George Outen - "Faith, Hope, and Love" (August 8, 1971) / Duke Chapel Recordings / Duke Digital Repository

♪ Holy Almighty God, king of creation ♪

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(instrumental music)

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Grace be to you and peace from God, our Father,

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and from the Lord, Jesus Christ.

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The gospel tells us that Christians are a people

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who accept life as a gift from God.

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Here at this time and this place,

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we hear again, who we are,

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and we stand in faith before the one who created us

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and gave us life.

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And it is also here again

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that we grasp what it means to truly live

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a free and human life

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under God.

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And in that light, we see our own attempts

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weakened, tired, and discouraged.

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And we realize that most of us have lived

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and used our life with reckless unconcern.

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And although our tongues and our hearts

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are a little used to confession,

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yet our lives make unavoidably plain

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the fact that we have tried to live

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on what the world offered us

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and that in our own inner selves,

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we are neither sustained nor satisfied.

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And thus, we hear again,

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the external call of God

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to come back again to his forgiving love,

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let us then offer unto God our prayer of confession

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and for pardon,

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let us pray.

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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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Almighty and forgiving God,

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we turn to thee in this act of worship,

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realizing afresh that we have no claim upon thee

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until we are real with ourselves,

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help us our Father to make this service

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and affirmation of faith and trust and honesty,

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thou art, our father,

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and we belong to thee.

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Only in thy presence are we genuinely human,

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thou art our maker and owner

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only in response to thy creative love

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are we capable of creation.

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Our Father, we believe that Jesus Christ is mighty to save

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and that we stand in constant need of his redeeming grace.

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We believe in thy Spirit

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quickening life and all things,

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vivifying the stale stuff of our tradition and our habit,

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and leading us upward into new conquests of life.

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Yet we are here today, not because we believe in thee,

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but because thou does believe in us,

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help us to stand in that faith and confess our sins.

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Father we have come out of a world

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where things have shouted at us,

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bullied us into listening,

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competed for our attention,

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bribed us with a hope of glittering prices.

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And now we find ourselves

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in the shy and delicate world of the Spirit

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where nothing shouts.

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Here, nothing is revealed except to the humble and contrite.

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And we confess that we are not humble

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though we would like to be deeply and truly humble,

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humble enough to bow to the authority of truth

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and goodness and beauty.

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We confess that we are not contrite

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though we are often sorry,

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sorry for ourselves and our own failures.

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Make us, our Father genuinely contrite,

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aware that the sins we commit are done against thee,

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and thy purposes of love.

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Forgive us, oh Lord what we have been,

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help us to truly amend what we are

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and in thy Spirit direct what we shall be

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that thou may as come into the full glory of thy creation

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in us and in all men,

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we ask it in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord.

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Amen.

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Let us hear and receive these assuring words

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of promise and of hope from the gospel.

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Jesus said to a repentance sinner,

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"Be of good cheer.

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Your sins are forgiven,

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go and sin no more."

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And the gospel tells us

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that the power that lighted the stars,

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that puts down evil and lifts up the poor from the dust

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can also transform our twisted and broken lives

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for the door of our freedom opens by itself

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for all who have not.

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Whoever is in Jesus, the liberator has become a new being.

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And so he who provides us with bread from the earth,

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air to breathe and fire to purify rottenness,

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now, also in his great waters of life,

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drowned your old self

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and give you a new beginning

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to the community of love, which is his church.

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Amen.

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So may it be for all of us.

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Let us respond to these new acceptances,

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these new meanings of the gospel message in our own life

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as we offer unto God, our unison prayer of thanksgiving.

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Let us pray.

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Oh Lord our God,

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the author, and giver of all good things.

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We thank thee for all thy mercies

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and for thy loving care over all thy creatures.

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We bless thee for the gift of life,

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for thy protection round about us,

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for thy guiding hand upon us

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and for the tokens of thy love within us.

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We thank thee for friendship and duty,

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for good hopes and precious memories,

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for the joys that cheer us

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and the trials that teach us to put our trust in thee.

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Most of all, we thank thee

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for the saving knowledge of thy son, our savior,

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for the living presence of thy Spirit,

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for thy church, the body of Christ,

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for the ministry of word and sacrament,

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and all the means of grace

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and all these things, oh Father,

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make us wise unto a right use of thy benefits

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that we may render an acceptable thanksgiving unto thee

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all the days of our life.

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Through Jesus Christ,

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amen.

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(instrumental music)

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The scripture lesson for the day is taken

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from the First Epistle to the Corinthians chapter 13.

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Let us hear as Saint Paul describes

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the nature of the essence of the Christian life,

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which is love.

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"And now I will show you the best way of all.

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I may speak in the tongues of men or of angels,

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but if I am without love,

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I am a sounding gong or a clanging symbol.

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I may have the gift of prophecy and know every hidden truth.

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I may have faith, strong enough to move mountains,

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but if I have no love, I am nothing.

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I may dole out all that I possess

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or even give my body to be burnt,

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but if I have no love, I am none the better.

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For love is patient,

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love is kind and envies no one,

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love is never boastful nor conceited, nor rude,

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never selfish, not quick to take offense.

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Love keeps no score of wrongs,

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does not gloat over other men's sins,

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but delights in the truth.

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There is nothing love cannot face.

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There is no limit to its faith,

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its hope

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or its endurance.

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Love will never come to an end.

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Are their prophets?

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Their work will be over.

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Are their tongues of ecstasy they will cease,

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is their knowledge, it will vanish away.

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For our knowledge and our prophecy alike are partial

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and the partial vanishes when wholeness comes.

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When I was a child, my speech, my outlook,

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and my thoughts were all childish.

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When I grew up, I had finished with childish things.

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Now we see only puzzling reflections in a mirror,

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but then we shall see face to face.

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My knowledge now is partial

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then it will be whole like God's,

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like God's knowledge of me.

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In a word then,

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there are three things that will last forever,

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faith,

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hope,

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and love,

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but the greatest of them all is love."

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Here ends the reading of the lesson.

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(instrumental music)

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The Lord be with you.

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Let us pray.

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Let us offer unto God,

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our prayers for others and for ourselves.

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Oh God, invisible and eternal,

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thou thy hundred names,

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but ever the same in mercy and in love.

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We praise thee for creation and all its power,

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for the things made in the beginning

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that have come in the spring and in the summer,

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for the things that live and bear fruit

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and die and are with thee.

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Almighty God, we take our place in the family of men,

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as we offer our prayers of concern

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and petition for our world,

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for our brothers and sisters and for ourselves.

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We call on the thy Spirit, oh God

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and we ask thy presence and power

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for all those in thy creation

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that are poor and hungry this day,

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for those who are outcast and unemployed,

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for children, unwanted in their homes,

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for the wounded,

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for prisoners and the exile,

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for all those in every land persecuted for conscience sake,

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we call on thy Spirit

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and we ask thy presence and thy power

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for all who are sick and suffering in mind and in body.

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Be with all those who this day are about to die,

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we ask, oh God,

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may thy love penetrate their condition

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and quench their hunger and bring peace.

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Ooh, Lord, we call on thy presence

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and we ask thy power for those

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whom we fear

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or resent

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or cannot love.

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We ask thy presence for all those who are close to us here

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and in every place,

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our relatives and our friends.

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Oh, creator and Redeemer God,

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we have labored each of us in our own place

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seeking to share in the work of thy world.

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We have known the anguish of incompetence

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and we have tasted the bitterness of failure.

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We have dreamed dreams and we seen visions,

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our brains and our hands have longed to lift our labor

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to such creativity

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that all that we did would sing with joy,

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lured by something beyond our failure

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and something beyond our small successes,

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we have struggled onward

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that we may be accounted worthy of thee.

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Grant, us oh Lord, patience to endure our failures

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and humility to outgrow our achievements,

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that we may increasingly serve thee and our fellow men.

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Oh God, our Father,

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help us we ask to come to terms with our humanness

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and all of its glories and frustrations,

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for it seems as if we are always trying

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either to take thy place

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or to forget about thee and do just as we please.

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We feel frustrated by our animal needs

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and we ask thy help in transforming and humanizing them.

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To be able to see food as a daily assurance of thy care,

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to accept sleep as a well earned benediction

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and not merely an interruption of our activities.

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To know love is not self-gratification,

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but self-giving as thou has taught us in Christ.

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Oh God, our Father,

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we feel frustrated by the tyranny of time,

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eight hour days, and 40 hour weeks,

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and threescore years and 10.

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Help us we ask to accept the endless details

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that chew up our days,

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without which nothing would ever get done.

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Help us to come to terms with our own laziness

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that lets us think we are working

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when we're only moaning about lack of time.

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Above all our Father,

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we feel frustrated by our limited minds and spirits

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and we pray for a reach that exceeds our grasp,

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help us to see beyond the trivia

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that threatened to clutter up our minds,

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that we may see the grand design of love

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and of truth and of beauty.

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Help us, oh God, to be open,

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open to every experience which life does present to us,

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to tolerate new thoughts

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and new persons that seem threatening

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and help us to give our spirits free reign

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that we may see thee, and find thee,

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and know thee who speaketh to us through Jesus of Nazareth,

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who taught us that we might be bold

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to pray together saying as Christians,

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"Our father who art in heaven,

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hallowed be thy name,

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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

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and the glory

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forever.

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Amen."

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I consider that the sufferings of this present time

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are not worth comparing

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with the glory that is to be revealed to us.

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For the creation waits with eager longing

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for the revealing of the sons of God,

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for the creation was subjected to futility,

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not of its own will,

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but by the will of him who subjected it in hope

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because the creation itself will be set free

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from its bondage to decay

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and obtain the glorious liberty of the children of God.

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We know that the whole creation

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has been groaning in travail together until now,

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and not only the creation,

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but we ourselves who have the first fruits of the Spirit

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groan inwardly as we wait for adoption as sons,

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the redemption of our bodies.

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For in this hope we were saved.

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Now, hope that is seen is not hope

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for who hopes for what he sees,

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but if we hope for what we do not see,

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we wait for it with patience,

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for in this hope we are saved.

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At the close of the 13th chapter of 1 Corinthians,

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which was read in your hearing,

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Paul lists the three great words of Christian experience,

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faith,

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hope,

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and love

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and concludes by saying that the greatest of these is love.

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I do not wish to engage in debate with Paul on the subject,

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although in essence,

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I suppose I already have by simply rearranging his triad

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and putting hope last for emphasis.

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Of course, all three concepts are of vital importance.

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The late Emil Brunner, the great Swiss theologian,

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said that each one of them could claim to be

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the most important.

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Even more, he said,

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"Each of them expresses the whole of Christian existence,

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the totality of what it means to be a Christian.

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Each one of them is not just one possibility,

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but is the criteria of true Christianity."

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Thus to emphasize in one of these three words,

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my point is, is by no means to belittle the other two.

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I lift up the concept of hope this morning

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because I feel that in this time,

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what we need most is hope.

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And the words of Paul's letter to the Romans,

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"We are saved

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by hope."

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Perhaps hope has been the most misunderstood

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and the most neglected of the three great Christian facts.

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For example, Brunner, in trying to

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demonstrate the relationship between these concepts

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and the realms of existence,

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links faith with the past,

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love with the present, hope with the future.

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We live in the past by faith.

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We live in the present by love.

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We live in the future by hope.

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Now immediately,

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this place has hope and a disadvantage,

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after all, the future is not quite as real

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as the present or even the past.

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Faith linked to the history of our heritage

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is highly prized

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as we rejoice in the great examples of Christian faith

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in the past and as recorded in our Bible

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and in other biographies.

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You see all of this and all that I've experienced

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as a part of my present faith,

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faith is that which we believe

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and live by.

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It is built upon a firm foundation

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of that which I have learned in my own experience.

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Faith is non-transferable.

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It cannot be passed on from father to son.

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I must live by that, which has informed my existence.

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Faith is Paul saying, "I know in whom I have believed,

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and I am persuaded."

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Faith demands you see that each man know God for himself.

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I cannot live on my mother's faith,

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but in the words of George Arthur Buttrick,

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"One day God through Jesus Christ walked down my street

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and knocked at my door.

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And I heard him say to me,

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"Thy sins I've forgiven thee.""

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I stand here this morning,

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because one day I met Jesus and he changed my life.

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That's something you can get ahold of.

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That is something that you can grab.

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That's real,

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but hope, well, that is for dreamers,

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idealists, stargazers, isn't it?

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Not so.

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If that were true,

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Paul could never say that we are saved by hope

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for no man is saved by merely stargazing.

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I'm also conscious of the fact that we usually say

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that we are saved by love or grace,

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which is God's forgiving love.

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It was a song that's a long, we were on the hit parade,

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which said, "Amazing grace,

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how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me."

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And that's true.

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The love of God, his unmerited favor,

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which is so freely showered upon us.

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The winsomeness of God is that which wins us over,

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which helps us to turn around, which is conversion.

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And so in that sense, we are saved by love.

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But the faith response

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to the love of God

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is only the beginning of the process.

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After our conversion,

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we must grow in discipleship

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and it is hope that keeps us moving along the path.

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See salvation is not a one shot affair,

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it is a lifelong process.

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We continue to walk in the ways of God

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and it is hope that makes us disciples,

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or perhaps we should define our term as best we can.

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Hope is not to be confused with wishful thinking.

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Pardon me for beginning my discussion of what hope is

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by saying what it's not.

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But I take my cue from Paul

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as he wrestles with the definition of love

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in the 13th chapter of 1 Corinthians,

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notice, he says, "Love is not jealous or boastful.

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It is not arrogant or rude,

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does not insist on its own way,

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is not irritable or resentful and so forth."

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Sometimes the best way to get ahold of a difficult concept

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is to begin to peel away that which does not belong to it,

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to isolate it from that, which is foreign to it.

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So, hoping is not wishing, even though we use the word,

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you know, I hope tomorrow is a sunny day.

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That's a wish, it has nothing to do with Christian hope.

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That is a specific and very personal desire

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and it really doesn't differ much from

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some of our other wild wishes like,

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I hope tomorrow I inherit a million dollars.

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Of course that's daydreaming, pleasant, but not profitable.

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But always hope, it seems to me reaches out

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to embrace more than the self.

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It is never just my hope nor does it apply only to me,

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in that sense, hope is more general than specific.

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It is more holistic than fragmentary,

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more universal than parochial.

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You see Christian hope is really a total attitude

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toward all of life.

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It makes therefore the same all embracing claim

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as does love.

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Love cannot be selective by its very nature.

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You cannot decide whom you will love

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and say, "I will love this person and this person,

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but not that person."

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It does not work that way.

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If you do not love your brother,

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you cannot love God.

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The Bible puts it more bluntly.

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He who says that he loves God whom he has not seen,

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but hates his brother whom he has seen is a liar

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and the truth is not in him.

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Jesus says you are to love your neighbor

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as you love yourself.

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So, if I am incapable of loving myself,

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I can not love my neighbor.

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If I do not love my neighbor, I cannot love God.

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It's all of one piece, one fabric.

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You either love everybody or nobody.

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One of the ironic tragedies of our lifetime

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is to watch those persons who have begun

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by hating certain people in the society,

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have now come to the sorry state

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of hating their own children, their own flesh and blood.

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But then that's the way it works.

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Well, hope is a total outlook upon life.

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While it is future-oriented, nevertheless,

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it changes our attitude toward the present

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and even the past for that matter,

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it causes us to act upon our faith

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and it may help us to understand how to love

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as well as how to live in the present,

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for we live by hope.

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On the other hand, hell is hopelessness.

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It is entirely appropriate that at the entrance

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to Dante's Hell, his Inferno,

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there stands the words,

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"Abandon hope all ye who enter here."

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Ultimate death,

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perhaps it ought to read,

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"Ye who have abandoned hope enter here."

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And so Paul defines Christians simply

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as those who have hope.

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Now, what are some of the components of hope?

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Well, Christian hope will take a careful look

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at human history and say that history is not cyclical.

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It is aiming at something.

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It is going somewhere.

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It is moving toward an omega point, a culmination.

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There's not going around in circles.

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It is moving toward a climax and a goal.

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There is both direction and purpose and human history

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and events occur that serve to movers toward that goal.

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Cynics like the writer of Ecclesiastes in the Old Testament

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may claim that there's nothing new under the sun,

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the sun rises and sets,

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the winds blow to and fro,

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what has been is what will be,

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and what has been done is what will be done.

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And there's nothing new under the sun,

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of course, right in the Old Testament,

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this pessimism is corrected when Isaiah,

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hears God saying, "Behold, I am doing a new thing."

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And then there's that radical revolutionary statement

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in the New Testament,

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which says, "Behold, I make all things new."

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In 2 Peter, the word is,

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"We wait for new heavens and a new earth

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in which righteousness dwells, all things new."

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That's our hope.

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Isn't it but you notice there was no separation

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in the matter of heaven and earth,

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they are and they belong together.

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Hope is related to the destinies of both heaven and earth.

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It therefore transcends the false dichotomy

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that we tend to set up.

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It is convenient to talk about the natural

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and the supernatural, but is the truth.

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St. Thomas Aquinas said centuries ago,

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"Man has not an ultimate natural end

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and an ultimate supernatural end.

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He has only one single ultimate end,

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namely the future promised by God."

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And to push it further,

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what do we know of a body without a spirit?

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Has not God forever joined the two?

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When God, as portrayed in the creation story in Genesis,

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kneels down by, in the words of James Weldon Johnson,

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"The banks of a river and begins to mold

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this body out of the clay."

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It says that, "After he had formed the physical body,

38:28

that God breathed into this lump of clay,

38:32

his own breath, his Spirit, the breath of life,

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and now out of this union of body and spirit,

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something new emerges, man becomes a living soul."

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Soul is getting it all together.

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You know soul music is being able to take

38:56

the nitty gritty of life,

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the hard knocks, the problems, the troubles and the trials,

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and putting these things to music

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so that the indomitable spirit of man shines through

39:11

as he is able to sing about not only the joys,

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but the sorrows of life,

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that's soul.

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A man can project it in such a way

39:25

that you can feel what he feels.

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And we say, we seek to save souls.

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We need the whole man, all of him.

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And so to the question,

39:42

should the Christian Church be involved

39:43

in poverty and health and welfare programs?

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The answer is, of course.

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Should we be involved in the efforts

39:51

to end the pollution of our environment?

39:54

Of course, this is God's world.

39:56

And anything that harms man physically, mentally,

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or spiritually, or his world must be dealt with.

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So the church,

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not just a few kids that we can dismiss as hippies,

40:11

but the church ought to confront general motives

40:13

in the other corporations and say repent and be converted.

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After all a corporation, legally

40:20

is just an extended personality.

40:22

Well, hope causes us, you see,

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to be actively involved in all phases of human existence,

40:29

as we await for a new heaven and a new earth

40:33

in which righteousness will dwell

40:35

and where there shall be universal justice,

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universal liberation,

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universal peace.

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So the major concept here

40:47

is nothing less than the very kingdom of God.

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Well, perhaps you're beginning to see

40:55

what I meant when I said that hope is more,

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is much more really than having a future dream.

40:59

We must harness that dream and become actively involved

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in causing the future projection

41:06

to become a present reality.

41:08

There is nothing in the eschaton,

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which is not in the present,

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at least in capsule form.

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The future determines the present.

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You thought it was the other way around.

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No, the future

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determines the present.

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I can remember hearing the late Paul Shira,

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illustrate this so eloquently.

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He talked to a student who was pouring over his books,

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studying on a weekend at a college.

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His contemporaries were all out at social events.

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Why was this student there?

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Well, he wanted to be a doctor surgeon,

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and he knew that there were certain facts

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that he had to put into the memory bank of his mind.

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And there were certain disciplines

41:52

of mind and body under which he had to go.

41:54

The future determines the present.

41:59

The Hudson River begins as fresh water streams

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high up in the Adirondack Mountains

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and flows down until it becomes a great river

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that cuts through the hot of the Empire State

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out past New York City and into the bay of New York,

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where it begins to mingle with the bryony,

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tangy, salty deeps of the Atlantic Ocean.

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But long before it reaches the Atlantic Ocean,

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way back upstream, about a hundred miles

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near Poughkeepsie, New York,

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the Hudson River begins to taste salty.

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Beloved, now are we the sons of God?

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It does not yet appear what we shall be

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but when Christ appears, we shall be like him.

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We shall see him as he is.

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How do you know that?

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Because each day we're getting more like him.

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We're growing in his likeness.

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Whoever, John says, "Has this hope within him,

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purifies himself as he is pure."

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So you'll notice the message of Jesus to his disciples.

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He talked about the kingdom, not just as a future dream,

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but as a present reality.

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As you go, he said to his disciples,

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"Say the kingdom of God has come near to you.

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Even if they don't accept you,

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as you shake the dust from your garment and walk away,

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say to them, nevertheless, know this,

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the kingdom has come near.

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How do you know, you brought it with you?

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You are part of it."

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Jesus could say without a candor and confidence,

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as he walked the dusty roads of Galilee to anyone he met,

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"Repent, the kingdom of God has come near."

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Because he was the embodiment of it.

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He was part and parcel of it.

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So the vision of the future, while we call it that,

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really places us under a present obligation,

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the theologians of hope have reminded us

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of the sin of omission.

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You know that other aspect of sin,

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we have usually equated sin with the acts,

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the deeds, even the thoughts that we have,

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the words spoken that are wrong

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and not in accord with the will of God.

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We placed the emphasis upon those things that are committed.

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But these men stress the good that is omitted,

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that which we failed to do.

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You see, given a vision of the kingdom of God

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that has been entrusted to us as Christians,

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what are we gonna do about it?

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To do nothing towards its realization

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or to do little toward the implementation is to sin.

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Jesus, condemn men, sometimes not for what they did,

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but what they didn't do.

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Note please, his harsh, verbal condemnation

45:10

of the man with one talent.

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Not because he had one talent,

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but because he failed to use the one talent.

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And note the tacit condemnation of the scribe

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and the Levite in the Good Samaritan story

45:26

who passed by leaving the man

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who had fallen among the robbers to bleed

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and that great picture of the last judgment,

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which Jesus narrates.

45:39

There were some who were told to enter the kingdom,

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but others were told to depart

45:43

and they said, "Why,

45:45

what did we do wrong?

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We were good church members.

45:48

We gave our money."

45:50

And Jesus said, "Is not so much what you did,

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but what you didn't do.

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I was hungry and you did not feed me.

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I was naked and you didn't cloth me.

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I was sick and in prison and you never came near me.

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I was thirsty and you did not give me the drink."

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This is the other dimension of sin.

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We must deal with it.

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So my choices have to be controlled.

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My ordering of priorities sometimes have to be changed.

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I must be as a Christian dissatisfied

46:23

with the present situation.

46:27

Now, I can't see the New Order yet.

46:31

I have to admit that I would need hope if I could see it.

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As Paul says, "Who hopes for what he sees

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if we hope for what we do not see,

46:42

we wait for it with patience."

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And the word patience as used here means endurance.

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It does not mean we sit down and twiddle our thumbs.

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It means we don't give up.

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We are impatient with things as they are and we don't quit.

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So hope motivates us to do something

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about the present situation.

47:04

When I was young,

47:06

I heard an eloquent sermon about the hereafter.

47:07

It described the beauties of heaven.

47:10

It talked about the pearly gates and the golden streets,

47:13

but what good are golden streets there

47:18

if the streets of the ghetto

47:22

are not even paved with asphalt here?

47:24

And if we expect the lion and the lamb to lie down together,

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we'd better be preparing some lions

47:31

and some lambs right now for this great encounter.

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"What happens to a dream deferred?",

47:41

Langston Hughes as in his "Lenox Avenue Mural"

47:45

called "Harlem".

47:49

Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun

47:52

or fester like a sore

47:56

and then run?

47:59

Does it stink like rotten meat

48:02

or crust and sugar over like a syrupy sweet?

48:06

Maybe it just sags like a heavy load

48:12

or does it explode?

48:18

We are called upon not to defer the dream,

48:23

but to live out the tenants of our hope

48:27

as well as our faith and our love.

48:30

I said that I do not yet see the New Order,

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but I can report to you this morning that

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I can see the outlines of it.

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And I'm happy to be able to say this.

48:43

I see

48:45

it as I am able to discern

48:48

what God is doing in the world right now,

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for truly God is involved in the affairs of men,

48:53

but he moves in mysterious ways.

48:57

He has wonders to perform, I must warn you.

48:59

We naturally look and wish for hope

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as it is embodied in peace and tranquility,

49:08

but oftentimes, God stirs us to unrest.

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Well, I know we blame other people

49:20

for the turmoil in our world.

49:22

We even sometimes blame the devil,

49:24

but it is God who is often the culprit.

49:26

You see, as long as there is evil

49:31

and injustice in the world,

49:35

there will be no tranquility,

49:37

for God will not let us rest.

49:40

We normally wish and hope for order and conformity,

49:45

but isn't it becoming clear that what we have called order

49:52

really leads to chaos,

49:56

that our order ends in repression and an exploitation,

50:00

perhaps what we need is some chaos.

50:05

All of which hopefully,

50:09

there might emerge a new order, a new creation.

50:11

Well, the point is that God is involved in human history.

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And the amazing fact is that unlike

50:22

the way we attempt to live,

50:24

he is not a spectator, but a participant,

50:26

moreover he is not just a neutral participant

50:31

like the umpire in a baseball game.

50:35

God is not neutral.

50:38

The umpire doesn't care who wins or loses, God cares.

50:39

He is not neutral.

50:43

God takes sides in the struggles of life.

50:45

The Bible pictures, him therefore,

50:50

not on the side of the majority,

50:53

whether silent or otherwise,

50:56

but on the side of the minority,

50:58

he is on the side of the Hebrew slaves against Egypt.

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He's on the side of the widow, the orphan, the distress,

51:06

the downtrodden, the oppressed,

51:10

and not those who devour widows' houses.

51:14

And Jesus comes along and picks up this prophetic tradition

51:18

by saying, "I have a message of cheer

51:21

for the weary and the heavily laden.

51:24

I have come to release the captive

51:28

and to set at liberty those who are oppressed.

51:31

I have good news for the poor."

51:35

God is therefore involved

51:41

so that judgment can become effective.

51:43

We did not talk so much now about judgment,

51:48

but it seems to me in any kind of concept of hope,

51:50

there must be the concept of judgment.

51:54

It may seem incompatible at first,

51:56

but judgment has to be an important part

51:58

of any concept of hope.

52:02

We used to sing, you may run on for a long time,

52:05

but let me tell you, God Almighty is gonna cut you down.

52:09

You may throw a rock and hide your hand,

52:13

working in the dark against your fellow man

52:16

but sure has God made day and night,

52:20

what you do in the dark will be brought to light.

52:22

You may run and hide, slip and slide

52:26

trying to take the moot from your neighbor's eye,

52:29

but sure as God made the rich and the poor,

52:32

you're gonna reap my brother, just what you sow.

52:34

You may run on for a long time, but after a while,

52:38

God Almighty is gonna cut you down.

52:42

Unless we think the judgment is just a personal matter

52:46

and I guess we tend to do this,

52:48

to think of one person standing before the bar of God.

52:50

No, judgment is a continuing phenomenon through life.

52:53

And it applies not just to individuals,

52:59

but to institutions and governments and nations.

53:01

We used to also sing, my Lord's gonna move this wicked race.

53:05

And he's gonna raise up a nation that shall obey.

53:11

Well, you see the eye opening fact is

53:18

that the disinherited all over the world

53:22

are beginning to possess a new hope

53:26

as they struggle for liberation,

53:28

the gospel has been heard and it is being appropriated.

53:31

Make no mistake.

53:36

You see the gospel always bears fruit.

53:38

We may not like the fruit it bears.

53:42

If you tell a man long enough that he's a son of God,

53:45

like you are, he begins to believe it after awhile.

53:47

And then he may say to you, get your foot off my neck,

53:50

but that's the gospel bearing fruit,

53:55

whether we like it or not.

53:57

So the Christian hope is liberating people

54:00

all over the world.

54:04

What a tragedy will be if they are saved

54:08

and we are not.

54:13

Suppose the statement of Jesus literally comes true

54:17

when he said that the harlots and the publicans

54:21

and the sinners go into the kingdom, but not you.

54:24

And let's refer that to the respectable Western churchmen,

54:28

suppose people in other parts of the world,

54:32

what we would call the third world

54:35

begin to grasp this picture of universal justice and peace

54:37

while we have neglected it in our haste for other pursuits.

54:42

What a tragedy?

54:48

Is that why Paul says at one place,

54:52

"I keep my body under subjection.

54:55

I pummel it," he says.

54:58

Lest after I have preached to others,

55:00

been a missionary all over the world.

55:03

After I have preached the gospel to others,

55:05

I myself shall become a castaway

55:08

or disqualified.

55:12

Well, you see, my Bible tells me,

55:17

"That on that day, when God gathers up his people,

55:20

then men will come from the east as well as from the west,

55:24

from the north and from the south

55:29

and out of every tongue and tribe and nation

55:32

and they shall sit down together around the Lord's table

55:36

in God's everlasting kingdom."

55:40

John, and his vision of the future

55:45

on the island of Patmos saw a number

55:48

that no man could number

55:50

coming up before the throne of God.

55:51

And an elder said to him, "John, who are these people?"

55:54

And John began to hedge.

55:57

He said, "Well, you must know."

55:59

I think I know why John didn't wanna answer.

56:02

You see all the folks who were supposed to be there

56:05

had already come up before the throne of God.

56:07

The 12 tribes of Israel had already paraded past,

56:09

all the respectable churchmen had already come.

56:13

And now here comes a great multitude

56:16

and John's not sure who these people are.

56:18

We used to sing,

56:23

there'll be some people there

56:25

we never thought would get there.

56:27

And we'll say, "Who are they?"

56:30

The Spirit said to John, "John, these are they

56:34

the disinherited, the wretched of the earth.

56:38

These are they the poor, the outcast.

56:42

These are they ready to cry sometimes,

56:45

but John these are they

56:49

who've come up out of great tribulation.

56:51

They've washed their roofs white in the blood of the lamb.

56:54

And now they've got palm branches in their hand.

56:59

The sun shall not smite them anymore, John.

57:03

They shall not hunger nor thirst

57:07

for the lamb in the midst of the throne

57:09

shall lead them out to springs of living water

57:12

and God himself,

57:17

shall wipe the tears from their eyes."

57:19

Oh, well, well, it's a great God we serve.

57:25

A God who was able to take that, which is low

57:27

and to lift it to a higher state,

57:30

a God who can take things which are not

57:33

and bring to nothing things that are.

57:37

Well, you see, I look for that day

57:44

when every knee shall bow

57:45

and every tongue confess that Christ is Lord.

57:47

Therefore, I work for the day

57:51

when the kingdoms of this world

57:53

shall become the kingdom of our Lord and of our Christ.

57:55

Hallelujah.

57:59

The Lord our God, omnipotent threeness.

58:02

And he shall reign forever

58:05

and ever,

58:08

and ever,

58:11

and by this hope

58:13

we are saved

58:18

right now.

58:22

We are saved.

58:25

Oh God, our Father,

58:32

grant that not only shall we

58:36

relate to our neighbor in love and

58:39

being able to walk by the faith that we have accrued,

58:42

but oh our God, give us hope.

58:48

A hope that reaches beyond the grave,

58:53

but a hope also that sustains us

58:57

in the many situations of life

59:01

in which we find ourselves today.

59:02

For thine is the kingdom

59:07

and the power

59:10

and the glory

59:11

forever and ever.

59:13

Amen.

59:17

(instrumental music)

59:19

George Outen - "Faith, Hope, and Love" (August 8, 1971)

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