Andrew J. O'Brien - "Our Union with the Lord in the Community of the Church" (May 16, 1976)

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	(soft piano music)	0:05
	(congregation singing)	5:32
-	And let us confess our sins publicly and in unison.	8:27
	All mighty God, we tell you the truth.	8:33
	We have a hard time believing in rebirth.	8:38
	We act childish rather than childlike,	8:42
	and we are anxious and won't let go.	8:46
	We are afraid yet more afraid still to anyone know.	8:50
	We are busy at our own small concerns.	8:57
	We think we can manage somehow.	9:01
	And that's not all,	9:06
	if we have a hard time believing in our own redemption.	9:08
	You can imagine how little faith we have	9:13
	and the possibility of the world's redemption.	9:17
	If we have such a hard time trusting ourselves,	9:21
	you can imagine how difficult it is for us	9:26
	to trust the community of all believers.	9:30
	So it seems to us that we need you to break us open,	9:34
	crack our shells, tend our tender shoots,	9:40
	forgive us and take us back,	9:45
	birth us again into the kingdom of heaven.	9:49
	Amen.	9:53
	Now let us pause for a moment	9:56
	and confess our sins privately in silence.	9:58
	Be of good cheer.	10:32
	God is a loving God.	10:35
	He is a forgiving God	10:39
	and he is a just God.	10:42
	His concern is our welfare	10:47
	and our well being.	10:50
	For as the hymnists put it,	10:54
	his eye is on the sparrow,	10:57
	and I know he watches me.	11:01
	(soft piano music)	11:11
	(congregation singing)	11:41
	Let us prepare to hear the reading of the scripture	14:10
	taken from 1 John 3:18-24.	14:14
	Little children, let us not love in word or speech,	14:23
	but in deed and truth.	14:28
	By this we shall know that we are of the truth	14:31
	and reassure our hearts before him	14:35
	whenever our hearts condemn us	14:38
	for God is greater than our hearts	14:41
	and he knows everything below.	14:43
	If our hearts do not condemn us,	14:49
	we have confidence before God	14:52
	and we receive from him whatever we ask,	14:55
	because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him.	14:59
	And this is his commandment	15:04
	that we should believe in the name of his son, Jesus Christ,	15:08
	and love one another, just as he has commanded us.	15:12
	All who keep his commandments abide in him and he in them.	15:19
	And by this, we know that he abides in us	15:27
	by the spirit which he has given us.	15:31
	And now let us stand and hear the proclamation	15:35
	of our savior, Jesus Christ,	15:38
	as it is found in the gospel of John 15:1-8.	15:40
	I am the true vine and my father is the vine dresser.	15:50
	Every branch of mine that bears no fruit, he takes away.	15:56
	And every branch that does bear fruit,	16:00
	he prunes that it may bear more fruit.	16:03
	You are already made clean by the word,	16:06
	which I have spoken to you.	16:09
	Abide in me and I in you	16:11
	as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself,	16:14
	unless it abides in the vine.	16:17
	Neither can you, unless you abide in me.	16:20
	I am the vine,	16:25
	you are the branches.	16:27
	He who abides in me and I in him,	16:30
	he it is that bears much fruit.	16:34
	For apart from me, you can do nothing.	16:37
	If a man does not abide in me,	16:41
	he is cast forth as a branch and with us	16:44
	and the branches are gathered,	16:48
	thrown into the fire and burned.	16:49
	If you abide in me and my words abide in you,	16:53
	ask whatever you will and it shall be done for you.	16:58
	By this, my father is glorified that you may bear much fruit	17:04
	and so prove to be my disciples.	17:10
	God bless the reading of his holy word.	17:14
	(soft piano music)	17:18
	(congregation singing)	17:28
	Let us confirm our faith.	18:02
	We are not alone, we live in God's world.	18:05
	We believe in God who has created and is creating,	18:11
	who has come in the truly human Jesus to reconcile	18:16
	and make new	18:21
	who works in us and others by the spirit, we trust him.	18:23
	Who calls us to be the church to celebrate life	18:29
	in its fullness, to love and serve others,	18:34
	to seek justice and resist evil,	18:38
	to proclaim Jesus crucified and risen,	18:42
	our judge and our hope in life, in death	18:46
	in life beyond death, God is with us.	18:52
	We are not alone.	18:56
	Thanks be to God.	18:58
	The Lord be with you.	19:01
	Let us pray.	19:04
	Oh, gracious God, father of our Lord Jesus Christ,	19:14
	father of mankind, and of old creation,	19:23
	having cleanse our hearts and our souls,	19:28
	we amid your presence at the throne of grace	19:30
	by confessing our sins.	19:33
	We now offer our thanks for your goodness and mercy.	19:35
	We thank you for our creation and our preservation.	19:41
	We thank you for your inestimable love	19:46
	and the redemption of the world about our Lord Jesus Christ,	19:49
	for the means of grace,	19:55
	for the hope of glory, and for the blessings of this life.	19:58
	We thank you for the despondent heart made joy.	20:04
	The sadden face made to smile.	20:09
	Tearful eyes made lethal, and wearied minds set at ease.	20:14
	We thank you for the strength, tenderness,	20:22
	and love of mothers and fathers,	20:25
	and for caring and concerned that sons and daughters	20:28
	who do not neglect parents growing lonely with age.	20:33
	Thank you for restoring good health to the infirm.	20:39
	Thank you for guiding those of us	20:44
	who even as a stream chartering,	20:46
	a meandering course to the seed have found their way to you.	20:49
	And thank you oh, gracious God	20:56
	for the work of the church and striving to aid the destitute	20:59
	and the oppressed.	21:03
	Now oh, heavenly father, may we stay ever mindful	21:07
	that it is you who made us and sustains us	21:12
	and that you are the rock upon which we build	21:17
	for the future.	21:20
	We ask that you will continue to endow us with your love	21:22
	and capacity to forgive,	21:26
	and that you will continue to bless the homeless,	21:29
	those who suffer in warring nations,	21:33
	those who suffer at the hands of others,	21:37
	those who are lonely, ill, or lost.	21:40
	And we ask that your spirit will forever remain vibrant	21:45
	among your community of believers, which is the church.	21:49
	With this we pray in the name of our Lord and savior,	21:55
	Jesus Christ who taught us to pray.	21:58
	Our father who art in heaven,	22:03
	hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come.	22:06
	Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.	22:11
	Give us this day our daily bread	22:16
	and forgive us our trespasses	22:19
	as we forgive those who trespass against us.	22:22
	Lead us not into temptation,	22:27
	but deliver us from evil for thine is the kingdom,	22:30
	the power and the glory, forever and ever.	22:35
	Amen.	22:40
-	Jesus said to his disciples,	23:01
	"I am the vine, you are the branches.	23:04
	"He who believes in me,	23:08
	"he who lives in me and I in him	23:12
	"will produce abundantly,	23:14
	"for a part from me, you can do nothing.	23:17
	"A man who does not live in me	23:21
	"is like a weathered, rejected branch,	23:24
	"picked up to be thrown into the fire and burned.	23:27
	"Little children, let us love in deed and in truth	23:35
	"and not merely talk about it."	23:41
	Whereas Paul speaks often of the body of Christ.	23:48
	He the head and we the members	23:53
	who have been buried and then raised with the Lord.	23:57
	John's classic expression of our incorporation into Christ	24:01
	is today's figure of the vine and its branches.	24:06
	The Joanine school,	24:11
	which produced this gospel and epistle,	24:13
	stresses belief in God's son, Jesus Christ.	24:16
	To have this faith is to be of the truth.	24:22
	We must first dwell in the vine,	24:26
	that is the risen Christ,	24:30
	partaking of the life that flows from Jesus through the word	24:33
	and the sacraments.	24:38
	Thus living in the name of the son,	24:41
	living the life of prayer	24:46
	and having the assurance of a forgiving conscious,	24:49
	and the indwelling of the spirit.	24:53
	We must proceed to show forth our Christian standing	24:56
	by loving, not in word or speech,	25:01
	but indeed in truth,	25:04
	in loving one another,	25:08
	keeping God's commandment and bearing much fruit.	25:10
	In practice, these scripture readings	25:18
	call us to examine today's American stress on individualism.	25:21
	We are called not to dependence,	25:26
	but to extend our independence to interdependence.	25:30
	Interdependence must be in our personal lives	25:37
	as well as our collective lives as a nation.	25:42
	May this text be fulfilled today even as you listen.	25:46
	This morning on the way to church,	25:54
	as you came up to chapel drive,	25:56
	the beauty, the grace,	25:59
	the splendor of healthy trees was all around.	26:01
	While you were admiring their green richness,	26:06
	did your eye catch a broken shriveled branch?	26:10
	The contrast can be startling.	26:15
	The dead withered leaves surrounded	26:18
	by so much living freshness.	26:21
	Sometimes lightening severs branches,	26:24
	or even a whole section of a tree from the main trunk.	26:27
	This sheared section then hangs lifeless and rigid,	26:32
	while the rest of the tree still dances gaily in the breeze.	26:37
	Christ uses this same familiar image	26:43
	in today's gospel reading.	26:47
	He is illustrating for us how our life is joined with his	26:50
	and his life is joined to God and to other men and women.	26:56
	We understand well how life given nutrients	27:02
	flow from the trunk of a tree out into the branches.	27:05
	It is these gifts from the trunk	27:10
	that keep the branches green and productive.	27:12
	Extended, these images also describe	27:16
	our relationship with Christ and our brothers and sisters.	27:20
	Jesus is the source and the center of our life	27:26
	and its significance.	27:31
	He is our loving support.	27:33
	Spiritually, we draw sustenance from him.	27:36
	We are united to each other through him.	27:41
	We too know that skillful pruning	27:46
	makes a tree more fruitful.	27:50
	Apply to our life in Christ then,	27:53
	difficult things can happen to us like suffering	27:56
	and other tragedies.	28:01
	These force us to turn to Christ.	28:03
	In prayer and trust,	28:06
	we must turn to him and away from self-concerns	28:09
	and exaggerated self-assurance.	28:12
	Such a pruning time makes us concentrate	28:16
	all the more on what is most valuable in our lives.	28:20
	Our loving relationships, our interdependence.	28:26
	A branch that is laden with bright green leaves,	28:35
	dark thick sap and ripening fruit,	28:39
	receives all this bounty	28:43
	because it is joined to the trunk and the roots.	28:44
	If separated from them, it quickly dies.	28:48
	This life we cherish is both our own and not our own	28:53
	as it is true of a branch.	28:58
	We are truly of God's family,	29:01
	and so we have his life.	29:04
	But like a branch,	29:07
	we do not carry this life of and in ourselves.	29:09
	It comes to us in and through Christ.	29:13
	John in the epistle reading though	29:20
	is saying something further.	29:23
	The fruit,	29:27
	the decisive test of authenticity to union	29:28
	with Jesus of Nazareth is actual love.	29:31
	Love in deed and truth.	29:36
	The life question that God abides in us	29:40
	and we and God finally comes down to one thing, love.	29:43
	We have a number of popular remarks to catch the idea	29:52
	that it is not enough just to talk about something.	29:56
	We must really do it.	30:00
	We say, for example,	30:02
	talk is cheap or actions speak louder than words.	30:05
	More recently, we have coined a phrase,	30:12
	especially intended to challenge	30:16
	a talkative person into action.	30:18
	Put your money where your mouth is.	30:22
	All these phrases and many others	30:26
	indicate that something is significant only when it is done.	30:28
	Things that are simply planned or talked	30:34
	just do not count until	30:38
	and unless this talk is put into action.	30:41
	Excessive talk like this sermon	30:46
	can both absorb precious time	30:49
	and create obstacles to our carrying out good intentions.	30:52
	Psychologists call this type of escapist behavior,	30:56
	characteristic of an oral character.	31:01
	In modern language, St. John is saying,	31:06
	put your good works where your mouth is.	31:09
	It's not enough merely to discuss our religious commitments,	31:14
	we must demonstrate them.	31:19
	John here sums up as Christ did earlier,	31:22
	the central idea that a truly Christian dedication	31:27
	will be shown by our actions.	31:31
	Our actions are the final test.	31:35
	Deeds of love rather than words.	31:39
	This is the branch's fruit.	31:43
	What impresses one in this passage	31:48
	is the way in which the Joel nine author	31:50
	succeeds in holding together things	31:53
	which are often separated one from another in our thinking.	31:56
	Faith and works,	32:02
	belief and obedience.	32:05
	The prayer of union with God and love for the brethren.	32:10
	It's not a matter of either or, but both and.	32:17
	A problem may arise for those in the American culture	32:27
	take this figure of vine and branches seriously,	32:31
	although the gospels are otherwise full of examples	32:35
	of God's tender care for individuals.	32:39
	The parables, for example, of the prodigal son,	32:43
	of the lost coin and the sheep.	32:47
	The incorporation theme of this branch and vine allegory	32:51
	comes dangerously close to denying	32:55
	the importance of our individual selves or so it may seem.	32:58
	Does not Jesus say, apart from me, you can do nothing.	33:05
	Coming back from India,	33:12
	I'm immediately struck by certain emphasis	33:15
	in our American lifestyle.	33:18
	Everyone wants to be themselves.	33:21
	The clause, I'm trying to find myself	33:24
	has become the goal of all ages, not merely youth,	33:29
	privacy, personalism, owning my own thing.	33:34
	Marriages where one partner needs out to find himself	33:40
	or herself alone.	33:44
	Independence.	33:46
	All these describe individualism.	33:50
	This is what most Americans call	33:53
	the struggle for self-realization.	33:55
	The punishment of it is loneliness,	34:01
	isolation, emptiness, boredom.	34:04
	In India, self-realization	34:08
	was through annihilation of the ego.	34:10
	The idea of perfection was shedding my ego.	34:13
	It's passions, it's appetites, it's ambitions,	34:18
	it's idiosyncrasies.	34:21
	The elimination of individuality.	34:23
	Returning to the states, I see the contrary.	34:28
	Self-realization is through creating differences.	34:32
	The unfolding of individuality.	34:36
	Obviously these two attitudes of self-realization	34:40
	are poles apart.	34:43
	Neither is what Christ as Jesus is talking	34:46
	not about a loss of self, but about complete independence	34:51
	when he says, without me, you can do nothing.	34:58
	Examine your lifestyle.	35:05
	What do you see?	35:07
	Rugged individualism where persons, God,	35:10
	or our brothers and sisters enter your life	35:14
	only at your invitation and terms or interdependence.	35:17
	As a nation, this bicentennial anniversary	35:27
	reinforces this radical individualism	35:30
	under the name of independence.	35:34
	Today, like the representatives of the American colonies	35:38
	who met in 1776 to frame a declaration of independence	35:41
	based on self-evident truths of their time.	35:47
	We find the United States and the whole world again,	35:51
	facing self-evident truths.	35:54
	The cultures, the fortunes,	35:59
	the very lives of all people today are threatened	36:02
	by worldwide imbalances,	36:06
	food, natural resources,	36:09
	population density, monetary systems,	36:12
	and the transnational threats of military armament	36:17
	out of control.	36:20
	Pollution of the air and the seas	36:22
	call us to shift from an emphasis of independence	36:25
	to interdependence.	36:30
	Listening to the allegory of the vine and the branches,	36:35
	how do we assess our capacity as a nation	36:39
	to cope with interdependence?	36:42
	Until recently, it was quite different for Americans.	36:46
	We somehow didn't need to worry about interdependence	36:51
	because it was mostly a one-way street.	36:56
	Others needed our food, our computers, our technological,	36:59
	and organizational skills, our aid, our weapons,	37:05
	our protection, our advanced education,	37:11
	and as we thought, our movies and television programs.	37:16
	We seem to need from others	37:22
	only a few of their key raw materials,	37:24
	their specialty imports,	37:27
	their reasonably peaceful behavior	37:30
	and hardest to come by, their love.	37:34
	The oil embargo brought us up short	37:39
	as we focused on the fact that the imported part of the oil	37:43
	we had used had risen from 15% in 1960	37:47
	to nearly 40% in 1974.	37:53
	A sudden world food shortage made it clear	37:57
	that the North American Granary	38:01
	is more and more the central reserve for a global market.	38:03
	Several post-war recessions have shown	38:09
	that even the so-called independent American prosperity	38:12
	is not immune to damage.	38:16
	An American Christian will naturally resist	38:22
	such radical individualism in their personal lives	38:24
	as being at odds with any idea of the church.	38:28
	We know that interdependence	38:33
	or incorporation into the vine	38:35
	is not the destruction of personal freedom,	38:37
	but it's very perfection.	38:41
	As a nation, we likewise have to grow interdependent.	38:44
	Interdependence among nations	38:52
	like the personal is not something to be for or against,	38:55
	but a fact to be lived with now	39:00
	and reckoned with in the future.	39:04
	Even though we can see very great obstacles,	39:08
	structural and psychological	39:11
	to the spreading of global interdependence,	39:14
	our unity in Christ offers a way.	39:18
	All men are brothers.	39:22
	We are sisters under the skin,	39:24
	fellow branches of the true vine.	39:27
	Also following the scriptural command.	39:31
	The true substance of our declaration of interdependence	39:35
	is to be found, not in words, but in actions.	39:39
	The vine and the branches, Christ and others.	39:46
	They and love are the works of God and humanity equally.	39:53
	Our prayer is one of God's in dwelling in us.	40:04
	The Lord be with you.	40:11
	Lord, keep us growing,	40:21
	growing in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord	40:25
	and savior, Jesus Christ, the vine,	40:29
	and we, the branches.	40:32
	Growing in unity with each other, the branches.	40:35
	May our interdependence show love and bring peace.	40:40
	We do this always in the name of Jesus.	40:47
	In the name of the father, and of the son,	40:52
	of the holy spirit.	40:55
	Amen.	40:56
	(soft piano music)	41:06
	(congregation singing)	41:29
	(slow-paced piano music)	43:25
	(congregation singing)	44:27
	(soft piano music)	46:53
	(congregation singing)	49:03
-	Dear Lord, we offer these gifts	50:03
	as tokens of our thanks and appreciation.	50:07
	Use them, bless them, consecrate them Holy Trinity.	50:11
	Amen.	50:21
	(soft piano music)	50:34
	(congregation singing)	51:13
-	And now may the grace of God	55:19
	and the sweet communion of the holy spirit.	55:22
	Rest, rule, and abide with you hence forth	55:26
	now and forevermore.	55:29
	(congregation singing)	55:42
	(bell chiming)	56:39
	(soft piano music)	56:56

Item Info

Title:

Andrew J. O'Brien - "Our Union with the Lord in the Community of the Church" (May 16, 1976)

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4m90645f

Date:

May 16, 1976

Speaker:

O'Brien, Andrew J.

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Duke University. Chapel

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UA.17.01.0003 RR-0836
ref6872_ppq
uachapelsermaud
duke:628377
dcrau002795
ark:/87924/r4m90645f
8d09c3ba-ba89-4fed-874c-762b907aa381

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Duke University Chapel recordings, 1954-2005

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Andrew J. O'Brien - "Our Union with the Lord in the Community of the Church" (May 16, 1976)

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1. Andrew J. O'Brien - "Our Union with the Lord in the Community: Interdependence" (May 16, 1976)

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Andrew J. O'Brien - "Our Union with the Lord in the Community of the Church" (May 16, 1976)

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