C. Jarrett Gray, Jr. - "Sent Into the World" (May 11, 1997)

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-	The second lesson is from the Gospel of John, Chapter 17.	0:05
	Jesus is speaking to his father.	0:10
	"I have made your name known to those	0:16
	whom you gave me from the world.	0:18
	They were yours, and you gave them to me,	0:22
	and they have kept your word.	0:25
	Now they know that everything	0:28
	you have given me is from you.	0:30
	For the words that you gave to me,	0:33
	I have given to them,	0:36
	and they have received them	0:38
	and know in truth that I came from you,	0:40
	and they have believed that you sent me.	0:44
	I am asking on their behalf,	0:49
	I am not asking on behalf of the world	0:51
	but on behalf of those whom you gave me,	0:54
	because they are yours.	0:57
	All mine are yours,	1:00
	and yours are mine,	1:02
	and I have been glorified in them.	1:04
	And now I am no longer in the world,	1:07
	but they are in the world, and I am coming to you.	1:10
	Holy Father, protect them	1:15
	in your name that you have given me,	1:18
	so that they may be one as we are one.	1:20
	While I was with them,	1:25
	I protected them in your name that you have given me.	1:27
	I guarded them and not one of them was lost	1:31
	except the one destined to be lost	1:34
	so that the scripture might be fulfilled.	1:37
	But now I am coming to you,	1:40
	and I speak these things in the world	1:43
	so that they may have my joy made complete in themselves.	1:45
	I have given them your word,	1:50
	and the world has hated them	1:53
	because they do not belong to the world	1:55
	just as I do not belong to the world.	1:57
	I am not asking you to take them out of the world,	2:01
	but I ask you to protect them from the evil one.	2:05
	They do not belong to the world,	2:09
	just as I do not belong to the world.	2:12
	Sanctify them in the truth, your word is truth.	2:15
	As you have sent me into the world,	2:20
	even so have I also sent them into the world,	2:23
	and for their sakes I sanctify myself	2:27
	so that they also may be sanctified in truth.	2:30
	This is the word of the Lord.	2:35
	Thanks be to god.	2:38
Male Pastor	I greet you this morning	2:56
	in the name of the risen Christ,	2:57
	and I also want to wish to all of you a happy Mother's Day.	3:00
	I'm very pleased to be here this morning,	3:06
	in this august Institution with this august congregation.	3:08
	I count it a privilege to have this opportunity	3:14
	to share with you.	3:16
	I might say just before I begin,	3:19
	that I'm happy for all of the cooperation	3:22
	and all of the kindnesses that have been shown me,	3:25
	especially by Reverend Ferree-Clark,	3:28
	she has welcomed me today,	3:31
	and as we anticipated this moment.	3:33
	But I'm particularly grateful this morning to the choir.	3:35
	I'm so glad that they are here	3:39
	and I like their music very much.	3:41
	It reminds me of my first appointment in my first church,	3:43
	and despite the way I look, it wasn't all that long ago.	3:47
	(audience laughs)	3:51
	But for some reason, I was a young--	3:53
	Well, not so young, but I was a new pastor,	3:55
	and I was sort of feeling my oats,	3:58
	and so I decided that one of the things	4:00
	I wanted to do was to have communion every Sunday.	4:03
	And being a young pastor,	4:07
	my parishioners put up with me	4:09
	and let me do that,	4:13
	and I remember quite vividly on those mornings	4:14
	when we would have communion,	4:19
	and the pianist would start playing	4:20
	"I Want Jesus To Walk With Me",	4:23
	and the spirit that filled the place	4:26
	as the congregation joined in.	4:28
	So, thank you very much for singing	4:31
	one of my favorite songs this morning.	4:33
	Again, I am honored to be here this morning.	4:36
	Let us pray.	4:41
	Creator God,	4:45
	we pray that you would be with us now	4:46
	as we listen to hear you speak to us.	4:49
	We pray that you would fill us with your spirit	4:52
	and send us forth to minister in your name, Amen.	4:55
	So much of our time is spent thinking about,	5:05
	concerned about, the world.	5:09
	The world.	5:13
	It scares, almost escapes our imagination,	5:15
	the world is so big it seems as though	5:19
	we can hardly conceive of it,	5:22
	but we talk about it all the time.	5:23
	Think, for example, when we're in school,	5:26
	we study world history.	5:28
	As we look at the news and we read the newspapers,	5:31
	we think often about world peace.	5:34
	Conferences are held and people devote their lives	5:37
	to the seeking of world peace.	5:40
	We lament the fact	5:43
	that there is so much hunger in the world,	5:45
	and so we are concerned about world hunger.	5:46
	The world is ever on our minds.	5:51
	In our Gospel lection today,	5:56
	we have Jesus offering a prayer for his disciples,	5:58
	he is just preparing to leave them	6:01
	and he prays for them, lifting them up,	6:05
	telling them what he has done during his life,	6:07
	telling them what to expect,	6:10
	but also turning them over to God.	6:12
	He, having almost completed his work,	6:15
	is ready now to send them forth into the world,	6:17
	and so during the prayer he explains a number of things.	6:23
	What he has done, and what he intends for them.	6:26
	But there near the end,	6:31
	he says that he is sending them into the world.	6:33
	It seems to me that to be a Christian	6:39
	is to be sent into the world.	6:41
	Now, it's not quite that simple,	6:45
	it's not quite that simple.	6:47
	Christians, it seems to me,	6:49
	have always had a sort of a love-hate relationship	6:50
	with the world,	6:53
	and if you look at John's Gospel you'll see that	6:54
	the world is seen as an entity that is at odds with God,	6:57
	as a matter of fact, in rebellion against God.	7:02
	Jesus talks about the fact that the world had hated him	7:07
	and so the disciples can expect	7:11
	that the world will hate them as well.	7:12
	It has been very popular among Evangelical Christians	7:17
	to talk about being in the world but not of the world,	7:20
	and as we look around ourselves we must say that, indeed,	7:27
	the world is in rebellion against God.	7:30
	As we look around, we see the hatred,	7:34
	we see the strife, we see the wars,	7:37
	we see rumors of wars, we hear rumors of wars,	7:39
	and as we count the roll today of the countries of the world	7:43
	there are very few where there are not problems.	7:46
	Isn't it ironic that just a few years ago	7:50
	we were so happy that the Berlin Wall had come down	7:52
	and there was the ending of the Cold War?	7:56
	But now we find ourselves in a position that is even,	8:00
	in some ways, more precarious than it was	8:03
	during the Cold War.	8:07
	There are more tensions now in many ways.	8:10
	The world, what are we to do with the world?	8:14
	What are we to make of it?	8:17
	As I've mentioned, John's attitude is against the world.	8:20
	It is against the world, the world is in opposition to God.	8:25
	Perhaps what we should do is wash our hands of the world,	8:29
	we should do away with it after all?	8:32
	Aren't we Christians?	8:35
	Haven't we been saved?	8:36
	Haven't we learned the truth of Jesus Christ in heaven?	8:37
	We've been in some sense redeemed,	8:41
	why do we need the world?	8:45
	Why don't we just form our own society,	8:46
	an ideal society, a christocentric society	8:48
	in which we might go about our business	8:52
	and perform the tasks that Jesus and God have lain upon us?	8:54
	So, one way of handling the situation	9:03
	would be to withdraw from the world.	9:05
	To have no dealings with it,	9:08
	and certainly as we look at Christian history	9:10
	we know that there are numbers of examples of groups	9:12
	who have tried to make that choice.	9:16
	The world isn't as it should be,	9:21
	it's in rebellion, and we should not be a part of it,	9:22
	let's leave it and have our own communities!	9:26
	And yet, it's not that easy.	9:31
	When we are honest, when we really look at ourselves,	9:37
	we must say that we are part of the world indeed.	9:39
	Many of the tensions and the ambitions and longings	9:44
	that we see in the world we see within our own hearts.	9:47
	We see within the church as well,	9:51
	I know that some years ago,	9:55
	they started thinking about the church,	9:57
	they started introducing some of the techniques	9:58
	and some of the thinking from	10:02
	the business world into the church	10:03
	and so we talked about management by objectives	10:05
	and we talked about ways in which we could	10:08
	do the business of the church that would be more efficient.	10:10
	We're accepting the ethos of the business world,	10:14
	or again as we look at the church,	10:19
	we see that the same kinds of tensions,	10:21
	the same kinds of brokenness that we see	10:23
	in the world at large.	10:26
	So, what started out as being rather promising,	10:31
	that is, escaping the world and trying to go our own ways	10:34
	in a rather pure form as a covenant community	10:38
	isn't quite as simple as it first appeared,	10:42
	because when we're honest with ourselves we must admit	10:47
	that we too, in many ways,	10:50
	are in rebellion against God.	10:54
	So, where does that leave us?	10:58
	What are we to do then?	10:59
	Are we to forsake the world,	11:01
	are we to try to live in it wholeheartedly?	11:02
	Then we're reminded,	11:10
	that John told us also that God so loved the world.	11:12
	So we have another way of looking at the world,	11:20
	not one that's quite as negative,	11:23
	but one that's much more positive.	11:25
	One that sees the world not merely as being	11:26
	in rebellion to God,	11:30
	as being antithetical to the will of God,	11:32
	but we see the world as the object of divine love and care.	11:35
	We see the world as the place where God	11:41
	is acting to redeem the world, and indeed,	11:44
	to redeem the cosmos,	11:47
	and so this gives us a very different view of the world.	11:51
	One that's more positive,	11:55
	one that will allow us to engage it,	11:56
	one that will allow us to become a part of it,	11:58
	and to take our rightful place in it.	12:04
	Today we will have the opportunity to take communion,	12:09
	and Jesus told us that as oft' as we take it,	12:12
	we should do it in remembrance of him,	12:15
	and as we think of him and as we think about his life	12:19
	and his ministry, his death and resurrection,	12:22
	we'll know that he was the one who demonstrated to us	12:26
	that God indeed loved the world,	12:32
	and as he went around he taught	12:35
	and he was concerned for the world	12:37
	and he engaged in the lives of people	12:40
	and he involved himself in their lives	12:42
	and he met their needs, whatever they might have been.	12:44
	Where people were hungry, he fed them.	12:47
	Where they were sick, he cured them.	12:50
	Where they were spiritually hungry,	12:53
	he fed them in that instance as well.	12:56
	God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son,	13:04
	and it is in that son that we see the way	13:10
	in which we are supposed to engage the world.	13:14
	And so as Jesus is praying, then, for his disciples,	13:20
	he says finally that he is sending them into the world	13:23
	and so this is the option that we must take.	13:32
	We can't turn our backs on the world	13:37
	and look down our noses at it.	13:40
	We must engage it, we must love it,	13:42
	we must minister to it, we must engage it,	13:44
	yes indeed we must argue with it,	13:47
	but always and everywhere we must love it and minister to it	13:51
	because it's the object of God's love,	13:58
	not because we are so great.	14:02
	Not because we know how to answer	14:05
	all the problems of the world	14:08
	but merely because of our relationship with Christ	14:09
	and the fact that he has sent us into the world.	14:12
	We are called upon to love it and minister to it.	14:16
	As we come to the table this morning,	14:22
	we should keep these things in mind.	14:26
	That Jesus has indeed sent us into the world	14:27
	to be his ambassadors, and to be his spokespeople.	14:31
	Amen.	14:38

Item Info

Title:

C. Jarrett Gray, Jr. - "Sent Into the World" (May 11, 1997)

Description:

Sermon start time: 02:56. Sermon end time: 14:39.
The Christian relationship to the world can be difficult to discern at times. Because we see the world is in rebellion against God, we are tempted to want to remove ourselves from it. Yet this same rebellion dwells within our hearts and churches. Nor can we wholeheartedly embrace the world. In John 17, we see that Jesus calls us in the world, as the object of divine love to love it, minister to it, and challenge it. (Abstract created by Duke Divinity School staff.)
Key quotation: “God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son, and it is in that son that we see the way in which we are supposed to engage the world…We must engage it, we must love it, we must minister to it, yes indeed we must argue with it…because it’s the object of God’s love.”

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https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4pg1j39s

Date:

May 11, 1997

Speaker:

Gray, C. Jarrett, Jr.

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Duke University. Chapel

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UA.17.01.0003 CS-0854
ref9858_9we
uachapelsermaud
duke:320331
dcrau001499
ark:/87924/r4pg1j39s
917d8109-abf8-4c52-bd73-1928a97f9e81

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C. Jarrett Gray, Jr. - "Sent Into the World" (May 11, 1997)

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