Howard C. Wilkinson - "An Educated Religion" (September 18, 1960)
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
- | I'm starting over again. | 0:05 |
And I'm going to see if this will not record pretty well | 0:07 | |
with the volume turned all the way up | 0:11 | |
and the green light flickering just a little bit | 0:14 | |
as the recording goes into it. | 0:18 | |
I'm hoping very much that this will record | 0:22 | |
to the extent that the... | 0:24 | |
- | The New Testament lesson is found in the sixth chapter | 0:47 |
of the book of Galatians, | 0:51 | |
reading from the king James version. | 0:53 | |
"Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, | 0:57 | |
ye which are spiritual restore such a man | 1:00 | |
in the spirit of meekness, considering thy self | 1:04 | |
lest thou also be tempted. | 1:08 | |
Bear ye one another's burdens | 1:12 | |
and so fulfill the law of Christ | 1:14 | |
for if a man think himself to be something, | 1:17 | |
when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself. | 1:20 | |
But let every man prove his own work. | 1:25 | |
And then shall he have rejoicing in himself alone | 1:28 | |
and not in another for every man shall bear his own burden," | 1:32 | |
Here the lesson ends. | 1:39 | |
- | You freshmen have been here at Duke only three full days, | 1:56 |
now. Already however, | 2:02 | |
you have discovered more things that you will need to do | 2:06 | |
than you have hours in which to do them. | 2:11 | |
There are approximately 150 extra curricular interests | 2:15 | |
that are pulling for your time and your energy | 2:21 | |
and your devotion. | 2:25 | |
Oh yes, and then there will be courses too. | 2:28 | |
Before the coming week has reached its end, | 2:32 | |
you will be very much aware of these courses. | 2:35 | |
Now to the tension that is set up between | 2:41 | |
your curricular courses and your extracurricular | 2:46 | |
Campus interests will be added yet another tension. | 2:51 | |
You need to keep in with the folks back home. | 2:57 | |
You need to write your parents. | 3:02 | |
And then you need to write to your sweetheart back home. | 3:05 | |
Now you need to do all of these things. | 3:10 | |
You really should keep in touch with your parents | 3:16 | |
and I suppose it's perfectly all right to correspond | 3:18 | |
with your hometown date. | 3:22 | |
You know, this person that you told last Wednesday night, | 3:25 | |
that you would never forget. | 3:28 | |
Now, I would suggest, however, | 3:34 | |
that once classes begin, | 3:40 | |
you should start each day by going to class, | 3:44 | |
rather than by writing your hometown date. | 3:47 | |
The difficulty that would be with your taking time | 3:51 | |
to write your hometown sweetheart, | 3:55 | |
before you'd go to class is not that you would be | 3:57 | |
putting the cart before the horse, | 4:01 | |
but that you would be putting the heart before the course. | 4:04 | |
(students laughing) | 4:07 | |
Your professors, I can assure you | 4:09 | |
will not look with favor upon that. | 4:11 | |
There will be curricular classes, | 4:15 | |
extracurricular activities, the writing of your parents, | 4:18 | |
your hometown date, and many other things. | 4:23 | |
And you will be aware that there is something | 4:26 | |
of a conflict of interest for your time and your energy. | 4:28 | |
The wise student is one who discovers a proper balance | 4:36 | |
among all these conflicting or seemingly conflicting | 4:43 | |
interests, finds out how much time to give to this | 4:47 | |
and how much energy to devote to that. | 4:52 | |
Now all of this that I have said is by way of introduction | 4:57 | |
to the topic of the freshman sermon, | 5:01 | |
which is an educated religion. | 5:05 | |
You have come here to college to educate your knowledge | 5:09 | |
of English, to educate your knowledge of the sciences, | 5:14 | |
of philosophy, of history, of government, et cetera. | 5:19 | |
I would like to insist now that you also need to educate | 5:24 | |
your religion and that you give proper emphasis | 5:29 | |
to the education of your religion, | 5:33 | |
along with your education of these other important areas | 5:37 | |
of your life. | 5:41 | |
It needs to be educated, believe me. | 5:44 | |
Your high school knowledge of algebra needed to be educated | 5:49 | |
and so you came to college. | 5:54 | |
Your high school knowledge of the sciences | 5:57 | |
needed an education, so here you are. | 5:59 | |
The religion which you learned at your mothers knee, | 6:05 | |
or at Sunday school, likewise needs an education. | 6:08 | |
The word educate comes from a Latin word, | 6:14 | |
which means to bring up or to bring to maturity. | 6:18 | |
Now that in essence is what you have come here to do | 6:26 | |
to your algebra, to your science and so forth. | 6:30 | |
And that in essence is what you need to do to your religion, | 6:35 | |
to bring it up, bring it to maturity. | 6:39 | |
Now notice if you will, | 6:43 | |
that this may involve the acquiring of a great deal | 6:45 | |
of factual information. | 6:49 | |
However much of that is involved, | 6:54 | |
there is something more important than that involved | 6:56 | |
in getting an education. | 6:59 | |
Because if to be educated is to be brought up, | 7:02 | |
to be brought to maturity, | 7:05 | |
then there is a matter of emphasis that is as important | 7:08 | |
as the matter of information. | 7:11 | |
All right, then what does it mean to educate your religion? | 7:15 | |
It seems to me that an educated religion is a religion | 7:19 | |
which is reflected upon, which is studied, | 7:25 | |
which is informed, which is well balanced, well-rounded, | 7:32 | |
which does not become obsessed with any particular idea | 7:40 | |
of religion or any particular cause in religion | 7:46 | |
to the exclusion of other equally valid ideas and causes | 7:51 | |
in religion. | 7:55 | |
Like we were saying a while ago about your curricular | 7:59 | |
courses, your extracurricular campus activities | 8:03 | |
and your interests off campus, | 8:07 | |
all of which need to be pursued in balanced fashion. | 8:10 | |
So your religion and the ideas and causes of religion | 8:16 | |
need to be pursued in balanced well-rounded fashion. | 8:22 | |
This is not only extremely important to you | 8:30 | |
as an individual, | 8:32 | |
but it will be a greater importance even to the church | 8:33 | |
of which you are a member after you have graduated | 8:37 | |
from this university and have begun your family life | 8:40 | |
and your vocational activity. | 8:43 | |
Many of our local churches suffer from having a great many | 8:47 | |
people on the roles of their membership, | 8:51 | |
who are obsessed with one idea, and one only, | 8:56 | |
who do not have a balanced religion. | 9:02 | |
And it is my hope that when you return to Archdale | 9:06 | |
and go to your church, | 9:12 | |
that you will have a more balanced religion | 9:13 | |
than you had when you came here. | 9:17 | |
That when you returned to Albuquerque, | 9:20 | |
your religion will be one upon which you have reflected | 9:23 | |
while you are at college. | 9:26 | |
And it is one that is seen steadily and seen whole. | 9:29 | |
Too many of our people will select one emphasis. | 9:35 | |
For example, here is a person who is interested in tithing, | 9:38 | |
and he tithes but that's the end of his religion. | 9:42 | |
Here's another person who is interested | 9:46 | |
in church attendance, | 9:48 | |
and he condemns everyone who doesn't attend church | 9:49 | |
and that's all there is to his religion. | 9:52 | |
Here's another one who is interested in temperance | 9:55 | |
and temperance only, one who is interested in race relations | 9:57 | |
and nothing else. One who is interested in world peace, | 10:01 | |
but not in peace at home. | 10:05 | |
I suggest to you that while you are here at college, | 10:10 | |
you learn the value of not riding religious hobby horses. | 10:14 | |
But that you see what religion is as a whole | 10:21 | |
and learn to adjust the various demands and requirements | 10:25 | |
of religion to each to the other, | 10:30 | |
so that you will have an educated religion, | 10:32 | |
so it will be brought up to maturity. | 10:35 | |
Now, having said that, let's take a look at | 10:40 | |
some of the things that happened in this area | 10:42 | |
and see how they should be brought to adjustment. | 10:45 | |
Suppose we were to pick up our Bibles and turn to the book | 10:50 | |
of Galatians as Bob Hyatt did a while ago. | 10:53 | |
We turned to the sixth chapter and we began reading at | 10:57 | |
the first verse, and very soon we'd come to a statement, | 10:59 | |
"every man shall bear his own burden." well, he said. | 11:03 | |
Now that's wonderful, clear, cut advice. | 11:08 | |
We'll put down our Bibles now and we'll go out | 11:11 | |
and bear our individual burdens. | 11:13 | |
This means that every man should assume a sense | 11:17 | |
of responsibility for the things which are his, | 11:19 | |
and he should not try to push off onto someone else, | 11:23 | |
those decisions and those duties and those actions, | 11:25 | |
which he can perform, which he can be faithful to | 11:28 | |
and which by the help of God, he is able to do, all right? | 11:32 | |
So far, so good. | 11:36 | |
But here's what often happens. | 11:39 | |
A person who makes this verse of scripture, | 11:42 | |
the text of his life begins to draw some unfortunate | 11:44 | |
conclusions from this text when he sees it in isolation | 11:48 | |
and out of its context. | 11:52 | |
When a neighbor gets in trouble or a friend needs some help | 11:55 | |
comes to him for help. He says, | 11:59 | |
"Why, I read in the Bible where Paul wrote to the Galatians, | 12:01 | |
"Every man shall bear his own burden." | 12:05 | |
I'm bearing mine, you bear yours." | 12:07 | |
So he cuts himself off from his fellow man, | 12:10 | |
and in the hour of his friends need, | 12:13 | |
he uses scripture to justify his selfishness | 12:16 | |
and his failure to help. | 12:19 | |
Now, if he would only educate his religion | 12:22 | |
and read a little bit farther in that same chapter, | 12:25 | |
he would come to further light on the matter | 12:27 | |
of bearing burdens and would find this bit of advice | 12:30 | |
given by the apostle Paul, "Bear ye one another's burdens." | 12:33 | |
That was only in verse five. | 12:38 | |
We didn't have to read very far to see another side | 12:40 | |
of the same picture, the other side of the coin as it were. | 12:43 | |
Now, this does not in any sense detract | 12:48 | |
from the importance of every man bearing his own burden, | 12:50 | |
but it says, this is not the whole picture, | 12:53 | |
because if we're going to be well-rounded Christians, | 12:55 | |
it is necessary for us from time to time, indeed, | 12:58 | |
as one of the great motives of our lives | 13:01 | |
to bear the burdens of our fellow man, | 13:03 | |
to share their burdens. | 13:06 | |
Now, an educated religion is one which sees | 13:11 | |
that it is not an either/or situation. | 13:14 | |
Either I bear my burdens or I bear another person's burdens, | 13:16 | |
but that I do both and in the right way. | 13:20 | |
Even this is not enough. | 13:25 | |
Because after we have had a hard day of burden bearing | 13:27 | |
and of burden sharing, | 13:30 | |
we find that still the load of the world's responsibility | 13:33 | |
has not been properly carried. | 13:37 | |
And we have to read elsewhere in the Bible | 13:40 | |
and come to the book of Psalms. | 13:42 | |
Psalm number 55, verse 22, | 13:44 | |
where it is suggested to us, "Cast by burden upon the Lord." | 13:49 | |
Often as we go to bed at night, | 13:57 | |
or even in the heat of the day's activity, | 13:59 | |
when we have done the best we can to bear our burdens | 14:02 | |
and have done the best we can | 14:05 | |
to share the burdens of another, | 14:08 | |
it is still necessary for us to catch the whole load | 14:09 | |
upon God. | 14:13 | |
And yet you see the uneducated person who has not reflected | 14:16 | |
upon his religion is likely to say, | 14:20 | |
"Why does not the Bible say cast thy burden upon the Lord?" | 14:23 | |
And so he doesn't bear his burden | 14:26 | |
or the burden of his neighbor either. | 14:27 | |
I have a burden, what do I do? | 14:29 | |
I follow the Bible? I cast it on the Lord. | 14:31 | |
Now a religion that has been brought up to maturity | 14:38 | |
is one that sees that in these paradoxical situations, | 14:41 | |
where we are commanded to be responsible, | 14:47 | |
commanded to share responsibility, | 14:49 | |
and finally commanded to turn our responsibility | 14:51 | |
over to God. | 14:55 | |
With the great insights of the whole gospel | 14:57 | |
and the genius of the gospel of Christ is seen. | 15:00 | |
Now, in case you think that this is a little bit strange | 15:06 | |
or unusual, | 15:08 | |
let me remind you that as Ralph Sockman said some years ago, | 15:09 | |
"The genius of the gospel is never seen in any one | 15:13 | |
admonition or advice or any one insight. | 15:18 | |
It is seen partially when we get additional insight | 15:22 | |
and advice,". But said Sockman, "It is seen best | 15:28 | |
when we view the paradoxical sense of advice, | 15:32 | |
which the scriptures give us," | 15:36 | |
such as the one that has been presented just now. | 15:38 | |
Or let us turn to another. | 15:44 | |
There are those who say, | 15:47 | |
Well, it is the business of the church to be prophetic. | 15:48 | |
It is the business of the individual Christian | 15:52 | |
to be prophetic." | 15:54 | |
That is to say he supposed to take a look at society | 15:56 | |
and its ills and speak out against them. | 15:59 | |
And he is not supposed to pay any attention to the mind | 16:02 | |
or the influence of man, | 16:06 | |
he's not to regard a person of any body who might disagree | 16:07 | |
with this, or who might be upset by his prophetic utterance. | 16:10 | |
He is simply to call the shots as he sees them. | 16:14 | |
He is to be a prophet and speak out against social | 16:17 | |
injustice. | 16:19 | |
Not only is the church supposed to do this with regard to | 16:22 | |
the secular world, | 16:25 | |
but the church is supposed to do this to itself. | 16:26 | |
We are supposed to preach the prophetic word in the church | 16:30 | |
to the church and to show how Sam has crept in to the very | 16:33 | |
body of Christ. | 16:38 | |
We have very good precedent for this. Our Lord said, | 16:41 | |
"I did not come to send peace, but a sword." Jesus said, | 16:44 | |
"I have come to speak a word that will divide | 16:49 | |
father from son and sister from sister." | 16:51 | |
And set the members of the man's household against him | 16:54 | |
because of the sharp biting unflinching, unyielding, | 16:58 | |
prophetic word. | 17:02 | |
Now this is true, we are supposed to do this. | 17:06 | |
And Christ did say he came not to send peace, but a sword. | 17:09 | |
But some people who have made this | 17:15 | |
the text of their religion, | 17:16 | |
and this has been all of their religion | 17:17 | |
have forgotten another very important part | 17:19 | |
of the gospel of Christ. | 17:21 | |
And if you truly educate your religion | 17:25 | |
while you're here in college, | 17:27 | |
you will not be like these people. | 17:29 | |
You will do this much, but you will do something else also, | 17:33 | |
which is paradoxical. | 17:35 | |
The apostle Paul wrote to the Romans and he said, | 17:38 | |
"In so far as it lies with you," | 17:40 | |
now he implied by that | 17:45 | |
that it doesn't always lie entirely with you, | 17:47 | |
but in so far as it lies with you | 17:52 | |
live at peace with all men. | 17:55 | |
That is to say, we have on the one hand, | 18:01 | |
the demand to be prophets and on the other hand, | 18:02 | |
we have the demand to build and to hold unity | 18:05 | |
and brotherhood. | 18:08 | |
We are not out to divide simply for the sake of dividing | 18:10 | |
and even when we must speak the divisive, | 18:13 | |
prophetic word at the same time, | 18:15 | |
we must be grasping with all the strength we can muster | 18:17 | |
to hold the people of God together in one unity | 18:21 | |
and not to destroy the brotherhood, | 18:24 | |
not to destroy the spirit of love | 18:26 | |
and of brotherly affection, which we have for each other, | 18:29 | |
even when we must disagree over social issues | 18:33 | |
and the implications of the gospel in ethical situations. | 18:37 | |
We have this twofold equally important emphasis here, | 18:41 | |
to speak sharply, to speak unflinchingly | 18:46 | |
and yet to promote and protect the unity of the church. | 18:49 | |
Let's look at a third. | 18:59 | |
And this paradox is contained in one verse of Paul's letter | 19:02 | |
to the Philippians. | 19:05 | |
It sounds as though he's contradicting himself. | 19:07 | |
"Work out your own salvation," he said with fear | 19:11 | |
and trembling. Well, that sounds like our salvation | 19:15 | |
depends upon our work, doesn't it? | 19:20 | |
What we do. | 19:23 | |
Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. | 19:24 | |
It's all up to us. | 19:29 | |
Now here's the rest of the sentence, | 19:32 | |
"For it is God who works in you and enables you both | 19:35 | |
to will and to achieve." It's all up to us? | 19:42 | |
No, it's all up to God. | 19:52 | |
Is it all up to God? No, it's up to us. | 19:55 | |
What did he mean? | 20:00 | |
He meant it is all up to us in so far as what we can do | 20:02 | |
is concerned, but it is for us to realize that unless, | 20:06 | |
and without the activity of God, | 20:10 | |
everything we do would be null and void. | 20:13 | |
And in fact, | 20:20 | |
if it had not been for the prior activity of God, | 20:21 | |
through his grace in our hearts, | 20:25 | |
we would have not the ability even to will | 20:27 | |
to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. | 20:30 | |
And we would not have the ability to work out our salvation | 20:34 | |
with fear and trembling, | 20:37 | |
if it were not for the prior activity of God's grace | 20:39 | |
in our hearts. And so what are we to do? paradoxically, | 20:42 | |
we are to work out our salvation with fear and trembling, | 20:47 | |
knowing all the time that it is God who makes it possible. | 20:52 | |
Now, when we see this, | 20:58 | |
we are led to see a couple of other things. | 20:59 | |
One of which is that human activity on the human level | 21:02 | |
is an absolute necessity in the Christian life. | 21:07 | |
Now, not that we're going to earn our salvation, | 21:12 | |
the idea that any one of us could go out today | 21:14 | |
and earn his salvation is almost as extinct | 21:17 | |
as the hooping brain and it ought to be. | 21:19 | |
But at the same time, | 21:23 | |
we should be guarded against the thought | 21:26 | |
that it is all up to God as is the fashion | 21:28 | |
in certain circles today, to think that we do not need | 21:31 | |
as Christians to be actively concerned | 21:35 | |
with promoting our Christian faith, | 21:38 | |
because when God decides to act, | 21:39 | |
he will act, when he acts, that's everything, | 21:42 | |
and until he does, there's nothing we can do. | 21:44 | |
Now there's an element of truth in this, | 21:47 | |
but it is an element of truth, | 21:49 | |
which is corrected by the first part of the advice | 21:50 | |
which the apostle Paul gives. | 21:53 | |
The second conclusion by way of a scripture verse | 21:57 | |
that we would be driven to here is | 22:00 | |
the one where Paul says that it is for us to plant, | 22:04 | |
It is for us to water. | 22:10 | |
It is for us to harvest, | 22:13 | |
but it is God who gives the increase. | 22:16 | |
So that without the increase, which God gives, | 22:20 | |
our planting would be vain. | 22:25 | |
Our watering would be vain and there wouldn't be anything | 22:28 | |
to harvest. | 22:30 | |
But even though God is able and willing | 22:32 | |
to give the increase, | 22:35 | |
the crop would not be harvested if it were not for our | 22:37 | |
planning and our watering and our harvest. | 22:39 | |
An educated religion is one which does not ride | 22:46 | |
any one idea or hobby or obsession about religion | 22:49 | |
to the exclusion of the rest of the picture. | 22:54 | |
Oh, there are so many of the religious concepts, | 22:58 | |
values and causes that need this kind of education. | 23:03 | |
We do not have time to mention them here this morning, | 23:07 | |
but there's one that must not be passed up | 23:09 | |
even in a brief sermon, such as this. | 23:11 | |
Some people have the feeling that when you | 23:16 | |
get your religion educated, that you will cease to hate sin. | 23:18 | |
You will become tolerant of sin because you love the sinner. | 23:22 | |
And religion that has been informed by scriptural insights | 23:27 | |
is one that insists upon the value of the human personality | 23:31 | |
and how God loves every sinner. | 23:35 | |
And of course he does, that is our gospel. | 23:38 | |
And yet an emphasis upon loving sinner that minimizes | 23:42 | |
a hatred of sin is paradoxically | 23:47 | |
an emphasis which will undercut the significance | 23:51 | |
even of loving the sinner, | 23:54 | |
because you do not have the love a sick person | 23:57 | |
if you say to him, | 23:59 | |
"Now, I love you in spite of the fact | 24:00 | |
that you've got cancer, | 24:01 | |
and don't you worry about this cancer, | 24:02 | |
because really we love you. | 24:04 | |
And we're going to forgive this cancer you have in you." | 24:05 | |
An attitudes such as that would of course kill the patient | 24:09 | |
because it would leave the disease unchecked. | 24:11 | |
And so someone whose life is filled with all kinds of pride | 24:14 | |
and lust and hatred and greed, | 24:18 | |
and all other forms of sin is not a person who is redeemed | 24:20 | |
simply by saying to him, "God loves you, | 24:24 | |
sinner that you are," | 24:26 | |
a love of the sinner must go hand in hand | 24:29 | |
with a bitter burning hatred of sin. | 24:32 | |
And unless it does, | 24:38 | |
it loses its force and significance. | 24:39 | |
By the same token, the person who decides, | 24:43 | |
"Well, you can't really love the sinner | 24:46 | |
unless you hate the sin." | 24:49 | |
And so he majors on hating sin and goes around with a shovel | 24:50 | |
and a pickax and begins to chop out sin wherever | 24:54 | |
he can find it and develop some burning animosity | 24:57 | |
against sin. | 25:00 | |
Well, unless he is careful begin to minimize the love | 25:01 | |
of the sinner. And he will become so zealous in rooting out | 25:05 | |
sin, that he will also root out the sinner. | 25:09 | |
The educated mature person is one who must | 25:15 | |
constantly check himself to see if the insights | 25:20 | |
in this paradoxical need both to love the sinner | 25:25 | |
and to hate the sin are in proper balance in his own life. | 25:28 | |
Now, we've said a few other things | 25:35 | |
that an educated religion is, | 25:37 | |
I'm sure we ought to mention a few things | 25:41 | |
that an educated religion is not. | 25:43 | |
So that by way of contrast, | 25:47 | |
we will not confuse the one with the other. | 25:48 | |
Some people have the idea that an educated religion | 25:51 | |
is one that always communicates its content | 25:54 | |
in six syllable words. | 25:56 | |
This is not true, necessarily. | 26:00 | |
Religion has its six syllable words. | 26:02 | |
It has some eight and 10 syllable words, | 26:04 | |
which are perfectly good words. | 26:06 | |
And if you're going to major in theology, | 26:09 | |
and this is a perfectly legitimate thing for you to do, | 26:12 | |
you may become familiar with all of these terms | 26:15 | |
and the concepts behind them, | 26:18 | |
but having an educated religion does not necessarily mean | 26:22 | |
that you are thoroughly conversant with all of the large | 26:26 | |
technical terminology, which theology has, like law has, | 26:30 | |
like medicine has, like all of the disciplines have. | 26:35 | |
You can do this if you want to, | 26:40 | |
but it is not an absolute requirement | 26:42 | |
of an educated religion. If you want to, | 26:44 | |
you can get interested in Christology | 26:46 | |
and go back into the history of theology | 26:49 | |
and decide whether or not your concept of the nature | 26:51 | |
of Christ makes you a whole Mol Lucien, | 26:55 | |
or a whole Moi Lucien. | 26:57 | |
You can decide whether the Nicene Creed really represents | 26:59 | |
the adequate statement of your belief or whether really | 27:03 | |
you feel we should move beyond Nicean formulation | 27:06 | |
to the Chalcedonian Creed. | 27:10 | |
And then after you got into the Chalcedonian Creed, | 27:13 | |
you can decide whether those theologians are right, | 27:15 | |
who say that it was nothing more than a political compromise | 27:19 | |
to keep the Ecumenical Church together, | 27:22 | |
or whether Albert Outler is right in saying that it was | 27:23 | |
the greatest theological formulation that has ever been made | 27:26 | |
by an Ecumenical group. | 27:30 | |
And then if you say, "Well, I don't wanna deal in the past | 27:33 | |
in these big terms and then theological significance. | 27:37 | |
I'll come down to the present time." | 27:40 | |
You can, you can tackle Tillich. | 27:42 | |
And when you've tackled Tillich, | 27:46 | |
then you can decide while you're studying him, | 27:47 | |
whether the Harvard theologians are right | 27:52 | |
in saying that Tillich is the finest thing | 27:55 | |
that ever happened to theology, | 27:56 | |
or whether Nelson Ray is right in saying | 27:58 | |
he's the most dangerous theologian alive. | 28:00 | |
And while you're deciding that, you can then decide | 28:04 | |
whether or not he represents a blending of neo orthodoxy | 28:07 | |
and Neo animism, or whether really, | 28:10 | |
what he has done is to take Protestant theology | 28:13 | |
and bring it up and link it with depth psychology. | 28:15 | |
Or whether those are right, | 28:20 | |
who suspect that Tillich is not original at all. | 28:22 | |
That he's simply putting into English thought forms | 28:25 | |
and language, | 28:27 | |
what the German metaphysicians Shelling had already written. | 28:28 | |
You see, you could learn all that | 28:33 | |
and there would still be 99 other concepts | 28:35 | |
in theological personalities, | 28:37 | |
just as important that you would not know anything about. | 28:39 | |
Now, you can do this, | 28:42 | |
but you do not have to do this to have an educated religion. | 28:43 | |
You can have a well-balanced mature brought up religion | 28:50 | |
without becoming a professional theologian. | 28:54 | |
There is another illusion which some people have about | 29:00 | |
an educated religion that I should dispel. | 29:03 | |
And that is, they say an educated religion | 29:06 | |
is one that has given up faith in favor of fact. | 29:08 | |
That whereas these ignorant, uneducated people | 29:13 | |
out in our local churches, | 29:15 | |
who've never been to college, live by faith, | 29:16 | |
the educated person is one who lives by a fact. | 29:19 | |
And while I'm at college, | 29:21 | |
I'm going to throw out my religious faith | 29:22 | |
and bring in religious fact. | 29:24 | |
Now that's absurd. | 29:27 | |
The more you educate your religion, | 29:30 | |
the greater your faith will become. | 29:31 | |
And instead of you throwing out your faith, | 29:34 | |
your faith will grow, to be sure you will add facts. | 29:36 | |
You should, and you should throw out some things | 29:40 | |
you thought were facts that are not. | 29:43 | |
Now, this is very important for the reason | 29:47 | |
that some people have the idea that religion deals in faith | 29:50 | |
and science deals in fact. If you had that illusion, | 29:58 | |
this is one which you can at this moment, | 30:04 | |
dispel from your mind, there is not a science, | 30:07 | |
there is not a discipline that is taught in this university | 30:11 | |
or in any other university that is not founded upon | 30:14 | |
unproven and unprovable faith. | 30:17 | |
The greatest scientists are men | 30:21 | |
who will tell you that you cannot move an inch in a | 30:23 | |
laboratory without proceeding on unprovable faith. | 30:25 | |
Religion is no different from anything else at this point. | 30:31 | |
So therefore do not have the idea that what you're going to | 30:35 | |
try to do as you educate your religion, | 30:37 | |
is get rid of your faith and started walking on solid fact. | 30:39 | |
It isn't so, it isn't done anywhere in town, | 30:43 | |
be done anywhere in this world. | 30:45 | |
And then there is another misconception, | 30:49 | |
which we should not take into the process of educating | 30:50 | |
our religion. | 30:53 | |
And that is, if when a religion becomes a properly educated, | 30:54 | |
it loses its zeal and enthusiasm, | 30:58 | |
it becomes polled and dead and formal. | 31:00 | |
I say to you that during the three years, | 31:05 | |
I have been chaplain to this university, | 31:08 | |
I have come to know some highly educated professors | 31:12 | |
who are as zealous and as enthusiastic | 31:16 | |
and as devoted in their Christian faith | 31:21 | |
as any ignorant church man I ever met anywhere else. | 31:24 | |
And who would as quickly die for his faith. | 31:29 | |
Do not feel that you want to keep your religion | 31:34 | |
in an airtight compartment and not infuse it | 31:38 | |
with the insights of education, | 31:41 | |
because you're afraid you'll lose your religious zeal | 31:44 | |
and devotion. It is not true. | 31:47 | |
This brings us in conclusion to see why the church | 31:56 | |
has stood through all these years, | 32:02 | |
when religious societies and leads and associations | 32:05 | |
have died. You can get interested in world peace | 32:12 | |
and have you a society for world peace. | 32:16 | |
You can get interested in temperance | 32:19 | |
and have you a temperance society. | 32:21 | |
You can get interested in Bible reading | 32:23 | |
and have you a Bible reading society. | 32:25 | |
But these societies and associations and leagues | 32:30 | |
and organizations have a tendency to die out | 32:34 | |
because they promote one cause | 32:36 | |
and very often promoted out of context. | 32:39 | |
But the church down through the centuries has been preaching | 32:45 | |
and witnessing to and working for the whole gospel. | 32:48 | |
It has been preaching the Bible, yes, | 32:55 | |
but it hasn't been worshiping the Bible, | 32:59 | |
It has been worshiping Christ. And it has been seeking | 33:02 | |
to save people from giving that measure of devotion | 33:06 | |
to the Bible, which they ought to give to Christ. | 33:10 | |
One Sunday, the church preaches hatred of sin. | 33:14 | |
And the next Sunday, it preaches the love of the sinner. | 33:16 | |
One Sunday, the church preaches the prophetic message | 33:20 | |
and the next Sunday, it preaches the need for unity | 33:23 | |
and harmony in the body of Christ. | 33:26 | |
It is a brought up gospel, | 33:29 | |
an educated gospel which the church has. | 33:32 | |
And it is my hope that by you're here at Duke, | 33:36 | |
you will get this whole gospel. | 33:40 | |
You will bear your own burdens, | 33:43 | |
but you will bear one another's burdens | 33:45 | |
and you will know the fine art of casting your burden | 33:48 | |
upon the Lord without taking it off of your own shoulder. | 33:51 | |
You will learn to appreciate the Bible | 33:55 | |
without worshiping it. | 33:57 | |
You will learn all of the things that you must do, | 34:00 | |
If you're to be a devoted Christian. | 34:07 | |
Not obsessed, any one idea or cause to the exclusion | 34:11 | |
of any other. | 34:17 | |
I really hope that what is possible may come to pass. | 34:19 | |
That you will educate your religion. | 34:24 | |
Most of the people who have educated their science | 34:28 | |
and have thrown out their religion, | 34:30 | |
threw out an uneducated religion, | 34:33 | |
they had a science that had grown up, | 34:36 | |
but a religion that was still in the 'now I lay me down | 34:39 | |
to sleep' category. | 34:42 | |
Educate your religion. | 34:45 | |
Instead of throwing it out, you will grow up with it. | 34:48 | |
Because the Christ who offered to comfort men with the cross | 34:52 | |
and arrest them with a yoke. | 34:57 | |
And who said, "If you'll lose your life for my sake, | 35:00 | |
you will save it. But if you try to save your life, | 35:02 | |
you'll lose it." | 35:04 | |
Has in these paradoxical teachings of his | 35:06 | |
challenged us to a magnificent way of life. | 35:09 | |
Life abundant here and life hereafter. | 35:15 | |
Oh God, our heavenly father, | 35:27 | |
give us grace to plant and to water | 35:29 | |
and to harvest and keep us mindful always, | 35:34 | |
that it is thee does give the increase, | 35:40 | |
through Christ our Lord. | 35:44 | |
May the Lord bless you, and keep you. | 35:49 | |
May the Lord make his face to shine upon you | 35:52 | |
and be gracious unto you. | 35:54 | |
May the Lord lift up the light of his countenance upon you | 35:56 | |
and give you peace. | 35:59 |
Item Info
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