Charles E. Raven - "Sequel to the Resurrection" (May 5, 1963)
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
(choir sings) | 0:03 | |
(organ music) | 2:58 | |
(choir sings) | 3:25 | |
- | Almighty God, we, the disciples of the risen Lord, | 4:10 |
make these offerings for thy service. | 4:14 | |
Praying that as the resurrection of Jesus Christ | 4:18 | |
brought new life and hope to all mankind. | 4:21 | |
So may these offerings remind the world | 4:25 | |
and impress the world that Christ is alive | 4:28 | |
for all of them in his name, amen. | 4:32 | |
(soft organ music) | 4:37 | |
In the name of the eternal God, Father, Son | 4:59 | |
and Holy Spirit, amen. | 5:03 | |
The Lord is risen. | 5:10 | |
The Lord is risen indeed. | 5:12 | |
So the church throughout the ages has acclaimed | 5:16 | |
the message of Easter and its splendor | 5:20 | |
in the victory of Jesus. | 5:25 | |
But in the joy of that victory, we have too often, | 5:29 | |
I think, forgotten the full significance | 5:34 | |
of Easter's message. | 5:39 | |
We have stopped with the idea | 5:41 | |
of the living presence of the Lord with us, | 5:45 | |
each one of us and in his church, | 5:48 | |
but we have too often neglected the sequels to it. | 5:52 | |
By which alone, I think the apostolic band was able | 5:59 | |
to undertake the colossal task of evangelizing the world. | 6:05 | |
It is with those sequels, | 6:11 | |
that I want to be concerned today and the weekends, | 6:14 | |
because they are of enormous relevance | 6:21 | |
to our present situation and opportunity. | 6:23 | |
In this amazing day of the Lord, | 6:27 | |
when for the first time, the vision of the ages | 6:30 | |
of a worldwide human family could be, | 6:35 | |
indeed must be brought to fruition. | 6:39 | |
We cannot afford to neglect | 6:43 | |
the two consequences which flow from Easter. | 6:46 | |
The first to them of course, | 6:52 | |
is the revelation to the disciples | 6:54 | |
that this Jesus, whom they had known | 6:58 | |
as companion, and teacher, master and prophet, Messiah, | 7:01 | |
and gift of God, was much more than that. | 7:10 | |
That he was not just one more | 7:17 | |
the last and greatest in a succession of messengers, | 7:20 | |
though he held that place. | 7:24 | |
But that he had for them, | 7:27 | |
and as they came for the world, | 7:29 | |
the eternal value of the divine. | 7:33 | |
That is of course the meaning | 7:36 | |
of what we commemorated ascension tied. | 7:39 | |
When the they saw the glory of God | 7:43 | |
transfiguring and fulfilling the presence of Jesus. | 7:51 | |
That is the first sequel. | 8:00 | |
And the second is of course | 8:02 | |
that which happened at Pentecost. | 8:05 | |
The consequent development, | 8:09 | |
the consequent emergence, as we might say, | 8:12 | |
in the group of the apostles of a new kind of community, | 8:16 | |
a community of which it could truly be said | 8:21 | |
that the multitude of them that believed | 8:24 | |
were of one heart and of one soul. | 8:27 | |
Now those two consequences represent the answer | 8:31 | |
which the church can give to the two supreme needs | 8:38 | |
of our day and generation. | 8:43 | |
No one could spend as my wife and I have spent | 8:46 | |
the last three months since Christmas | 8:49 | |
in the city of Brussels | 8:52 | |
without realizing the total bewilderment, | 8:54 | |
not to say the total bankruptcy of European statesmanship. | 8:58 | |
And anyone who takes the future of the world seriously | 9:04 | |
must find it almost impossible to predict | 9:10 | |
what will be the position of that world, | 9:14 | |
even of the western alliance in the next six months. | 9:18 | |
We have lost what, when I was last in this place, | 9:25 | |
five years ago, Walter Lippmann had taught us | 9:31 | |
to call a public philosophy. | 9:35 | |
We have not got a coherent outlook upon the world, | 9:39 | |
neither churches nor sexual societies, | 9:44 | |
neither art nor music, neither ethics nor sex, | 9:49 | |
neither philosophy nor religion, | 9:55 | |
has a coherent philosophy. | 9:58 | |
And we are at the mercy of bright ideas in religion, | 10:01 | |
plenty of them in the world, | 10:07 | |
it's almost universal bright ideas | 10:11 | |
but no consistent and generally acknowledged | 10:15 | |
compass bearings for our course. | 10:22 | |
Now that is what the early church claimed | 10:28 | |
to have discovered when they had reflected upon | 10:32 | |
the impact which Jesus made upon his contemporaries. | 10:37 | |
They had seen him give life and life abundant. | 10:43 | |
They had seen him exemplify the great law of sacrifice | 10:49 | |
life by life laid down. | 10:54 | |
And they were coming to experience the life | 10:58 | |
which is life indeed, | 11:01 | |
the knowledge of God and to this Christ. | 11:03 | |
Yes, they had received a new outlook. | 11:07 | |
You can trace the sequel, the two sequels | 11:16 | |
in the book of the Acts. | 11:22 | |
But I would rather trace it | 11:25 | |
in the life history of the apostle St. Paul. | 11:28 | |
Because of course of all the figures in the Bible, | 11:32 | |
St. Paul is the one whom we know best. | 11:36 | |
The one who is incomparably revealed to us | 11:41 | |
in the series of his letters. | 11:46 | |
We can see how a real man facing this situation | 11:49 | |
of the death and resurrection, | 11:58 | |
and continued influence of Jesus reacted to it. | 12:00 | |
That is why I would take as a text this morning, | 12:06 | |
the first verse of the lesson, which was read to us. | 12:12 | |
In the fifth chapter of the second letter | 12:17 | |
to the Corinthians. | 12:19 | |
Words written when St. Paul had passed, | 12:22 | |
far beyond his first conversion experience. | 12:27 | |
To the great achievement of his career | 12:31 | |
when he came to Corinth. | 12:34 | |
And so could write, | 12:36 | |
"If any man be in Christ, there is a new creation. | 12:39 | |
The old is gone. | 12:46 | |
Rather it has become new, | 12:50 | |
and all things old and new are God, | 12:55 | |
who has reconciled us unto himself in Christ Jesus, | 13:00 | |
and given unto us ministry of reconciliation. | 13:04 | |
A new creation." | 13:09 | |
That is what we in the church, | 13:13 | |
no longer appear to be able to recognize. | 13:17 | |
This complete novelty of outlook, | 13:21 | |
which the Christian faith rightly understood | 13:25 | |
and faithfully practiced, must involve. | 13:29 | |
St. Paul had seen himself, | 13:33 | |
how the event of the resurrection had challenged | 13:37 | |
his way of life, had broken his career, | 13:42 | |
had transformed his whole outlook, | 13:46 | |
so that no longer was Jesus to him via person to God | 13:50 | |
But he acclaimed and glorified of God. | 13:55 | |
He had experienced that transformation, | 14:01 | |
and had taken time in Arabia, in Antioch, in Tarsus. | 14:06 | |
And on his first journey in Galatia | 14:13 | |
to work out the significance of it. | 14:17 | |
But in spite of recognizing | 14:21 | |
the contrast between old and new | 14:24 | |
in his letter to the Galatians. | 14:28 | |
And receiving those flashes of insight, | 14:30 | |
which come through that amazing letter, | 14:34 | |
"I live, yet not I, Christ lives in me. | 14:38 | |
There is neither Jew nor Greek, | 14:42 | |
there is neither bond nor free, | 14:44 | |
there is it male or female." | 14:45 | |
He could say that and we can't. | 14:50 | |
We can't say neither American nor Chinaman. | 14:53 | |
We don't say it. He could. | 14:57 | |
So soon after his conversion, | 15:02 | |
and then love and joy, peace and courage, | 15:05 | |
mercy and virtue coupling the new Christian virtues | 15:14 | |
as we call them, love, and joy, and peace. | 15:19 | |
With the old pagan virtues, | 15:24 | |
fortitude, virtus as the Romans called it. | 15:29 | |
But in spite of his flashes of genius, | 15:36 | |
he was still a long way from realizing | 15:40 | |
the stupendous thing that he learned | 15:44 | |
through his failure in what was, I suppose | 15:47 | |
the most remarkable of all the invasions | 15:51 | |
of Europe from Asia. | 15:53 | |
Is there anything so effective among various movements | 15:56 | |
as the occasion when the Greek doctor | 16:04 | |
and the Jewish evangelist, | 16:06 | |
science and religion of the time hand in hand, | 16:09 | |
set out from Samothrace to come to Philippi | 16:12 | |
to invade the new western continent | 16:16 | |
where it started badly. | 16:20 | |
You remember he stood on his dignity in Philippi | 16:24 | |
And to stand on your dignity is to assume | 16:28 | |
one of the only positions | 16:30 | |
in which a man cannot conceivably see God. | 16:33 | |
Some of us might do well to remember that. | 16:37 | |
Fatal, they have cast us and condemned | 16:41 | |
into prison, being Romans. | 16:45 | |
Would they throw us out secretly? | 16:48 | |
Let them come themselves and fetch us out. | 16:51 | |
That's not a very high level of Christian achievement. | 16:54 | |
And it was followed by his proclamation | 16:59 | |
of a crude Jewish apocalyptic, | 17:03 | |
a person in Nicaea preaching one Jesus, | 17:07 | |
a king who should come from heaven | 17:11 | |
at a time when all the Roman world was wondering | 17:14 | |
what would happen when Claudius died? | 17:16 | |
Well he aroused riots, which he had to write | 17:20 | |
two good letters to restrain. | 17:25 | |
Went on to Athens and tried to turn himself into a dawn. | 17:28 | |
Preaching a sort of university sermon on the text, | 17:34 | |
we are also his offspring. | 17:38 | |
And receiving what academic audiences are apt to give, | 17:41 | |
nothing but mockery. | 17:47 | |
And so he went to Corinth humbled. | 17:50 | |
And learned the amazing lesson, | 17:54 | |
which he expressed in the familiar words. | 17:58 | |
It is the Jews who are a God for miracle and a God of power. | 18:03 | |
It is the Greeks who are beset with the idea of wisdom. | 18:10 | |
We preach of God in terms of a man on a cross, | 18:15 | |
in terms of the love that suffers to the utmost. | 18:20 | |
That is of course a scandal to the Jews, | 18:25 | |
and mockery to the Greeks. | 18:30 | |
But to those who come under its spell, | 18:33 | |
it is the power of God and the wisdom of God. | 18:39 | |
He saw, you see ,that if Jesus was like God, | 18:42 | |
then God must be like Jesus. | 18:47 | |
And he set himself to rethink the images, | 18:50 | |
of power and wisdom, | 18:56 | |
the universal provider and the Lord of the earth. | 18:59 | |
And even I think the king of the religious mysteries, | 19:05 | |
in terms of the oldest and simplest | 19:10 | |
of all human relationships, | 19:13 | |
the thing that really distinguishes man from the animals, | 19:15 | |
in terms of the family, our father. | 19:19 | |
And consequent, to revolutionize his whole way | 19:25 | |
of proceeding, he must no longer huckster the gospel. | 19:30 | |
He must no longer think in terms as a power and wisdom. | 19:37 | |
He must be content with the building | 19:44 | |
of what he could only call agape, | 19:51 | |
the unable word for which love is our nearest | 19:56 | |
but our remote translation. | 20:01 | |
And so he came, you see, to see | 20:08 | |
how if the old had passed, | 20:12 | |
nevertheless, it had given rise to the new. | 20:16 | |
Because in old and new alike was God. | 20:21 | |
God reconciling the world to himself. | 20:26 | |
A great philosopher, Teilhard, | 20:33 | |
Teilhard de Chardin, the French paleontologist | 20:36 | |
paleontologist and seer has literally revived | 20:40 | |
a word used by biologist in my younger days, | 20:45 | |
the word convergence to indicate exactly | 20:50 | |
what St. Paul means by reconciliation. | 20:55 | |
This coming together into a solid and organic community | 20:58 | |
of those who share the same loyalty. | 21:06 | |
Express that loyalty in the same activities. | 21:11 | |
And so find among themselves | 21:16 | |
the most intimate kind of partnership. | 21:20 | |
That we shall speaker on weekends. | 21:26 | |
Today I just want to finish by reminding you | 21:29 | |
of the novelty with which we should approach | 21:34 | |
the things of our faith. | 21:40 | |
Jesus had set us the example. | 21:43 | |
In his first utterance the time is fulfilled, | 21:47 | |
the kingdom of God is upon you. | 21:53 | |
Change your outlook and believe the good news. | 21:56 | |
The good news of God's kingdom. | 22:00 | |
We don't believe in one world, do we? | 22:04 | |
At least we blessedly accept two, | 22:08 | |
if not three or for our 50 worlds. | 22:11 | |
We don't believe in one world, | 22:16 | |
although we profess to believe | 22:17 | |
that the world is God's world. | 22:19 | |
We believe in two worlds and try fitfully | 22:22 | |
to find a place in both of them. | 22:28 | |
Trying to ride two horses | 22:32 | |
which in fact are proceeding fairly rapidly | 22:34 | |
in different directions. | 22:36 | |
No wonder we don't make much of a success | 22:39 | |
either of secular or of religious affairs. | 22:43 | |
And we are not making much of a success | 22:48 | |
of them at present, are we? | 22:50 | |
Jesus, you see set himself to disabuse men | 22:55 | |
of the idea that to the welfare state | 23:00 | |
command these stones that they be made bread | 23:05 | |
was the right basis for a community. | 23:10 | |
And he regarded the stockpiling of armaments | 23:13 | |
as merely diabolical. | 23:16 | |
No doubt about that, that was sacred. | 23:19 | |
And I think he also regarded the paraphernalia | 23:25 | |
of religion as not his way. | 23:29 | |
He would not exploit the Lord his God | 23:34 | |
by casting himself down, | 23:38 | |
and appearing as the Jews expected the Messiah to appear | 23:41 | |
in the courts of the temple. | 23:47 | |
On the contrary, He told men and women to open their eyes | 23:50 | |
and see God in his world. | 23:56 | |
And he began with flowers and birds | 24:01 | |
and little children at play. | 24:04 | |
And women sweeping houses and baking bread. | 24:07 | |
And men sewing fields and searching for pearls. | 24:11 | |
And said, do you see, do you see the many splendor thing? | 24:16 | |
Do you see the glory in the midst of you, | 24:22 | |
in the common ways of common folk, | 24:26 | |
there is the kingdom. | 24:30 | |
You needn't fly away to the beyond. | 24:33 | |
You needn't to descend into the heavens. | 24:37 | |
You needn't delve into the earth, | 24:39 | |
Heaven and hell are poor metaphors for Christian. | 24:42 | |
Here in the midst is God, | 24:50 | |
doing his eternal work. | 24:53 | |
Bringing good out of evil, | 24:57 | |
challenging the pride of man. | 25:00 | |
Because the first effect of his configuring vision | 25:04 | |
upon the disciples was to make them ask | 25:09 | |
which of them was the greatest? | 25:13 | |
What privilege do we have? | 25:16 | |
What can I get out of this? | 25:18 | |
They went up to Jerusalem arguing you remember, | 25:21 | |
about seats on the right hand, and seats on the left. | 25:25 | |
So they had to be broken into life | 25:31 | |
by way of betrayal. | 25:35 | |
Think of how often we say to others, | 25:40 | |
"Depart from us we are holier than thou." | 25:44 | |
How often we claim to be the only free people in the world. | 25:50 | |
God forgive us for our misunderstanding | 25:57 | |
of what freedom means. | 26:00 | |
Think of it, of the humbling that it means. | 26:05 | |
If we are to escape crucifying the son of God of flesh, | 26:13 | |
and putting him and ourselves to a perpetual shape. | 26:20 | |
Well, they had begun to learn that lesson | 26:27 | |
as please God, after two world wars | 26:31 | |
and this constant reign of fear and suspicion | 26:34 | |
we are beginning to discover that that is not the road. | 26:38 | |
It is God's world. | 26:46 | |
And the movements towards | 26:50 | |
a larger understanding of that fact, | 26:53 | |
are plain for all who have eyes to see. | 26:56 | |
To me, at least, the movements of sounds | 27:03 | |
in the last 10 years, indeed in the last 50 years | 27:07 | |
have been full of an indisputable encouragement. | 27:13 | |
And the movements within the churches, the ecumenical | 27:19 | |
are council of the churches, | 27:27 | |
and the Vatican council | 27:30 | |
and the noble and cyclical of Pope John. | 27:33 | |
These things beckon us in the direction, | 27:37 | |
which St. Paul had proclaimed. | 27:43 | |
Be ye ambassadors for God. | 27:48 | |
That is the task of this great people. | 27:54 | |
To be ambassadors for the prince of peace. | 27:59 | |
And in doing so, to disclose once more to the world, | 28:05 | |
the fullness and the splendor of Jesus. | 28:11 | |
To say again, to the world as the Victorian poet said. | 28:16 | |
I say the acknowledgement of God in Christ | 28:22 | |
accepted by thy reason, | 28:25 | |
solves that the all problems in the earth and outreach. | 28:27 | |
And has so far advance thee to be wise. | 28:32 | |
We have a great gospel. | 28:37 | |
We have a great sequel to the Easter message. | 28:40 | |
God the all in all, | 28:45 | |
in and through Jesus Christ, our Lord. | 28:48 | |
Let us pray. | 28:55 | |
O thou who art the light of the minds that know thee, | 29:02 | |
and the joy of the hearts that love thee, | 29:07 | |
and the strength of the will that serve thee, | 29:10 | |
grant us so to know thee that we made truly love thee. | 29:14 | |
So to love thee that we may faithfully serve thee, | 29:19 | |
whose service is our freedom and our fulfillment | 29:23 | |
through Jesus Christ, our Lord, amen. | 29:29 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 29:40 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 29:48 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 29:55 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 30:13 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 30:24 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 30:39 | |
(soft piano music) | 34:57 |