Paul F. Perry - "Beyond the Ordinary" (February 12, 1984)

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	("Allegro Cantabile" by Alain Bouvet)	0:04
	(classical organ music)	7:46
	(choir singing in foreign language)	13:57
	(classical organ music)	14:56
	(choir singing indistinctly)	15:28
-	Grace and peace be unto you from God our creator,	18:52
	and our Lord Jesus Christ.	18:57
	We have been unwilling to be faithful.	19:01
	We have failed to take seriously	19:05
	our responsibility to persons.	19:08
	We ignore the tragedy of human separation.	19:11
	Hear then, oh God, our prayers for forgiveness.	19:16
	Let us pray.	19:20
	Oh God who has set forth the way of life for us in your son,	19:33
	we confess with shame our slowness to learn	19:39
	and our reluctance to follow.	19:42
	You have called, but we have not heeded.	19:45
	Your beauty in Jesus Christ	19:48
	has showed us life's possibilities,	19:50
	but we have been blind.	19:53
	You have stretched out your hand to us	19:56
	through other persons, but we have passed by.	19:58
	We have accepted great benefits with little thanks.	20:02
	We have been unworthy of your changeless love.	20:06
	Have mercy upon us and forgive us, oh Lord.	20:10
	Forgive us for having wasted our time	20:14
	and having misused our gifts.	20:17
	Forgive us for excusing our wrongdoing	20:20
	and evading our responsibilities.	20:24
	Forgive us for refusing to believe	20:27
	that we could have overcome evil with good.	20:29
	Forgive us that so little of your love	20:33
	has reached others through us, amen.	20:37
	May almighty God, who caused light to shine out of darkness,	21:17
	shine in our hearts, cleansing us from all our sins,	21:22
	and restoring us to the light of the knowledge	21:27
	of God's glory in the face of Jesus Christ, our Lord, amen.	21:30
	Let us give thanks, for God is good	21:39
	and God's love is everlasting.	21:41
	Thanks be to God, whose love creates us.	21:45
	Thanks be to God, whose mercy redeems us.	21:49
	Thanks be to God, whose grace leads us into the future.	21:53
	We welcome you this seemingly spring morning	22:00
	to worship here with us in Duke University Chapel.	22:03
	It is a beautiful day, and we come and celebrate together	22:08
	the good gifts of God's creation.	22:12
	It is the sixth Sunday after Epiphany,	22:16
	where we, as God's people, received the promises	22:19
	that light in our lives will come,	22:23
	even in the midst of darkness.	22:27
	We welcome you, and are glad that you are here	22:30
	with us on this special day.	22:33
	This afternoon, sponsored by Arts in Duke Chapel,	22:37
	we will have an organ recital at five o'clock.	22:42
	Mr. Peter Marshall, our chapel organist,	22:46
	is the featured organist for this afternoon's performance.	22:50
	We invite you to come, the public is welcome.	22:54
	Here, five o'clock, in the chapel.	22:57
	Our guest preacher this morning	23:02
	for worship in Duke University Chapel	23:05
	is the Reverend Doctor Paul F. Parry.	23:08
	He is a clergy member of the Southwest Texas Conference	23:12
	of the United Methodist Church.	23:17
	Throughout his ministry, he has been in the parish,	23:20
	he has served as teacher and professor.	23:24
	He is currently preaching regularly	23:28
	in two churches in west Texas.	23:30
	Dr. Parry received his training and degrees	23:34
	from Southwestern University, Garrett Evangelical	23:38
	Theological Seminary, and Southern Methodist University.	23:42
	We are delighted that he has come	23:47
	to share with us God's word on this day.	23:49
	We welcome him and his wife Quinn, who has joined him	23:53
	for this weekend's visit to Duke.	23:58
	We look forward to the message	24:01
	that he will bring for us this day.	24:03
	The sermon title is Beyond the Ordinary.	24:06
-	Let us pray.	24:20
	Oh Lord our God, by the entrance of your word	24:23
	gives light into the soul,	24:26
	pour down upon us the spirit of wisdom and understanding.	24:29
	That being taught by you and holy scripture,	24:33
	we may receive with faith the words of eternal life.	24:36
	And be made wise into salvation	24:39
	through Jesus Christ our Lord, amen.	24:42
	The Old Testament lesson is from Deuteronomy,	24:47
	chapter 30, verses 15 through 20.	24:50
	See, I have set before you this day	24:55
	life and good, death and evil.	24:57
	If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God,	25:01
	which I command you this day,	25:04
	by loving the Lord your God,	25:07
	by walking in his ways, and by keeping his commandments,	25:09
	and his statutes, and his ordinances,	25:13
	then you shall live and multiply.	25:16
	And the Lord your God will bless you in the land	25:19
	which you are entering, to take possession of it.	25:21
	But if your heart turns away,	25:25
	and you will not hear, but are drawn away	25:28
	to worship other gods, and serve them,	25:30
	I declare it to you this day that you shall perish.	25:34
	You shall not live long in the land	25:38
	which you are going over the Jordan to enter and possess.	25:41
	I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day.	25:45
	That I have set before you life and death,	25:50
	blessings and curse.	25:54
	Therefore, choose life, that you	25:56
	and your descendants may live,	25:59
	loving the Lord your God, obeying his voice,	26:01
	and cleaving to him.	26:06
	For that means life to you and length of days.	26:08
	That you may dwell in the land	26:11
	which the Lord swore to your fathers,	26:13
	to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob to give them.	26:16
	Here ends the reading from the Old Testament.	26:22
	The epistle lesson is from 1 Corinthians,	26:26
	chapter two, verses six through 13.	26:29
	Yet among the mature, we do impart wisdom.	26:34
	Although it is not a wisdom of this age,	26:38
	or of the rulers of this age,	26:41
	who are doomed to pass away.	26:43
	But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God,	26:45
	which God decreed before the ages for our glorification.	26:49
	None of the rulers of this age understood this.	26:54
	For if they had, they would not	26:58
	have crucified the Lord of Glory.	27:00
	But as it is written, what no eye has seen,	27:03
	nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived	27:07
	what God has prepared for those who love Him.	27:11
	God has revealed to us through the Spirit.	27:14
	For the Spirit searches everything.	27:17
	Even the depths of God.	27:20
	For what person knows a man's thought,	27:22
	except the spirit of the man which is in him?	27:25
	So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God,	27:28
	except the Spirit of God.	27:32
	Now we have received not the spirit of the world,	27:35
	but the Spirit which is from God.	27:38
	That we might understand the gifts bestowed on us by God.	27:40
	And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom,	27:45
	but taught by the spirit, interpreting spiritual truths	27:49
	to those who possess the spirit.	27:54
	Here ends the reading from the epistle lesson.	27:57
	(liturgical organ music)	28:16
	(choir singing indistinctly)	28:29
	(liturgical organ music)	29:58
	♪ But nothing changes him ♪	30:39
	♪ Oh God unchanging ♪	30:50
	(liturgical organ music)	31:07
	(choir sings indistinctly)	31:15
-	It's a delight for my wife and I to be here with you today	34:06
	and to worship the Lord, and to share	34:10
	in the power of your fellowship.	34:13
	Will the congregation please stand	34:16
	for the reading of the Gospel.	34:17
	The Gospel is from Saint Matthew,	34:27
	chapter five, verses 20 through 37.	34:29
	For I tell you that unless your righteousness	34:35
	exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees,	34:39
	you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.	34:44
	You have heard that it was said to men of old,	34:48
	you shall not kill.	34:51
	And whoever kills shall be liable to judgment.	34:54
	But I say to you that everyone who is angry	34:58
	with his brother shall be liable to judgment.	35:01
	Whoever insults his brother shall be liable to the council.	35:04
	And whoever says you fool shall be liable	35:08
	to the hell of fire.	35:12
	So if you are offering your gift at the altar,	35:15
	and there remember that your brother	35:18
	has something against you,	35:20
	leave your gift, go, and first be reconciled to your brother	35:23
	and then come and offer your gift.	35:28
	Make friends quickly with your accuser.	35:32
	While you are going with him to court,	35:36
	lest your accuser hand you over to the judge,	35:38
	and the judge to the guard, and you be put into prison.	35:41
	For truly I say to you that you shall never get out	35:46
	until you have paid the last penny.	35:49
	And you have heard that it was said	35:53
	you shall not commit adultery.	35:55
	But I say to you that everyone who looks	35:58
	at a woman lustfully has already committed	36:01
	adultery with her in her heart.	36:04
	And if your right eye causes you to sin,	36:07
	pluck it out and throw it away.	36:11
	It is better that you lose one of your members	36:14
	than that your whole body be thrown away.	36:17
	And it is also said whoever divorces his wife,	36:21
	let him give her a certificate of divorce.	36:26
	But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife	36:29
	except on grounds of unchastity makes her an adulteress.	36:33
	And whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.	36:38
	Again, you have heard that it was said to men of old	36:43
	you shall not swear falsely, but shall perform	36:46
	to the Lord what you have sworn.	36:50
	But I say to you, do not swear at all,	36:53
	either by heaven, for it is the throne of God,	36:57
	or by the earth, for it is his footstool,	37:00
	or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great king.	37:03
	Do not swear by your head, for you cannot make	37:08
	one hair white or black.	37:12
	Let what you say be simply yes or no.	37:15
	Everything more than this comes from evil.	37:20
	Here ends the reading of the Gospel of our Lord, amen.	37:25
	(organ music)	37:32
	(choir singing indistinctly)	37:40
	We could have made a mint on the sale of Kleenex,	39:04
	she was heard to say as she came	39:09
	from the movie Terms of Endearment.	39:11
	And as you reached into your purse or pocket	39:16
	to get that Kleenex in the last scene of the film, you wept.	39:21
	You wept because of a young woman in that room	39:28
	with her mother there with her	39:33
	and with her husband,	39:35
	and yet, we all wept.	39:38
	Because although there were three persons in that room,	39:42
	none were present to one another.	39:47
	And we also wept not just for them,	39:52
	but for ourselves.	39:57
	For there was hardly a one of us in the theater that night	40:00
	who as a child did not know that there was something	40:04
	perhaps about relationships that we have with our parents,	40:08
	either living or now deceased, that was not as full	40:12
	and as fulfilling as they might have been.	40:18
	And there was not a one of us in the theater	40:21
	that night who, as a spouse,	40:23
	did not have the sense	40:28
	there is something about our relationship	40:30
	which is not as full and fulfilling as it might have been.	40:32
	And there was something about each of us	40:38
	in the theater that night that as a parent	40:40
	reflecting upon our infant or grown children	40:44
	who would say there is something that is not quite	40:49
	full and fulfilling in our relationships.	40:53
	And so we wept twice that night.	40:57
	Once for those in the film,	41:02
	and once for ourselves.	41:06
	Because our experience is not life.	41:07
	Perhaps death.	41:13
	Or something of a shadow.	41:16
	But the community that we are a part of today,	41:20
	and the larger tradition of the church	41:22
	that brings us together in this auspicious place	41:24
	knows what life is,	41:28
	and where life is to be found.	41:32
	The Hebrew forefathers and foremothers	41:35
	of our heritage knew that fully well.	41:37
	And they were able to say that in the tradition	41:41
	of the Torah, in the covenant community,	41:44
	in the precepts and the law of the commandments,	41:51
	the ordinances, in the gift of God's way	41:54
	is life itself.	41:59
	For the Hebrews would say	42:01
	Torah is life.	42:04
	And so the document Deuteronomy has brought about	42:09
	a spiritual renewal and revitalization to those	42:12
	who have read it through the centuries.	42:16
	It's a sermonic recital of the gift of life,	42:18
	no one of us could come to life and say,	42:23
	I am a self made person.	42:25
	I have achieved what I have achieved by my own wit and whim.	42:28
	It is surely a gift.	42:34
	And so the opportunity of God's grace	42:37
	and to respond to that grace,	42:41
	God's gift and the call to obedience	42:43
	are wrapped up together for there in that kind	42:46
	of covenant is the secret and the mystery of life.	42:49
	And whenever Deuteronomy is read,	42:55
	it brings about vitality, as it did	42:59
	even at the time that it was discovered.	43:02
	For King Josiah in about the year 621 BC	43:05
	was wanting to shore up the magnificent temple	43:09
	over which he was king.	43:11
	And so he had his craftsman, his stonemasons,	43:14
	his artisans, his woodsmen, the persons	43:18
	who were gifted in the arts working on the temple.	43:22
	And as they dug around, shoring up the temple,	43:26
	they came across the scroll.	43:28
	And when it was brought to the king and he read it,	43:30
	the scroll which we now call Deuteronomy,	43:33
	it quickened him so much to the soul of his heart	43:36
	that he wept and put on sackcloth and ashes.	43:41
	And the city of Jerusalem and indeed the whole nation	43:45
	went into an extended period of mourning	43:48
	that resulted in tremendous spiritual fervor.	43:51
	Whenever Deuteronomy comes to life,	43:54
	no wonder the summons challenges us again,	43:58
	choose life, I set before you this day,	44:01
	life and good,	44:04
	death and destruction.	44:08
	Oh my friends, choose life.	44:10
	Choose life.	44:15
	And the rabbinical tradition that began	44:17
	with the work on Deuteronomy, updating the experience	44:20
	of the people living within different vicissitudes of life,	44:24
	different chapters of their national history,	44:28
	began to experience new life	44:32
	as the rabbis worked on that tradition.	44:35
	Updating it.	44:40
	Offering them the dimensions of grace	44:41
	and responsibility, gift and demand.	44:46
	Why is it then we ask the question?	44:51
	If this is the heritage of the rabbis,	44:54
	of the teachers of our faith,	44:56
	of the tradition and heritage of which we are a part,	44:58
	why is it then that Jesus would say to us,	45:01
	as he said to the community of Matthew,	45:04
	unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes,	45:08
	you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven?	45:14
	Strange, isn't it?	45:17
	Given this wonderful expression of how life is put together,	45:19
	of where life is found, of choosing life.	45:23
	Choose life.	45:26
	That Jesus should say unless it exceeds	45:31
	that of the scribes, you cannot.	45:35
	Well, something happens in all of our lives.	45:41
	That the high ideals,	45:45
	the great dreams,	45:49
	the holy affirmations that we make,	45:51
	as life goes on has a tendency to become more familiar.	45:54
	More tame, more reduced, more compatible	45:59
	to life as we would like it to be.	46:02
	Not on the high platitudes.	46:04
	But in the lowlands.	46:07
	We can travel around the campus,	46:10
	see beautiful tablets and statuary,	46:13
	monuments to the great noble visions,	46:16
	not only of this buildings, but of this university.	46:19
	And we discover, after a month into the semester,	46:24
	well, I guess it's about time that I began to crack a book.	46:27
	And there's something about what's said in the catalog,	46:32
	what's been instilled in us perhaps in Founders' Day,	46:36
	or some other noble occasion here at the university,	46:39
	we begin to have a little bit of quickening of conscience.	46:43
	How can I get by?	46:46
	And so gradually, the great dreams	46:49
	that we have begin to erode.	46:51
	And perhaps it comes slowly.	46:55
	Quietly.	46:58
	Or perhaps it comes dramatically,	47:00
	as it did for the rabbis long ago.	47:02
	For they had been in Jerusalem, and for four years,	47:05
	the city was besieged by the Roman army.	47:07
	After four years, the city was destroyed,	47:10
	the temple was destroyed,	47:13
	the religious, the national, the cultural institutions	47:15
	that they knew were destroyed.	47:18
	And the small remnant of the rabbinate	47:20
	moved to a community called Jamnia, about 40 miles away.	47:23
	And there, for survival purposes,	47:28
	they clung to that which they thought	47:30
	they could do to keep life together.	47:32
	And in that experience, the lofty dreams of the putting	47:35
	together of gift and responsibility,	47:40
	grace and demand, came if we can	47:43
	just hold onto the commandments.	47:47
	If we can just remember Moses. If we...	47:50

	...could just remember we shouldn't kill anybody.	0:03
	We shouldn't commit adultery.	0:05
	We shouldn't bear false witness against somebody.	0:06
	There's some things that we, as the Hebrew community,	0:10
	must not do and if we can just refrain	0:12
	from doing them, then we're in.	0:15
	How difficult it is to hold on to the tensions.	0:17
	The bigger picture, life comes to us	0:20
	either gradually or cataclysmically.	0:23
	And we find ourselves, if we can just hold on and we justify	0:28
	our existence and we say, well, I'm a good citizen.	0:31
	I haven't killed anybody.	0:36
	Oh, I'm a moral person.	0:39
	I haven't been in bed with somebody who's not my spouse.	0:42
	I'm a person who pretty much is able to sign	0:47
	the honor statement or you can count on me, kind of.	0:50
	Forgetting the loopholes that we all know	0:56
	that are there in the public law and in the religious law.	0:58
	In life itself, we kind of slip through	1:02
	and it gradually becomes reduced.	1:06
	We're okay.	1:11
	We are indeed alright,	1:13
	because we haven't done some of the gross things	1:15
	that some of those other people have done.	1:19
	We justify ourselves on the basis,	1:22
	we've done at least enough to get by.	1:27
	And so it comes as a great shock to us,	1:36
	it disturbs us tremendously when we discover	1:40
	that Jesus says, unless your righteousness	1:43
	exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees,	1:45
	you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.	1:49
	Unless you move beyond that,	1:52
	unless you're in a different realm,	1:54
	unless you're functioning on a different agenda,	1:55
	there's not a place for you in the kingdom.	1:59
	And just at the point that we've begun to make our peace	2:02
	with issues such as capital punishment,	2:05
	mass nuclear destruction,	2:11
	whether a handgun should be registered or not.	2:14
	Just at the point of where we've made some kind of peace	2:19
	that we think is responsible, we hear Jesus say,	2:23
	if you have any kind of animosity	2:28
	toward another family member,	2:31
	you've already committed murder.	2:32
	It's not the act, it's the attitude that lies behind it.	2:35
	And we're undone.	2:40
	And just at the point that we've kind of figured out,	2:42
	now, how far should we go on the third date	2:44
	or the first?	2:49
	Just about the time we figured out	2:51
	whether marriage is as long as life shall last	2:53
	or as long as love shall last.	2:57
	Just at the point we begin to get in touch	3:01
	with the sexual dimensions of life,	3:03
	we discover Jesus saying, as Jimmy Carter said,	3:05
	in Playboy magazine a few years ago,	3:10
	he who lusts after a woman	3:15
	has already committed adultery in his heart.	3:19
	And sexual fantasies that are typical of all of us,	3:21
	somehow or other undo us.	3:25
	And just at the point that we know	3:29
	what things we indeed say yes to and no to,	3:32
	we discover how easy it is	3:37
	to cross our fingers, king's X.	3:41
	Have some kind of little trick that we play,	3:45
	no it's not perjury,	3:47
	but false witness.	3:51
	And we can play games with the Olympic Committee,	3:54
	who's eligible?	3:58
	And have national laws passed to allow a person	4:02
	who has grown up in another country	4:05
	suddenly to become an American citizen	4:07
	and become a part of our team?	4:09
	And just at the point where we become comfortable,	4:14
	Jesus says, unless your righteousness	4:18
	exceeds that of the scribes,	4:21
	you cannot be a part of my kingdom.	4:27
	And we're undone by that.	4:30
	We don't know quite what to make of it.	4:32
	We wonder, Jesus, how are we going to be saved?	4:34
	It's like discovering that the agenda of life	4:37
	has been so radically altered.	4:40
	What do we do with that?	4:42
	It's like perhaps taking computer science	4:45
	and discovering that one plus one does not always equal two.	4:47
	Or if you're working in binary math,	4:53
	suddenly it's one plus one equals 10.	4:55
	There's a new agenda.	4:57
	We're functioning in a new arena.	4:59
	We're functioning in the arena of the kingdom,	5:01
	not in the kingdom that we've created	5:03
	but the gift of heaven that has come into our midst	5:08
	and we're undone by that.	5:15
	And we cry out, where is life?	5:18
	Where, in the midst of all this confusion,	5:21
	is indeed their life?	5:23
	And we hear the World Council of Churches,	5:26
	meeting in Vancouver last summer, sing the theme hymn.	5:28
	If you would receive life, be open in body, mind, and soul.	5:32
	Receive what God has promised, God's breath for humankind.	5:37
	If you would live, be ready to fight the friends of death	5:43
	and rise with Christ, the victor, to once again take breath.	5:47
	If you would live, grow daily in ways that lead to life.	5:52
	God's kingdom, one yet varied, encompassing all strife.	5:56
	If you would live, be one with every one	6:03
	of those whom God doth love, to break down every barrier,	6:05
	to let Christ's spirit move.	6:10
	The church in Corinth was baffled	6:17
	by how it could be that the humble Galilean peasant	6:22
	becomes now the mystery and the wonder	6:27
	and the wisdom and yes,	6:32
	the personification of the Spirit of God.	6:34
	And in the arena of where they were thinking,	6:38
	we are justified, we are in.	6:40
	We belong to the kingdom	6:44
	because we have a favorite preacher.	6:45
	Saul or Apollos or Paul or some great person	6:48
	who's come to the pulpit in one series after another.	6:53
	Why, we're in because we've married the right person.	6:57
	We're in because we eat the right food.	7:00
	We're in because we have the right psychic experiences	7:02
	and perhaps speaks in tongues.	7:05
	The Apostle said to that church	7:07
	in that ancient seaport town,	7:08
	in a community and a country that was known	7:11
	for its Olympics and for its universities.	7:13
	The Apostle said, we are dealing	7:18
	with a different kind of wisdom and a different kind	7:21
	of spirit and it's the power of the cross.	7:24
	And the Christ who is represented by the cross	7:29
	that's carried in our procession	7:32
	and by the shape of the Cathedral in which we worship today,	7:34
	that cross says to us that Jesus went far beyond	7:37
	the boundaries of what was anticipated	7:42
	as the definition of Messiah,	7:45
	the expectation in the popular and in the professional mind.	7:47
	We have a new expression of the majesty	7:51
	and of the power and of the tenderness of God.	7:54
	The unchangeable God, as sung in our anthem this morning,	7:59
	is the one who is moved by the one	8:02
	who has entered so completely into life	8:05
	and only the one who has gone to that extremity	8:09
	is able to say to us, unless your righteousness	8:13
	exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees,	8:15
	you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.	8:19
	Nothing in my hand, I bring.	8:26
	Simply to thy cross, I cling.	8:30
	And the one who knew that the gift of life	8:36
	was for those who were pure in heart,	8:42
	for they see God.	8:43
	And the one who knew that those who are peacemakers	8:47
	experienced being children of God.	8:52
	And the one who hungered and thirsted	8:56
	for a right relationship with God	9:00
	are the ones who were truly satisfied.	9:03
	He is the one who says to us,	9:08
	unless your righteousness exceeds	9:13
	that of the scribes, you cannot.	9:18
	And we find expressions in life that give us hope,	9:28
	of moving beyond the ordinary, the mundane, the usual.	9:35
	We give God praise for the numerous breakthroughs	9:40
	that have come through the scholarship	9:44
	and the experimentation of Duke.	9:46
	Of the Research Triangle, of this region,	9:50
	of pushing the boundaries into God's horizons.	9:57
	And we give God praise.	10:03
	When the most visible leader of the Christian world	10:07
	goes into a prison just after Christmas in Rome	10:10
	and Pope John Paul reaches out and takes the hand	10:15
	and the arm and the whole body of the one	10:18
	who held a pistol and attempted his assassination	10:21
	about a year and a half earlier.	10:26
	And on the cover of Time magazine,	10:30
	at the beginning of this year, is a picture	10:32
	of the would-be assassin and of Pope John Paul.	10:36
	And the writer of the article concludes it by saying,	10:40
	forgiveness is not an impulse	10:43
	that is much in favor these days.	10:45
	It's a mysterious and sublime idea, in many ways.	10:49
	The prevalent style in the world	10:54
	runs more to the High Plains drifter,	10:55
	to the hard cold eye of the avenger,	10:59
	to the numb remorselessness.	11:02
	Forgiveness does not look much like a tool	11:05
	for survival in a bad world.	11:08
	But that is what it is,	11:11
	unless your righteousness exceeds.	11:15
	And my friend Tom Long who teaches at Princeton	11:25
	tells about a experience he had in talking	11:30
	with the person sitting next to him on the airplane.	11:33
	A family had a 30 year old son	11:38
	who was in a nursing home with a brain tumor.	11:40
	And he said, we had stopped loving him.	11:44
	It's a hard thing to admit but we had stopped loving him.	11:49
	It's hard to love someone who never responds.	11:53
	We visit him often but our feeling	11:58
	for him as a son had begun to die,	12:00
	until one day we happened to visit our son	12:03
	and discovered a visitor, a stranger in his room.	12:06
	She turned out to be a visitor	12:10
	from the nearby church whose custom	12:12
	it was to visit all the patients in the nursing home.	12:14
	When we arrived, we found her talking to our son	12:19
	as if our son could understand.	12:23
	And then she read scripture to our son	12:26
	as if our son could hear it.	12:28
	And finally, she prayed with our son	12:30
	as if our son knew that she was praying.	12:33
	My first impulse was to say, you fool,	12:37
	don't you know about our son?	12:39
	And then it dawned on me that of course she knew.	12:44
	She knew all along.	12:48
	She cared for our son as if he was made whole	12:50
	because she saw him through the eyes of faith	12:56
	and she saw him already healed.	13:00
	And that woman renewed in us	13:05
	the capacity to love our son.	13:07
	Well, choose life, my friends.	13:16
	Choose life beyond the ordinary.	13:21
	For unless your righteousness exceeds that,	13:24
	unless your righteousness,	13:30
	unless.	13:36
	Thanks be to the Christ	13:44
	who has given us life beyond the ordinary.	13:49
	Amen.	13:57
	(church organ music)	14:05
	(congregation singing)	14:41
-	As the people as the people of God,	17:14
	let us affirm what we believe.	17:16
-	We believe in God who has created and is creating,	17:20
	who has come in the truly human Jesus	17:25
	to reconcile and make new,	17:28
	who works in us and others by the spirit.	17:31
	We trust God, who calls us to be the church,	17:35
	to celebrate life and its fullness,	17:40
	to love and serve others,	17:43
	to seek justice and resist evil,	17:46
	to proclaim Jesus crucified and risen,	17:49
	our judge and our hope.	17:53
	In life, in death, in life beyond death,	17:56
	God is with us.	18:01
	We are not alone.	18:03
	Thanks be to God.	18:05
-	The Lord be with you.	18:07
-	Also you.	18:09
-	Let us pray.	18:11
	Eternal Spirit, maker of all worlds	18:25
	and creator of our souls,	18:29
	we worship you this holy day.	18:32
	We pray that out of our littleness, that you weave us	18:36
	into your larger design of life.	18:41
	Lead us up from our low levels	18:46
	and out of our narrow boundaries,	18:49
	that somehow we may escape from our obsession with ourselves	18:51
	and loving and serving something greater than ourselves,	18:57
	find what we are in you.	19:02
	Remind us, this day,	19:06
	of the families from which we have come,	19:08
	the fathers and mothers and nurturers who have loved us,	19:12
	the better heritage of our nation's life in which we share,	19:17
	the prophets who have spoken to us,	19:22
	the martyrs of our faith who have died that we might live,	19:26
	in order that our lives may be lifted up and we be grateful.	19:31
	Grant us this day, a new vision	19:37
	of the causes we should serve,	19:40
	justice in a generation that is full of wrong,	19:43
	unselfishness in a time when many are suffering,	19:48
	and peace in a day of violence.	19:53
	Grant unto us your servant so sincerely,	19:58
	to worship you this day, without pretense,	20:01
	that across all lines of division,	20:06
	our hearts may today perform an act of goodwill.	20:10
	Give us the victory over our private prejudices	20:16
	and vindictiveness for we would take into our care	20:21
	every sort and condition of humankind.	20:25
	O God, if hearts are here,	20:30
	to whom such calls and words come in vain	20:33
	because they are to hurt themselves,	20:37
	we ask your strength for them.	20:41
	It is not for soft and easy lives that we pray	20:44
	but for great strength and resources	20:50
	to greet life that you give to us.	20:52
	Some of us feel burdens of grief and anxiety.	20:57
	We ask for stability,	21:02
	for inward reserves of spiritual power,	21:04
	that while the outward person is falling apart,	21:08
	the inward person may be renewed day by day.	21:12
	So in the worship of your sanctuary,	21:18
	this holy place, may serenity,	21:21
	stability, and peace come to your people.	21:25
	Now send us out, we pray you,	21:30
	to face this troubled, difficult,	21:32
	and sometimes cruel world.	21:36
	May we know how to lay soothing hands upon places	21:39
	in this world and people who are hurting.	21:44
	Give us radiance.	21:49
	Make our faith contagious.	21:51
	Help us to make goodness itself attractive.	21:54
	And may Christ's joy be ours and the promise	21:59
	of abundant life be fulfilled in each of us.	22:02
	May we be among those who help bring humanity	22:07
	to its fullness, when the kingdom of God's	22:11
	righteousness shall come.	22:14
	We ask it, in the spirit of Jesus the Christ,	22:17
	who taught us to pray, saying,	22:21
	our Father, who art in heaven,	22:25
	hallowed be thy name.	22:28
	Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is heaven.	22:30
	Give us this day, our daily bread	22:36
	and forgive us our trespasses	22:39
	as we forgive those who trespass against us.	22:41
	And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil,	22:45
	for thine is the kingdom	22:50
	and the power and the glory forever.	22:51
	Amen.	22:55
	(church organ music)	23:04
	(church organ music)	26:29
	(choir singing)	26:47
	(church organ music)	28:47
	(faint singing)	29:03
	Eternal, God giver of every good and perfect gift,	30:09
	who seeks above all to give yourself to us,	30:13
	grant that with these token gifts of our hands,	30:18
	we may more fully give ourselves in joyous obedience	30:22
	and service, through Jesus Christ our Lord.	30:26
	Amen.	30:30
	(church organ music)	30:34
	(congregation singing)	31:37
	The Lord bless you and keep you.	36:01
	The Lord's face shine upon you and be gracious unto you.	36:04
	The Lord's countenance be upon you and give you peace.	36:10
	♪ Amen ♪	36:18
	♪ Amen ♪	36:23
	♪ Amen ♪	36:29
	♪ Amen ♪	36:35
	♪ Amen ♪	36:43
	♪ Amen ♪	36:54
	♪ Amen ♪	37:09
	(church organ music)	37:29
	(church organ music)	47:11

Item Info

Title:

Paul F. Perry - "Beyond the Ordinary" (February 12, 1984)

Description:

Our lives, and our understanding of what we must do to live into the Kingdom, have a tendency to settle into what is comfortable, to what we need just to get by. Jesus' words in the sermon on the mount come to unsettle our complacent notions of morality and to offer us extraordinary life, the life of the Kingdom. (Abstract created by Duke Divinity School staff.)
Sermon start time: (Part 1) 34:06. Sermon end time: (Part 2) 13:58.
Key quotation: “And just at the point where we become comfortable, Jesus says, ‘Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes, you cannot be a part of my kingdom.’ And we’re undone by that…There’s a new agenda. We’re functioning in a new arena. We’re functioning in the arena of the kingdom. Not in the kingdom we’ve created, but the gift of heaven that has come into our midst, and we’re undone by that.”

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4707x39r

Date:

February 12, 1984

Speaker:

Perry, Paul F.

Liturgical Calendar:

Ordinary Time

Biblical Book:

Chapter and Verse:

Subject:

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 CS-0193
ref7909_rqd
uachapelsermaud
duke:320801
dcrau001183
ark:/87924/r4707x39r
cddba00b-d84c-4ead-a3ac-2b6cb8a9f8b9

Digital Collection:

Duke Chapel Recordings

Source Collection:

Duke University Chapel recordings, 1954-2005

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:

No Re-Use

In Copyright

Rights Note:

This material is made available for research, scholarship, and private study. Copyright in this material has not been transferred to Duke University. For reuses of this material beyond those permitted by fair use or otherwise allowed under the Copyright Act, please see our page on copyright and citations: https://library.duke.edu/rubenstein/research/citations-and-permissions.

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Paul F. Perry - "Beyond the Ordinary" (February 12, 1984)

Transcript

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Duke University Archives

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