William H. Willimon - "A Good Name" (September 11, 1988)

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	(soft music)	0:00
	(organ playing)	0:48
-	Good morning and welcome to Duke University Chapel.	5:29
	Glad to have you here this day.	5:33
	I'd like to call to your attention	5:35
	if you live on this campus, two events	5:37
	that are held every week here in the chapel.	5:42
	The first is our noon prayer service.	5:44
	Prayer is offered in Memorial Chapel	5:47
	here in Duke Chapel every weekday	5:50
	during the school year at noon.	5:53
	Also, on Thursday evenings at 5:15,	5:56
	an even song service of choral vespers	6:01
	is offered here in Memorial Chapel, 5:15 on Thursdays.	6:05
	These services have become popular	6:10
	with many people here and campus	6:12
	and we call them to your attention.	6:14
	Let us continue our worship.	6:17
	(man singing)	6:25
	(choir singing)	6:44
	(organ playing)	9:11
	(choir singing)	9:42
	(choir singing)	13:21
-	Let us pray.	13:59
	Oh God, because without you we are not	14:02
	able to please you.	14:05
	Mercifully grant that your Holy Spirit	14:07
	may in all things direct and rule our hearts	14:10
	through Jesus Christ, our Lord who lives and reigns	14:14
	with you and the Holy Spirit.	14:19
	One God now and forever, amen.	14:20
-	Let us pray.	14:38
	Open our hearts and minds oh God	14:41
	by the power of your holy spirit.	14:44
	So that as the word is read and proclaimed,	14:47
	we might hear with joy what you say to us this day.	14:50
	Amen.	14:55
	The first lesson is taken from the book of Proverbs.	14:58
	A good name is to be chosen rather than great riches.	15:01
	And favor is better then silver or gold.	15:06
	The rich and the poor meet together.	15:09
	The Lord is the maker of them all.	15:12
	They who sow in justices will reap calamity.	15:15
	And the rod of their fury will fail.	15:19
	They who have bountiful eyes will be blessed	15:23
	for they share their bread with the poor.	15:26
	This ends the reading of the first lesson.	15:29
	(organ playing)	15:33
	(choir singing)	16:07
	The second lesson is taken from the letter of James.	18:23
	My brothers and sisters, show now partiality	18:28
	as you hold the faith of our Lord, Jesus Christ.	18:31
	The Lord of glory.	18:35
	For if a person with gold rings and in fine clothing	18:36
	comes into your assembly and a poor person	18:40
	in shabby clothing also comes in,	18:43
	and you pay attention to the one who wears	18:45
	the fine clothing and say, have a seat here please.	18:48
	While you say to the person stand there	18:52
	or sit at my feet, have you not made distinctions	18:55
	among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?	18:58
	Listen my beloved brothers and sisters.	19:03
	Has not God chose those who are poor	19:05
	in the world to be rich in faith	19:08
	and heirs of the kingdom which he has promised	19:11
	to those who love Him?	19:13
	If you really fulfill the royal law	19:16
	according to the scripture, you shall love	19:18
	your neighbor as yourself, you do well.	19:21
	But if you show partiality, you commit sin	19:24
	and are convicted by the law as transgressors.	19:27
	For whoever keeps the whole law,	19:31
	but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it.	19:34
	What does it profit, my brothers and sisters,	19:39
	if a person says he has faith, but does not have works?	19:41
	Can his faith save him?	19:46
	If a brother or sister is ill clad and in lack of daily food	19:48
	and one of you says to them, go in peace.	19:52
	Be warmed and filled, without giving them the things	19:56
	needed for the body, what does it profit?	19:59
	So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead.	20:03
	This ends the reading of the second lesson.	20:09
	Will you please stand for the gospel hymn.	20:12
	(choir singing)	20:56
	The gospel is taken from the book of Mark.	22:07
	And Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages	22:11
	of Cesaria Philipi.	22:14
	And on the way he asked his disciples,	22:16
	who do people say that I am?	22:18
	And they told him John the Baptist, and others say Elijah.	22:22
	And others, one of the prophets.	22:26
	And he asked them, but who do you say that I am?	22:29
	Peter answered him, you are the Christ.	22:33
	And he charged them to tell no one about him.	22:36
	And he began to teach them that the son of man	22:37
	must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders	22:41
	and the chief priests and the scribes, and be killed.	22:45
	And after three days, rise again.	22:49
	This ends the reading of the gospel.	22:53
	(choir singing)	23:05
-	Be seated.	24:21
	A good name is better than great riches.	24:33
	Do you believe that?	24:38
	It's from the book of Proverbs.	24:40
	You get this sort of moral platitude	24:43
	in the book of Proverbs.	24:47
	Sounds a little quaint, this talk of a good name.	24:50
	Doesn't it?	24:55
	But it's typical of Proverbs.	24:56
	For here is ethics,	25:00
	done the sixth century BC way.	25:03
	That is an older person telling a younger person	25:08
	how to get on in the world, how to have a good life.	25:12
	Proverbs is a collection of this sort of	25:17
	practical advice to the young on how to get on in the world.	25:20
	Now some of proverbs, like say advice your parents	25:25
	gives you is quite valuable.	25:29
	And some of proverbs, you can get along	25:32
	just as well without.	25:34
	Here's some proverbs.	25:38
	A soft answer turns away wrath, okay.	25:40
	A fool takes no pleasure in understanding,	25:45
	but only expressing his own opinions.	25:49
	You're thinking about someone in your hall	25:52
	right now, aren't you?	25:54
	A wife's quarreling is continually dripping rain.	25:59
	Like a diamond in a pig's snout	26:06
	is a beautiful woman with no sense.	26:09
	To which some of you will quote to me another proverb,	26:12
	like a lame man legs is a proverb in the mouth of a fool.	26:18
	Well you get the picture, proverbs is this kind	26:24
	of advice to the young on how to get along well.	26:26
	Experience really is a good teacher says proverbs.	26:32
	The nice thing is when you're young	26:37
	you don't have to reinvent the wheel, morally speaking.	26:38
	This is ethics from the Proverbs perspective.	26:46
	What ever happened to ethics?	26:54
	Asked a cover issue of Time last year.	26:56
	Assaulted by sleaze, scandals and hypocrisy,	27:01
	America searches for its moral bearings, said the article.	27:06
	The article was a devastating revelation	27:12
	of a nation in ethical crisis.	27:15
	Sleaze in high places, two presidential candidates	27:19
	hounded out of the campaign.	27:23
	One for plagiarism, another for adultery.	27:25
	Scandals on Wall Street and among popular clergy.	27:30
	When offered the choice between good name	27:36
	and the gold, it appears that we go for the gold.	27:39
	Our own campus was shaken last year,	27:46
	when one of our own graduates and benefactors	27:49
	was indicted for fraud on Wall Street.	27:52
	An article in the Duke Chronicle said of this	27:57
	unfortunate young man's years at Duke,	28:00
	he was always ambitious and he didn't care	28:03
	what it took to get where he got.	28:07
	And I say that when we read that article	28:12
	a chill went down our collective spines	28:14
	because we know that we are also here	28:19
	because we are ambitious.	28:21
	How are you getting on in the world?	28:28
	So here we are again in Duke Chapel,	28:33
	again in the book of Proverbs,	28:35
	again talking about ethics.	28:37
	Ethics is hot.	28:41
	Right, wrong, good, evil.	28:43
	In the past two years at Duke commencement	28:46
	we have had speeches, one by a newspaper reporter,	28:48
	a TV reporter, the other by a cartoonist.	28:52
	And one person spoke on the 10 commandments,	28:56
	the other on the golden rule.	28:59
	Ethics is hot these days.	29:01
	The discredited presidential candidates said,	29:05
	why should a higher standard of personal morality	29:10
	apply to me than to everybody else?	29:13
	To which one commentator said he should've campaigned	29:16
	on the slogan it takes a sleaze to lead a bunch of sleazes.	29:19
	What happened to ethics?	29:25
	Well one thing that happened before many of you	29:30
	who are students were in diapers is that we started	29:33
	having ethical quanderies, dilemmas.	29:36
	Whether you know it or not, your parents were among	29:43
	the first to debate abortion and contraception	29:46
	and invitro fertilization and nuclear power.	29:50
	Surely our grandparents had ethical quandries,	29:55
	but never before have people been faced	29:58
	with so many tough choices and difficult decisions	30:00
	we told ourselves.	30:04
	We live in a brave new world where urbanization	30:08
	and appeal and technology have changed everything,	30:12
	so that everything is up for grabs morally speaking.	30:17
	In this new world you can't get along	30:22
	on what momma or daddy told you,	30:24
	because they didn't live where you live.	30:27
	They didn't know what you know.	30:29
	Their values and what everybody else said was right	30:35
	is not necessarily right.	30:39
	So now you must decide, you must choose afresh.	30:41
	Now this ethics we labeled situation ethics.	30:48
	There was an influential book by that title,	30:54
	written by Joseph Fletcher.	30:57
	Read it my sophomore year.	31:00
	Ethics, Fletcher said, consists of a string of decisions.	31:03
	Ethics occurs when somebody asks,	31:09
	well what ought I to do, how should I choose?	31:11
	Fletcher said that it's a mistake	31:16
	to decide on the basis of what your parents told you	31:19
	or what society says was right.	31:22
	For after all, how could they know your specific situation.	31:27
	You've got to decide for yourself afresh	31:31
	in each situation.	31:34
	After all, before 1960 everybody thought	31:36
	that it was okay for black people to sit	31:39
	on the back of a city bus.	31:42
	Everybody was wrong.	31:45
	And this new generation was so impressed	31:48
	by how everybody before was so wrong.	31:51
	And Fletcher told stories in his book	31:54
	of courageous people who acted in ways,	31:58
	that conventional social morality might condemn.	32:01
	Jean Val Jean in Hugo's Les Miserables	32:06
	steals a loaf of bread to feed his starving family.	32:11
	Did Val Jean do wrong?	32:17
	Well stealing is wrong, oh yes.	32:18
	But not necessarily in that situation.	32:20
	Dietrich Bonhoffer, a pastor in Germany	32:24
	was a pacifist but eventually participated	32:28
	in a plot to murder Hitler.	32:31
	If Bonhoffer had succeeded, would he still	32:35
	be guilty of murder?	32:38
	Well not necessarily, said Fletcher.	32:40
	Not necessarily in that situation.	32:41
	Fletcher told of people who lied, who stole,	32:45
	a mother who smothered her child	32:49
	in order to keep marauding Indians	32:52
	away from her other two children.	32:54
	All to demonstrate to that one must take	32:56
	each new situation into account	32:59
	before you know whether this is right	33:02
	or whether this is wrong.	33:04
	Well if murder and stealing or lying	33:08
	are sometimes right, what is the control on our behavior?	33:11
	Is everything potentially right?	33:15
	No, no said Fletcher.	33:19
	Well how can we tell?	33:23
	Fletcher said you can know what is right	33:24
	in your situation by applying what he called	33:27
	the law of love.	33:31
	Love.	33:35
	Jesus didn't come preaching rules and regulations,	33:38
	said Fletcher, Jesus came preaching love.	33:41
	In each situation you should ask,	33:46
	not what momma or daddy told you	33:49
	or what society said was right.	33:51
	You should ask, as a Christian,	33:53
	what is the loving thing to do in this situation?	33:55
	As I said, I read Situation Ethics	34:02
	my sophomore year of college, and I loved it.	34:04
	To tell a college sophomore, say when faced	34:09
	with an ethical dilemma on Saturday night	34:12
	in the back seat of a Chevrolet,	34:14
	don't worry about what your momma told you.	34:16
	Do the loving thing, it was great.	34:18
	It was just what I wanted to hear.	34:23
	It was just what we all wanted to hear.	34:27
	Situation Ethics was not new.	34:31
	It had become the moral modus operandi	34:35
	of the average American.	34:38
	We modern Americans really enjoy	34:42
	thinking of ourselves as the first generation	34:44
	that have ever hit the history of the world.	34:46
	We keep telling ourselves that we're	34:51
	just living in such a totally new environment.	34:53
	We value the individual above all else.	34:57
	The free, self standing,	35:00
	autonomous individual above everything.	35:02
	For us growing up is defined as leaving home	35:08
	and leaving momma and daddy and your community	35:11
	and your values.	35:14
	You have to create your values as you go.	35:15
	You can't trust what everybody else did.	35:17
	We got to create our values ad hoc	35:21
	in each new situation.	35:24
	Cut off without community, without history	35:28
	we are at last free we say.	35:34
	Free to twist this way and that depending on the situation.	35:38
	All we needed was some vague indefinable principle	35:45
	like love to give us the philosophical justification	35:49
	for reducing ethics to a matter of personal opinion.	35:55
	As many of us found in our own lives,	36:02
	the trouble with such a view is	36:04
	that it doesn't foster ethics.	36:09
	It defeats ethics.	36:12
	For ethics is not simply a matter of what ought I to do.	36:16
	It's not simply a matter of choice and decision.	36:21
	For the question, what ought I to do,	36:25
	is virtually unanswerable apart from something else.	36:27
	How do you know, what ought I to do,	36:35
	until you first answer a question like,	36:37
	well where do you want to go?	36:40
	Where are you going?	36:47
	If your life is nothing more than a string of detached,	36:50
	ad hoc momentary string of choices	36:53
	and decisions without reference to any	36:57
	goal or purpose then you aren't going anywhere.	37:01
	You aren't becoming a more courageously ethical person.	37:06
	Rather, you are becoming a person without	37:11
	coherence or depth.	37:13
	We really haven't freed ourselves.	37:17
	Rather we have enslaved ourselves	37:20
	to the urges and the whims of the now.	37:24
	A few years ago dear Abby received a letter which began,	37:31
	I'm a 23 year old liberated woman	37:38
	who has been on the pill for two years.	37:40
	It's getting pretty expensive and I think	37:43
	my boyfriend should share half the expense.	37:45
	But I don't know him well enough	37:49
	to discuss money with him.	37:50
	In deciding to listen only to ourselves	37:58
	for ethical guidance we wake up one day	38:00
	and realize that there's no self there.	38:03
	There's nobody there, but this being	38:08
	twisted to and froe by the moment.	38:14
	We haven't grown, we've shrunk.	38:16
	We haven't become free, we're enslaved.	38:20
	And I think that's because our selves	38:26
	are creations of an accumulated past.	38:28
	We're historical creatures.	38:34
	Each of us has got a past.	38:35
	Our decisions are significant because they contribute,	38:39
	they accumulate into a picture of an agent,	38:45
	a self who is doing the deciding.	38:49
	Your decisions are important, not simply	38:52
	because of what they do to the world	38:54
	but because of what they do to you.	38:57
	So when your faced by an issue like abortion, say,	39:01
	it doesn't really help too much to ask	39:06
	what ought I to do in this situation,	39:07
	until you first ask,	39:11
	who do I want to be?	39:16
	It doesn't help much to ask, is it right	39:20
	to do in this situation,	39:23
	as if the situation could determine	39:26
	the goodness of your action.	39:29
	A much better question would be to ask	39:32
	who do I want to look like when I'm 65?	39:37
	That's the question because you see	39:42
	your decisions and your choices will contribute	39:44
	or detract from the creation of that person.	39:46
	So your choices really do make a difference,	39:52
	but not so much in the correctness to each situation,	39:54
	but because they accumulate into a picture of a person.	40:00
	A name.	40:03
	The most pressing ethical question is not,	40:07
	what ought I to do?	40:09
	It's, who ought I to be?	40:12
	We're talking about a rather old fashion	40:17
	quality called character.	40:18
	Character is the accumulation of certain dispositions,	40:22
	certain dependable virtues over a lifetime.	40:28
	That's just what I would have expected her to do.	40:35
	That's an everyday down home affirmation	40:37
	of the presence of character.	40:40
	An affirmation that this is a dependable,	40:43
	coherent self standing before us.	40:45
	Whose life is something more than simply	40:49
	a string of knee jerk decisions,	40:51
	or just one damn thing after another.	40:55
	That's character.	40:58
	Because ethics, ethics is not only choice and decision.	41:02
	That's a modern fiction designed further	41:07
	to fragment our lives.	41:10
	To deceive us into thinking that our real problem	41:12
	is in making right choices,	41:15
	rather than in living good lives.	41:17
	For most of us ethics is not so much	41:21
	a matter of what we decide to do,	41:24
	but it's all those daily little things,	41:26
	those unselfish ways that we live our lives	41:32
	that make us who we are.	41:37
	In my first ethics course in college I was told	41:42
	that your ethics isn't much good unless you think about it.	41:45
	Unless you weigh all the facts and you think about it.	41:50
	Preferably with help from what you've learned	41:54
	in a college ethics class.	41:55
	But I've noted that so many of the truly ethical	42:00
	things we do are not things that you have to think about.	42:04
	They're just part of you.	42:07
	I dare say that many of you have not had	42:10
	to sit here this morning agonizing	42:12
	over whether or not to steal the wallet	42:14
	of the person seated next to you in the pew.	42:16
	You just don't do that.	42:19
	There are just some things you don't have to	42:20
	agonize over because they're a part of you.	42:21
	And I tell you, that is just as ethical	42:24
	as all of these choices and decisions.	42:27
	That's ethics too, in its deepest sense.	42:31
	That there are just some things you don't do	42:36
	and can be accounted upon to do.	42:38
	Character.	42:42
	Aristotle once noted that it's too much	42:45
	to expect ordinary people to be good.	42:48
	Ordinary people like us.	42:52
	About the best you could expect of ordinary people	42:54
	is that they learn good habits.	42:57
	A good person, said Aristotle, is somebody who's been	43:05
	trained to be good.	43:09
	Somebody who is habitually good.	43:12
	Aristotle did not believe that ethics	43:16
	is a democratic or egalitarian virtue.	43:18
	We are not born good.	43:21
	We have to be trained good.	43:23
	Preferably by looking over the shoulder of someone	43:25
	who is good at being good.	43:28
	Ethics is a matter of repetition.	43:32
	It's a matter of imitation, apprenticeship.	43:34
	It takes time to be good.	43:39
	The author, Phillip Hallie, visited a little village	43:45
	in France called Les Chambon.	43:49
	A little village that distinguished itself	43:53
	by hiding its Jews in World War Two,	43:56
	in distinction from most French villages.	43:59
	And Hallie went there wondering who were these	44:04
	courageous people that risk everything	44:07
	to do such good.	44:10
	He went to the little village, he interviewed people.	44:13
	And he was astounded.	44:17
	The people he interviewed did not impress him	44:20
	as some sort of astute normal heroes.	44:22
	They were just ordinary, everyday people.	44:25
	At the end of his interviews, Hallie came to one conclusion.	44:34
	In the little village of Les Chambon,	44:38
	the main factor that united their goodness	44:40
	was that Sunday after Sunday they were habitually	44:44
	present in their little church and heard	44:48
	the simple sermons of Pastor Trokmay.	44:50
	Hallie said, in the end, Aristotle was right.	44:53
	Good people are mostly the result of good habits.	44:58
	He interviewed an old woman	45:06
	that when the day when the Nazi's came to town	45:09
	she faked a heart attack to keep them	45:11
	out of her house and away from the Jews in her basement.	45:13
	And the old woman said, pastor always told us	45:18
	that in every life, every life, no matter how simple	45:21
	you are, Jesus comes to you and asks you	45:24
	to do something for Him.	45:28
	And when the Nazi's came to town, we just knew what to do.	45:31
	Good people are the result of good habits.	45:40
	Many of us have been neglecting our habits.	45:47
	Having convinced ourselves that our world	45:51
	is so new and demanding.	45:53
	That we are faced with problems our parents never knew.	45:56
	That there are no guides or values,	46:00
	save the ones of our own creation.	46:02
	We have not grown, we've shrunk	46:07
	into detached, incoherent, untrustworthy selves	46:15
	who cannot be depended upon beyond	46:18
	the confines of the moment.	46:20
	People who are victims of every situation,	46:24
	because we got no vision of ourselves beyond today.	46:29
	Our selves that we take such pride in.	46:35
	Our selves are just a bundle of detached	46:39
	ad hoc decisions, rather than a life	46:42
	that has focus and meaning.	46:45
	Not long ago, in a state in which I was living,	46:51
	our congressman was convicted for bribery.	46:56
	I was surprised.	46:59
	A friend of mine said, I'm not surprised.	47:03
	You see, I was in college with him.	47:07
	He had no morals then, and I predict he's got less now.	47:10
	I'm not surprised.	47:14
	You see, here was an everyday affirmation of character,	47:18
	or the lack of it.	47:22
	And it makes you ask, what will they say	47:26
	about me at age 60?	47:29
	I have a hunch it will be something very close	47:34
	to what they say about me at age 20.	47:38
	And it will be the same for you.	47:42
	A good name	47:48
	is to be chosen above great riches.	47:51
	(organ playing)	48:01
	(choir singing)	48:38
-	The Lord be with you.	51:27
Congregation	And also with you.	51:28
-	Let us pray.	51:30
	Oh eternal God, we have seen in Jesus Christ	51:42
	our savior your true nature.	51:46
	A compassionate, loving, generous and sacrificial heart.	51:49
	We cannot think of the heartaches of the world	51:56
	without thinking of the great price you did pay	51:58
	and you continue to pay for our sinfulness	52:02
	and our brokenness.	52:06
	We come to you as children to a loving parent.	52:08
	We bring our cares to you who knows them	52:12
	before we bring them.	52:14
	We pray for our world, for its warring madness.	52:18
	Its myopic preoccupation with prosperity.	52:24
	And its disdain for peace and justice.	52:28
	Raise up leaders everywhere who prefer peace to war.	52:33
	Justice to game.	52:38
	Human welfare to ideology.	52:41
	Your service to self promotion.	52:45
	We pray for your creation.	52:50
	For relief from punishing drought, raging wild fires	52:54
	and rising flood waters.	52:59
	We grieve the human abuse of our natural environment.	53:03
	Teach us to treat our earth as the treasure it is.	53:08
	Your creation, our world.	53:12
	We pray for our nation.	53:16
	Keep it centered on justice and peace.	53:19
	Save us from greed and preoccupation with wealth.	53:23
	Teach us how to love other nations	53:27
	and to will their welfare along with our own.	53:31
	Raise up leaders with vision, courage and character.	53:35
	Resistant to the abuse of others for selfish gain.	53:41
	We pray for our church.	53:47
	Make her to be the treasure and urn and vessels	53:50
	she already is by your grace.	53:53
	Keep the church faithful in good times and bad.	53:57
	A sign of redemption and reconciliation and hope.	54:01
	Help us to be what we say we are.	54:06
	Your people purchased for a price,	54:10
	freed from sin and reconciled with you and our neighbors.	54:14
	We pray for those who suffer everywhere,	54:21
	especially for the poor and for those who disdain the poor.	54:25
	For those have forgotten and yes, even despised	54:31
	that no one this day will remember them in prayer.	54:35
	We pray especially for them.	54:40
	We remember the depressed.	54:43
	And all those in Duke Hospital and similar	54:45
	healing agencies, that they may know your will	54:48
	for their lives and be able to rejoice in it.	54:51
	We remember those who grieve.	54:57
	Especially our dear friends, Paul and Jane Nicki,	55:00
	and their daughter, Sandy who this day grieve	55:03
	the tragic loss of their son, Bruce.	55:07
	We pray for all those who's sense of loss	55:12
	is overwhelming and who cannot seem to grieve enough.	55:14
	Comfort them and teach us, Lord, how to comfort	55:18
	and to reach out to all who suffer.	55:24
	Our comfort, Lord, is in you who has promised	55:29
	always to be with us.	55:31
	Even when we are convinced you are far away.	55:34
	We commend to you all our longings and cares	55:38
	with the prayer that you will teach us how to pray.	55:41
	And how to be more effective servants	55:45
	in your marvelous kingdom.	55:47
	We pray in the name of him whose reign has no end.	55:50
	Even Jesus Christ, our Lord and savior, amen.	55:54
	Our worship continues with the offering	56:00
	of our tithes and gifts.	56:03
	(organ playing)	56:07
	(choir singing)	57:07
	(choir singing)	1:02:55
	♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪	1:03:07
	(choir singing)	1:03:15
	♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪	1:03:26
	♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪	1:03:33
	♪ Hallelujah ♪	1:03:39
	It is not only our duty, but our privilege	1:03:59
	to render you thanks, oh Lord.	1:04:01
	You are the source of our bounty.	1:04:04
	All that is, all that was, all that will be	1:04:07
	ourselves included, oh, is existence to you.	1:04:10
	You whose unbounded love and goodness	1:04:15
	pours itself day by day, night by night.	1:04:17
	Tirelessly, ceaselessly.	1:04:21
	Your name is synonymous with creativity and inventiveness.	1:04:24
	We bring you thanks and praise	1:04:28
	that we have known you as our creator	1:04:32
	and are the beneficiaries of your creativity.	1:04:36
	We thank you, redeeming Lord, that you did not	1:04:39
	create and forget us.	1:04:42
	But that you tirelessly and repeatedly	1:04:44
	enter into our world and our lives to renew,	1:04:47
	to redeem, and to reconcile.	1:04:49
	Without you, we would be victim to the endless	1:04:53
	cycles of time and nature.	1:04:55
	By your grace we enjoy the freedom faith can bring.	1:04:58
	Freedom to walk on charted paths.	1:05:03
	Freedom to embark on uncertain journeys.	1:05:06
	Freedom to forget ourselves and love and service	1:05:10
	of our neighbors.	1:05:12
	Freedom to live in reconciliation	1:05:14
	where walls of class, sex, race, and nationality divide.	1:05:16
	We cannot, oh Lord, recount the ways	1:05:22
	in which your redeeming activity has changed our lives.	1:05:24
	Without you our lives would be indeed without hope,	1:05:28
	without love, without light.	1:05:32
	We give you thanks, counselor, comforter, and Holy Spirit	1:05:36
	that we are not alone.	1:05:39
	That you sustain us in work and play.	1:05:41
	That you speak to us through families and friends,	1:05:44
	teachers and fellow workers.	1:05:47
	When we stray from you, you admonish us.	1:05:50
	When we forget God, you remind us.	1:05:52
	You create for us communities of faith,	1:05:56
	which nurture us, guide us, assure us,	1:05:58
	judge us, and comfort us.	1:06:02
	We thank you, especially, for this community	1:06:06
	here gathered and praise you for the many ways	1:06:09
	it speaks to us of you.	1:06:12
	And speaks to you on our behalf.	1:06:14
	Now creator, redeemer, sustainer,	1:06:18
	father, son and Holy Spirit bless the gifts we bring.	1:06:22
	The gifts on this table and the gifts in these pews.	1:06:26
	Multiply and direct them to where they are most needed	1:06:30
	to continue and extend your creating,	1:06:33
	redeeming, and reconciling work.	1:06:36
	As you have enriched and ennobled our lives,	1:06:40
	bless these, our gifts that they may enrich	1:06:43
	and ennoble all your world.	1:06:46
	We pray in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord	1:06:49
	who taught us with all his disciples everywhere to pray,	1:06:52
	our father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name.	1:06:56
	Thy kingdom come, they will be done	1:07:01
	on earth as it is in heaven.	1:07:04
	Give us this day our daily bread	1:07:06
	and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those	1:07:09
	who trespass against us.	1:07:12
	And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.	1:07:15
	For thine is the kingdom, the power,	1:07:19
	and glory forever, amen.	1:07:21
	(organ playing)	1:07:27
	(choir singing)	1:08:12
	Now may the Lord bless you and keep you.	1:11:25
	May the Lord make His face shine upon you	1:11:27
	and be gracious unto you.	1:11:29
	May the Lord lift up his countenance upon you	1:11:32
	and give you peace this day and forevermore.	1:11:34
	(man singing)	1:11:42
	(choir singing)	1:11:58
	(organ playing)	1:12:50

Item Info

Title:

William H. Willimon - "A Good Name" (September 11, 1988)

Description:

Sermon start time: 24:33. Sermon end time: 47:55.
The preacher argues that ethics are not simply situational and contextual, but affect one’s life. He argues that ethics is not about behaviors (what to do) but is, instead, about identity (who I want to be). (Abstract created by Duke Divinity School staff.)
Key quotation: “The most pressing ethical question is not, what ought I to do? It’s, who ought I to be?”

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r48c9rk1z

Date:

September 11, 1988

Speaker:

Willimon, William H.

Liturgical Calendar:

Ordinary Time

Biblical Book:

Proverbs

Chapter and Verse:

Proverbs 22:1-9

Subject:

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 VHS-0097
ref8508_m1a
uachapelsermaud
duke:321535
dcrmv001096
ark:/87924/r48c9rk1z
4c9c0702-575d-4a0a-a0f7-da5fb1f8cbc6

Digital Collection:

Duke Chapel Recordings

Source Collection:

Duke University Chapel recordings

Related Resources:

See below

Language:

English

Location:

United States
North Carolina
Durham (N.C.)

Format:

Provenance:

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

Rights:

Limited Re-Use

CC BY-NC 4.0

Rights Note:

This recording may contain 3rd party materials, such as music or readings that are therefore not covered by the Creative Commons license indicated here. For more information see https://library.duke.edu/rubenstein/research/citations-and-permissions.

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William H. Willimon - "A Good Name" (September 11, 1988)

Transcript

Item Info

Related Item

Duke University Archives