers of thanksgiving.

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O Lord, our Father,

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on this day, we would offer unto thee

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our thanks for the beauty of earth,

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which now has created

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and given unto us for our use

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For beauty, O Lord,

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wherever our eyes have seen it,

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in the heavens or on the earth,

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in the blossoming of flowers,

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in the greenness of grass,

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in a world, awakened by the coming of the spring sun.

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For beauty that is heard,

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whether in the voice of man

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or in the music of manifold instruments,

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whether it be in the song of a bird

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or in the laughter of a child,

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we give thee our thanks.

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For the beauty that is neither seen nor heard,

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deeper than our flesh,

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higher than the stars,

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the grace of lasting human affection,

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of forgiveness freely given,

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and of hospitality boldly offered by our neighbors,

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we offer thee our thanks.

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For all the beauty, O Lord,

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we bow our hearts gratefully on this day

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and in reverence,

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and for him in whom life became

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a great redeeming grace on this day,

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we offer thee our thanks.

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We remember also with thanks, O Lord,

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every triumph of the spirit,

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every resurrection of life from death,

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of hope from despair,

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of love from hate,

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and we give thee our thanks.

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For all the joys,

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which the beauty of thy world creates,

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for that joy men know in the creation of beauty themselves,

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for all the joys of truth,

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and for that joy men know

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in the struggle with mystery and with the unknown,

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we give thee thanks.

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For the joy of hands at work

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or at prayer or at play,

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for the joy of the seeing eye

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and the understanding heart

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and the creative spirit,

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for the joy of struggle and for the joy of rest,

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for the joy of deeds,

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and the joy of the dreams out of which they came,

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for all these joys and others,

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such as any of us who are willing may know,

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we give thee thanks.

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Through Him who first made this

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a time of joy and celebration.

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O God, if we give thee thanks for bread and meat,

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for the shelter of house and warmth of clothing,

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for daily work and for thoughtful friends,

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for reasonable margins of security and comfort,

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and yet have no pain of heart,

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no anguish in the midst of our ease,

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that even now our brothers and sisters,

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thy sons and daughters,

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are in our world, in our city,

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starving, homeless, hopeless,

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with no sign of human caring,

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fearing tomorrow, sometimes, more than death.

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Then leave us, we ask, without thy blessing

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until we learn again in the ways of mercy.

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Deliver us, O God,

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from the gross sin of indifference,

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and sanctify to us

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that which we enjoy,

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that by the courage and kindness,

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which thou alone can give.

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We may be unable to share it with the world.

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O God, who has set the solitary in families,

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and given us happiness in one another,

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we give thee thanks

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that the deepest joys of our life can be those

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and that we may share with others.

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We give thee thanks for the enrichment

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and the support of love and marriage,

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and parenthood,

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for the blessings of friendship,

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and for the claims of duty and responsibility

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that quicken our humanity.

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We lift up our hearts and our prayers

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in intercession for those who are lonely,

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for the bereaved,

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for those who are torn away from those that they love,

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for those who live in countries that are at war,

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and especially for those

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who have created loneliness for themselves

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through pride and fear,

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who have cut themselves off from their neighbors,

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and also for, from thee.

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We pray, O Lord,

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for those who are strong

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and who have not learned to share their strength,

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for those who are impatient with the problems of others,

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and for those who have all the answers

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and refuse to listen to any of the questions,

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We pray O Lord for all those who are bitter in spirit,

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inflicting pain on others

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because they are hurt or bewildered,

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for those who are seeking recognition

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by outrageous conduct and sarcastic speech,

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for all those who seek revenge on society

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by refusing to cooperate,

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and we pray for ourselves, O Lord.

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We pray for words

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to restore self-respect and to awaken hope,

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for sensitiveness to know the time to speak

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and the time to be silent,

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for the courage to be frank,

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and for the ability to speak the truth in love.

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And we ask, O Lord, for freedom.

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For freedom from self,

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and for such commitment to Christ

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and the meaning of his resurrection,

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that we will be liberated to be perpetual intercessors

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living for, and with, other people in this thy world.

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These in all things, O Lord,

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we ask in the name of Jesus Christ

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who came,

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who lived among us,

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who died for us,

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and who rose again to offer us life eternally.

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Amen.

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O God, our Father,

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we thank thee for the privilege of giving

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without which our lives would be impoverished, indeed.

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We pray for grace to give well,

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to help without patronizing,

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to assist without weakening,

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to share without diminishing the self-respect of others,

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with these gifts,

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for the work and the witness of this community,

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we offer our prayers for the one church

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of Jesus Christ throughout all the world.

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In his name, we pray.

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Amen.

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The topic I have chosen for my sermon this morning,

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or the title, "Christ the Pattern,"

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I am sure to modern ears,

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both young and old,

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sounds just a bit old-fashioned.

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This is also true in my own case,

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partly because my theological training

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included strong injunctions

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against taking seriously the idea

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that a Christian should follow the Jesus way of life.

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At the time I was in seminary,

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Sheldon's book, "In His Steps," was still in vogue,

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and its rather thin humanism was very much in disrepute.

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Actually, I chose this title for these very reasons,

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that it does refer to the old-fashioned idea

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of making Christ the pattern for our lives.

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And, also, because I'm not so sure, as I once was,

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that the Jesus way of life is all wet

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as a meaningful approach to the Christian life.

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Like a great many others,

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I recently have been reading

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Joseph Fletcher's provocative book, "Situation Ethics:

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The New Morality."

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Also, like many others,

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I find very much in it to agree with

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and not too much to disagree with,

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though I am puzzled by the stress he places

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on a non-biblical idea.

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The idea that the only law binding on a Christian

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is to love God in one's neighbor.

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He sounds a bit too much like a Hindu here for me,

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but my purpose in referring to Fletcher

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is not to discuss his ideas so much

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as to use some of them for a starting place.

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Since he is a typical exponent

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of current relativism in the area of ethics,

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I could not agree more with his opposition

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to two approaches to ethical living.

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The first of which is that happiness

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is the test for ethical decisions.

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I agree with him that personal happiness

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is not a truly Christian basis for making ethical decisions.

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Happiness too easily becomes not only a warm puppy,

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but also no exams, no classes, no responsibilities,

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nothing that is frustrating to one's personal wishes

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and selfish desires must be tolerated

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if one is to be happy.

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I also agree with his opposition to legalism

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as an approach to Christian ethics,

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or rather, I agree that legalism

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never has been a truly Christian approach to ethics.

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That is to say Jesus and Paul

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were in strong opposition to the legalistic strain

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of the Judaism of their day.

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But Judaism, itself, was nowhere near as legalistic

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as many Christian interpreters would have it be.

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But, in spite of Fletcher's attempts to be scientific,

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by including case studies

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as an approach to ethical decisions,

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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,

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which cannot be altered,

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he still leaves the average Christian up in the air

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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.

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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,

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which assumes that the Bible is relative for our day,

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not because it is the Bible,

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but because the people in the Bible

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and the people of the day are very much the same.

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Not to overlook at profound corollary

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that the God of the Bible is also the same today

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as he was in biblical times.

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That is to say the messages of Amos, Isaiah,

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Moses, Jeremiah, Jesus, and Paul,

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all had to do with persons and their personal problems.

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Hate, love, fear, kindness, and good will

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are all human emotions and qualities

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which have not changed over the millennia.

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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.

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This stress runs counter to our basic axiom

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about the relevance of the Bible.

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It is true that Amos' day was one of ox carts,

39:06

and Jesus' day was one of Roman roads,

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and our day is one in which skillful engineers

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can do marvelous things

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with modern materials and equipment.

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Yet, I spent last week in the Los Angeles area,

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where it was necessary for me to travel

39:23

as much as a hundred miles daily

39:25

through rush hour traffic

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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,

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especially when the traffic plugged up and stalled,

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or when some driver,

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not yet fully converted to Christianity,

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wove in-and-out of traffic,

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endangering not only his

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but the lives of many others as well.

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In a recent book by Konrad Lorenz,

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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.

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To read his description

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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,

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as Lorenz himself points out,

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hopeful because his analysis may help us

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to see ourselves in a more clear light.

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But, the fact remains

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that man is a beast all too often,

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and he is as much a wolf to his fellow man today

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as he was in the time of Amos or of St. Paul.

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If it is true that in our Atomic Age,

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we have 10 times or 1,000 times

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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,

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10 to one, 10 to 10,

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or 10,000 to 10,000 are all equal.

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They're all equal to the ratio of one to one,

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or of one, or to repeat.

41:06

The Bible is relevant to our day because

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it treats the same human problems

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that continue to plague mankind.

41:13

Now, one of the fascinating problems

41:18

that one meets in reading the letters of Paul

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is that he so seldom quotes the words of Jesus

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when he is offering advice to the first Christians

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on how to meet ethical problems.

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Instead, he does something most interesting.

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He continually refers to the pattern of Christ

41:34

as the example to follow.

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Although, a large proportion of Paul's letters

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have to do with ethical problems and recommendations

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on what the Christians should do about them.

41:45

He almost never quotes teachings of Jesus,

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or, at least, ones that we find in the Four Gospels.

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Yet, again and again,

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Paul will use such phrases as "Do this in Christ,"

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"as is pleasing in Christ," "as Christ did," and so on.

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Paul seemed to feel that

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if one followed the pattern of Christ,

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he did not need to worry about following the law of Moses,

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just as Joseph Fletcher opposes the legalism

42:11

of much Protestant ethics.

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But, there appears to me to be a radical difference

42:15

between the negative opposition to law

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by Joseph Fletcher and other contemporary ethical teachers,

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and the positive emphasis of which Paul offers us.

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If I read Fletcher rightly,

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he is saying that all the 10 Commandments

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have much to commend them,

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they should not be considered always binding

42:35

in every situation.

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There are times that it might be right

42:40

to break any one of the 10 Commandments,

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if the situation and the commandment

42:44

of love for a neighbor require it.

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Such obvious illustrations as mercy killings,

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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.

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Although, what I'm about to say

43:05

is a caricature of Fletcher's position.

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Any enemy undoubtedly would expect

43:08

a much more sophisticated response to his ideas.

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On my part, I find myself thinking

43:13

of the 10 Commandments a la Joe Fletcher follows.

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"Thou shalt, normally, not kill.

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Thou shalt, normally, not steal.

43:23

Thou shalt, normally, not commit adultery,"

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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

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(man speaking indistinctly)

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-

I'm not sure.

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(indistinct speech)

David G. Bradley - "Christ the Pattern" (April 2, 1967)

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