Orval S. Wintermute - "What's in a Name?" (May 28, 1972)

Download
- Rights
- Limited Re-Use
  Unknown Rights-Holder
  More Rights Info
- Files (1)
- MP3
- Please be patient with media downloads. They are often large files.
Share

Embed Code
<iframe src='https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4nz84r5k?embed=true' height='125px' width='100%' frameborder='0' marginwidth='0' marginheight='0' scrolling='no' loading='lazy' allowfullscreen></iframe>
Permalink

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4nz84r5k
Skip to Item Info

Loading the media player...

Files for this Item

Transcript

Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.

-	Beloved, as we come before almighty God,	0:11
	we come before one who knows us	0:15
	better than we know ourselves	0:18
	and honesty therefore is required	0:22
	and whatever may be our pretenses and our defenses	0:27
	with our fellow men.	0:31
	We should acknowledge our real condition to almighty God	0:34
	and in the presence of each other.	0:38
	Therefore, let us offer a prayer of confession.	0:41
	Oh God, the father of mercy,	0:47
	who despises not a broken heart	0:50
	nor the confession of a penitent,	0:54
	hear our prayers about our sins.	0:57
	To be honest, we must acknowledge that in our lives,	1:02
	we have been willing to crucify Christ	1:06
	and liberate criminals.	1:09
	We have sought to build monuments	1:13
	to the prophets who are safely dead	1:15
	while making plans to crucify	1:18
	those who now call us to righteousness.	1:20
	We have tried to avoid facing our own shortcomings	1:25
	by pointing to the mistakes of others.	1:30
	We have been self-centered and have tended to judge others	1:34
	by the degree of their likeness to us,	1:38
	rather than by the degree of their likeness to Jesus Christ.	1:42
	Oh God, even when we have tried to do right,	1:48
	we have not tried hard enough.	1:51
	And we have tried to do it without recognizing	1:54
	our need of divine grace.	1:56
	Our attempts to satisfy our own consciences	2:00
	have been too superficial.	2:04
	We have not come to grips with our radical need	2:06
	to be made right in the center of our being	2:09
	by your cleansing power and your renewing grace.	2:13
	As we think of this now, forgive us these sins, oh God,	2:18
	and spare us from judgment for your great mercy sake.	2:23
	We pray you to extinguish in us	2:30
	what cannot exist before your face,	2:32
	break in us what is trying to revolt against you	2:37
	so that our hearts shall belong to you, the living God,	2:41
	in Jesus' name we ask this, amen.	2:47
	Jesus told a story	2:55
	which I suppose could be made into a novel	2:58
	about a young man who voluntarily left his father's house	3:03
	and his father's principles,	3:09
	went into another country	3:12
	and into a different style of life.	3:14
	Finally, he discovered that his new kind of life	3:18
	was not working out as well as he had thought it would.	3:23
	And when he came to himself,	3:29
	he was in a pig pen feeding the pigs	3:30
	and he decided among other things,	3:36
	he would rather be a slave in his father's house	3:39
	than to be a king in a hog pen.	3:41
	So he went home to claim the position of servant,	3:45
	but his father seeing him coming,	3:50
	not only forgave him his wasting of the family substance	3:54
	and his turning his back upon higher principles,	4:01
	but he rewarded him for coming	4:06
	by giving him back his status as son,	4:08
	honored him with a ring on his finger,	4:12
	shoes on his feet, robe on his back and a dinner.	4:14
	Now, the explanation of this was,	4:20
	this my son which was dead, is alive.	4:24
	He was lost and he is found and there was great rejoicing.	4:30
	He told the story, not simply to amuse his hearers,	4:38
	but to give assurance to you and me and others like us,	4:43
	that when we turn to God in penitence,	4:48
	he does indeed forgive and restore.	4:51
	And may it be so with us today.	4:56
	Now when this happens there not only is merrymaking	5:00
	and rejoicing in heaven, but in our own hearts,	5:03
	there is the great prompting to express our thanks to God.	5:07
	May we do this by using as our prayer of Thanksgiving,	5:13
	a portion from the book of Jonah.	5:17
	Let us join heart and voice together	5:21
	in this prayer of Thanksgiving.	5:23
	We called to you Lord out of our distress	5:27
	and you answered us.	5:31
	You heard our voices.	5:33
	We said we are cast out from your presence.	5:35
	How shall we again look upon your holy temple?	5:38
	The waters closed in over us,	5:42
	the deep was round about us.	5:44
	yet, you brought up our life from the pit,	5:47
	oh Lord, our God.	5:50
	When our souls fainted within us,	5:52
	we remembered the Lord and our prayers came to you	5:55
	into your holy temple.	5:59
	With the voice of Thanksgiving, we will sacrifice to you.	6:01
	Deliverance belongs to the Lord.	6:06
	Amen.	6:09
	(church music)	6:11
	(high pitched music)	7:31
	(indistinct chanting)	7:33
	The scripture lesson is from John's gospel,	14:24
	Chapter Three, the first 15 verses.	14:27
	There was a member of the Jewish council named Nicodemus.	14:32
	He came to Jesus by night and said to him,	14:37
	rabbi, we know that you have come from God to teach us	14:41
	for no man can do these miracles if God is not with him.	14:45
	Jesus answered and said unto him, in truth I tell you,	14:51
	unless one is born a new, he cannot see the kingdom of God.	14:56
	Nicodemus said unto him.	15:02
	How can a man be born when he is old?	15:04
	Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb	15:08
	and be born?	15:11
	Jesus answered, I assure you	15:14
	unless a man is born from water and from spirit,	15:18
	he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.	15:21
	Flesh gives birth to flesh and spirit gives birth to spirit.	15:25
	Do not be astonished that I said unto you,	15:30
	you must be born again.	15:33
	The wind blows wherever it pleases	15:36
	and you hear the sound of it,	15:39
	but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it goes.	15:40
	It is the same with everyone that is born of the spirit.	15:45
	Nicodemus said to him, how is all this possible?	15:51
	Jesus answered and said, are you a teacher in Israel	15:55
	and do not know these things?	16:00
	Truly, I say unto you, we know what we're talking about	16:02
	and bear witness to that which we have seen,	16:08
	yet you refuse our testimony.	16:11
	If I have told you of things which happened on this earth	16:14
	and none of you believe me,	16:18
	how shall you believe me if I tell you of heavenly things?	16:21
	No man has ascended up to heaven	16:25
	and yet the son of man descended from heaven	16:29
	is the only one who has ever ascended into heaven.	16:33
	And just as Moses in the desert	16:37
	lifted the serpent on the pole,	16:40
	the son of man must be lifted up	16:43
	that everyone who trusts in him	16:45
	should not perish, but have eternal life.	16:49
	Amen.	16:54
	(church music)	16:56
	♪ Glory to the Father ♪	17:07
	♪ And to the Son ♪	17:10
	♪ And to the Holy Ghost ♪	17:12
	♪ As it was in the beginning, ♪	17:18
	♪ Is now and ever shall be ♪	17:23
	♪ World without end ♪	17:28
	♪ Amen, amen ♪	17:32
	The Lord be with you.	17:43
-	And with thy spirit.	17:45
-	Let us pray.	17:47
	Our heavenly father, we have expressed thanks	17:56
	for our blessings already received	17:59
	in the past and in the present.	18:03
	We come now to make new claims upon your love and grace	18:06
	asking fresh favors for others and ourselves.	18:10
	We request your blessing upon the efforts	18:16
	now being made by the president of our United States	18:20
	to make progress toward peace and goodwill	18:25
	with the Soviet Union.	18:28
	May this effort be successful,	18:32
	may mankind move rapidly toward brotherhood	18:35
	and justice and peace.	18:41
	We come also to request your blessing upon the efforts	18:45
	now being made to answer your son's prayer,	18:47
	that we might all be one in him.	18:50
	Give courage and love to those who seek to bring	18:54
	Catholic and Protestant together and to unite Protestants.	18:58
	To those who seek to United liberal and conservative.	19:03
	Grant to all of us,	19:08
	a gracious portion of the mind of Christ,	19:09
	so that by his living in us, we may find our unity in him.	19:13
	We pray, especially for our brothers in Ireland	19:19
	who are having difficulty rising above their animosities.	19:24
	May they realize that they have more in common	19:30
	than they have that divides them.	19:34
	We come today, oh God,	19:39
	to ask for a blessing of the word of God.	19:40
	Without being slaves to the letter of scripture,	19:46
	may we have a hunger and thirst after the living word,	19:50
	which is found in the holy Bible.	19:55
	Give us liberally the holy spirit to guide us	19:59
	into all truth as Christ promised.	20:02
	We come also, oh Lord,	20:09
	to ask for the things we've prayed for so many times	20:12
	that the habit seems almost trite,	20:16
	and yet we still do need food,	20:19
	clean air to breathe, healing for our hurts,	20:23
	comfort for our sorrows, strength for this present day.	20:29
	We come praying, oh God,	20:38
	that you would thwart any evil work,	20:40
	which we may have performed in the name of righteousness	20:43
	asking you to arrest us, if we are going down the wrong path	20:47
	while thinking it is the way to eternal life.	20:52
	Bring us to know your perfect way and your perfect will,	20:56
	overcome any error we may have taught	21:02
	in the name of truth or science.	21:05
	May we not only learn facts,	21:08
	but the truth which leads to meaning	21:11
	and the meaning, which leads to wisdom.	21:14
	We pray for Christ-like graces in the important	21:18
	little places of our lives.	21:22
	May we not automatically blame the waiter	21:25
	when our food is late.	21:28
	May we not automatically blame the bus driver,	21:31
	when we miss the bus.	21:34
	Keep us from the tendency to blame the professor,	21:37
	when we receive a low grade.	21:39
	Grant oh God, that we may not put wholesale judgmental	21:44
	labels on individuals by calling them politicians,	21:48
	the establishment, hippies or animals	21:53
	when we really don't know them personally at all.	21:58
	In this and in all things, oh God,	22:03
	whether they're great or small,	22:06
	give us the mind of Jesus Christ	22:09
	for we make our prayer in his name,	22:12
	remembering that better prayer	22:15
	which he taught all his disciples to pray saying,	22:17
	Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name,	22:21
	thy kingdom come, thy will be done	22:26
	on earth as it is in heaven.	22:29
	Give us this day our daily bread	22:32
	and forgive us our trespasses	22:35
	as we forgive those who trespass against us	22:37
	and lead us not into temptation,	22:41
	but deliver us from evil,	22:44
	for thine is the kingdom and the power	22:46
	and the glory forever.	22:49
	Amen.	22:51
-	What's in a name?	23:11
	Durham, a city in the Piedmont of North Carolina,	23:15
	a city that grew up around a railroad station,	23:23
	which was situated on the end of Mr. Durham's cow pasture.	23:29
	Duke, a university in Durham	23:40
	characterized perhaps in some ways by a chapel	23:47
	which attracts many tourists to this region.	23:52
	Duke, a university named after a great tobacco man.	23:58
	Trinity College.	24:08
	Yes.	24:11
	Where did we get that name?	24:14
	When I first visited Duke University some 15 years ago,	24:17
	I was mildly surprised to discover Trinity College.	24:24
	I had once been misinformed about the name of the college	24:30
	by a very disturbed professor of classics	24:35
	at another school far away.	24:40
	A man who had considerable interest	24:44
	in the meaning and significance of names.	24:47
	The professor was disturbed,	24:52
	although he may not have known why,	24:54
	but he was disturbed because the names Duke and Trinity	24:58
	reflected two aspects of his own personality.	25:03
	On the one hand, he was a great supporter of capitalism.	25:09
	By investing in General Motors stock at $15 per share	25:13
	during the depression and reinvesting in real estate,	25:17
	he had slowly built up what appeared to me	25:22
	to be an enormous fortune.	25:25
	He admired those who were giants in business world.	25:29
	And he certainly approved of the educational endowments	25:33
	as handsome as those of Mr. Duke.	25:38
	On the other hand,	25:42
	this professor had another side of his personality,	25:44
	which contrasted with his business life.	25:49
	He was a non-smoking, teetotally, Presbyterian elder	25:53
	well-schooled in Westminster catechism.	25:59
	Therefore he was perplexed when he heard that	26:03
	one of the great capitalists whom he admired	26:07
	had prevailed upon the trustees of a small Methodist college	26:11
	named for the Holy Trinity to convert their school	26:15
	into a university named for Duke, the tobacco merchant.	26:19
	Industrialists might be granted privileges,	26:26
	tax shelters or investment protection,	26:29
	but to attempt to usurp the name of the Trinity	26:34
	showed a great lack of respect for all Christian symbols	26:41
	in the mind of that professor.	26:44
	In those early days,	26:48
	I thought that all professors were generally right.	26:49
	So you can understand my surprise to discover	26:53
	that some of the professor's facts were an error,	26:57
	for when I arrived at this university,	27:01
	I discovered that Christian symbols were all around us.	27:03
	The chapel in the center of the campus,	27:07
	Trinity College still surviving	27:11
	and even a blue devil to remind us of sin.	27:14
	But in the presence of Trinity College,	27:20
	we must ask again what's in a name?	27:24
	Does it mean anything to be named for the Trinity	27:28
	if no one ever speaks of it?	27:32
	Well, today is Trinity Sunday and I would like to take	27:36
	the time to speak of the Trinity.	27:43
	It took over four centuries for the Christian Church	27:47
	to conclude that most comprehensive	27:50
	and precise doctrine in language that suited all men,	27:55
	language that claimed that God was of one substance	28:01
	existing eternally in three persons,	28:09
	father, son, and holy spirit.	28:13
	You will forgive me I hope,	28:17
	if this morning I pass over	28:20
	most of those 400 years in silence.	28:22
	Now those of you who have studied	28:27
	the history of church councils know their importance,	28:30
	you know as well the murky waters that prevail	28:34
	and swirl around the Christological debates	28:37
	within the early church and the many shades of meaning	28:41
	given to those critical Greek words ousia,	28:45
	which came to be translated by way of Latin as substance	28:50
	and hypostasis which came by the same way	28:56
	to be translated person.	28:59
	You know this, but if you are both kind and wise,	29:02
	you will forgive me for ignoring these issues as well.	29:07
	What I have to say this morning is really very simple.	29:12
	The earliest Christians realized that Jesus Christ	29:17
	had revolutionized their understanding of God.	29:22
	When they attempted to specify	29:27
	the content of that new understanding,	29:30
	they realized that they could not ignore	29:33
	what they had been taught earlier about the father,	29:36
	the son, or the spirit of God.	29:41
	To deny the validity of the church's experience	29:46
	of any one of these three was to worship too small a God.	29:49
	Now there is really no doctrine of the Trinity	29:55
	in the New Testament,	29:58
	but there are a number of passages which provide	30:00
	traditions on which the doctrine was constructed.	30:03
	Such a passage was read as our morning scripture	30:09
	from the gospel of John.	30:13
	It is the story of Nicodemus.	30:15
	The author of the fourth gospel has many talents.	30:19
	Two of his skills are important	30:24
	to our understanding of this text.	30:25
	The first of these,	30:29
	is his ability to describe biblical characters in a brief,	30:31
	yet warm and convincing manner.	30:36
	His characters are true to life, Nicodemus,	30:40
	the woman at the well, the beloved disciples	30:45
	are all real people from the gospel of John.	30:48
	The author's second skill is his ability	30:54
	to give both his characters and the setting,	30:56
	a universal, epic quality.	30:59
	They are moved as players in a cosmic drama.	31:05
	The author's twofold skill,	31:08
	encourages us to look at the text from two perspectives.	31:12
	Looking at the scripture from the first perspective,	31:19
	we can see that Nicodemus is a real man indeed.	31:23
	A man with whom we can identify is first of all a scholar,	31:29
	the national pastime of the Pharisees in the first century	31:35
	was study, study,	31:39
	study, Torah, day and night.	31:42
	He was a Pharisee and he was a ruler of the Jews.	31:48
	Now with that information,	31:53
	there is no way for us to believe	31:55
	that he was anything less than a distinguished scholar	31:58
	filled to his ears with learning,	32:03
	MA, PhD, LLD.	32:06
	We know also that Nicodemus as the ruler of the Jews	32:11
	was a member of the establishment.	32:16
	It was a serious and good establishment.	32:21
	An establishment which sought to preserve	32:24
	the sober practical wisdom of its ancient Jewish heritage	32:27
	while charting a middle course	32:33
	between a right wing repressive authoritarianism,	32:36
	symbolized by Roman legions	32:41
	and an explosive left-wing Jewish revolutionary movement	32:44
	directed by zealots and their hatchet men,	32:50
	the sicario or the assassins.	32:54
	Now, where did Jesus,	32:59
	this other character fit into this spectrum?	33:01
	Was he really the anti-establishment hero	33:05
	portrayed by modern revolutionaries in pop art,	33:10
	the face of a disheveled Jesus,	33:14
	(indistinct) us as a criminal from a wanted poster.	33:18
	The Bible suggests that many members	33:25
	of the ancient establishment thought he was.	33:28
	It hints that he was crucified	33:32
	on charges of being a revolutionary.	33:33
	Now, under these circumstances,	33:37
	dealing with real people, Nicodemus and Jesus,	33:41
	it is not hard to understand why this ruler of the Jews	33:45
	might very well have gone by night	33:50
	to seek out this unschooled faith healer,	33:54
	whose public image was confused with	33:58
	unsavory, revolutionary politics.	34:00
	In the opening scene, we hear Nicodemus	34:06
	that most distinguished scholar addressing Jesus as rabbi.	34:11
	Now that means my master.	34:20
	He granted him a degree.	34:24
	Teacher, scholar, professor, first-class.	34:26
	Now don't you wonder why a distinguished man	34:31
	like Nicodemus would call a man like Jesus rabbi.	34:36
	You're supposed to wonder.	34:45
	One of the talents of the author of the fourth gospel,	34:48
	is his restraint.	34:52
	He doesn't psychoanalyze,	34:54
	he doesn't explain everything.	34:55
	He's writing for an intelligent reader.	34:57
	Let each reader answer the question for himself.	35:01
	The writing has all the fascination of Mona Lisa's smile.	35:07
	Was Nicodemus the great scholar	35:14
	a sincerely devout and humble man,	35:16
	who was so awed by the power of God and Jesus' signs	35:19
	that he addressed him as rabbi, my master?	35:25
	Or was he just rudely arrogant,	35:30
	treating Jesus as a spectacle,	35:34
	an unusual political figure worth looking in on.	35:36
	A man whom he might address mockingly as a professor.	35:40
	Perhaps Nicodemus was neither.	35:48
	Like so many of us he may have lived between extremes.	35:51
	Was he perhaps a man sincerely interested in investigating	35:58
	the Galilean wonder worker, impressed by his mighty works,	36:04
	sensitive to the possibility that God	36:09
	might just work through such a man,	36:12
	but still a bit of the pompous professor	36:17
	who would flatter the Galilean	36:22
	by conferring upon him the honorary title of rabbi	36:24
	and then continuing in a flattering but pompous tone,	36:28
	we know that you are a teacher who come from God.	36:35
	There is no need for Jesus to introduce himself.	36:40
	We know who you are.	36:44
	Courtesy required only that Jesus answer in kind.	36:47
	He should recognize the rabbi, Nicodemus.	36:55
	He might have been expected to reply,	36:59
	Professor Nicodemus, you are the rabbi.	37:03
	My master, I am merely your humble servant,	37:07
	but Jesus didn't say that.	37:12
	Like some contemporary guru living in a strange world,	37:15
	Jesus refused to engage in small talk.	37:24
	Only weighty words flow from his lips.	37:28
	He looks up and talks past Nicodemus,	37:32
	answering a question that Nicodemus didn't even ask,	37:36
	truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born again,	37:41
	he cannot see the kingdom of God.	37:47
	Nicodemus appeared shaken by this breach of protocol.	37:52
	And he muttered some words, perhaps sarcastically	37:57
	about an old man climbing back into his mother's womb.	38:03
	And Jesus goes on to ignore him and talk about the spirit.	38:08
	When Nicodemus is totally confused,	38:16
	he finally says to Jesus, how can this be?	38:19
	Then for the first time Jesus speaks to him directly.	38:25
	You are a teacher in Israel,	38:31
	and yet you don't understand this.	38:35
	To the ears of a slightly pompous professor	38:40
	that reply ranks high among the nasty put downs,	38:44
	as in, is it any wonder	38:51
	that Jesus never made it on the university scene.	38:54
	Back in those days, there were few aides	39:00
	for the disciple rush enough to question	39:05
	the competence of a distinguished professor.	39:08
	For some reason, Jesus and Nicodemus failed to communicate.	39:13
	Jesus went on talking about the heavenly son of man and God,	39:22
	the father's relation to his son,	39:28
	but we hear no more of Nicodemus in this chapter.	39:31
	The author of the fourth gospel	39:37
	writes convincingly about biblical characters.	39:40
	You must go home and read this text	39:44
	with a little imagination,	39:47
	supplying possible Lord likely motives to the actors.	39:50
	You may fill out your own account of this event,	39:56
	for the author grants us this privilege	40:02
	with his realistic cast.	40:05
	Now, that brings us to the author's second skill.	40:09
	He has preserved real life characters, it is true,	40:14
	but he has placed them in a highly stylized religious drama.	40:19
	The author of this text	40:25
	is the representative of a Christian community,	40:27
	which looks back on the resurrection	40:31
	and exultation of Jesus.	40:33
	The community knows him as the son of God	40:37
	and the heavenly son of man.	40:40
	They also know the power of the spirit	40:43
	bearing witness in their midst.	40:46
	And they sought to explain to their Jewish neighbors	40:49
	the new expanded vision of God,	40:53
	which they had inherited in Christ.	40:55
	Once they knew God as a spirit	41:01
	working in the Christian community	41:04
	and believed Jesus to be the preexistent	41:07
	heavenly son of man,	41:10
	their world and their God was no longer the same.	41:12
	The deepest insights of their former Jewish world	41:18
	were by way of contrast	41:23
	held to be scarcely more than darkness.	41:26
	Thus, the author of this gospel intends us to recognize	41:30
	the story of Nicodemus as an epic drama,	41:36
	describing a confrontation between two worlds,	41:41
	a Jewish world before and without the Christ	41:46
	and the post-resurrection Christian community.	41:52
	One of the author's literary motifs, as you know well	41:56
	is the contrast between light and darkness.	42:03
	In the prologue to the gospel, he describes the true light,	42:08
	which shines in the darkness.	42:13
	And now telling the story of Nicodemus,	42:16
	he remembers that detail	42:20
	that this man came to Jesus by night.	42:23
	He wants us to understand	42:29
	that the most enlightened scholarship	42:31
	of a previous age was in darkness	42:34
	when compared to the light, which Jesus represents.	42:37
	The author allows Nicodemus to speak in the plural,	42:44
	rabbi we know that you are a teacher come from God.	42:49
	Nicodemus speaks for the whole Jewish community,	42:56
	but that knowledge, which he has as accurate as it may be,	43:01
	is not sufficient for the Christian community.	43:05
	They know that Jesus is more than a teacher.	43:09
	In the 11th verse, Jesus replies in the plural,	43:14
	providing a response for the whole Christian community.	43:20
	We speak of what we know	43:25
	and we bear witness to what we have seen.	43:28
	Behind this scripture is the early Christian community	43:34
	shouting its oldest conviction	43:38
	that now its vision of God is sure.	43:41
	Something happened in the life of Jesus,	43:44
	their own experience that opened up new possibilities	43:47
	for awareness of God,	43:52
	giving them a richer and fuller vision to live by.	43:54
	As wise as he was, Nicodemus had missed the point.	43:59
	All of the parts for a doctrine of the Trinity	44:05
	are present in this chapter of the fourth gospel.	44:10
	It is clear that the life of Jesus	44:14
	created a new understanding of God within the church.	44:17
	In this chapter, God is described as father.	44:22
	The heavenly son is mentioned	44:26
	and the work of the spirit is described,	44:27
	but there is no doctrine of the Trinity.	44:31
	Doctrine was not needed.	44:35
	Let every man understand the witness of these terms	44:37
	as the spirit leads him.	44:40
	Doctrine was never needed for its own sake.	44:45
	It grew on me in the wake of controversy	44:49
	when men denied the very terms the gospel used.	44:52
	It was not until Marcion and certain Gnostics	44:58
	in the second century sought to reject the Old Testament	45:00
	because it's anthropomorphic God	45:05
	seemed to them to have created an evil world.	45:08
	It was then the church was obliged to consider	45:12
	whether that creator God was indeed the father.	45:16
	When it appeared that others within the community	45:22
	were inclined to deny	45:25
	that Jesus was any more than just a man,	45:27
	the church responded with the doctrine of the incarnation.	45:32
	And when its studied prophets began to claim	45:38
	that their vision alone were directed by God's spirit,	45:41
	the church was forced to work out its own understanding	45:47
	of the way in which God's spirit worked within the world.	45:51
	Creation, incarnation and an openness	45:56
	to the prophetic spirit of God speaking in today's world,	46:02
	these are but three of the experiences	46:07
	of the Christian community,	46:10
	which the church sought to preserve	46:13
	in its doctrine of the Trinity.	46:15
	For despite all of the charges of heresy,	46:19
	all of the centuries of name calling,	46:22
	all of the political wrangling	46:25
	that went on in the early communities,	46:27
	I am persuaded that the result was an honest attempt	46:30
	to include rather than to exclude	46:36
	the broadest experience of Christians everywhere.	46:40
	Creation, incarnation and an openness	46:46
	to the prophetic spirit.	46:50
	These churchmen wish to include your experience also.	46:52
	There are some present here this morning	46:59
	who have lived in a chaotic and a broken world.	47:02
	Two world wars, a disastrous depression,	47:05
	the spectacle of a powerful nation	47:09
	dumping tons of explosive on a far off land.	47:13
	A maddening war that we cannot seem to stop.	47:17
	Auschwitz, Buchenwald an insane world	47:21
	in which Satan seems to have the upper hand.	47:24
	Nevertheless, despite all evidence to the contrary,	47:28
	some people here this morning	47:34
	are persuaded that this is a world	47:38
	which God has created.	47:42
	Beyond all the evil man can do, they are persuaded	47:45
	that cosmos, a created order	47:51
	is what God is seeking to establish in place of chaos.	47:56
	A faith as lively and powerful as that	48:03
	deserves to be preserved as one of the crucial experiences	48:06
	of the Christian community.	48:10
	In its doctrine of the Trinity, the church has said amen	48:13
	to that experience of yours my friend.	48:18
	There are some here who have not given up on man either	48:23
	despite persistent, reasonable and objective evidence	48:27
	of man's rottenness within,	48:32
	there are those dreamers	48:36
	who have discovered in the scriptures, a true humanity.	48:39
	From all the men who ever lived,	48:46
	they have found one man whose life was filled with truth	48:49
	as pure as the mind of God himself.	48:55
	That's what man would be, if man were truly more than man.	48:59
	A man unique,	49:07
	prepared to die for his friends, to die for evil men,	49:08
	to die for his enemies.	49:15
	To find this one man is to find more than man.	49:18
	It is to find God himself	49:24
	committed to the human cause in love.	49:25
	Now, there are some here this morning.	49:30
	I know some of you who are witnesses to this truth	49:34
	and the church in its doctrine says to you, amen.	49:42
	There are some here this morning	49:49
	who are even courageous enough to look	49:51
	for God's continuing witness in the world around them.	49:54
	They dare to believe that God's spirit	49:59
	is working in the lives of very ordinary, very fallible men.	50:02
	In Martin Luther King, (indistinct)	50:11
	in students working at Butner, (indistinct) Edgemont,	50:15
	even students working here on campus,	50:20
	wherever there are new and perplexing	50:24
	situations in difficult times,	50:27
	some people here believe that God will speak	50:31
	through sensitive people.	50:36
	There are some here this morning who believe,	50:38
	no, there are some here this morning	50:44
	who know that such a witness is possible.	50:46
	And through this possibility also	50:50
	the church has said, amen.	50:53
	Let us pray.	50:58
	Almighty God and father of mankind.	51:03
	we await the promise	51:10
	of a new creation amidst our chaos.	51:14
	Oh, son of God, we thank thee for a deathless love	51:21
	to sinful man.	51:30
	Oh, spirit of God fill us with power to prophesy	51:33
	through acts of kindness	51:40
	on behalf of all our brothers.	51:44
	Amen.	51:48
	(church music)	51:52
	(indistinct chanting)	52:25
	(soft music)	56:03
	(upbeat music)	58:55
	(indistinct chanting)	58:57
	♪ Alleluia ♪	1:01:18
	♪ Alleluia ♪	1:01:21
	♪ Alleluia ♪	1:01:26
	(indistinct chanting)	1:01:31
	♪ Alleluia ♪	1:01:40
	♪ Alleluia ♪	1:01:43
	♪ Alleluia ♪	1:01:46
	♪ Alleluia ♪	1:01:50
	♪ Amen ♪	1:01:56
-	Almighty God, we present this money	1:02:10
	and ourselves here at this altar,	1:02:12
	the symbol of your presence,	1:02:15
	praying that by this offering of money and ourselves,	1:02:18
	the great doctrines of our church	1:02:23
	may be translated from theology into a living experience	1:02:26
	for those around the world who do not know about it now	1:02:31
	and in the sake of the spirit of Christ.	1:02:37
	Amen.	1:02:40
	Now may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with us all.	1:02:46
	♪ Amen ♪	1:02:56
	♪ Amen ♪	1:03:03
	♪ Amen ♪	1:03:12
	♪ Amen ♪	1:03:30
	♪ Amen ♪	1:03:42
	♪ Amen ♪	1:03:58
	(bell rings)	1:04:17

Item Info

Title:

Orval S. Wintermute - "What's in a Name?" (May 28, 1972)

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4nz84r5k

Date:

May 28, 1972

Speaker:

Wintermute, Orval S.

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 RR-0619
ref6441_ikb
uachapelsermaud
duke:628400
dcrau002604
ark:/87924/r4nz84r5k
6da96f86-9bae-40bf-ab89-f06f46d94b33

Digital Collection:

Duke Chapel Recordings

Source Collection:

Duke University Chapel recordings, 1954-2005

Related Resources:

See below

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:

Limited Re-Use

Unknown Rights-Holder

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.

Sponsor:

Sponsor this Digital Collection

Orval S. Wintermute - "What's in a Name?" (May 28, 1972)

Transcript

Item Info

1. Orval S. Wintermute - "What's in a Name?" (May 28, 1972)

Duke University Archives

More Info & Options

Transcript

Item Info

Related Item

Duke University Archives

More Info & Options