D. Jürgen Moltmann - Communion Meditation (October 1, 1967)

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-	Sons of God	0:02
	through faith.	0:05
	For as many of you	0:08
	as were baptized into Christ	0:09
	have put on Christ.	0:12
	There is neither Jew nor Greek,	0:15
	there is neither slave nor free,	0:20
	there is neither male nor female,	0:24
	for you are all one	0:28
	in Christ Jesus.	0:31
	And if you are Christs,	0:34
	then you are Abraham's offspring,	0:37
	heirs according to promise.	0:41
	And may God bless unto us	0:45
	the reading of his holy word.	0:47
-	This communion meditation is based upon the verses	1:34
	from Galatians, which we have just heard.	1:37
	Who am I really?	1:42
	This is a crucial question we all have to answer	1:46
	in our lifetime, when we are young we compete	1:49
	in games to find out how strong we are physically.	1:53
	Later, we take a job to prove ourselves	1:58
	and others what we can accomplish with our total being	2:01
	and when we have exhausted ourselves in the demands	2:07
	and responsibilities of our everyday concerns,	2:10
	we often cry out, I have lost myself,	2:15
	I want to find myself again, I don't know at all	2:20
	who I really am.	2:24
	And so the question of our self identity	2:28
	keeps hounding is till the grave.	2:31
	Man has hidden to himself all his life	2:34
	he is in search of his true being.	2:38
	Dostoevsky wrote, the end knows the formula	2:42
	of her end who, the bee knows knows the formula	2:46
	of her bee hive, they do not know their formula	2:51
	in a human way, but in their own way.	2:55
	And they don't need to know more.	2:59
	Only man does not know his formula.	3:01
	Thus man is always man on the go, a risk, an adventure	3:06
	and a hope, he can gain everything,	3:11
	but he can also lose everything, he can find heaven	3:16
	and he can find hell as well.	3:20
	In his preaching, saint Paul opens up two ways of life	3:24
	for us, that of a slave and that of a son.	3:28
	What does he want to say?	3:33
	A man can try to find his self identity	3:35
	by enormous works, who really he is then depends	3:38
	on what other people see him doing.	3:43
	Here he places himself under the law.	3:46
	Everyday he hears the command of his conscience,	3:50
	you must accomplish something big today.	3:54
	You have to be somebody, you have to prove yourself	3:58
	and to others, that you are a good guy or a charming woman.	4:02
	You have to do better than others	4:07
	and this voice evokes ambition in man	4:10
	and his anxiety acts him on.	4:14
	He looks for approval in the eyes of his fellowmen	4:17
	and seeks self respect from their compliments.	4:20
	On the other hand, however, he is also constantly	4:25
	trying to humiliate others in order to exalt himself.	4:28
	I am not like this text collector, said the Farizee,	4:33
	I am not like this Jew or that Negro	4:38
	or like the communist, some say today.	4:41
	But this way of life is life under the law.	4:45
	If we live this way, we are slaves,	4:49
	slaves of our own anxiety seeking approval through works	4:52
	is a characteristic of slaves.	4:57
	A slave has to make something out of himself,	5:00
	because he is nothing in himself.	5:04
	Saint Paul's points to another way of life	5:09
	by proclaiming Christ to us.	5:12
	Don't look upon yourself, don't become dependent	5:15
	in your works, whether in pride over the good ones	5:20
	or in despair over the bad ones.	5:24
	Look upon Christ, who gave himself up to death for you.	5:28
	In him you will find yourself, whoever you are,	5:33
	deeply loved forever.	5:38
	In Christ, we recognize the love of the father	5:40
	and whenever we experience this love,	5:45
	we become free.	5:47
	The frantic struggle for approval stops.	5:50
	The anxiety of coming up on the short end of life	5:55
	disappears, we can accept ourselves as we are,	5:59
	because of being accepted by God in his love.	6:04
	We can have confidence as a son,	6:08
	who trusts his father, we are at home everywhere	6:12
	and can breathe freely, because we are surrounded	6:16
	by his love from all sides.	6:20
	No one can earn this, for no one becomes a son	6:24
	by doing good works, but only by the love of his parents.	6:28
	Yee all are sons of God by faith in Christ Jesus,	6:34
	saint Paul tells the Galatians.	6:39
	I don't think, that they were better people,	6:42
	than we are, they were probably just as hopeful	6:45
	and just as disappointed, just as proud	6:49
	and just as sad as we are.	6:52
	And nevertheless, they and we are sons of God	6:55
	by faith in Christ, because they and we find	7:00
	in Christ the costly love of God to his mankind	7:05
	and in this love we are changed from proud	7:11
	and unfortunate slaves to children of his joy.	7:14
	To sons, to whom belongs the world,	7:20
	to heirs of the coming kingdom in which all things	7:24
	will be new.	7:27
	Every fish needs water in which to swim.	7:31
	Every bird needs air for flying	7:35
	and we human beings need love to live in freedom.	7:38
	The boundless love for God is like the atmosphere	7:44
	in which we grow up to a truly free and human life.	7:48
	We find ourselves where we find with very love of God.	7:54
	Let us say therefore, seeking approval through works	7:59
	is a sign of slaves, but the freedom found in faith	8:04
	expresses the true dignity of the children of God.	8:09
	And there's another negative characteristic of man	8:16
	involved in saint Paul's reflections,	8:20
	that need to be mentioned.	8:23
	Whenever men come together, they easily draw apart	8:25
	from each other at once as if separation	8:30
	were a rule of their nature.	8:34
	The Israelites consider themselves separate from the heathen	8:38
	by divine election.	8:43
	The Greek claim to be better than the Barbarians,	8:46
	because of their education.	8:50
	Some Christians today take non Christians	8:53
	to be worse people.	8:57
	We separate ourselves from other people by pride	8:59
	in the superiority of our origin or education,	9:02
	worlds, class, race and countless other ways	9:07
	which we invent day by day.	9:12
	We are naturally inclined to congregate with people,	9:15
	whom we consider equals.	9:20
	People, who are our equals are at last similar to us,	9:23
	confirm us in which we are.	9:27
	People, who are strangers make us feel uncertain	9:31
	and uneasy.	9:34
	Birds over feather flock together	9:37
	and one crow doesn't pick out the eye of another.	9:40
	These proverbs go back to the Greeks,	9:44
	who thought, that only brotherly love	9:48
	can bring together free citizen in society.	9:52
	Their political society consisted of an assembly	9:57
	of the free and the lords, an assembly rigidly	10:01
	excluding slaves.	10:06
	We all know, that this attitude of exclusiveness	10:09
	is a basic motive for hate,	10:14
	for wars and even revolutions.	10:17
	The scheme of hate is rooted deeply in the souls	10:21
	of vile men, it is a result of a whole cast	10:25
	of thinking and of painting all of human reality	10:31
	in black and white tones.	10:35
	People divide each other up into neat categories,	10:39
	friends and foes, equals and unequals.	10:43
	Usually, they need an enemy, who creates in them	10:47
	anxiety and fear precisely in order,	10:50
	that they may solidify their own group	10:54
	and their own nation.	10:57
	Communists do in fact need a bad class enemy	11:00
	who is guilty of all evil.	11:04
	And many in the western world no less seem to need	11:06
	the bad communists to serve as a focal point of anxiety.	11:10
	Because man is not free to discover the guilt,	11:15
	that is his own, he urgently needs a ribbing boy	11:19
	or escape goat, whom he can accuse	11:23
	in order to excuse himself.	11:26
	Why do people act this way privately	11:30
	as well as in public life?	11:33
	I think because they are slaves of their own anxiety	11:35
	and are not free.	11:39
	God's love liberates us from this anxiety.	11:42
	We simply lose fear, whenever we experience	11:47
	everlasting love.	11:51
	And God's love creates peace on earth.	11:54
	We can see in the Christ of God,	11:58
	who died not for his friends, but for the enemies of God,	12:01
	what this love means.	12:06
	It is not brotherly love fill you up as the Greek said,	12:08
	but love of enemy agapi, as the new testament says.	12:13
	Jesus associated not with the equal,	12:19
	but with one, who was different, the unequal, the ostracized	12:23
	the despised, the humiliated ones.	12:28
	To the amazement of Farizee Jesus associates	12:31
	where prostitutes and text collectors,	12:35
	social outcasts, and political nobodies.	12:38
	In his love equal doesn't associate with equal.	12:43
	Opposites reflect each other	12:49
	and this means God justifies	12:53
	the godless and accept sinners and always them.	12:56
	This love is not like a playboy love, which is attracted	13:02
	by outward glamour and what appears lovable.	13:06
	It is a creative love, which seeks the lost and creates	13:10
	new life where otherwise hate kills everything.	13:15
	Through Christ we learn this new creative love,	13:20
	because we experience it only in him.	13:25
	If we are recreated to a new life by this love,	13:29
	we are unable to love our enemies.	13:33
	I think this is the creative reality of the Christian	13:37
	community, here all boundaries are infiltrated	13:42
	and the wars of separation, men themselves erect,	13:47
	for mutual isolation are raised.	13:52
	Here is neither Jew, nor Greek, neither bond nor free,	13:56
	neither male nor female and let us say neither friend	14:00
	nor foe for all are one in Christ Jesus.	14:05
	All are alike as sinners, lacking true humanity	14:10
	and yet all are equally loved by God.	14:14
	We can become a Christ to the other,	14:19
	for we have put on Christ as saint Paul says,	14:25
	thus we can become a brother and a helper	14:28
	and in this way the redeemer to the other.	14:32
	A way of freedom went through the ancient world,	14:38
	when people left behind them their prejustices	14:42
	and the nations classes and races	14:46
	to find a new humanity in the worldwide community	14:50
	of the church.	14:54
	They were called the new people	14:56
	of God and the third species.	14:58
	The movement of peace went through the medieval world	15:03
	when people left behind them the everlasting struggle	15:07
	for blood revenge and came to the last supper	15:11
	for reconciliation.	15:15
	It is especially at similar frontiers,	15:18
	that we have to seek the creative reality	15:22
	of the church today, where enemies make friends,	15:25
	where contempt is replaced with appreciation,	15:31
	where hate changes into kindness,	15:35
	there is the true Christian community.	15:39
	Christ is not against the communists, he died for them.	15:43
	Christ is not against our private or public enemies,	15:49
	he died for them, if we understand that	15:53
	and follow him in the ministry of reconciliation,	15:58
	then the Christian community is what it has to be,	16:03
	the avant garde of the coming new world of God,	16:07
	where man kind shall live in peace.	16:11
	Well it is true, what we are able to realize	16:16
	in this life are fragments, beginnings,	16:20
	only very small steps, but it belongs to the vision	16:24
	of the Christian hope to see in the fragments	16:29
	the form of the coming whole.	16:34
	In the ambivious beginnings	16:38
	beyond equivocal perfection,	16:42
	and in there some vessel the beauty of the coming kingdom	16:45
	of God.	16:50
	What we are able to realize of kindness and peace	16:52
	in our Christian community is always very human	16:56
	and puny and often all together much too human.	17:00
	But at the same time, this reality is a sacrament	17:05
	of the great hope for the future of mankind.	17:10
	Today is worldwide communion Sunday,	17:16
	throughout the world people are celebrating	17:19
	the supper of our lord, everywhere men are becoming	17:23
	free sons of God, out of proud or desperate slaves.	17:28
	Greek and barbarian, bond and free, male and female,	17:34
	Germans and Poles, black and white are entering	17:40
	the brotherhood of Christ, leaving behind	17:44
	what separates them and makes them enemies.	17:48
	Now they are becoming a unity in the midst of all disunity.	17:52
	They are celebrating the festival of freedom	18:00
	across all boundaries, they hope in peace on earth,	18:03
	because they believe in the reconciliation	18:08
	of the world through the love of Christ.	18:11
	This is presented as a great	18:15
	offer to each of us.	18:18
	God offers us his open hand to recreate us	18:21
	from slaves to sons,	18:26
	from all continents and nations,	18:29
	brothers stretch out their hands to find the brother in us.	18:32
	Do not let these hands remain empty.	18:37
	Seize these hands and hold firm, it is the offer	18:41
	of true life in the midst of death	18:46
	and herein we can experience what we really are.	18:50
	We are the sons of God by faith,	18:55
	we are all one in Christ	18:59
	Jesus and we shall live in the peace of God,	19:01
	amen.	19:07

Item Info

Title:

D. Jürgen Moltmann - Communion Meditation (October 1, 1967)

Description:

Sermon start time: (Part 1) 01:34. Sermon end time: (Part 1) 19:09.
All of us are faced with the question of our identity: are we slaves who live in competition and quest for approval, or children of God who find our identity in God's love and seek reconciliation with one another? This sermon calls the hearers to become Christ to one another. (Abstract created by Duke Divinity School staff.)

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https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r45m62n3w

Date:

October 1, 1967

Speaker:

Moltmann, D. Jürgen

Liturgical Calendar:

Biblical Book:

Galatians

Chapter and Verse:

Galatians 3:23-29

Subject:

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 RR-0401
ref6005_ado
uachapelsermaud
duke:320730
dcrau001790
ark:/87924/r45m62n3w
b6e98ff7-c4ef-482b-ac12-a420569afd35

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Duke Chapel Recordings

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Duke University Chapel recordings, 1954-2005

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

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D. Jürgen Moltmann - Communion Meditation (October 1, 1967)

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