Robert T. Young - "Where Do We Go from Here?" (July 4, 1976)

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	(high intensity cathedral music)	0:12
-	Let us confess our sins of omission and commission to God	9:30
	who knows us completely and loves us still.	9:36
	Oh God, our creator, redeemer and sustainer.	9:41
	We confess to you that we have wasted our personal resources	9:47
	and the resources of this land you have given	9:53
	to our ancestors and to us.	9:56
	We have built industries which are dehumanizing	10:00
	and which pollute our air and lands and waters.	10:03
	We have allowed our cities to grow without design,	10:09
	destroying peoples and neighborhoods.	10:14
	We have used neighborhood school and property values	10:18
	as code words for maintaining segregation in education	10:23
	and housing, our greed and our indifference	10:29
	have blinded us to our responsibilities	10:35
	for inflation, unemployment, and economic insecurity.	10:38
	Forgive our hardness of heart towards all who are starving,	10:46
	homeless, jobless, lonely,	10:51
	our brothers and sisters here, and in other nations.	10:55
	Forgive our being too easily discouraged	11:01
	as we work for economic and personal justice	11:05
	for the oppressed in our land, blacks, native Americans,	11:09
	Chicanos, women, all ethnic and religious minorities,	11:16
	forgive our isolation and indifference	11:23
	to the oppression in other lands.	11:27
	Forgive us when our actions create greater dependency	11:31
	rather than freedom and liberation.	11:36
	Forgive our not remembering that your love requires acts	11:41
	of justice, and mercy, and forgiveness	11:45
	toward all who need support, affirmation and acceptance.	11:50
	Amen.	12:10
	There is a balm in Gilead to make the wounded whole.	12:12
	There is a balm in Gilead to heal the sin sick soul.	12:19
	There is a balm in Gilead to heal a broken	12:27
	and repentant people and nation.	12:32
	And for this we give thanks and rejoice.	12:36
	Let us pray.	12:41
	Creator God, renew all your creation	12:44
	beginning with each of us.	12:49
	Where there is oppression, help us sow seeds of liberation.	12:52
	Where there is pollution, help us work for cleanness.	12:58
	Where there's hunger, help us set up ways to provide food.	13:03
	Where there's homelessness, housing,	13:09
	where there's joblessness, opportunity for work.	13:13
	Redeemer God, redeem us from slavery	13:19
	to our own selfish desires,	13:23
	help us to simplify our lives and needs,	13:27
	enable us to plan to share resources of fuel and food	13:32
	to meet needs of all persons.	13:37
	Sustainer God, spirit of life, quicken our concern	13:41
	for the needs of others who are aged and firm,	13:46
	handicapped, disabled.	13:51
	Renew in us a warm and tender concern for others.	13:55
	Reassure us of your gracious and continuing love	14:01
	and care for us, so we may be liberated	14:05
	and with joyful thanksgiving,	14:10
	be quick to care about others who need our patience,	14:13
	our help, our prayers, our love.	14:18
	Oh God, strengthen our trust in you,	14:23
	warm our love for others and release your power	14:27
	through the actions of our lives	14:32
	that your will may be done on earth,	14:36
	that your saving liberation and sustaining justice	14:39
	may come to our nation and all its people	14:44
	and to all the people of the world in our time.	14:49
	We pray in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, amen.	14:53
	(gentle piano music)	15:00
	(high intensity cathedral music)	15:33
	♪ He shall be satisfied ♪	16:29
	♪ And he shall satisfied ♪	16:30
	♪ And he shall satisfied ♪	16:32
	♪ And he shall satisfied ♪	16:36
	♪ Be satisfied ♪	16:38
	♪ Be satisfied ♪	16:40
	♪ Be satisfied will he ♪	16:41
	♪ Be satisfied ♪	16:44
	♪ Be satisfied ♪	16:46
	♪ Be satisfied will he ♪	16:47
	(high intensity cathedral music)	16:54
	Hear the reading from the old Testament lesson	19:01
	from the 31st chapter of Jeremiah.	19:05
	"Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord,	19:10
	when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel	19:14
	and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant	19:17
	which I made with their fathers when I took them by the hand	19:21
	to bring them out of the land of Egypt,	19:24
	my covenant which they broke,	19:27
	though I was their husband, says the Lord.	19:30
	But this is the covenant which I will make	19:33
	with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord.	19:36
	I will put my law within them,	19:40
	and I will I write it upon their hearts	19:43
	and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.	19:47
	And no longer shall each man teach his neighbor	19:53
	and his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,'	19:57
	for they shall all know me from the least of them	20:00
	to the greatest, says the Lord.	20:05
	For I will forgive their iniquity,	20:08
	and I will remember their sin no more."	20:12
	Will the congregation rise	20:17
	for the reading of the gospel lesson.	20:19
	Hear the reading from the fourth chapter of Luke.	20:25
	"And he came to Nazareth where he had been brought up	20:31
	and he went to the synagogue as his custom was	20:35
	on the Sabbath day, and he stood up to read	20:38
	and it was given to him the book of the prophet of Isaiah.	20:43
	He opened the book and found a place where it was written,	20:47
	the spirit of the Lord is upon me	20:51
	because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.	20:54
	He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives	20:59
	and recovering of sight to the blind,	21:03
	to set at liberty those who are oppressed,	21:06
	to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.	21:11
	And he closed the book and gave it back to the attendant	21:16
	and sat down.	21:20
	And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him.	21:22
	And he began to say to them,	21:27
	'Today, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.'"	21:30
	We give thanks that God continues to speak to us	21:37
	through the written Word.	21:42
	(high intensity cathedral music)	21:44
	Let us with one voice confidently affirm our faith	22:30
	for we are not alone, we live in God's world.	22:35
	We believe in God who has created and is creating,	22:40
	who has come in the truly human Jesus	22:47
	to reconcile and make new,	22:50
	who works in us and others by the Spirit.	22:53
	We trust God who calls us to be the church	22:58
	to celebrate life and its fullness,	23:03
	to love and serve others, to seek justice and resist evil,	23:07
	to proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen,	23:13
	our judge and our hope, in life, in death	23:17
	and life beyond death, God is with us, we are not alone.	23:23
	Thanks be to God.	23:31
	The Lord be with you.	23:33
-	And with your spirit.	23:35
-	Let us pray.	23:37
	Oh, holy God, God of our history, God of all history,	23:48
	we bow before your power and might and wisdom.	23:56
	We wait before you, for without your presence,	24:02
	our celebration will be empty and meaningless.	24:09
	Guide us that we may keep our country	24:15
	and its history and heritage	24:18
	in the perspective of your love and your justice,	24:21
	that we will not be too cynical or too pompous	24:26
	or too arrogant.	24:30
	We remember, oh God, those persons of honor and wisdom	24:33
	and courage and vision who brought forth a new nation	24:37
	out of wilderness and tyranny.	24:40
	Come now oh God, to this same nation,	24:44
	threatened by new tyrannies, shamed by fraud and dishonesty,	24:49
	sick with its own prosperity.	24:55
	Restore to us leaders who speak truth and practice mercy,	24:59
	and guard the freedom and wellbeing of all peoples.	25:04
	(Priest clears throat)	25:08
	We lift before you now those persons	25:11
	for whom this day affords no time of celebration.	25:13
	Those whose lives hang by a thread and whose pain	25:19
	and suffering and fear blot at all times and seasons.	25:24
	Those whose future seem so barren and hopeless that they	25:32
	cannot find the courage to look forward or backward.	25:36
	Those whose hunger make a mockery out of our celebration	25:42
	of our abundance and greatness.	25:47
	Those whose dreams that we would now be living in a world of	25:51
	peace and freedom, celebrating one world under you.	25:55
	We pray for those whose dreams have become bitter memories.	26:00
	We give thanks to you for your healing presence	26:06
	in this world, oh God.	26:09
	Where we are broken, mend us.	26:13
	Where we are unrighteous, judge us.	26:17
	Where we are blind, restore our sight.	26:23
	Where we are deaf, open our ears.	26:28
	Where we are paralyzed, help us to move again	26:32
	and hear us now as we pray the prayer	26:37
	of our Lord Jesus Christ.	26:40
	Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name,	26:45
	thy kingdom come, thy will be done,	26:50
	on earth as it is in heaven.	26:55
	Give us this day our daily bread.	26:58
	And forgive us our trespasses,	27:01
	as we forgive those who trespass against us.	27:04
	And lead us not into temptation,	27:08
	but deliver us from evil.	27:10
	For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory,	27:13
-	Forever amen.	27:19
-	Amen.	27:21
	This afternoon at two o'clock,	27:23
	the carillon at Duke chapel will be played joining	27:25
	in all the bells and carillons in Durham	27:28
	celebrating our religious heritage and freedom.	27:31
	We welcome you all today to this special service.	27:36
	And we're especially pleased to have those persons	27:40
	who are here for the Folklife Festival.	27:43
	It is our privilege to have you worship with us today.	27:46
	And it is your privilege to have Robert Young minister	27:50
	to the university, speak to you today.	27:55
	And we give thanks that God continues to speak to us	27:58
	through the spoken word.	28:02
-	Some of you may think that the ministers for today,	28:11
	intentionally planned to wear red, white, and blue	28:18
	in celebration of the 4th of July.	28:24
	I assure you it is simply coincidental	28:27
	that blue and white happened to be the colors	28:31
	of the robes of Duke and of Duke Chapel.	28:33
	And red happens to be the liturgical color	28:36
	for this particular time of the year.	28:38
	Coincidence, providence, who knows?	28:41
	Grace to you and peace on this holy day.	28:45
	During the past 12 months,	28:51
	I have had the privilege of teaching a course, many times,	28:53
	for the United Methodist Women entitled,	28:56
	A Nation Under God.	28:59
	The text for this course has been a little book	29:02
	by Bishop James Armstrong,	29:04
	bishopped into United Methodist Church,	29:06
	a book entitled, "The Nation Yet To Be."	29:08
	I think that title sums up my own personal philosophy	29:14
	of who we are as a nation.	29:18
	We are a nation, both individually and corporately,	29:21
	that is yet to be.	29:26
	Now some of us do not like to hear it that way.	29:30
	Some of us think that we as a nation have arrived.	29:34
	Some of us feel that indeed we are okay today.	29:38
	We don't want anyone to criticize our country,	29:42
	its leaders or its policies,	29:45
	its practices or its priorities.	29:47
	There are some in this country who cry,	29:51
	my country right or wrong.	29:53
	There are those who parade the bumper stickers would say,	29:57
	"America love it or leave it."	30:00
	But who among us, however, this morning, thinking soberly,	30:04
	reflecting clearly, perceiving rightly, feeling sensitively,	30:12
	could say anything but that we are a nation yet to be?	30:20
	And we are.	30:27
	This does not mean however,	30:30
	that we are to forsake our history	30:31
	or ignore our past, overlook our heritage	30:34
	or close off our memory.	30:38
	No, not at all.	30:40
	What it does mean is that as we relive or re-enact	30:42
	or replay our history both past and present,	30:45
	we do not have to bless it all.	30:49
	We are a nation with a past and a present	30:53
	that have in them what today's young call some good bad,	30:56
	and some bad bad,	31:01
	but under the grace of God,	31:05
	we are a nation that is yet to be.	31:06
	Yet to achieve our full potential	31:11
	of justice for all peoples,	31:14
	yet to see all persons anointed with human dignity,	31:17
	yet to see in our midst all children born	31:22
	and reared with love and life and hope,	31:26
	yet to see God's gifts in nature under the ground,	31:30
	on the earth, in the water, in the air used responsibly	31:35
	by good stewards of a gracious God.	31:40
	And yet to live out God's command to love the Lord	31:43
	with all our heart and soul and mind and strength	31:46
	and to love our neighbors as ourselves.	31:49
	The nation yet to be, yours and mine.	31:52
	We are its people.	31:57
	We are its present and its future.	31:58
	That's who we are this morning.	32:02
	But look for just a moment with me if you will,	32:04
	at who we are, we're a nation of words.	32:07
	"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses,	32:11
	yearning to breathe free,"	32:15
	say the words on the Statue of Liberty.	32:17
	Thomas Jefferson said, "Indeed, I tremble for my country	32:21
	when I reflect that God is just."	32:25
	James Russell Lowell wrote, "True freedom,	32:31
	is to share all the chains our neighbors wear	32:34
	and with heart and hand to be earnest,	32:37
	to make others free."	32:40
	Franklin Delano Roosevelt said,	32:45
	"Remember all ways that all of us are descendants	32:47
	from immigrants and revolutionists."	32:51
	John F. Kennedy said, "Pay any price, bear any burden,	32:56
	meet any friend, oppose any foe in order	33:01
	to assure the survival and the success of liberty."	33:03
	"One day," preached Martin Luther King Jr., "one day,	33:10
	all of God's children will be able to join hands	33:16
	and sing the spiritual of all free at last,	33:20
	free at last, thank God almighty we're free at last."	33:23
	We hold these truths to be self evident	33:31
	that all persons are created equal,	33:35
	that they are endowed by their creator with certain inherent	33:37
	and an inalienable rights that among these are life,	33:40
	liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.	33:43
	That was what we declared.	33:49
	Thomas Jefferson in 1787 said,	33:52
	"God forbid that we should ever go 20 years in this nation	33:56
	without a rebellion," oh.	34:01
	Abigail Adams wrote to her husband John Adams in 1776	34:07
	and said, "If particular care and attention	34:11
	are not paid to the ladies,	34:14
	we are determined to foment a rebellion	34:17
	and will not hold ourselves bound to obey any laws	34:20
	in which we have no voice or representation."	34:24
	And then Susan B. Anthony said,	34:32
	"Give your heaviest raps on the head to every neighbor	34:34
	who does injustice to a human being	34:39
	for the simple crime of color or sex."	34:42
	Albert Einstein not too long ago said,	34:47
	"Never do anything against conscience,	34:49
	even if the state demands it."	34:52
	Our currency says, "In God we trust."	34:56
	Our pledge of allegiance says, "One nation under God,	35:01
	indivisible with liberty and justice for all."	35:05
	Yes, a nation of words, but we're a nation of peoples,	35:09
	Puerto Ricans, Cubans, Greeks, Portuguese,	35:13
	Russians, Poles, Jews, Scandinavians, Italians,	35:16
	Africans, Asians, Irish, Germans, Dutch, Spanish,	35:20
	French, English, native Americans,	35:24
	E pluribus Unum, one out of many.	35:26
	But we're not a melting pot my friends.	35:30
	We are, as someone said, a mixture of many.	35:32
	Indeed instead of being a melting pot,	35:36
	we're more like a tossed salad.	35:38
	Let us rejoice then and celebrate our differences	35:41
	and our peculiarities.	35:44
	We're a nation of persons.	35:48
	Jonathan Edwards, Thomas Paine, George Washington,	35:51
	George Whitfield, Phillis Wheatley,	35:57
	black African slave brought to this country,	36:00
	educated by her master, the first black poet,	36:03
	Abraham Lincoln, Booker T. Washington, Jonas Salk,	36:06
	Albert Einstein, Dwight L. Moody, Thomas Edison,	36:10
	Susan B. Anthony, Jane Adams, Marian Anderson,	36:13
	Mary McLeod Bethune, Washington Irvin,	36:18
	Martin Luther King Jr., Wilbur Wright,	36:22
	Harriet Beecher Stowe, Phillips Brooks, Benjamin Franklin,	36:25
	George Washington Carver, Walt Whitman, Helen Keller,	36:29
	Clara Barton, William Faulkner, Adlai Stevenson,	36:32
	Dwight Eisenhower, Francis Asbury, Harriet Tubman.	36:36
	Yes, we are a nation of persons.	36:40
	And where are we now this morning my friends?	36:46
	Where are you?	36:50
	Where am I?	36:51
	Where are we as a people in this nation under God?	36:52
	It is as if a word I read the other day	36:57
	is truly descriptive at least of my own feelings,	36:59
	which said something outside of us is over perhaps forever	37:02
	and something inside us seems very, very empty.	37:08
	Something outside of us seems over perhaps forever	37:14
	and something inside us seems very, very empty.	37:20
	I see this day as a time of discontinuity,	37:26
	the time when we feel reluctant to look at our past	37:49
	and fearful to hope for the future.	37:52
	We're content just to be today.	37:55
	We refuse to deal with yesterday.	37:58
	We have no desire to plan for tomorrow.	38:02
	I see this time as a time of tentativity,	38:06
	a time when we all make tentative commitments about matters	38:10
	that once demanded ultimate and lasting commitments from us,	38:14
	commitments about our jobs, about marriage,	38:19
	about friendships, about values,	38:22
	all these things today seem to be tentative	38:24
	and relative and subject to change.	38:28
	Even these are basic life and death commitments.	38:30
	I see this as an age of partiality,	38:35
	all of life is seen in bits and pieces.	38:38
	Where do I get a sense of the whole of life?	38:42
	The whole of the world around me, the whole of myself.	38:45
	I see a psychiatrist for my psyche,	38:50
	a podiatrist for my feet,	38:53
	a dentist for my teeth and ophthalmologist for my eyes,	38:55
	a cardiologist for my heart, who will see me whole?	38:59
	I see this as an age of anonymity.	39:07
	With 225 million or so of us in the United States	39:10
	and 3 billion of us in the world,	39:14
	there is no way that I can help but feel lost in the masses.	39:15
	I am one among millions, my name is no person.	39:20
	To my bank, I am number 6015015113.	39:25
	To the telephone company, I am 9194891564.	39:30
	To my mortgage holder, I am 6136144.	39:35
	To BankAmericard, I am 4342190389181.	39:40
	To Blue Cross Blue Shield, I'm not even one.	39:46
	I am a group,	39:48
	group number 0320248001.	39:50
	(congregation laughs)
	To the bookstore, I am to 2208467.	39:55
	To the Internal Revenue Service and to Social Security,	39:59
	I am to 245445569.	40:03
	And to our church downtown where my family belong,	40:07
	we are envelope number 460.	40:11
	(congregation laughs)	40:14
	How much of an age of anonymity we are.	40:17
	So where do we go from here?	40:24
	This is a glorious moment in the life of our country.	40:27
	To celebrate any birthday is always a time	40:31
	of joy and goodness and rejoicing,	40:34
	but even more so when it's number 200.	40:36
	And is it coincidence or is it providence	40:40
	that this day falls on Sunday and gives us the opportunity	40:43
	for the Word of God to speak to our celebration?	40:46
	I'm not sure, but I rejoice in the fact	40:49
	that the two do fall on the same day.	40:52
	So where do we go from here?	40:54
	Isaac Asimov in National Geographic's special US issue	40:56
	this month says, "The big slogan of the 21st century	41:01
	will be no more 20th centuries."	41:06
	My prayer on this 200th birthday	41:19
	is, oh God, take us from here	41:22
	to heal the brokenness of our land.	41:26
	We have 200 years ago made our declaration of independence.	41:30
	I call today for us to make our declaration of intra	41:34
	dependence because we are dependent one upon the other.	41:38
	A fellow American of ours from Louisiana has a word.	41:45
	He says, "In a regular year, there are 31,536,000 seconds,	41:47
	525,000 minutes and 8,760 hours.	41:53
	I hear daily people say,	41:58
	'I don't have time to get involved in this or that,'	42:00
	which affect our ways of life.	42:03
	Americans," he says, "such an attitude is the surest way	42:05
	for apathy and then for slavery."	42:08
	Buckminster Fuller tells us, "Our greatest challenge today	42:14
	is not at all how we get on independently,	42:18
	but how we get on together."	42:21
	And then he says,	42:24
	"We need to realize what our priorities are	42:25
	and get them in order and realize what we're doing	42:29
	with people as we take care of things,"	42:31
	listen to what he says, "we have typewriters,	42:35
	typewriters sleeping with the best of plumbing.	42:37
	And we have people sleeping in our slums."	42:41
	(Minister Robert breathes out heavily)	42:47
	This land is your land.	42:48
	This land is my land.	42:52
	I love my country, I love her people,	42:54
	but all what we do to one another,	42:57
	Yahweh gave to all the people of Israel a new covenant	43:00
	written not on tablets of stone, but on the very flesh	43:03
	and spirit of the hearts of the people.	43:07
	"I will write it on their hearts," he said,	43:08
	"I will be their God and they shall be my people."	43:11
	Those of us in this country who belong to Christ	43:14
	are the new Israel, and this same covenant is ours.	43:17
	God is our God, we are the people of God, all of us.	43:21
	This word to heal the brokenness of our nation comes	43:26
	to all people of God, to you and me.	43:29
	Colin Morris in "Mankind My Church" writes,	43:34
	"According to classical theology,	43:37
	man's greatest sin is pride.	43:41
	Personally, I would say that the great sin	43:45
	of the modern world is not pride, but cruelty.	43:48
	But just a short way behind cruelty is another besetting	43:53
	sin of our time, triviality.	43:57
	Never have such fantastic resources and human ingenuity	44:00
	been dedicated to such paltry, short lived ends."	44:05
	How true of much of what we do and who we are	44:11
	in this, the goodliest land of them all?	44:15
	And my sin of cruelty my friends, destroys others,	44:18
	while my sin of triviality destroys me.	44:21
	Heal the brokenness of our land.	44:28
	You think we're not broken?	44:31
	Listen, if you will, to the hurts, the cries, the longings,	44:34
	the yearnings, the pleas of your neighbors.	44:37
	We do hurt.	44:39
	We feel separated, estranged, alone.	44:40
	The 14 year old poet with pain and beauty and real agony	44:44
	wrote, "My God has left me.	44:48
	He has left me all alone.	44:52
	There is no one else.	44:55
	I am all alone."	44:59
	As someone said this week in a class which I attended,	45:05
	"To let people know reality as it is,	45:10
	you don't have to simulate crucifixions.	45:13
	There are enough of those walking around already."	45:19
	Perhaps the future calls us not to build bridges,	45:26
	but to become the bridges, which tie us together.	45:29
	Perhaps the future calls us not to speak words,	45:33
	but to become the words in life	45:36
	and the words in love to others.	45:39
	"Your theology," writes a contemporary theologian,	45:42
	"your theology, whether it's fancy or plain	45:45
	is what you are when the talking stops	45:48
	and the action begins."	45:51
	John Peter Muhlenberg preacher in 1776 wrote,	45:55
	"There is a time to preach and a time to fight.	45:58
	Now," he said, "is the time to fight."	46:01
	May I say, there is a time to break and the time to heal.	46:04
	And now is the time to heal.	46:10
	I know as you do, that the great problems of hunger	46:15
	and racism and sexism and depersonalization	46:21
	and dehumanization and mechanization	46:25
	are not going to be abolished in my lifetime	46:27
	and perhaps not even in the lifetime of my children.	46:30
	My friends, I'm not going to lay down	46:33
	and bemoan the fact that it is hopeless	46:36
	and that we are helpless.	46:38
	Well you see, I can take one short step.	46:41
	I can strike some puny blow.	46:44
	I can lay just one tiny brick on behalf of the future	46:47
	for that is where our citizenship as Christians lies.	46:53
	My prayer on this 200th birthday, oh God,	46:59
	take us from here to heal the brokenness of our world.	47:04
	We have declared 200 years ago,	47:10
	our declaration of independence.	47:12
	And so I call today on this 200th anniversary	47:14
	for us to declare a declaration of interdependence	47:18
	for we cannot live as a nation alone.	47:22
	Our world belongs to God, but it will be what we make of it.	47:28
	And our world this morning, my dear friends,	47:35
	is a broken world.	47:37
	Riots in South Africa with all its oppression,	47:40
	war in Lebanon between Christians and Muslims,	47:44
	death and destruction, fighting in Ireland between	47:48
	Protestants and Catholics, hunger in Asia, Africa, India,	47:52
	the United States, starvation, disease, illiteracy,	47:57
	suppression, division, and hatred.	48:00
	And someone has warned us as a contemporary word that the	48:03
	real struggle of ahead of us will not be between East and	48:07
	West and capitalist and communist, between the Russians	48:10
	and the Americans or the black and the white.	48:13
	But the real struggle that lies ahead of us	48:17
	is between the haves and the have-nots.	48:19
	And all of us who dwell in this land or among the haves,	48:22
	"To whom much is given," says the Word of God,	48:29
	"from them much will be expected."	48:35
	And I think that's both an individual and a corporate word.	48:39
	I remember last summer hearing Dr. Robert Bella,	48:43
	noted sociologist, speak in Boulder, Colorado.	48:46
	And as he analyzed and tried to project	48:51
	what was going on today and what is to go on tomorrow,	48:53
	most of what he said was very, very pessimistic.	48:57
	There wasn't much hope in his words,	49:01
	as he talked about our future	49:03
	and I came away from his lecture, somewhat depressed.	49:04
	There was a woman there, a black woman from Guyana.	49:09
	Her name is Dr. Sylvia Talbot.	49:13
	She has been at one time, the secretary of health	49:16
	or comparable to the secretary of health, education	49:18
	and welfare in her own country	49:21
	where I'm sure she has known depravity	49:24
	and hopelessness at its worst.	49:26
	She also has been her country's ambassador	49:29
	to the United Nations, and so after having heard Dr. Bella,	49:31
	she and I were walking along the sidewalk to where she was	49:35
	going to speak in just a few minutes.	49:39
	And I said, "Dr. Talbot, you heard Dr. Bella.	49:41
	Do you share his pessimism about the future?"	49:44
	And I really expected her to agree with him	49:48
	because she probably has seen it more in the role than he.	49:51
	And she replied and looked me right straight in the face	49:54
	as she said it, "No, I do not think the future is hopeless	49:56
	because God is in control and not man."	50:01
	One of the truly prophetic words of our time	50:11
	was spoken by Senator Mark Hatfield,	50:13
	at one of the Washington prayer breakfasts	50:19
	some three years ago.	50:21
	I share that word with you now.	50:24
	He said, "We sit here today as the wealthy and the powerful,	50:27
	but let us not forget that those who follow Christ will more	50:36
	often find themselves not with comfortable majorities	50:39
	but with miserable minorities.	50:43
	Today, our prayers must begin with repentance.	50:46
	Individually we must seek forgiveness	50:50
	for the exile of love from our hearts,	50:53
	and corporately we must turn as a people in repentance	50:56
	from the sin that has scarred our national soul.	51:00
	If my people," he quoted from 2 Chronicles,	51:05
	"shall humble themselves and pray and seek my face	51:09
	and turn from their wicked ways,	51:15
	and I will forgive their sins and heal their land."	51:18
	There's a world out there.	51:26
	The Lord gave us ears that we might hear,	51:29
	the sounds of hurt and pain and fear,	51:33
	but we stop our ears to shut out the sound of a world	51:37
	that's crying and dying all around.	51:40
	There's a world out there.	51:43
	The Lord calls you to listen.	51:44
	There's a world out there.	51:47
	Don't you hear it crying.	51:48
	There's a world out there.	51:51
	Won't you stop and listen, listen, listen, listen.	51:53
	A young black of Rhodesia had earned his PhD	52:02
	in this country.	52:04
	He returned to Rhodesia with all of its troubles.	52:08
	And one day he was asked why he had gone back	52:12
	to his homeland and whether or not	52:15
	he really saw any hope there.	52:17
	And he said, "Yes, for I believe in my church.	52:19
	And in Rhodesia, the church is leading the way.	52:22
	We are not alone.	52:26
	There are hungry and oppressed people in the world,	52:27
	and they are one with us.	52:29
	There are Christian people around the world	52:31
	and they are one with us.	52:33
	We are not alone.	52:35
	And finally," he said, "I believe in God.	52:36
	We belong to God.	52:39
	The future belongs to God, I am not afraid."	52:41
	(Minister Robert claps)	52:48
	And there you have it, my friends,	52:52
	the future belongs to God.	52:55
	We celebrate today and rightly so,	52:58
	there's much cause to rejoice and give thanks	53:02
	and shout with joy, but where do we go from here?	53:04
	May I share with you a word from my friend, Karl Armani,	53:08
	that speaks to me personally, and I think will speak to you	53:11
	and to all of us, he said,	53:14
	"People are always leaving the theater	53:16
	before the show is over.	53:18
	They never see the end of the play nor hear the benediction.	53:21
	Sometimes even the actors throw up their hands	53:25
	and leave before the curtain falls.	53:29
	There is a difference between the end of things	53:32
	and the edge of things.	53:34
	There is a future from anywhere a person stands.	53:36
	You must not despair of anything or any body	53:40
	until God gets through, there is a future.	53:44
	There is a future from where you are."	53:49
	The Word of God which I have for you and for myself	53:56
	and for all my sisters and brothers in this land	53:59
	this morning is, by the grace of God,	54:01
	there is a future from wherever we are.	54:07
	Let us pray.	54:14
	Teach us good Lord to serve you as you deserve,	54:20
	to give and not to count the cost,	54:29
	to suffer and not to heed the wounds,	54:33
	to toil and not to ask for rest,	54:37
	to labor and not to ask for any reward	54:41
	other than that we know, we are doing your will	54:46
	through Jesus Christ, our Lord, amen.	54:53
	(high intensity cathedral music)	55:05
	(gentle piano music)	1:00:15
	(high intensity cathedral music)	1:01:02
	(high intensity piano music)	1:06:03
-	Accept this offering from your people, oh God,	1:07:18
	and save us from making these gifts	1:07:21
	a substitute for the gift of ourselves.	1:07:24
	We offer them to you, these outward tokens	1:07:29
	of our inward commitment to you and your work	1:07:34
	in this whole world.	1:07:38
	We pray in the spirit of Christ, amen.	1:07:41
	(high intensity cathedral music)	1:07:46
	(indistinct) of America are not ours,	1:09:32
	but are your gift given to us and all generations.	1:09:38
	May we cease filling those skies	1:09:46
	with the refuge of our progress.	1:09:49
	Shed your grace on us as we celebrate	1:09:53
	in remembrance, and in hope.	1:09:59
	(high intensity cathedral music)	1:10:04
-	Thank you, oh Lord, for the pilgrims of long ago,	1:11:00
	and the pilgrims of today.	1:11:06
	Pilgrims who speak for peace, for love, for justice.	1:11:09
	You cannot mend our every flaw until we respond	1:11:16
	to your healing spirit.	1:11:21
	So let us, oh God, bend our knees to you,	1:11:24
	before we express our love for our country.	1:11:29
	(high intensity cathedral music)	1:11:34
-	Oh God, may America be a land where people	1:12:29
	no longer have to die to protect liberty or their country.	1:12:34
	May we remember that you're refining	1:12:40
	is the flame that rekindled the spirit of your people.	1:12:45
	Cleanse us oh Lord, that truly our success be nobleness	1:12:51
	and our love be real.	1:12:58
	(high intensity cathedral music)	1:13:02
-	Following these closing words,	1:14:02
	let us sing together the last stanza of that hymn,	1:14:03
	in one voice.	1:14:07
	And now let us say together, oh God,	1:14:08
	you who are the God of all nations,	1:14:13
	help us in reclaiming our ancestors' dreams	1:14:16
	to remember your vision,	1:14:21
	that we shall be your people and you shall be our God.	1:14:23
	As we look through the human tears of our nation's history,	1:14:29
	we commit to you, oh God, our future as individuals	1:14:34
	and as a nation, with all our needs,	1:14:39
	aspirations, longings, and hope, amen.	1:14:43
	(high intensity cathedral music)	1:14:49
-	Dismiss us now, oh God, with your blessing	1:16:17
	and accompany us elbow with your grace,	1:16:22
	that we, as a people and as a nation,	1:16:26
	may henceforth live in peace and love and holiness.	1:16:32
	We pray in the Spirit of Jesus who is with us always.	1:16:40
	♪ Amen ♪	1:16:50
	♪ Amen ♪	1:16:56
	♪ Amen ♪	1:17:01
	♪ Amen ♪	1:17:14
	♪ Amen ♪	1:17:22
	♪ Amen ♪	1:17:34
	(bell rings)	1:17:46
	(high intensity cathedral music)	1:18:03

Item Info

Title:

Robert T. Young - "Where Do We Go from Here?" (July 4, 1976)

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4rj4dw6f

Date:

July 4, 1976

Speaker:

Young, Robert T., 1935-2009

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 RR-0843
ref6886_rfu
uachapelsermaud
duke:628330
dcrau002802
ark:/87924/r4rj4dw6f
dac3243f-2db0-40ec-ab06-44a6c5a28e24

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Duke Chapel Recordings

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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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Robert T. Young - "Where Do We Go from Here?" (July 4, 1976)

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