Howard C. Wilkinson - "Christian Mellontology" (March 21, 1971)
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| (organ music) | 0:06 | |
| (choir music) | 1:07 | |
| (choir continues) | 3:32 | |
| - | If we say we have no sin, | 3:53 |
| we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. | 3:57 | |
| If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just | 4:04 | |
| to forgive us our sins, | 4:11 | |
| and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. | 4:14 | |
| Therefore, let us offer unto God, | 4:18 | |
| our unison prayer of confession. | 4:20 | |
| Let us pray. | 4:24 | |
| Oh, righteous father, | 4:27 | |
| before whose holiness our hearts tremble, | 4:29 | |
| we humbly confess the many sins with which we have | 4:33 | |
| dishonored thy name, | 4:37 | |
| our shortcomings in faith, obedience, and love. | 4:40 | |
| We confess that we have failed to love our enemies | 4:45 | |
| and to do good to those who hate us. | 4:49 | |
| We have pointed to the speck in our brother's eye, | 4:53 | |
| but have not noticed the log in our own eye. | 4:57 | |
| We often have behaved as badly as those | 5:01 | |
| who are not of the household of faith. | 5:04 | |
| We pray thee to forgive us our sins, | 5:08 | |
| and to enable us to make a gracious witness for Christ | 5:11 | |
| in the world. | 5:15 | |
| We pray in his name, Amen. | 5:17 | |
| And hear these words of the assurance of pardon | 5:22 | |
| as the heaven is high above the earth, | 5:26 | |
| so great is God's mercy toward them that fear Him. | 5:30 | |
| As far as the east is from the west | 5:35 | |
| so far have God removed our transgressions from us. | 5:40 | |
| Therefore be of good courage. | 5:46 | |
| There is one announcement. | 5:52 | |
| The order of the anthems | 5:55 | |
| and the order of service has been reversed. | 5:56 | |
| This is the only announcement. | 6:02 | |
| (organ music) | 6:05 | |
| (choir music) | 6:54 | |
| (choir music continues) | 10:02 | |
| - | The scripture today is taken from the 16th chapter of | 10:21 |
| Matthew, | 10:24 | |
| the first through the fourth verses, | 10:25 | |
| and from the 12th chapter of Luke, | 10:28 | |
| the 54th through the 56th verses. | 10:30 | |
| The Pharisees and Sadducees came. | 10:34 | |
| And to test him, | 10:37 | |
| they asked him to show them a sign from heaven. | 10:38 | |
| His answer was, in the evening you say it will be fine | 10:41 | |
| weather for the sky is red. | 10:47 | |
| And in the morning, you say, | 10:49 | |
| it will be stormy today for the sky is red and threatening. | 10:51 | |
| You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky. | 10:56 | |
| Can you not interpret the signs of the times? | 11:00 | |
| It is a wicked generation that asks for a sign | 11:04 | |
| and the only sign that will be given it, | 11:07 | |
| is the sign of Jonah. | 11:10 | |
| He also said to the people, | 11:13 | |
| when you see clouds banking up in the west, you say at once, | 11:15 | |
| it's going to rain, and it does. | 11:19 | |
| And when the wind is from the south, | 11:22 | |
| you say, there will be a heat wave. | 11:24 | |
| And there is. | 11:27 | |
| What hypocrites you are. | 11:29 | |
| You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky. | 11:31 | |
| How is it that you cannot interpret this fateful hour? | 11:36 | |
| (organ music) | 11:43 | |
| (choir music) | 11:51 | |
| - | The Lord be with you? | 12:24 |
| Let us pray. | 12:28 | |
| Let us offer unto God, a prayer of Thanksgiving. | 12:35 | |
| Most gracious father | 12:40 | |
| who forever a new generation preparess thy blessings, | 12:42 | |
| we thy people offer this prayer Thanksgiving, | 12:48 | |
| for the assurance of sins forgiven, | 12:53 | |
| for the power love has given us to lay hold | 12:57 | |
| of things unseen. | 13:00 | |
| For the strong sense we have that | 13:03 | |
| this world is not our abiding home, | 13:07 | |
| for our restless hearts, which nothing finite can satisfy. | 13:12 | |
| We give thee thanks oh God, | 13:18 | |
| for the invasion of our souls by the holy spirit, | 13:22 | |
| for all human love and goodness that speak to us of thee, | 13:26 | |
| for the fullness of thy glory outpoured in Jesus Christ. | 13:33 | |
| We give thee thanks. | 13:38 | |
| Oh God, thou author of every good. | 13:40 | |
| And let us offer three prayers of intercession. | 13:46 | |
| We bring before the, oh God, | 13:52 | |
| the troubles and perils of peoples and nations, | 13:54 | |
| the sighing of prisoners and captives and refugees. | 13:58 | |
| The sorrows of the bereaved, | 14:03 | |
| the necessities of strangers, | 14:06 | |
| the helplessness of the weak, | 14:10 | |
| the despondency of the weary, | 14:13 | |
| the failing powers of the aged. | 14:16 | |
| Oh God, even through us, draw near to each, | 14:20 | |
| for the sake of Jesus Christ, our Lord. | 14:26 | |
| Almighty God who through thy profit and thy son | 14:32 | |
| has instructed the church to proclaim | 14:35 | |
| release to the captives, | 14:38 | |
| and liberty for those who are oppressed. | 14:41 | |
| Hear our special prayer of intercession, | 14:45 | |
| for our countrymen who are prisoners of war | 14:49 | |
| or missing in action, | 14:52 | |
| whom we would neither forget, nor abandon. | 14:55 | |
| Be with them. | 15:01 | |
| Be our representative. | 15:05 | |
| Be thou the comforter, | 15:08 | |
| remedy the folly and the wrongdoing of those | 15:12 | |
| who led us into this conflict, | 15:15 | |
| which has so little obvious meaning, | 15:19 | |
| and who depend on others, the young, | 15:23 | |
| the drafted, the out of place, | 15:27 | |
| to carry out their doubtful strategy. | 15:31 | |
| And yet their fault is also our fault, | 15:35 | |
| because we elected them. | 15:41 | |
| We can do so little for our fellows who are prisoners. | 15:45 | |
| We have to leave them in thy hands. | 15:48 | |
| We commit them to the, | 15:53 | |
| asking thee to keep reminding us, to remember them. | 15:56 | |
| Almighty and merciful God who woulds't have the kingdoms | 16:04 | |
| of this world become thy kingdom on earth. | 16:07 | |
| Bestow thy blessing upon all who labor for peace | 16:10 | |
| and for righteousness among the peoples, | 16:13 | |
| in Washington and Moscow, | 16:17 | |
| and Tel Aviv and Cairo, | 16:21 | |
| in Geneva and New York. | 16:23 | |
| That the day may be hastened when war shall be no more. | 16:27 | |
| And thy holy will, shall govern the nations upon the earth. | 16:31 | |
| And let us offer two prayers of supplication. | 16:38 | |
| Almighty God who has called us through Jesus Christ | 16:44 | |
| to be thy sons and daughters | 16:47 | |
| give us so to know at this season of lent, | 16:51 | |
| Christ and his life, | 16:55 | |
| that the same mind, which wasn't him, may be in us, | 16:58 | |
| that we may be in the world as he was in the world, | 17:02 | |
| give us so to know Christ and his death that we may not | 17:08 | |
| glory save in his cross, | 17:13 | |
| whereby the world is crucified unto us, | 17:17 | |
| give us so to know Christ and the power of his resurrection. | 17:21 | |
| That like as he was raised from the dead by thy glory. | 17:25 | |
| We also may walk in newness of life | 17:30 | |
| through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord. | 17:35 | |
| Help us this day oh God to serve thee devoutly | 17:42 | |
| in the world busily. | 17:45 | |
| May we do out the work wisely, | 17:48 | |
| gifts offered secretly, | 17:51 | |
| go to our meet appetitely, sit there at discreetly, | 17:54 | |
| arise temperately please, | 17:59 | |
| our friend duly go to our bed merrily | 18:01 | |
| and sleep surely, | 18:05 | |
| for the joy of our Lord, Jesus Christ. | 18:07 | |
| And now as our savior Christ has taught us, | 18:12 | |
| We humbly pray together. | 18:16 | |
| Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, | 18:19 | |
| thy kingdom come, thy will be done | 18:24 | |
| on earth as it is in heaven. | 18:28 | |
| Give us this day, | 18:31 | |
| our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, | 18:32 | |
| as we forgive those who trespass against us | 18:36 | |
| and lead us, not into temptation, | 18:40 | |
| but deliver us from evil, | 18:43 | |
| for thine is the kingdom | 18:45 | |
| and the power and the glory forever. | 18:47 | |
| Amen. | 18:51 | |
| - | Now let's see. | 19:15 |
| We come to church to do several things. | 19:16 | |
| One is to adore God, | 19:21 | |
| to confess our unworthiness before him, | 19:25 | |
| and receive his assurance, | 19:30 | |
| that we are acceptable to Him. | 19:33 | |
| To ask for new blessings, | 19:37 | |
| to express our gratitude to God and to one another, | 19:41 | |
| to intercede for our fellows. | 19:47 | |
| We also come to church for fellowship | 19:53 | |
| and to hear the witness, | 19:58 | |
| which the church is led to make, | 20:01 | |
| about the contemporary meaning of Christian faith, | 20:06 | |
| and then to respond to this witness | 20:11 | |
| and to the call of God, | 20:17 | |
| in personal dedication, | 20:21 | |
| and to offer God ourselves, our money, our influence. | 20:25 | |
| Well, now we are at the point at this moment | 20:32 | |
| where the witness of the church is scheduled. | 20:37 | |
| Now this could be done in any one of a number of ways. | 20:41 | |
| We could have a movie shown now, | 20:46 | |
| which would portray some aspect of the contemporary meaning | 20:48 | |
| of the faith. | 20:53 | |
| We could watch that. | 20:54 | |
| Or we could pause now for 20, 25 minutes | 20:57 | |
| and have the members of the church who are in the pews | 21:01 | |
| to turn to each other and explain in conversational fashion, | 21:05 | |
| how you understand the faith to each other. | 21:10 | |
| What is usually done in church is one person who has been | 21:15 | |
| set aside for that purpose and who it is expected has made | 21:18 | |
| some preparation, will on behalf of the church, | 21:23 | |
| make an attempt to explain some aspect of the contemporary | 21:28 | |
| meaning of the faith. | 21:31 | |
| Now that's what I plan to do in this sermon that I have | 21:34 | |
| prepared today, but I want to get you involved in this too. | 21:37 | |
| And so there is a witness I would like you to make to each | 21:42 | |
| other in the pews before I make my witness. | 21:46 | |
| And it's a very important witness | 21:50 | |
| that I would like for you to make. | 21:52 | |
| You can say to each other, | 21:56 | |
| that there is nothing between you, | 21:58 | |
| that stands between you as a barrier. | 22:01 | |
| You can express friendship, acceptance to each other, | 22:05 | |
| and this can be done by a handshake and a smile. | 22:11 | |
| And so now before I make my witness, | 22:16 | |
| I'd like for you to make your witness to someone near you | 22:18 | |
| in the pew, okay? | 22:21 | |
| All right. | 22:34 | |
| Now what you have done is probably more important than what | 22:35 | |
| I'm going to do, | 22:37 | |
| even though what I do will take more time than what you did. | 22:39 | |
| Gerald Kennedy tells an interesting story | 22:47 | |
| about a baccalaureate sermon preached in the early 1890s | 22:50 | |
| by a Bishop Milton Wright, | 22:54 | |
| who was a leader in the United brethren church. | 22:57 | |
| In his sermon, the Bishop took note of some speculation | 23:01 | |
| that was going around to the effect | 23:07 | |
| that man would one day fly. | 23:08 | |
| He declared that this was loose talk | 23:12 | |
| and nothing would come of it. | 23:15 | |
| Where if God had wanted man to fly, | 23:17 | |
| he would have equipped us with wings | 23:19 | |
| or at least would have predicted in the Bible, | 23:22 | |
| that man would fly. | 23:25 | |
| Now the truly significant part of that bit of history is | 23:28 | |
| that Bishop Wright had two young sons at home | 23:31 | |
| named Orville and Wilbur. | 23:35 | |
| Most of Bishop Wright's contemporaries agreed with him, | 23:41 | |
| that the whole idea of powered flight was ridiculous. | 23:45 | |
| Not because they had | 23:49 | |
| carefully, scientifically, and logically | 23:50 | |
| examined the factors involved in flying | 23:53 | |
| and had found the project to be theoretically impossible, | 23:56 | |
| but they rejected the idea | 24:01 | |
| because nobody had ever flown before, | 24:03 | |
| and they weren't sure how it would affect their lives, | 24:07 | |
| if powered flight indeed should become a reality. | 24:10 | |
| Now looking back on those days | 24:15 | |
| with the advantage of hindsight, | 24:17 | |
| it seems very strange that the majority of people | 24:20 | |
| then living would not have expected man to fly. | 24:23 | |
| If they had listened to the facts | 24:28 | |
| and the theories of the Wright brothers | 24:29 | |
| while they were building their flying machine. | 24:32 | |
| But the facts and theories were not the determining | 24:36 | |
| ingredients in the molding of the public mind. | 24:42 | |
| The mental inertia of the majority was what molded it. | 24:48 | |
| I bring this up today because unfortunately that incident | 24:56 | |
| is not an exception to the rule. | 25:00 | |
| Rather, it is typical of the reaction which humans make | 25:03 | |
| to any prediction of strange or unusual happenings. | 25:08 | |
| Dipping back into history, | 25:14 | |
| we find a committee appointed by King Ferdinand | 25:16 | |
| and Queen Isabella in Spain reported to the crown | 25:19 | |
| in the year 1490, that a voyage, | 25:23 | |
| such as the one proposed by Christopher Columbus, | 25:26 | |
| would be foolish. | 25:29 | |
| And for the following reasons, | 25:31 | |
| one, a voyage to India | 25:34 | |
| would take longer than man could endure. | 25:37 | |
| Two, the Western ocean is infinite, | 25:40 | |
| and perhaps unnavigable. | 25:43 | |
| Three, if Columbus reached the Antiphates, | 25:46 | |
| he couldn't get back. | 25:50 | |
| Four, there are no antiphates. | 25:52 | |
| Five, three of the five earthly zones | 25:55 | |
| are habitable and two are not. | 26:00 | |
| Last of all, they said this long after creation, | 26:04 | |
| it is not likely that anything of value is still | 26:08 | |
| undiscovered. | 26:11 | |
| Now, before we smiled too broadly | 26:15 | |
| at the embarrassment of either | 26:18 | |
| Bishop Wright or the Spanish crowns committee, | 26:20 | |
| you and I can reflect upon the recent comments we have heard | 26:24 | |
| and which some of us may even have made, | 26:29 | |
| about the impossibility of man's walking | 26:32 | |
| on the surface of the moon. | 26:35 | |
| Remember? | 26:37 | |
| Many of our most trusted leaders of science | 26:40 | |
| and of government who are still living, | 26:43 | |
| freely predicted that the human attempt to land on the moon | 26:45 | |
| would be a tragic failure. | 26:50 | |
| Yet by means of live television, | 26:52 | |
| you and I have personally witnessed | 26:55 | |
| a man playing golf on the moon. | 26:57 | |
| We may be able to learn something from that, | 27:01 | |
| which will illuminate our religious and ethical behavior. | 27:04 | |
| And for that reason, let's ask the question, | 27:09 | |
| why did so many people refuse to believe that a successful | 27:13 | |
| landing could be made on the moon? | 27:18 | |
| Was it because the planners of the moon voyage announced | 27:22 | |
| that everything depended on luck? | 27:26 | |
| Nope. | 27:30 | |
| They had studied every detail of what would be necessary for | 27:32 | |
| the venture. | 27:35 | |
| The steps of the flight are pretty widely known for years in | 27:37 | |
| advance. | 27:40 | |
| Robert Goddard, who worked on rockets for 37 years, | 27:43 | |
| and he was always willing to discuss his theories, | 27:46 | |
| his accomplishments, his hopes, and his plans. | 27:49 | |
| In fact, as long ago, as the year 1919, | 27:54 | |
| the Smithsonian institution published a paper by Goddard, | 27:59 | |
| in which he discussed reaching the moon by rockets. | 28:04 | |
| But it seemed to many that too much of the venture depended | 28:10 | |
| upon the accuracy of Einstein's theories, | 28:14 | |
| and too much of it dependent upon the unproven performance | 28:19 | |
| of the rocket out in space. | 28:23 | |
| Also, and most importantly, | 28:25 | |
| nobody had ever landed on the moon before. | 28:29 | |
| So forget it. | 28:32 | |
| However, you and I have the privileged opportunity | 28:36 | |
| to observe today that since no one showed any real error | 28:40 | |
| in the theories and since no one could discover flaws | 28:46 | |
| in the accepted facts, | 28:50 | |
| one hot day in July of 1969, | 28:52 | |
| Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins blasted off, | 28:57 | |
| and whatever else they accomplished, | 29:02 | |
| they magnificently celebrated the triumph of fact, | 29:05 | |
| and honest theory over old wives tales | 29:10 | |
| and defeatist standfast conservatism. | 29:15 | |
| That stands as a solid achievement of that trip into space. | 29:19 | |
| So from that experience, | 29:28 | |
| and at our vantage point in history, | 29:31 | |
| we should learn and never forget the lesson that if one's | 29:34 | |
| facts are solid, | 29:38 | |
| and if the theories based on the facts are logical, | 29:39 | |
| one may trust the projection of the theories, | 29:43 | |
| even though those projections may seem strange, | 29:46 | |
| may never have happened before, | 29:51 | |
| or even if they are dramatically good or horribly bad. | 29:53 | |
| Now it's unlikely that we could overemphasize the importance | 30:00 | |
| of that, because we were already living in a day | 30:04 | |
| when advances in science and technology | 30:07 | |
| have not only set in motion forces | 30:10 | |
| that are radically altering the shape | 30:12 | |
| of our physical environment, | 30:14 | |
| but which more importantly are thrusting upon us, | 30:17 | |
| social changes equally radical. | 30:21 | |
| In such a situation, 'tis terribly foolish, | 30:27 | |
| not to give serious attention to the proven facts | 30:31 | |
| and the logical theories, | 30:35 | |
| which bear upon the questions of human welfare. | 30:37 | |
| Yet, what do we find? | 30:43 | |
| We find that in this exciting new day of discovery | 30:46 | |
| and exploration, | 30:49 | |
| in this Aladdin moment of seeming magic, | 30:51 | |
| many people are acting from a mindset of the middle ages, | 30:57 | |
| unwilling to think critically about social issues, | 31:02 | |
| unwilling to examine where their own habits and customs, | 31:06 | |
| may be leading society or leading the nation or the world. | 31:11 | |
| We find people who project harsh and buggy assumptions | 31:17 | |
| onto jet-age problems, who take for granted | 31:21 | |
| that if a given kind of conduct was accepted by their | 31:25 | |
| grandpa, it therefore is acceptable for them now. | 31:28 | |
| Others, bewildered by the fast traffic | 31:34 | |
| on the Boulevard of ideas have copped out, | 31:38 | |
| to a schizophrenic, anti-intellectual stance, | 31:41 | |
| which from moment to moment, | 31:45 | |
| depends on the feelings and impulses of the physical body. | 31:46 | |
| And they listened to the voice of wisdom to come | 31:50 | |
| through their stomach, rather than in their mind. | 31:52 | |
| Now it is time that all of us should come wide awake | 31:58 | |
| and responsibly use our critical intelligence, honestly. | 32:01 | |
| That we should seek to identify the solid facts. | 32:06 | |
| That we should build on them logical theories | 32:09 | |
| and then govern our personal lives and our social practices | 32:13 | |
| by those facts and theories. | 32:17 | |
| Well, fortunately, | 32:22 | |
| there are already many people who are now applying critical | 32:24 | |
| intelligence to the future | 32:27 | |
| that is rushing so rapidly toward us. | 32:29 | |
| Robert Theobald, for example, is talking about | 32:34 | |
| a do-it-yourself future, which is very fascinating. | 32:39 | |
| We need to pay attention to what such people as Eddie Albert | 32:45 | |
| are saying about the future of our environment, | 32:49 | |
| what Ralph Nader is saying about the drift of American | 32:52 | |
| corporation habits, | 32:55 | |
| what Julian Bond and Jesse Jackson are saying | 32:57 | |
| about the future of racial interaction, | 33:00 | |
| and a group of theologians are writing about the future | 33:04 | |
| from a religious perspective. | 33:07 | |
| Some of those whose ideas deserve our attention | 33:10 | |
| are Kenneth Coffin, Edward Thornton, | 33:13 | |
| Jurgen Moltmann, Andrew Greeley, and Daniel Shores. | 33:16 | |
| They along with others are exploring Christian Mellontology | 33:21 | |
| for the benefit of the church and mankind. | 33:24 | |
| Now, for those who may not be familiar with that term, | 33:28 | |
| I will explain that the word mellontology | 33:32 | |
| came into being the same way the word theology did. | 33:34 | |
| That is by forming an English word from two Greek words. | 33:38 | |
| It is not a perfect concept. | 33:43 | |
| If one carries over into the composite term, | 33:45 | |
| all of the nuances of the Greek words, | 33:49 | |
| but essentially mellontology is the study of the being | 33:52 | |
| of the future. | 33:58 | |
| It's a term which has been used in the world future society. | 34:02 | |
| And it has had currency in at least two national magazines. | 34:06 | |
| These theologians that I mentioned are studying | 34:11 | |
| the religious facts of the present and the past | 34:13 | |
| with an eye toward the future. | 34:18 | |
| They're asking, for instance, | 34:21 | |
| what does it mean for the future church that adult church | 34:23 | |
| attendance in this country has declined 50% | 34:27 | |
| in the last 12 years? | 34:30 | |
| They are asking the future meaning of the present fact that | 34:35 | |
| one may change his or her sex at will. | 34:38 | |
| That one may transplant human organs from one body | 34:43 | |
| to another. | 34:46 | |
| That presumably one may soon be able voluntarily | 34:49 | |
| to rearrange the heredity codes in the genes. | 34:52 | |
| That one may program his dreams by chemistry | 34:56 | |
| even while awake. | 34:59 | |
| That subliminal persuasion of entire populations | 35:02 | |
| is now a present possibility. | 35:06 | |
| That cybernetics is here to stay. | 35:10 | |
| That human hibernation for extended periods, | 35:14 | |
| looms closely on the horizon. | 35:18 | |
| What does it mean we should do today | 35:23 | |
| to have any future at all for young people in New York city, | 35:26 | |
| where at present more young people are dying from heroin | 35:30 | |
| than from any other cause, | 35:34 | |
| more than from auto accidents, | 35:36 | |
| more than from homicide, suicide or cancer. | 35:39 | |
| What does this mean for 1980? | 35:43 | |
| Jesus criticized the religious leaders of his day | 35:47 | |
| because of their failure to make projections | 35:50 | |
| into the future on the basis of present facts. | 35:53 | |
| He declared to them, when evening comes, | 35:57 | |
| you say it will be fine, for the sky is red. | 36:01 | |
| In the morning you say it will be stormy today, | 36:05 | |
| for the sky is red and cloudy. | 36:07 | |
| You know how to distinguish the look of the sky, | 36:10 | |
| but you cannot read the signs of the times. | 36:14 | |
| Why was this true of people in Jesus day? | 36:20 | |
| And why is it still true in our own time? | 36:24 | |
| Well, in my opinion, there are two basic reasons. | 36:28 | |
| The first is our unwillingness to believe in the likelihood | 36:33 | |
| of anything radically new or different. | 36:37 | |
| Just as Bishop Wright could not accept | 36:42 | |
| the idea of a flying machine, | 36:44 | |
| and the Spanish committee could not visualize Columbus | 36:48 | |
| sailing his ship around a global earth, | 36:51 | |
| we have great difficulty trusting any predictions, | 36:55 | |
| whether happy or unpleasant, | 36:59 | |
| that portray a basically different event. | 37:01 | |
| There's some kind of psychological shock, | 37:07 | |
| which we suffer under these circumstances. | 37:10 | |
| And we apparently feel subconsciously that the prediction | 37:13 | |
| will not come to pass | 37:17 | |
| if we only will deny it vehemently enough. | 37:19 | |
| We're like the proverbial ostrich, | 37:24 | |
| which sees something big coming and whose strategy | 37:27 | |
| for making it go away is to bury his own head in the sand. | 37:29 | |
| Now, I don't wish to minimize this shock | 37:36 | |
| because it's very genuine. | 37:38 | |
| Alvin Toffler has written in his new book, Future Shock, | 37:41 | |
| that an increasing number of people are suffering | 37:46 | |
| from the impact of social change that is coming | 37:50 | |
| with a greater rapidity, than they can adjust to. | 37:53 | |
| So this psychological shock is one reason | 37:59 | |
| for the ostrich-like stance, which many people take | 38:02 | |
| when something strangely different is predicted. | 38:06 | |
| But it's not the only cause. | 38:11 | |
| And there's another factor | 38:13 | |
| which often is more powerful than that one. | 38:14 | |
| When a predicted event is of a tragic nature, | 38:18 | |
| and when it appears that we are presently doing something, | 38:23 | |
| which is contributing toward that tragedy, | 38:29 | |
| we resist the acknowledgement that | 38:33 | |
| the prediction will come true because of personal pain. | 38:35 | |
| It would be painful to admit | 38:41 | |
| that we are contributing to the future tragedy. | 38:44 | |
| And in many instances it would be painful to prevent that | 38:48 | |
| tragedy by making some necessary change in our style of life | 38:51 | |
| at the present. | 38:56 | |
| Suppose for example, | 39:00 | |
| someone should step forward and predict | 39:01 | |
| that the United States will be bankrupt, | 39:04 | |
| and the free enterprise system | 39:08 | |
| will be in utter chaos within five years, | 39:10 | |
| unless we stop militarily defending | 39:14 | |
| corrupt governments abroad, | 39:17 | |
| and pouring billions of dollars worth of chemicals | 39:19 | |
| and hardware into distant jungles. | 39:22 | |
| What reaction would greet such a prophecy? | 39:26 | |
| Would Pentagon officials rush forward | 39:31 | |
| to ask how they can help prevent this bankruptcy? | 39:33 | |
| Would the leaders of the military industrial complex | 39:37 | |
| ask the prophet what facts and what reasoning | 39:40 | |
| he based his prediction on? | 39:43 | |
| Probably not. | 39:46 | |
| The prophet probably would be greeted with anger | 39:49 | |
| and rejection, and an attempt would be made | 39:52 | |
| to make it appear that the prophet himself was | 39:55 | |
| the problem and that if he would only keep his mouth shut, | 39:58 | |
| everything would be all right. | 40:01 | |
| Or, suppose the profit should step forward and predict | 40:05 | |
| that America will have a conservative dictatorship | 40:10 | |
| within four years, | 40:13 | |
| unless the disruptive radicals soon become less disruptive, | 40:16 | |
| and the intransigent conservatives become less intransigent. | 40:21 | |
| What reaction could such a prophet expect? | 40:28 | |
| Would he not be angrily attacked both by the violence prone | 40:33 | |
| radicals who hate dictatorship | 40:37 | |
| and by the reactionary conservatives who, | 40:40 | |
| although not hating all forms of dictatorship, | 40:43 | |
| nevertheless would not want to be accused of helping such a | 40:46 | |
| thing to come about. | 40:50 | |
| Or again, | 40:55 | |
| suppose a prophet should arise and predict | 40:56 | |
| that 10 years from now in universities | 40:59 | |
| such as Yale and Duke and Princeton and Harvard, | 41:02 | |
| one professor out of every five will have to be retired | 41:07 | |
| early on account of alcoholism, | 41:11 | |
| unless present drinking trends and attitudes | 41:14 | |
| change very significantly. | 41:17 | |
| What reaction would greet him? | 41:21 | |
| Would the drinkers ask, | 41:24 | |
| what facts and factors lay behind his predictions? | 41:25 | |
| Would the faculty appoint a university-wide committee | 41:29 | |
| to study the situation about drinking? | 41:33 | |
| Would anyone ask whether his own habits might be moving | 41:36 | |
| in that direction? | 41:40 | |
| Well, what is more likely is that the prophet himself | 41:43 | |
| would be ridiculed, | 41:46 | |
| and perhaps an attempt would be made to silence him. | 41:48 | |
| Now for a final example, | 41:53 | |
| let us back up 25 years, | 41:54 | |
| and ask a slightly different type of question | 41:58 | |
| about a tragedy, which has already happened. | 42:01 | |
| Suppose that 25 years ago, | 42:05 | |
| some prophet had gone through the lecture halls of the | 42:09 | |
| cities of Buffalo, Erie, Cleveland, Toledo, and Detroit, | 42:12 | |
| predicting that by the end of the decade of the sixties, | 42:20 | |
| lake Erie would be dead. | 42:25 | |
| Dead from the pollution of the | 42:29 | |
| cities of Buffalo, Erie, Cleveland, Toledo, and Detroit. | 42:30 | |
| What reaction would have greeted him? | 42:37 | |
| Would the five chambers of commerce have jointly given them, | 42:40 | |
| given the man of metal for alerting them in time to a coming | 42:43 | |
| tragedy, which they could prevent? | 42:48 | |
| I doubt it. | 42:51 | |
| Jesus said, oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem that kill us, | 42:55 | |
| the prophets and stone us them that are sent unto her. | 43:00 | |
| How often would I have gathered thy children together? | 43:05 | |
| Even as a hen gathereth her own brood under her wings. | 43:09 | |
| And you would not. | 43:13 | |
| This, too often, is the fate of the prophet. | 43:16 | |
| But even as we're mindful of the certainty of tragedy, | 43:21 | |
| if wrong patterns remain unchanged, | 43:26 | |
| we are also mindful at the same time of the potentialities | 43:30 | |
| of great blessing. | 43:33 | |
| If God's people will turn and seek his face, | 43:35 | |
| the biblical view of history is never a closed one, | 43:40 | |
| never a deterministic one. | 43:45 | |
| There's always the possibility of grace. | 43:48 | |
| If we will but choose it in time. | 43:52 | |
| It is well summarized in these words of God, | 43:57 | |
| from the book of Deuteronomy. | 44:00 | |
| I have set before thee life and death, | 44:02 | |
| the blessing and the curse, | 44:07 | |
| therefore choose life that thou mayest live. | 44:11 | |
| If a nation will choose life, as God understands life, | 44:16 | |
| the possibilities of blessing and greatness are as dramatic | 44:21 | |
| as the possibilities of tragedy are, | 44:24 | |
| if a nation chooses death. | 44:27 | |
| Christian mellontology in this miracle age | 44:30 | |
| of science and technology holds open the possibility | 44:33 | |
| of the ending of war, | 44:36 | |
| the total elimination of poverty, | 44:38 | |
| the conquering of disease, | 44:41 | |
| the provision of generous leisure time for every worker, | 44:43 | |
| and an abundant life for every man, | 44:48 | |
| woman and child on the face of God's earth. | 44:52 | |
| And it seems undoubtable that a nation, | 44:57 | |
| which has the brains, the resources, and the courage, | 45:00 | |
| to put men on the moon can solve any problem | 45:05 | |
| it has on earth, | 45:09 | |
| if it will only bring to that problem, | 45:11 | |
| the same degree of commitment, | 45:13 | |
| which it brought to the moon project. | 45:15 | |
| However mistaken, Bishop Wright may have been | 45:21 | |
| in his ideas about flying, | 45:23 | |
| he did have at least one thing going for him. | 45:26 | |
| He had two young sons who had a correct idea about it, | 45:30 | |
| and who had the patience and the courage | 45:35 | |
| to translate the idea into reality, | 45:37 | |
| and who in the end brought honor even to their father. | 45:41 | |
| So today as our nation hesitates between choosing life | 45:47 | |
| and choosing death, | 45:52 | |
| I am hopeful that a nucleus of its sons and daughters | 45:55 | |
| may have a true idea of the future. | 46:01 | |
| And I pray that God will give them the patience | 46:04 | |
| and the courage to translate the idea into a reality | 46:06 | |
| which will bring blessing to humanity, and glory to God. | 46:12 | |
| And unto his name be honor, and power and glory. | 46:18 | |
| Now and evermore through the church | 46:22 | |
| in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. | 46:25 | |
| Amen. | 46:29 | |
| (organ music) | 46:32 | |
| (choir music) | 47:24 | |
| (choir music resumes) | 49:55 | |
| (organ resumes playing) | 57:56 | |
| (choir music resumes) | 58:18 | |
| - | All things come of thee oh God, | 59:15 |
| our silver and our gold and of thy known, do we give thee, | 59:18 | |
| as the symbol of ourselves in the name of Jesus Christ, | 59:25 | |
| our Lord. | 59:30 | |
| And may the blessing of God come upon you abundantly, | 59:36 | |
| may it keep you strong and tranquil in the truth of His | 59:41 | |
| promises through Jesus Christ, our Lord | 59:46 | |
| (choir continues) | 59:54 |
