James H. Charlesworth - "The Mystery of the Advent" (November 28, 1971)

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-	Test.	0:04
-	From God our father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.	0:07
	Now all things living, domestic, or wild,	0:16
	with whom you must share light, water and the air	0:20
	and suffer and shake in physical need,	0:25
	the sullen limpid, the exuberant wheat,	0:28
	the mischievous cat, and the timid bird	0:31
	are glad for your sake for unto you a child is born.	0:34
	A son is given, praising, proclaiming	0:41
	the ingression of love, earth,	0:46
	darkness evince the blaze of heaven,	0:49
	and frigid silence meditates a song	0:53
	for great joy has filled the narrow and the sad,	0:57
	sing glory then to God and goodwill to men,	1:01
	let us run again to Bethlehem.	1:06
	Let us run to learn how to love and run.	1:09
	Let us run to love, sing glory to God	1:14
	and let us run again to Bethlehem.	1:19
	(slow instrumental music)	1:25
	Let us continue the worship of almighty God	4:46
	as we offer our prayers of adoration, let us pray.	4:49
	Oh mighty God in whose grace	4:59
	all our light is born.	5:03
	And then who's love is the font of our festivity	5:06
	and our hope, hear us we ask as we lift our prayers	5:10
	of adoration and of praise.	5:16
	Lord, your majesty is surrounded in mystery	5:21
	and your ways are far beyond our knowing	5:28
	yet you have come to us in Jesus born in Bethlehem	5:32
	and have offered us your graceful and faithful love,	5:38
	and you have called us to live and to come before you	5:44
	and praise and thanksgiving.	5:48
	With heaven's angels and shepherds are	5:52
	we praise and bless your advent into our world.	5:57
	We greet your coming oh God with wonder,	6:05
	you come to be with us,	6:09
	yet you remain far greater than we can imagine,	6:12
	you were near yet your wisdom set you apart from us.	6:16
	You appear among us yet we cannot describe	6:22
	your glory with our words.	6:26
	We greet your coming God with repentance	6:30
	for we are more or less satisfied with ourselves,	6:35
	but your very presence exposes our sins and our failure.	6:39
	We are self confident,	6:45
	but you challenge our confidence in ourselves.	6:47
	We are proud of our understanding and our learning,	6:51
	but you show us that we do not know	6:55
	the things that make for our peace.	6:58
	We greet your coming God with joy and with adoration,	7:03
	we had no true idea of what you are like,	7:09
	but you have shown us yourself in Jesus Christ.	7:14
	We felt that our human life could be of no importance	7:19
	to you, but you have shown its value	7:22
	by appearing among us as a man.	7:27
	We are aware of the gulf between us and you,	7:31
	but you have bridged it with love.	7:35
	God, our father, we greet your coming in Jesus Christ	7:39
	our Lord, and we offer unto you our worship	7:45
	and ourselves that your love	7:50
	might become incarnate in us.	7:53
	Amen.	7:59
	Let us hear these words of hope and assurance	8:04
	from holy scripture from the writings of the Prophet Isaiah.	8:07
	The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light	8:14
	and those who dwell in the land of deep darkness	8:19
	on them has light shine,	8:23
	for to us a child is born,	8:28
	to us a son is given,	8:31
	and the government will be upon his shoulder	8:34
	and his name will be called wonderful counselor,	8:37
	mighty God, everlasting father, prince of peace.	8:42
	And of the increase of his government and of peace	8:49
	there will be no end upon the throne of David	8:53
	and over his kingdom to establish it	8:58
	and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness	9:01
	from this time forth and forever more,	9:05
	the zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.	9:10
	Amen.	9:16
	Let us respond to this good news by offering unto God,	9:20
	our unison prayer of Thanksgiving.	9:25
	Let us pray.	9:28
	Heavenly father, the giver of every good	9:31
	and perfect gift,	9:35
	we thank you for our creation in your own image,	9:37
	for your preserving mercy every day of our lives,	9:42
	for the protection and comfort of our homes,	9:46
	for all who love us and whom we love,	9:51
	for healing in sickness,	9:55
	deliverance in danger, and strength and sorrow,	9:57
	for the work given us to do	10:02
	and the ability with which to do it,	10:05
	for the uncounted mercies of your mindful providence	10:08
	and above all for the coming of your beloved son	10:12
	into the world.	10:16
	For the gracious words he spoke,	10:18
	for the kind work he did, for his bitter passion	10:21
	and atoning sacrifice on the cross,	10:26
	for his mighty resurrection from the dead.	10:30
	We express our gratitude for the means of grace,	10:33
	the inward dwelling of your spirit	10:38
	and the life eternal, amen.	10:41
	(slow instrumental music)	10:47
	(choir singing indistinctly)	11:55
-	Today's lesson is found	15:15
	in the first chapter of the gospel	15:17
	according to Saint Matthew, verses 18 through 25.	15:20
	"Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way.	15:27
	"When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph	15:33
	"before they came together	15:38
	"she was found to be with child of the holy spirit.	15:40
	"And her husband Joseph being a just man	15:45
	"and unwilling to put her to shame	15:49
	"resolved to divorce her quietly.	15:52
	"But as he considered this behold,	15:55
	" angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream saying,	15:59
	"Joseph son of David do not fear to take Mary	16:04
	"your wife for that which is conceived in her	16:08
	"is of the holy spirit.	16:12
	"She will bear a son and you shall call his name, Jesus,	16:15
	"for he will save his people from their sins.	16:20
	"All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken	16:24
	"by the prophet, behold a Virgin shall conceive	16:28
	"and bear a son and his name shall be called Emmanuel,	16:33
	"which means, God with us.	16:39
	"When Joseph woke from sleep,	16:43
	"he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him.	16:45
	"He took his wife, but knew her not	16:48
	"until she had born a son and he called his name, Jesus."	16:52
	(slow instrumental music)	17:00
	The Lord be with you.	17:45
-	Let us pray.	17:48
	Let us offer unto God our prayers	18:01
	for others and for ourselves.	18:03
	Almighty God who has committed to your people,	18:09
	the ministry of intercession hear us we ask	18:13
	as we pray for others.	18:18
	Grant that our hearts may be so filled with peace	18:21
	and charity, that we may be fit instruments	18:25
	of your will for our neighbors need.	18:29
	Let us offer on to God,	18:34
	our prayers for the whole church	18:36
	of God throughout the world.	18:38
	Most gracious father we pray for your church universal	18:43
	in every land and among every race,	18:50
	fill it with all truth.	18:56
	And then all truth, all peace.	18:59
	Oh God, let your church with gladness	19:03
	and joy walk like a king through this time of confusion	19:08
	and of war, though principalities and powers,	19:14
	vast and mighty cast their shadows of anxiety	19:19
	over every path.	19:24
	Give we ask to the people of God	19:26
	the quiet confidence of their own integrity	19:30
	that they may walk all this day,	19:34
	not fearing the consequences of their devotion	19:37
	to the way of law or the judgment of an uncertain future.	19:41
	Almighty God we call on your spirit	19:52
	and we ask your presence and your power	19:56
	for the sick and the suffering in mind and body	20:00
	for those made slaves by disease, by drugs or by fear.	20:06
	May your love penetrate their condition	20:15
	and quench their hunger and bring peace.	20:18
	We call on your spirit oh God	20:25
	and we ask your presence and your power	20:26
	for those who are dying and have died,	20:31
	whether in bitterness or tranquility,	20:35
	we ask for them your eternal peace.	20:40
	For all poor and hungry, for outcasts and exiles,	20:46
	prisoners and victims of war, we pray oh Lord.	20:53
	We pray to you for peace on earth in this season of advent.	20:59
	We pray not because we have been men of Goodwill,	21:05
	but because we have come at last in our bewilderment	21:09
	to long for you that we might become men of Goodwill.	21:13
	Today we pray for little children,	21:21
	hungry and helpless and longing for life	21:24
	in Indochina, in East Pakistan and India,	21:30
	and wherever else they exist in our world.	21:35
	We pray for those in every land	21:39
	who hide amidst the ruins of their hopes	21:41
	and suffer from the cruelties of war.	21:45
	We bow our heads in shame for any part	21:49
	that we have had in visiting the family of man	21:53
	with ghastly terror and with tears of human pain.	21:57
	Finally, oh God we bring to thee our needs and desires.	22:06
	We are conscious that our greatest need	22:13
	is to be awakened to the needs	22:15
	of which we are not yet conscious.	22:17
	So we pray for finer ambitions,	22:22
	for deeper longings,	22:25
	for stronger commitment to your purpose,	22:28
	and for greater awareness	22:33
	of our radical dependence upon the life of faith.	22:35
	Almighty God whose mercy brought thee to earth	22:42
	and the coming of our Lord,	22:45
	deepen and widen our vision of your presence among us,	22:48
	that you may not be turned away	22:53
	from our crowded busy hearts,	22:55
	but welcomed with joy and thankfulness.	22:58
	Lord our hearts as ever rejoice in the advent message	23:04
	of the glad tidings of Christ	23:09
	who was born in Bethlehem	23:12
	to be the savior of all the world.	23:14
	Yet with all our joy and the long centuries behind us	23:18
	of hearts made glad by his coming,	23:24
	we know there is much in us that deafens our ears	23:27
	to the sound of angel anthems,	23:32
	much that blinds us to the site of guiding star	23:35
	amidst the darkness, much that crowds our hearts	23:40
	and leaves little room for the arrival of your great gift.	23:46
	Even in the midst of our advent oh Lord,	23:52
	we find ourselves as lonely as shepherds,	23:57
	as wayfaring as a Kings, as busy as the innkeeper.	24:02
	Forgive us and turn us again	24:09
	to the quietness of your peace in the season,	24:13
	come into our chaotic and warring world	24:17
	we pray as Jesus came with healing and with grace,	24:20
	you will find us proud oh Lord	24:29
	for we have not yet learned what it means to be humble.	24:33
	You will find us guarded and defensive	24:38
	for we are weak within and full of fear.	24:42
	You will find us as irritable and not a little arrogant	24:47
	even as Harold, for we are uncomfortably guilty,	24:53
	and are not often willing to admit our frail to your sin.	24:59
	While we dress and parade like little Harolds	25:05
	and lordly pilots, we know we have deeper needs,	25:09
	come again amidst of all Kings	25:15
	and save us from ourselves,	25:21
	that we may learn to live joyfully and lovingly for others.	25:24
	In the name of Christ of Bethlehem,	25:31
	our light and our peace,	25:35
	you taught us that we could pray together saying,	25:39
	our father who art in heaven,	25:42
	hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come,	25:46
	thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.	25:50
	And give us this day our daily bread	25:55
	and forgive us our trespasses	25:58
	as we forgive those who trespass against us,	26:01
	and lead us not into temptation,	26:05
	but deliver us from evil,	26:07
	for thy is the kingdom and the power	26:10
	and the glory forever.	26:14
	Amen.	26:17
-	Our heavenly father	26:29
	may the words of my mouth	26:33
	and the meditations of our hearts	26:37
	be acceptable in thy oh Lord	26:42
	our strength and our Redeemer. Amen.	26:46
	The mystery of the advent.	26:52
	On the first Sunday in advent,	26:57
	it is appropriate for Christians to pause a moment	27:00
	and reflect on the importance	27:04
	and meaning of the advent.	27:06
	To some of us the first response is praise to God	27:10
	for sending his son the savior of the world.	27:12
	To others of us praise is accompanied with wonder and awe.	27:16
	In the face of the mystery of the advent,	27:22
	recognizing that each time God reveals his will,	27:26
	he increases in grandeur and awesomeness.	27:30
	Each time God reveals himself	27:34
	the tremendous mystery increases within each of us.	27:36
	Out of the depths of this silence therefore	27:42
	some of us wonder what is the meaning of the advent.	27:45
	In and through the life of Jesus Christ	27:53
	what or who appeared?	27:56
	Is it fair to contend that in the words of the prophets,	28:00
	God revealed his will,	28:03
	but in Jesus of Nazareth	28:06
	he disclosed himself?	28:08
	Does that mean that Christianity is anchored	28:12
	in the Harbor of a past event?	28:14
	Recognizing that belief is neither reason	28:19
	nor knowledge and the truth faith	28:22
	is a total and dynamic commitment	28:25
	that grows by means of our total involvement	28:28
	through interrogation of our very gated experiences.	28:31
	Let us approach wondering on these things	28:35
	via looking at what was expected to happen,	28:38
	what was proclaimed to have happened,	28:42
	and what is yet to happen.	28:45
	The hope for the advent.	28:49
	Jesus of Nazareth was born in a time	28:55
	when men were obsessed with messianic expectations.	28:58
	As public ministry was proceeded by at least two men	29:02
	who were apparently claimed to be the Messiah.	29:05
	We have evidence of this in the new Testament itself	29:09
	for according to acts five Gamaliel,	29:12
	Paul's former teacher recalls that Theudas,	29:14
	and Judas the Galilean recently led a messianic revolt,	29:17
	but each man and each revolt perished.	29:22
	Later in the first century the Jews revolted against Rome	29:28
	as the flames of Messianism blew out of control.	29:31
	And the beginning of the second century,	29:35
	a man whose personal letters are just now been recovered,	29:36
	led the final revolt against Rome,	29:40
	was proclaimed the Messiah by the great Rabbi Akiva,	29:42
	and was renamed Bar Kokhba, son of the star.	29:46
	Moreover, there is increasing evidence that a better known	29:52
	figure was being proclaimed the Messiah.	29:54
	From at least the time of the evangelist	29:58
	until the present day,	30:00
	there have been some who claimed	30:01
	that John the Baptist was the Messiah.	30:03
	Jewish literature composed during this time	30:09
	is permeated by the belief that the new world	30:11
	promised by God will dawn any moment.	30:13
	It was expressed in ambiguous language	30:19
	because only God knew when the messianic age	30:21
	would dawn and only he knew what specifically would happen.	30:24
	It would in any case be a time	30:30
	when the righteous shall see and be thankful	30:33
	and rejoice with joy forever and ever.	30:37
	The messianic hope frequently	30:42
	centered upon the idea that the divine warrior	30:44
	would appear who would destroy the Romans	30:48
	and gather a holy people	30:50
	whom he shall lead in righteousness,	30:52
	behold, oh Lord and raise up unto them their king,	30:56
	the son of David at the time and the winch thou see us,	31:00
	oh God, that he may reign over Israel thy servant,	31:04
	and guard him with strength	31:10
	that he may shatter unrighteous rulers,	31:12
	and that he may purge Jerusalem from nations	31:14
	that trample her down to destruction.	31:16
	Even Virgil wrote a messianic eclogue	31:22
	after mentioning the birth of the boy	31:25
	in whom the iron shall cease the golden age arise.	31:27
	He liked the apocalypses,	31:33
	speaks of the future as if he had just returned from there.	31:35
	He shall receive the life of gods	31:41
	and see heroes with God's co-mingling,	31:43
	and himself be seen of them.	31:46
	And with his father's worth, reign on a world at peace,	31:50
	for thee oh boy first shall the earth	31:56
	untilled bore freely forth her childish gifts	32:00
	while flocks of field shall love	32:05
	the monstrous lion have no fear.	32:09
	Secondly, there is a striking resemblance	32:16
	between these lines of Virgil's eclogue four	32:18
	and the messianic overtones of Isaiah 11, six through seven.	32:21
	The Wolf shall dwell with the lamb	32:28
	and the leopard shall lie down with the kid,	32:31
	and the calf and the lion and the fat link together.	32:34
	And the little child shall lead them.	32:39
	The cow and the bear shall feed,	32:43
	their young together shall lie down,	32:46
	and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.	32:49
	Jesus's time therefore was characterized	32:56
	by boiling messianic expectations	33:00
	that overflowed through contemporary literature	33:03
	and poured into the political arena.	33:06
	If we could travel back to the Jerusalem of AD 28,	33:12
	we would find almost all Jews	33:16
	are initially waiting and hoping	33:19
	for the advent of the Messiah.	33:22
	Loyalty to God and his fast approaching future	33:27
	appears to be a common link	33:29
	between that diverse Jewish sects,	33:30
	hurdling what they claim is the promised land,	33:34
	the holy land, they sit facing the future	33:36
	looking for the advent of he that cometh.	33:42
	In a few years, a new sect of Jews appears	33:49
	professing one idea per dogmatically contrary	33:56
	to this consensus communist.	33:59
	For they rejoice in the hope of the advent.	34:02
	How difficult it is for us	34:10
	to have really never longed for anything	34:12
	to share their Supreme joy.	34:14
	They who saw their grandfathers and fathers	34:17
	go to their graves with this one dream.	34:19
	He shall come.	34:22
	Their ecstasy from experiencing the hope of the advent	34:26
	is unfortunately peculiarly theirs.	34:29
	We in contrast to our grandfathers and fathers	34:35
	can no longer lift the balloon of man's	34:39
	evolving humanitarianism because it is	34:41
	irreparably punctured by a century of barbed wire fences,	34:44
	and all rejoicing in the present popularity of such songs	34:49
	as the battle hymn of the Republic.	34:52
	And there is a new world coming.	34:54
	We must admit that full empathy with the joy	34:57
	of the first believers is impossible.	35:00
	One who united with his forefathers	35:05
	suffered through sixth centuries	35:06
	because of a resilient hope,	35:08
	and now exalts in his fulfillment	35:11
	can not simply transfer	35:12
	his unparalleled joy to a near fight.	35:15
	In our attempt to grasp the meaning	35:21
	of the recon died mystery of the advent	35:23
	let us look at witnesses brought forth	35:27
	by the new Testament and related early Christian documents.	35:28
	The hope of the advent.	35:34
	From the undeveloped proclamations	35:40
	found in Peter's speeches in Acts	35:41
	to the refined Christology of John 1:14,	35:44
	and the word became flesh and dwelt among us.	35:47
	The two new Testament men harmoniously explained	35:50
	that he who was to come has come.	35:55
	In contrast to the '30s of this century	36:01
	when many layman and scholars	36:04
	were swayed by who shows claim that Jesus the Christ	36:06
	was a myth fabricated by the creators of the new Testament.	36:09
	It is safe to say that new Testament scholars,	36:13
	regardless of whether they are Jewish,	36:15
	Christian or atheistic agree	36:17
	that there was a man named Jesus of Nazareth	36:21
	who lived during the first century,	36:26
	was baptized by John the Baptist,	36:28
	proclaimed the advent of God's kingdom,	36:31
	and healed the sick and Galilee,	36:34
	and was crucified in Jerusalem.	36:37
	Since Jesus has historicity is not an object of faith	36:44
	let us, if you will permit the license,	36:48
	imagine that we have traveled to Capernaum	36:52
	during the fall of 29 in order to see and to hear this man.	36:55
	One thing appears certain,	37:07
	you will react when you meet him.	37:10
	He was not one whom you could ignore	37:16
	or feel equivocal about.	37:20
	Were you offended by his associates, the prostitutes,	37:25
	the beggars, even the despise, and outcast toll collectors?	37:27
	Were you disturbed that he chastised	37:33
	those who always tried to obey God's commandments?	37:34
	And then he even said,	37:37
	blessed are you poor for yours is the kingdom of God.	37:39
	Or were you're struck in amazement,	37:49
	as you realized who he was.	37:52
	Perhaps joining hand with one who lived	37:56
	almost 2000 years ago leaving the following owed.	37:58
	For there is a helper for me, the Lord,	38:05
	he has generously showed himself to me in his simplicity	38:10
	because his kindness has diminished his grandeur.	38:14
	He became like me that I might receive him	38:20
	and for him he was considered like me	38:24
	that I might put him on.	38:27
	And I trembled not when I saw him	38:30
	because he was gracious to me.	38:37
	Like my nature he became that I might understand him,	38:44
	and like my form that I might not turn away from him.	38:47
	Here is a good indication of what the advent meant	38:56
	for one early Christian, for more insight	38:58
	let us turn to the first evangelist.	39:01
	Matthew 1:18-25 we find the first mention of the advent	39:07
	according to the canonical arrangement of these books.	39:11
	And as we shall soon see this passage contains	39:14
	one of the most significant statements regarding the advent.	39:17
	These verses relate to birth of Jesus Christ.	39:22
	In them however, there is an unmistakable contradiction.	39:26
	The angel tells Joseph, you shall call his name Jesus.	39:31
	But the following verse	39:38
	containing the prophecy cited states,	39:41
	"And his name shall be called Emmanuel".	39:45
	What are we to do with this contradiction?	39:51
	Should we retreat through 450 years of biblical research	39:55
	and agree with Martin Luther	39:59
	that if we confront an unsolvable difficulty	40:01
	in holy scripture we should simply let it alone.	40:03
	Or should we relax in the nonchalance	40:11
	of some contemporary scholars who affirmed	40:13
	that much of the new Testament is simply meaningless.	40:16
	Applying to develop techniques of biblical criticism	40:22
	we discovered delightful resolution to the problem,	40:24
	but that is getting ahead of ourselves.	40:28
	First, let us look carefully at the text.	40:30
	Some critics have advised that verses 22 and 23,	40:39
	the ones causing the problem are a later edition.	40:42
	In favor of this view is the observation	40:46
	that verse 24 neatly follows 21.	40:47
	This hypothesis however must be dismissed	40:51
	precisely because it fails to explain	40:54
	why verses 22 and 23 were added,	40:56
	and ignores how the prophecy cited in verse 23	40:58
	permeates the contiguous verses,	41:02
	providing the vocabulary for verses 18, 21 and 25.	41:06
	The solution appears to be along the following lines.	41:12
	First, let us observe that Matthew composed 1:18-25,	41:18
	an integral part of his gospel	41:22
	at biblical scholarship has shown,	41:24
	and that he has in mind the meaning	41:26
	of the incarnation, the advent.	41:27
	Most of all, he knew that in Jesus God was with us.	41:31
	And this conviction brought to memory Isaiah 7:14	41:38
	in which it was prophesied that a young woman	41:42
	would bear a son who would be called Emmanuel,	41:44
	which means with us is God.	41:49
	This first fulfillment of scripture in Matthew	41:55
	moreover coincides with Jesus's last words,	41:57
	"And behold I am with you always,	42:00
	"even to the close of the age".	42:06
	There is an important facet of Matthew's theology,	42:11
	God is with us in Jesus Christ.	42:14
	But there is still the problem	42:21
	that Mary did not call her son, Emmanuel.	42:22
	Matthew seemed to realize this tension	42:27
	and that may be why he is the only one	42:31
	who explains the meaning of the name, Jesus.	42:33
	Since Jesus in Hebrew means he, God will say.	42:37
	A second observation is imperative.	42:46
	Although it has been arbitrary missed.	42:49
	Matthew deliberately alters the quotation from Isaiah,	42:53
	changing, she will call his name Emmanuel to,	42:57
	they, or some will call his name Emmanuel.	43:02
	The shift in meaning is important	43:09
	theologically and historically.	43:11
	The young woman who Matthew following	43:13
	the Greek translation of Isaiah calls a virgin,	43:16
	does not call her son Emmanuel, but some do.	43:20
	And among the ladder of Matthew and all who shared	43:26
	his confession, that in Jesus with us is God.	43:28
	Certainly Christians today,	43:36
	you can see the beautiful Christology	43:37
	and calling he who came both Jesus and Emmanuel.	43:39
	He who came revealing both that God saves	43:43
	and that God is with us.	43:49
	This insight ushers us into the third aspect,	43:53
	the hope from the advent.	43:56
	Those of us who stand with the evangelists Matthew	44:02
	are not relegated to the melancholy sphere of history	44:04
	in which men reminisce about the glorious past.	44:07
	We are not abandoned to mere reflections	44:12
	on a man who celebrated the advent of the kingdom of God,	44:14
	but died in the late spring of 30	44:18
	upon a common cross in the mound of dirt,	44:20
	just north of the walls of Jerusalem.	44:22
	That is not the end of Jesus,	44:26
	because the hope of the advent	44:33
	is immediately galvanized with the hope from the advent.	44:35
	And the earliest confessing community of believers	44:42
	long before they were called Christian	44:45
	speaking in their language Aramaic, they would pray.	44:47
	(foreign language)	44:52
	Our Lord come.	44:57
	This is quite clear because Paul transliterates	45:02
	the Aramaic and leaves it untranslated	45:05
	in one of his early epistles.	45:08
	The three dimensions of the advent	45:13
	that we have just seen	45:15
	entail three mandates.	45:17
	The hope for the advent accentuates the truth	45:23
	that God is not an abstract idea	45:27
	that evolves into spaceless timeless zone,	45:30
	but the person who acts	45:35
	in a geographical time-bound world	45:37
	that circumscribes each man.	45:39
	God had clearly awakened in men	45:45
	the expectation for the advent.	45:47
	When the advent occurred in history and time,	45:52
	men had the ability to receive it.	45:56
	The hope of the advent signifies the mandate	46:03
	that the attempt to know Jesus Christ	46:08
	must precede any attempt to follow him.	46:11
	The attempt to know Jesus Christ	46:18
	must precede any attempt to follow him.	46:22
	And with Jesus, we are always only beginning to know him,	46:28
	always attempting to be open	46:33
	even to those offensive aspects of his conduct,	46:35
	like his apparently heartless rejection	46:39
	of the Phoenician woman.	46:44
	We must ever seek to know whom we follow,	46:48
	otherwise, we are like the blind that are led by the blind.	46:52
	As we attempt to know Jesus	46:59
	perhaps we will see that the so-called Christian Church	47:05
	like the leaning tower of Pisa	47:08
	has been led to stand on the shaky stands of a theology	47:10
	that is mesmerized by the cross and the open grave.	47:14
	These two must be founded	47:19
	upon the concreteness of the advent.	47:20
	Perhaps the oldest Christian theologian,	47:25
	the author of the stories commonly used	47:27
	by both Matthew and Luke,	47:29
	has something to tell us with his emphasis	47:33
	that Jesus is the salvation bringer,	47:36
	the one who brought salvation through his deeds and words.	47:42
	The hope from the advent clarifies the mandate	47:52
	that God is the God of hope,	47:57
	he is ever before us,	48:02
	ever coming to us from the future.	48:06
	We have seen therefore some evidences	48:14
	of the hope for the advent,	48:16
	the hope of the advent, and the hope from the advent.	48:19
	These three are couched	48:27
	in a theologically profound representation	48:28
	of the essence of the advent found in revelation 1:4.	48:31
	Grace to you and peace from him	48:40
	who is and who was,	48:45
	and who is to come.	48:53
	Our gracious heavenly father	49:01
	we bless thee for the hope of the advent	49:06
	and the hope from the advent.	49:12
	Amen.	49:18
	(slow instrumental music)	49:24
	(choir singing indistinctly)	54:09
	(slow instrumental music)	58:42
	(man speaking indistinctly)	1:00:07
	(bells ringing)	1:00:47
	(slow instrumental music)	1:01:02

Item Info

Title:

James H. Charlesworth - "The Mystery of the Advent" (November 28, 1971)

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4cn7315s

Date:

November 28, 1971

Speaker:

Charlesworth, James H.

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 RR-0596
ref6395_pan
uachapelsermaud
duke:628582
dcrau002583
ark:/87924/r4cn7315s
9a74ba39-a184-469b-a777-6b829be73181

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Duke Chapel Recordings

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Language:

English

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United States
North Carolina
Durham (N.C.)

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

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CC BY-NC 4.0

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James H. Charlesworth - "The Mystery of the Advent" (November 28, 1971)

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Duke University Archives