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God and Cosmos
From the sermon series on the Cosmos
Text: Hebrews 11:3
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
November 8, 1981
Transcription of the spoken sermon
By faith we understand that the world was created by the word of God…
Hebrews 11: 3
If you had come past my home last evening about 10 o'clock, you might have
thought that I was really desperate, for you would have seen me with my cap and
coat, out on the deck with my telescope, gazing at the moon and surveying the
stars. And you might have figured that, after a week's vacation, having played all
week, at the eleventh hour I was desperately looking for a message in the stars to
bring you. Such would not have been the case, of course, for the message was well
under way by then. But having reflected all week long on the fantastic cosmos of
which we are a part, having already savored the wonder of yesterday - the clear
air, the blue sky, the radiant sun; walking along the beach with its lapping water,
cold and clear as crystal; having seen the magnificent sun slip into the sea in the
West, and then the stars glimmering in the night heavens providing a fit setting
for the silvery brilliance of the moon, I thought to myself, why not get out of the
study and savor it even more? And so, I did. With my telescope, I gazed at the
moon and I located a star or two and thought to myself that it is true O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is thy name in all the earth!... When I
look at thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars
which thou hast established; what is man that thou art mindful of him,
and the son of man that thou dost care for him? Psalm 8: 1, 3, 4 (RSV)
The depth of eternity symbolized in the immensity of space in this vast cosmos of
which we are a part, is but a finger pointing beyond itself to Him Who, in the
beginning, created the heavens and the earth.
I am sure we all identify with the awe, the sense of majesty which is reflected in
this psalm of wonder and praise. I am sure we have all had the experience on a
starry night when the atmosphere was clear as it was last night and the sky
cloudless. We have looked up and we have wondered at it, and then we have
© Grand Valley State University
�God and Cosmos
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
found peace and comfort in the conviction that this is our Father's world. The
glories of the cosmos are a reflection of the glory of God. For, as the writer to the
Hebrews says in the words of our text taken from the 11th chapter,
By faith we understand that the world was created by the word of God.
By faith. It is certainly by faith. It is our conviction that He Who revealed Himself
supremely in the face of Jesus and Whom, through Jesus, we have found to be
gracious, is the Creator of the heavens and the earth. And, believing that, we have
found a home. We know this is our Father's world.
This is the first of a series of messages about God and Cosmos. God and Cosmos,
in that order, because I do believe that God is prior to Cosmos, and Cosmos is the
consequence of the deliberate intention of God to call into being that which was
not. All that is, is because God said, "Let there be." I deal with this right now
because I am currently viewing the television series, the 13-part Cosmos series,
which is written and narrated by Carl Sagan, who must be one of the world's
finest astronomers, and who is, besides being an excellent scientist, an
outstanding communicator. I hope that you have seen some of that series and, if
not, I hope that you will, for it is an amazing production. The photography is
thrilling, the technical aspects of it are superbly handled, and the communication
skills of Carl Sagan are something to behold. As I view that series, it causes me to
look beyond the cosmos to the creator of it all, to experience again what the
psalmist experienced, and to say within my heart, "O Lord, our Lord, how
excellent is Thy name in all the earth."
Carl Sagan would not agree with the psalmist or with you and me that the cosmos
is the consequence of the deliberate, creative act of God. Carl Sagan is an
excellent scientist and an excellent communicator and I acclaim the job that he
has done. I want to go on record as saying that I think it is tremendous that the
depths and the deep secrets of the physical universe are being more and more
unraveled in this wonderful way through this marvelous medium, by this great
communicator. For he is skilled, not only in his understanding of the universe,
but in his ability to make the profound simple. And when he is an astronomer, a
scientist, and when he is setting forth all of that data which is available through
the explosion of knowledge and through the use of instrumentation which is so
sophisticated that it boggles the mind, then I listen intently and I learn.
This past week I spent the week trying to master the book which is the narration
of the video series. It is entitled, Cosmos. It's a very big and beautiful book, and a
very expensive book. I recommend it. When Carl Sagan is a scientist and an
astronomer, I learn a great deal. When he ceases to be an astronomer and a
scientist and becomes a philosopher and a theologian, then he has moved into my
territory and I carry on a dialogue with him. As long as he is talking about
protons and neutrons and quasars and pulsars and galaxies and all of that, then I
am an innocent bystander listening in and learning and eagerly so. When he
becomes a philosopher and a theologian, then I say, "Carl, let's talk about that."
© Grand Valley State University
�God and Cosmos
Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
Now, a scientist has every right to be a theologian and a philosopher, and I
suppose most all of them really are, because all of us finally are. The difficulty
comes when the two are so closely intertwined that one hardly knows whether
this is the result of the data gathered through some radioscope, testing the outer
limits of space, or whether it is the configuration conjured in the mind and heart
of the scientist. When he becomes a philosopher and theologian, then I take
exception to him, because then he would not agree with our Judeo-Christian
tradition, our conviction that all that is, is as a consequence of the Word of God.
He would commit Genesis and the Letter to the Hebrews and the great Psalms to
that great body of myth and fable which is a part of the common human
experience. Every people who have ever lived have had some kind of an
explanation, some kind of a myth which explains why there is anything. And Carl
Sagan would lump our Biblical tradition with all of those religious and semireligious explanations for the fact that there is something rather than nothing. It
is at that point that I would differ with him and call him to account.
He is a materialist. Now, a materialist is one who believes that, finally, everything
can be reduced to matter or energy. Now, you all understand Einstein's Theory of
Relativity, which says that those two are interchangeable, that mass and energy
are interchangeable, that finally, ultimately, the building blocks of reality are very
simply molecules that can be reduced to energy. So a materialist believes that,
finally, you can reduce the whole of reality to energy, electricity if you will, to
chemical reactions, so that the emotions that we feel are the result of chemical
reactions and nerve connections, and so forth. A materialist believes that the
whole of reality and the totality of human experience can be reduced to that
which is material, physical.
Now, in saying that, he has to deal with the fact that you and I are intelligent and
we are conscious. We are self-conscious people. We can reflect back upon
ourselves, we know that we exist, we think about ourselves, for better or worse.
And we have an intelligence. We can communicate. He would say that there may
be intelligent beings in other universes. If there are, we don't know about it. They
haven't signaled us yet, nor have they returned our signal. But, be that as it may,
as far as we are concerned, and after all we can only deal here with planet Earth,
the highest form of the cosmic evolutionary process has resulted in human
intelligence and human consciousness . We are the only beings that know that we
are. We are the only beings with the intelligence and the self-consciousness to
reflect on the cosmic process of which we are a part. And, consequently, if
everything can be reduced down to that point of energy or matter, then human
intelligence and human consciousness and human emotion, likewise, can be
reduced down and be explained in terms of electricity, chemical reaction, etc.
And that would mean, of course, that we are at the top of the ladder. This is as far
as the process has gotten. And that would mean, of course, that there is no higher
rung as yet realized. Who knows what may be up there? One might say that
humans have become godlike. Human existence with its intelligence and
© Grand Valley State University
�God and Cosmos
Richard A. Rhem
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consciousness is the highest rung of the ladder at this point and, consequently,
with nothing beyond, there can be no one beyond.
A materialist explains the totality of the cosmos in terms of the building blocks of
reality that are reducible in the laboratory. Human intelligence and
consciousness may be praised and affirmed and acclaimed. It is the highest
development of the cosmic process. There is no one beyond. Such is the view of
the materialist. Such a one is a naturalist. He would be a humanist, too, I
suppose.
But you and I believe more than that. As long as Carl Sagan is an astronomer and
a scientist, we learn; we learn with fascination and with eagerness. We marvel at
the ingenuity of the human mind, at the intellectual powers of an Einstein, the
exploratory endeavors of Galileo and Copernicus, Kepler and the whole host of
those who have probed the depths of reality and given us today such an amazing
insight into the cosmic order. It is exciting and fascinating and we ought to affirm
that in the Church.
When Carl Sagan has said everything he has to say, he has not yet dealt with the
religious question. Being a materialist, he has planted his feet squarely within
this cosmos, whereas you and I see the totality of the cosmos as the consequence
of the creative act of One Who transcends the cosmos, Who is not encased within
the system of which we are a part, with our galaxies and our planets and our
stars. We look to One Who is beyond, One Who stands apart from and Who
spoke and called into being that which did not previously exist. By faith, we
believe the worlds were fashioned by the Word of God. That God was, and
nothing else was, and God spoke, and it came to be. That is the affirmation of the
Letter to the Hebrews, the reflection of that first chapter where he sees the
cosmos to the extent that he was able to understand it and he says,
…they will perish, but thou remainest; they will all grow old like a
garment, like a mantle thou wilt roll them up, and they will be changed.
But thou art the same, and thy years will never end. Hebrews 1: 11-12
Or the psalmist who said, "O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is Thy name in all the
earth." When I consider the heavens, the moon, the stars which you have made,
my worship is not offered, as it has been through so many ages of humankind, to
the stars and the moon or the sun or the cosmic order itself, but to the God Who
is apart from it and brought it into being. That is the Biblical tradition. That is the
Judeo-Christian faith. It is our faith.
And so we study the cosmos. As we view such a marvelous presentation as the
television Cosmos series, we are fascinated and we marvel at the wonders, the
complexity and the simplicity of the created order. But we always look beyond,
and then we know this amazing place is our Father's world.
© Grand Valley State University
�God and Cosmos
Richard A. Rhem
Page 5
We have learned a lot through the research of astrophysics. They tell us that 15 to
20 billion years ago this universe was formed. Science, itself, has formulated what
is today the most accepted model of origin - the ''Big Bang." There was a high
concentration of energy and mass, almost a pinpoint. And from that intense
concentration of energy evolved a nuclear explosion that scattered the elements
in every direction, from which explosion we can still, through very delicate
radioscopes, hear the pulsing of radiation. From that Big Bang 15 to 20 billion
years ago, this whole cosmic order of which we are a part emanated. They tell us
that it is still expanding like a balloon. If you blow up a balloon that has polka
dots on it, the polka dots keep getting farther apart, but they remain relatively in
the same position on that sphere. And so, this universe is going outward. They
tell us if there is enough mass within this expanding universe, the force of gravity
will eventually stop the expansion, that it will, in turn, contract so that after the
Big Bang will come the Big Crunch. And then, they tell us, possibly with that Big
Crunch and that high concentration again, there will be another nuclear
explosion that will start the whole process over again.
Does it make any difference to Genesis? Does it make any difference to Hebrews
or to Psalm 8? Not a smidgin, really. For, who knows what God is up to? Who
knows what fantastic things He has in store for this, our planet Earth, which is
just a little speck of dust occupying an instant of time in this dramatic, cosmic,
evolutionary process. But on this little speck of dust, in this instant of time, we
exist, conscious and intelligent, able to reflect on the process and to adore the
God Who is behind it all.
What we have learned about space is so amazing. For example, they talk about
black holes. I wish I understood black holes. In the next life I'm going to conduct
great music. The third life I want to be an astrophysicist. I have never had a
physics course in my life, and I am really out of my element. But, anyway, try to
understand the black holes. Have you ever pulled the plug in a basin of water?
You pull the plug in the sink and the water goes down the drain. If you had good
drainage, the water was pulled down forming a whirlpool over the drain. Well,
they say that where there is a high concentration of energy from the collapse of a
great big star, maybe four or five times bigger than our sun, there is such a
concentration of gravity that it rushes right out of the universe. Like if you had
your hand inside the balloon and pushed it out. That gravity is so great, so
intense, that it doesn't even let the light out, so that you look in the sky and there
is a black hole. (You can't see the black hole where the star was, but you know
that the star was there because there is such a strong emanation of x-rays from
that point that they can tell by the radioscopes that it is there.) It is a tremendous
source of power. Well, even Carl Sagan says that those black holes might be the
shoots that would send us from one universe to another.
I was thinking about the book Life After Life, and all the stories of those who have
edged right up to death and then come back. They talk about that tunnel of light.
Who knows but maybe it's a black hole? It's a black hole from the outside, but
© Grand Valley State University
�God and Cosmos
Richard A. Rhem
Page 6
inside, the light is there, you see. Does it make any difference to Genesis, or
Psalm 8, or the Letter to the Hebrews? Not a bit. The more we learn, the more we
probe, the more we understand, the more wonder, the more sense of awe,
because of the majesty, the mind-boggling nature of the cosmic order.
Our earth, 4.6 billion years old, part of a cosmic evolutionary process 15 to 20
billion years old. They say if you took a few baseballs and scattered them on the
North American continent they would be crowded compared to the stars in space.
And our galaxy, the Milky Way, has four billion stars, and our galaxy is in what
they call the Local Cluster, a relatively small cluster. There are numberless
galaxies. Sagan writes,
We live on a mote of dust circling a humdrum star in the remotest corner
of an obscure galaxy. And if we are a speck in the immensity of space, we
also occupy an instant in the expanse of ages. Cosmos, p. 20f.
Can you begin to take it in? I cannot. But whoever said God wasn't big? And
whoever said God lacked power? By faith, we understand that the worlds were
fashioned by the Word of God, and the more we learn, the more we stand in awe
of One Who stands apart from and creates the heavens and the earth and this
place for you and for me.
When the Bible affirms that God created, it doesn't mean to tell us all of the
scientific details about where everything came from, or the process by which it
arose. The Church too long has used the Bible that way, as a scientific text. And
because of that kind of use of the Bible there has been the unnecessary and tragic
conflict between science and religion. The Bible simply is trying to say that God is
at the beginning and God is at the end, and whatever exists, this cosmic
evolutionary process contains nothing that can be threatening to you and to me,
because God is at the beginning and God is at the end. And when the Bible says
Creation is good, it simply is saying that it is a good place for us to develop and to
grow in the grace and the knowledge of Jesus Christ. And when it says that God
called into being that which exists from nothing, it is simply affirming that there
is nothing in the cosmic order that can be threatening, because God is sovereign
and Lord over all. That is really all we are saying, but that is to say tremendous
things about our human existence, and the cosmic order of which we are a part.
I am excited about this, because I believe too long in the Church there has been
an atmosphere of fear and an attitude of defensiveness. I grew up being
threatened by science. I grew up fearing every new discovery. I grew up wishing
there would be no more explosion of knowledge, fearing that somehow or other,
the faith and the things that were most dear to me would be exploded by some
new view under a microscope or some distant vista from a telescope.
The Church's history is tragic: Catholic and Protestant. Johann Kepler was
excommunicated by the Lutheran Church in the 17th Century, and Galileo was
put under house arrest the last years of his life by the Roman Church for simply
© Grand Valley State University
�God and Cosmos
Richard A. Rhem
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affirming what he knew was true, that the earth went around the sun rather than
vice versa. The Church's record is tragic, to be repented of, and the Church too
often continues to react negatively to the increase of knowledge. It stifles creative
thought and experimentation and offends its best spirits and drives out its finest
minds.
I am excited about this, because I believe that we can allow the fresh air,
knowledge and research and investigation to flow through the Church, and then,
if we have faith enough, we can stand with the psalmist and say, "Lord, our Lord,
how excellent is Thy name in all the earth. When I consider the heavens, the
moon and the stars which You have made, then from my heart arises wonder,
love and praise." By faith we believe that the worlds were fashioned by the word
of God, and whatever is out there of which we are a part, whatever its future, and
whatever its past, it is encompassed in the eternal love of God, Who has
manifested Himself as Grace and touched us in the flesh of Jesus. Blessed be His
holy name. Amen.
Father, we revel in the wonder of the Created Order, the mind-boggling
experience of the natural world, and we rejoice in the confidence that we have
that we have a home here, that this is our Father's world, and that you uphold all
things by the power of your word. Receive our adoring worship, through Jesus
Christ, our Lord. Amen.
© Grand Valley State University
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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Richard A. Rhem Collection
Description
An account of the resource
Text and sound recordings of the sermons, prayers, services, and articles of Richard Rhem, pastor emeritus of Christ Community Church in Spring Lake, Michigan, where he served for 37 years. Starting in the mid 1980's, Rhem began to question some of the traditional Christian dogma that he had been espousing from the pulpit. That questioning was a first step in a long and interesting spiritual journey, one that he openly shared with his congregation. His journey is important, in part because it is reflective of the questioning, the yearnings, and the gradual revision of beliefs that many persons in this part of the century have experienced and continue to experience. It is important also because of the affirming and inclusive way his questioning was done and his thinking evolved. His sermons and other written and spoken materials together document the steps in his journey as it took a turn in 1985, yet continued to revolve around the framework and liturgies of the Christian calendar.
Subject
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Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Religion
Interfaith worship
Sermons
Sound Recordings
Creator
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Rhem, Richard A.
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/514">Richard A. Rhem papers (KII-01)</a>
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives.
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Kaufman Interfaith Institute
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English
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KII-01
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1981-2014
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audio/mp3
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Scripture Text
Hebrews 1:1-4, 10-12
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Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI
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KII-01_RA-0-19811108
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1981-11-08
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God and Cosmos
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Richard A. Rhem
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
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Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Sermons
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Richard A. Rhem - An Archive of Sermons, Prayers, Talks and Stories: http://richardrhem.org/
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eng
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Text
Description
An account of the resource
A sermon given by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on November 8, 1981 entitled "God and Cosmos", at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: Hebrews 1:1-4, 10-12.
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application/pdf
Awe
Consciousness
Cosmos
Creation
Creator
Eternal Love of God
Faith
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https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b818a3401034b8939c347399695986cb.pdf
2c4decf99ca9df05a70e6e9d24bc6607
PDF Text
Text
Living Before the Face of God
Baccalaureate Sunday
Text: I Timothy 6:11-16
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
June 5, 1988
Transcription of the spoken sermon
But you, man of God, must shun all this, and pursue justice, piety,
fidelity, love, fortitude, and gentleness. Run the great race of faith and
take hold of eternal life. For to this you were called; and you confessed
your faith nobly before many witnesses. Now in the presence of God, who
gives life to all things, and of Jesus Christ, who himself made the same
noble confession and gave his testimony to it before Pontius Pilate, I
charge you to obey your orders irreproachably and without fault until
our Lord Jesus Christ appears. That appearance God will bring to pass in
his own good time -God who in eternal felicity alone holds sway. He is
King of kings and Lord of lords; he alone possesses immortality, dwelling
in unapproachable light. No man has ever seen or ever can see him. To
him be honour and might for ever! Amen. ... I Timothy 6:11-16 (NEB)
Commencement is a time of the giving of many speeches and most of them can be
lumped in the category of moral imperative, an urging of graduates to plunge into
life with seriousness of purpose and diligent effort, to pursue lofty goals, to live by
high ideals and to strive for nobleness of life. Who could argue with that? Surely
this is a good occasion for such stirring rhetoric.
What is usually missing, however, and in the context of public education
necessarily is missing, is any foundation for such moral urging. One might well
raise the question to much commencement speechmaking, "Why?" It is the
"Why" I want to address on this Baccalaureate Sunday. From the perspective of
biblical faith, the reason one ought to enter seriously into life with discipline and
purpose and live fruitfully, creatively and significantly as a catalyst for the
betterment of one's world and society is because one is not one's own; rather life
is a gift and is lived before the face of God. It is the consciousness of God, the
Living God, the Creator of the Universe, the gracious, saving God revealed in
Jesus Christ, that shapes human life into a faithful response, pointing one to the
highest and best and fullest realization of one's potential.
© Grand Valley State University
�Living Before the Face of God
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
The text this morning might seem to lead us down the pathway to another
instance of moralistic cheerleading:
Pursue justice, piety, fidelity, love, fortitude and gentleness. Run the
great race of faith and take hold of eternal life.
Good counsel, to be sure; who would argue with such encouragement? But, again,
why?
Let me try to answer that and thereby avoid the pitfall of another blind call to
goodness and duty. The call to serious, disciplined living here is based on the
assumption that one is not one's own. Note the address, "But you, man of God."
Is that a technical designation of one in Christian ministry? Perhaps in this
instance. Yet it is not to be so limited. The biblical assumption from beginning to
end is that God is God and the human person lives before the face of God. That is
stated expressly in verse 13:
Now in the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and of Jesus
Christ...
The solemn charge to duty is given "in the presence of God," but what is explicitly
stated as the context of this charge is true for us all at all times and in all
circumstances. We live before the face of God. God is the great reality embracing
all of nature and history and God is the ground and goal of our lives as well as the
origin, preserver and finally the goal of all existence.
Since the 18th Century, the Enlightenment Movement in France and Germany,
our thinking has been secularized. Reality has been bifurcated in such fashion
that the world has been viewed as a self-contained system running on its own
with its own natural law and bound together in a chain of cause and effect. God, if
God is still retained as a reality or possibility, is outside the reality of history and
nature. If God is given place at all in the natural world and the drama of history,
it is at specific points of intervention, still maintained by the religious but even
that is denied by the thoroughgoing naturalist.
In the philosophical movement, which gradually filtered down to popular
thinking, this removal of God from historical existence and the natural world was
spoken of as emancipation. Just as Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation freed
the slave, so clearing the world of God was thought to give space to the human
person to develop potential and carve out a destiny free from the oppressive
restraints of religion.
Much religion was and is oppressive. Much coercion and manipulation by
religion has done untold damage to human personality and bound the human
spirit in a strait jacket of fear and guilt and neurosis. Let that be freely
acknowledged.
© Grand Valley State University
�Living Before the Face of God
Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
But, that being candidly admitted, it must be recognized that a godless world and
a godless existence is a dismal business leading not to creative freedom and selfexpression, but rather to a dead end of hopeless futility. It is the absence of a
sense of the reality of God that is responsible for much of the malaise, the
ambiguity, the confusion, the moral crisis of our present world.
In a Christian Century editorial (June 1,1988), James M. Wall addresses the loss
of the transcendent source of moral values, the loss of a norm beyond the
standards of individuals or communities. Entitled "Ed Koch, Call Your Office,"
the editorial suggests that from time to time one ought to check in to determine if
one is still aligned with what is true and good and right - call your office. Koch
roused the Jewish community in New York City against the black democrat
candidate, Jesse Jackson, in the recent primary. Wall suggests Koch acted as
though a moral compass were irrelevant. He goes on to declare,
The ethical crisis in our public life stems not from the lack of parochial
ethical standards but from the failure to turn to any transcendent
standard in making decisions as individuals or as communities. We are not
calling our offices because there is no one there to take the call. And if we
did call, we would get only a recorded message we ourselves had made,
advising us to do whatever will enhance the bottom line, make us feel good
or guarantee a profit and/or a victory, preferably both.
Examples of this attitude abound in contemporary society. In addition to Koch,
they include Ed Meese in the Justice Department and Ivan Boesky on Wall Street.
The dominant operative mind-set tolerates and actually encourages a rudderless
moral climate.
Modernity has brought us incredible advances in the way we live, but it has left us
in a situation where we do not know how to live. The prevailing standard is
victory, not values....
Wall quotes a Czech-born novelist, Milas Kundera, (The Art of the Novel, p. 2)
who regards Cervantes, the author of Don Quixote,
... Kundera regards Cervantes, the author of Don Quixote as the first
novelist of the modern era who captured what it means to exist in a society
that puts all its emphasis on knowing a lot about little pieces and cares
nothing about the largest piece of reality. It was during Cervantes's era
that Western civilization began to assume that the only reality that matters
is that which is subject to measurement.
The central authority for all existence had once been called God, and that
authority's representative on earth was the church. Both of these entities
were pushed into a sacred reservation to keep them out of harm's way,
while rational and wise men (never women) pursued knowledge. Or as
Kundera puts it:
© Grand Valley State University
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Richard A. Rhem
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As God slowly departed from the seat whence he had directed the
universe and its order of values, distinguished good from evil, and
endowed each thing with meaning, Don Quixote set forth from his
house into a world he could no longer recognize. In the absence of
the Supreme Judge, the world suddenly appeared in its fearsome
ambiguity; the single divine Truth decomposed into myriad relative
truths parceled out by men. Thus was born the world of the Modern
Era... [p. 6].
I cannot begin to draw out and document the disillusioning end of the demise of
God in the modern world, but if you are really interested in one person's account
of where we are after a century of Nihilism filtered down to popular
understanding, read Allan Bloom's book. The Closing of the American Mind,
whose subtitle reads, "How Higher Education Has Failed Democracy and
Impoverished the Souls of Today's Students."
Nihilism is a philosophy, a world and life view that denies any reality beyond the
human mind and system of values. There is no God, no ultimate source of truth
or goodness. It is all simply human devising. Nihilism means Nothingness. Hans
Küng, in Does God Exist?, defines Nihilism as
"The conviction of the nullity of the internal contradiction, futility and
worthlessness of reality." (p. 388)
Bloom traces the line from Nietzsche’s philosophical ideas to contemporary
American Society where the denial of any Absolute is a given, but where the
resultant chaos of right and wrong, truth and error has led to the recognition of
the need for values clarification. The problem is there is no transcendent
reference, no absolute standard or norm. Consequently, one must determine
one's own values and then live authentically in the light of those values. Since
there is no norm, one value is as valid as the next and tolerance rules over all.
Bloom writes,
My grandparents were ignorant people by our standards, and my
grandfather held only lowly jobs. But their home was spiritually rich
because all the things done in it, not only what was specifically ritual,
found their origin in the Bible's commandments, and their explanation in
the Bible's stories and the commentaries on them, and had their
imaginative counterparts in the deeds of the myriad of exemplary heroes.
My grandparents found reasons for the existence of their family and the
fulfillment of their duties in serious writings, and they interpreted their
special sufferings with respect to a great and ennobling past. Their simple
faith and practices linked them to great scholars and thinkers who dealt
with the same material, not from outside or from an alien perspective, but
believing as they did, while simply going deeper and providing guidance.
There was a respect for real learning, because it had a felt connection with
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Richard A. Rhem
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their lives. This is what a community and a history mean, a common
experience inviting high and low into a single body of belief.
I do not believe that my generation, my cousins who have been educated in
the American way, all of whom as M.D.s or Ph.D.’s, have any comparable
learning. When they talk about heaven and earth, the relations between
men and women, parents and children, the human condition, I hear
nothing but clichés, superficialities, the material of satire. I am not saying
anything so trite as that life is fuller when people have myths to live by. I
mean rather that a life based on the Book is closer to the truth, that it
provides the material for deeper research in and access to the real nature
of things. Without the great revelations, epics, and philosophies as part of
our natural vision, there is nothing to see out there, and eventually little
left inside. The Bible is not the only means to furnish a mind, but without a
book of similar gravity, read with the gravity of the potential believer, it
will remain unfurnished.
The moral education that is today supposed to be the great responsibility
of the family cannot exist if it cannot present to the imagination of the
young a vision of a moral cosmos and of the rewards and punishments for
good and evil, sublime speeches that accompany and interpret deeds,
protagonists and antagonists in the drama of moral choice, a sense of the
stakes involved in such choice, and the despair that results when the world
is "disenchanted." Otherwise, education becomes the vain attempt to give
children "values." Beyond the fact that parents do not know what they
believe, and surely do not have the self-confidence to tell their children
much more than that they want them to be happy and fulfill whatever
potential they may have, values are such pallid things. What are they and
how are they communicated? The courses in "value-clarification"
springing up in schools are supposed to provide models for parents and
get children to talk about abortion, sexism or the arms race, issues the
significance of which they cannot possibly understand. Such education is
little more than propaganda, and propaganda that does not work, because
the opinions or values arrived at are will-o'-the-wisps, insubstantial,
without ground in experience or passion, which are the bases of moral
reasoning. Such "values"" will inevitably change as public opinion changes.
The new moral education has none of the genius that engenders moral
instinct or second nature, the prerequisite not only of character but also of
thought. Actually, the family's moral training now comes down to
inculcating the bare minima of social behavior, not lying or stealing, and
produces university students who can say nothing more about the ground
of their moral action than "If I did that to him, he could do it to me" - an
explanation which does not even satisfy those who utter it.
Bloom concludes,
© Grand Valley State University
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Richard A. Rhem
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Thus our use of the value language leads us in two opposite directions - to
follow the line of least resistance, and to adopt strong poses and fanatic
resolutions. But these are merely different deductions from a common
premise. Values are not discovered by reason, and it is fruitless to seek
them, to find the truth or the good life. The quest begun by Odysseus and
continued over three millennia has come to an end with the observation
that there is nothing to seek. This alleged fact was announced by Nietzsche
just over a century ago when he said, "God is dead." Good and evil now for
the first time appear as values, of which there have been a thousand and
one, none rationally or objectively preferable to any other. The salutary
illusion about the existence of good and evil has been definitively
dispelled. For Nietzsche this was an unparalleled catastrophe; it meant the
decomposition of culture and the loss of human aspiration. The Socratic
"examined" life was no longer possible or desirable. It was itself
unexamined, and if there was any possibility of a human life in the future
it must begin from the naive capacity to live an unexamined life. The
philosophic way of life had become simply poisonous. In short, Nietzsche
with the utmost gravity told modern man that he was free-falling in the
abyss of nihilism. Perhaps after having lived through this terrible
experience, drunk it to the dregs, people might hope for a fresh era of
value creation, the emergency of new gods.
Perhaps no one has given finer expression to the reckless affirmation of selfdetermination apart from any tradition, community value or transcendent
ground of existence than Frank Sinatra singing, "I did it my way!"
Call the office? No need; no one is there. I did it my way!
But, what of God? If God is God, then human life is lived before the face of God.
Our text speaks of "The presence of God and of Christ Jesus who in his testimony
before Pontius Pilate made a good confession." There we have a model set forth:
Jesus before Pilate.
Sinatra sings, "I Did It My Way!"
Jesus trembles and cries out, "Nevertheless, not my will but Thy will be done."
Can there be any starker contrast? Two different worlds. Two different
conceptions of life and Reality.
My Way! Thy Way!
The whole life of Jesus was characterized by an overwhelming sense of living
before the face of God. With Jesus, it was not a matter of finding out what works
and doing it in order to become successful as the world judges success. Rather, it
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Richard A. Rhem
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was to determine the will of God and do it in spite of human approval or
disapproval.
Before Pilate he was strong, steady, unmovable. Tell me, if you had to choose,
would you stand with Jesus knowing it would lead to crucifixion, or with Pilate
thereby saving your power and position?
What choice would you make?
Of course, you would stand with Jesus - masterfully clear-eyed, strong, not with
the pathetic Pilate, anxious, fearful, equivocating, vacillating. Who was really on
trial? Who was really in command of the moment? Is it not abundantly clear that
Jesus' "Thy will be done," freed him from every other bondage? True to God,
therefore truly himself.
They crucified him.
But, Jesus reigns, and one day every knee shall bow to him, every tongue confess
him Lord, to the glory of God!
To the glory of God!
The phrase sets the writer on fire. He breaks out into praise with a great
doxology, as he calls to mind God Who will bring all things to their
consummation in His own time, at the appearing of Jesus Christ.
God Who in eternal felicity alone holds sway. He is King of kings and
Lord of lords; he alone possesses immortality, dwelling in
unapproachable light. No one has ever seen or ever can see him. To God
be honour and might for ever!
Doxology. That is the tone quality of a life lived consciously before the face of
God. To live in the spirit of doxology is to live spontaneously, creatively in a
constant sense of awe and wonder, awe and wonder before the mystery of God,
the meaningfulness of existence, the sheer majesty of an eternal purpose already
at work, in us, through us, moving from Creation to new creation.
Doxology: The breaking forth of worship from one who is already participating in
life that is eternal - that is life lived within our time and space, but breaking
through those limits, breathing already the air of another reality, a transcendent
dimension.
... take hold of eternal life. For this you were called. So enjoins the text. In John's
Gospel, Jesus says,
I have come that they might have life and have it more abundantly.
Again, he declares,
© Grand Valley State University
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Richard A. Rhem
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This is life eternal that they might know the only true God and Jesus
Christ whom thou hast sent.
To live before the face of God is to live in the consciousness of a Reality beyond
the limits of time and space, beyond the appearances empirically perceived,
beyond the limited realm of nature that can be measured and of history that can
be documented. To live before the face of God is to have a transcendent reference
point, an absolute from which to measure, truth by which to discriminate the
confusing clamor of claims to validity that play upon one.
Doxology!
Not passive resignation to Fate.
Doxology!
Not unprincipled yielding to what works, is effective, gets one by or brings one
instant reward.
Doxology!
Not self-serving narcissism that aims at the instant gratification of desire, the
pleasure principle - doing what feels good.
Doxology!
Not a spineless, careful, fearful failure to dare, to risk, to live, to love -satisfied
with an obscene mediocrity.
Doxology - The overflowing life that senses the very Creative Spirit of God
rushing through it, reaching for the stars, dreaming the impossible dream,
believing that there is so much more, unwilling to rest with what has been,
dissatisfied with what is, always stretching, reaching, pushing the limits, knowing
that the possibilities of Reality are as limitless as the God Who is the ground and
goal of all that is.
And so I call you to take hold of life eternal and I ground that challenge in who
you are - a person, created in the image of God, the God Who is the source, the
ground, the norm of all that is good and true and beautiful and whose purpose for
you is the fullness of life in the present and beyond what eye has seen or ear
heard or has ever entered the human heart's conceiving.
That is to live fully, richly, creatively - that is to live before the face of God.
© Grand Valley State University
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Richard A. Rhem Collection
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Text and sound recordings of the sermons, prayers, services, and articles of Richard Rhem, pastor emeritus of Christ Community Church in Spring Lake, Michigan, where he served for 37 years. Starting in the mid 1980's, Rhem began to question some of the traditional Christian dogma that he had been espousing from the pulpit. That questioning was a first step in a long and interesting spiritual journey, one that he openly shared with his congregation. His journey is important, in part because it is reflective of the questioning, the yearnings, and the gradual revision of beliefs that many persons in this part of the century have experienced and continue to experience. It is important also because of the affirming and inclusive way his questioning was done and his thinking evolved. His sermons and other written and spoken materials together document the steps in his journey as it took a turn in 1985, yet continued to revolve around the framework and liturgies of the Christian calendar.
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Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
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Interfaith worship
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Rhem, Richard A.
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/514">Richard A. Rhem papers (KII-01)</a>
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives.
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1981-2014
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Baccalaureate Sunday
Pentecost II
Scripture Text
I Timothy 6:12-14
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Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI
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1988-06-05
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Living Before the Face of God
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Richard A. Rhem
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Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Sermons
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Richard A. Rhem - An Archive of Sermons, Prayers, Talks and Stories: http://richardrhem.org/
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eng
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A sermon given by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on June 5, 1988 entitled "Living Before the Face of God", on the occasion of Baccalaureate Sunday, Pentecost II, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: I Timothy 6:12-14.
Awe
Baccalaureate Sunday
Consciousness of God
Mystery of God
Transcendence
Values
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/25ea1e23df5ccb6aed633bb4bedf0ca4.pdf
78e337632ca6ed39b6157d6fadb91b44
PDF Text
Text
The Awe of Worship
From the series: The Church: Human Community
Text: Isaiah 6:1, 3; Revelation 5:13
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
November 15, 1998
Transcription of the spoken sermon
I was thinking about a statement that Paul made in a discussion in his first letter
to the Corinthians as I was thinking about the theme of today’s worship. It has
nothing to do with the theme, actually, but rather, with some domestic matters
that he was dealing with in the congregation at Corinth, and at one point he said,
"Now, as to thus and so, I have no commands from the Lord, but my opinion is,
as one who is faithful and trustworthy, ..." That statement from Paul, when I was
being educated into an understanding of scripture and how to interpret it, was
claimed to be the inspired word of God as much as anything else Paul wrote,
because, after all, Paul wrote it and it’s in the Bible.
The inspiration of the scripture - that’s a theological doctrine. But, as a matter of
fact, I don’t believe that anymore. I want to take the words at face value. What
Paul was saying is, on this issue, I don’t really have a clear word from the Lord.
Paul certainly was not conscious in writing the letter to the church at Corinth that
he was writing what would be considered scripture by the church, subsequently,
although, certainly he had a sense of authority, apostolic authority, and I think
what he was saying in this case is there are some things about which I am very
certain are reflective of the intention of God, but in this case, I don’t know, but let
me give you my opinion.
That’s what I want to do with you today. Of course, I’m always preaching my
opinion. But, it is an understanding or interpretation of a text or a theological
doctrine or something. But, today, not so much so. I have certainly biblical text
and a biblical basis for what I’m going to say, but I want to say up front that what
I’m going to speak about, the congregation, the Church, the human community in
worship, involves an opinion on my part. It involves a choice that I have made.
The way we worship at Christ Community is a deliberate and intentional choice.
There are assemblies all over the globe today in this hour worshiping God in all
kinds of settings, using all kinds of liturgy or non-liturgy, in all kinds of feel,
mood, mode, posture, and the way any community of faith worships is a
deliberate and intentional choice of that community of faith. At least, it is here. In
some communities of faith it may just be what has been done forever and forever
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Richard A. Rhem
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and forever. It seems that that was the way it was when I was a kid. Three hymns,
two prayers and a long sermon. And I don’t know that anyone ever thought about
it. But, at Christ Community, we have been very intentional about the way we
worship, and I want to talk about that this morning. I want to say again, up front,
not as some word from the Lord, but as some intentional, deliberate choice on
our part, and so, think with me about the action in which we are presently
engaged, the action of worship.
Now, I’ve already tilted my hand by the very title of the message, "The Awe of
Worship." Awe, a little three-letter word, but it carries a wallop. If you would look
it up in the dictionary, you’d find that it comes from a Greek word, achos, which
is defined as fear, and you might find the word "dread" in there, and you might
find the word "reverence" and "respect." The Awe of Worship is an attempt to
point to that which marks our worship, that gives it its characteristic mark, its
mode and mood. It is awe. Now, not fear in the sense of being afraid, but fear in
the sense of reverence and deep respect.
The classic study of the religious experience of worship, indeed, of the religious
experience itself, was done by a German scholar who died in 1937, Rudolf Otto,
and his book is entitled, in English, The Idea of the Holy. And he was one of the
pioneers in the study of comparative religions and he went around the world
tasting, experiencing, analyzing the religious experience of the human family, and
he found that at the core was this sense of awe, that there is a deep address to the
inner being of the person, there is a feeling which is a knowing, but a "knowing"
in quotation marks because it is not a rational knowing, it is supra-rational. It is
beyond the ability, intellectually, to analyze. It is a feeling; it is an experience
deep, deep down. He speaks about the Holy, or God, using a word he coins from a
Latin word, numen. Numen, in Roman mythology, was the presiding spirit or
divinity, and Rudolf Otto, then, in order to coin a new word, to catch attention,
and to try to say something in a fresh way, talks about the numenus, which is
really God. It’s the Mystery, however you want to speak of it. But, he noted that
universally there is this human experience of the numenus, of the Mystery, and
he used another Latin phrase, a mysterium tremendum, and you can hear the
English word "mystery" and "tremendous." Rather crassly, a tremendous
mystery. But, mysterium tremendum has that kind of sense about it of mystery.
Rudolf Otto says that the experience to which we are trying to point this morning,
that which is universally at the core of the human experience of God which is
evoked in worship, which arises, is a feeling that is beyond explanation. An
encounter with the Mystery who is unapproachable.
Maybe it sounds like so much gobbledygook, but I’m trying to speak reasonably,
rationally, understandably about a Mystery that cannot be spoken about
reasonably, understandably. But, I think you know what I mean. I think you have
all, at one time or another, felt it, experienced it; you’ve known it. And Rudolf
Otto says, interestingly enough, that that universal human experience, the awe of
that awesomeness beyond our ability to articulate, is that which has with it the
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Richard A. Rhem
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sense of fear or dread or reverence or respect that almost repels us and, at the
same time, draws us, allures us. There is that ironic tension within us; we are
drawn like a moth to the flame and yet, it is a fearsome, an overwhelming kind of
moment and experience. That’s the awe of worship. And, at Christ Community,
we have made a deliberate choice and with intention seek to create the possibility
of that awe happening.
All we can do is build the container. Whether the fire happens or not, whether
there is anything evoked in us or not is not at our command or our disposal. That
is the mystery of the Mystery.
But, I think you know that we are very intentional and deliberate about the way
we worship, about the mood and the mode and the posture and the spirit and the
feel of this hour. I’ll spend probably three hours tonight on next Sunday morning.
I have the pieces from Mr. Bryson, I know what music will be involved and
whether there’ll be dance or whatever, and then I will simply live into that
experience, trying to weave it together in such a way that it has a certain flow, a
certain naturalness. After that, I’m helpless. Then we can execute it. Then we
stand waiting, praying, hoping, longing for the experience which is beyond our
control or ability to manipulate. That’s how it is here, and in making that
intentional choice, we have expressed an opinion that that is worship and (this is
a value judgment that I’m going to say anyway), that is worship at its highest and
its best.
It certainly is consistent with the biblical experiences of worship that we have, for
example, Isaiah’s experience. "It was in the year that King Hosiah died." Was it a
crisis for the nation? Was it a personal loss for Isaiah? Was it a grief that fell over,
like on the day when Kennedy was assassinated? Was it a crisis of the nation as to
whether or not Iraq will finally provoke us to war? Anyway, it was in the year that
King Hosiah died that Isaiah went into the temple and suddenly the foundations
were shaking and the whole temple was filled with smoke, and seraphic beings
were everywhere, crying out, "Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty. Heaven
and earth is filled with God’s glory." Did you just get a goose bump? I did. And
Isaiah felt his utter creatureliness, his lostness, his dependence, total
dependence, and he heard a voice, and he said, "I’m unclean." The angel took a
coal from off the altar and touched his lips and said, "You’re cleansed." And,
being cleansed and graced, he was called and commissioned. It was an experience
of deep mystery. The prophet’s life was changed in the encounter with the Holy,
whatever that may be.
Or, the worship in heaven, before living creatures, the elders, bowls of incense,
the prayers of people symbolized in the bowls of incense. The adoration of the
Lamb that was slain. And again, that chorus of myriads and myriads and
thousands and thousands of angels with a loud voice saying, "Worthy is the Lamb
to receive honor and power and glory and wisdom and might, now and forever,"
and they fell down and they worshiped and they cried, "Amen, so let it be."
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Now, it would be a travesty to try and define the pieces of that picture. It’s a
picture. It is a scene painted for us that we can feel, we can enter into, even if
slightly, and we know some of it ourselves because we have felt our insides
quiver. We, too, have now and again, here and there, we have known that out of
ourselves and beyond ourselves we were in touch with something that was
embracing us and holding us and gracing us, confronting us, lifting us. We speak
of being wrapped in worship, our spirits inspired, uplifted into the Holy of Holies.
Now and again, here and there, thank God, we do sometimes taste the eternal in
the midst of our time, and if it is to happen, it will most likely happen where we
come seeking it and where the very environment and the hour is so structured
that it just might happen again.
In making that choice, we are making a deliberate, intentional choice, and we are
swimming against the stream. You know that, don’t you? And I don’t want you to
hear me this morning as being critical or condemning, because as I said early on,
I’m expressing an opinion and there are all sorts of assemblies and all sorts of
modes and moods of worship, and I do suppose that, just as I’m saying that
which we try to create registers in the depths of our being, that there are those
who find something registered in their being through an entirely different way.
On the other hand, I want to say a word about the way we worship in contrast to
that which is sweeping the landscape in our day. I would call it worship as
entertainment. The organ is out; praise bands are in; choruses whose words
generally lack any aesthetic value cast up on a screen to be repeated over and over
again, which certainly does touch something and move something. It touches the
emotion, somehow or other. Nothing against those things. I love an old-fashioned
hymn sing or a Christmas carol sing. I love to gather around the piano when Mr.
Bryson is playing and sing my lungs out before I lost my voice. But, now, I’m
talking about that holy moment in the week, this moment, and I want to suggest
to you that sacred space is so terribly important.
I had the opportunity last week, as many of you know, to preach in the Fountain
Street Church in Grand Rapids and to walk into that grand cathedral is to have
one’s breath taken away. The magnificent stained glass windows, the vaulting
architecture, the space itself lifts one’s soul. You cannot help but be still, silent,
tranquil, peaceful in that sacred space. And this far humbler space, yet beautiful,
carefully appointed with form and fabric, in order to address that below or above
your rational faculties, that intuitive sense you have to touch that aesthetic
dimension of your life - I didn’t know anything about that growing up. I didn’t
know how to worship; as I said, three hymns, two prayers and a long sermon and
we were finally out of there. There was no sense of mystery or awe; there was no
wrapping in the warm womb of fabric and smell and feel and touch. I didn’t even
understand it graduating from seminary. I suppose because, being in the
Reformed tradition, we were still 500 years later reacting against the mystery of
worship so magnificently captured still in the Roman Catholic church or the
Greek Orthodox, Russian Orthodox church, and the Jewish temple. I had to learn
it all from scratch. But, having learned it, having come to experience it and
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appreciate it, I am determined that it will prevail here over against that trend,
that contemporary trend in which mega-churches are growing by leaps and
bounds on such a diet.
I’m expressing an opinion and I’m an old fossil, and I don’t have a very open
mind on this question, and so you’re probably stuck with the way it is as long as
you’re stuck with me. And I acknowledge that it’s a deliberate, intentional choice,
but I would say that it is that medium that has the greatest possibility of reaching
into your inner being and leaving you speechless, full of wonder, lost in praise.
My critical question to the contemporary trend, worship as entertainment, is:
Can that medium bear the experience? Can the transcendent, the Awesome One
find as a vehicle for encounter the chatty, casual, informal gathering of folks?
That’s a serious question. I raise it here, there, other places. I’m a minority voice.
I have had many say to me, "Oh, yes, it can. The Transcendent, the Holy One can
be mediated through any vehicle, any medium." I’m not so sure. There is a little
song that I’ve heard a time or two. I do not know the words, I could not sing the
tune, but I know the title, and the title is "Our God is Awesome." And, I mean, it
really gets goin’, it’s "Our God is awesome, our God is awesome!" And I want to
say, "Come on, sit down, quiet down, be silent. Stop! For, what you’re singing
about is denied by the manner and the mode in which you sing! There are times
to sing and dance before the Lord. But, when I talk, when I think, when I open
myself to the awesomeness of God, then I shouldn’t be hopping around like a
Jiminy Cricket. So, that’s what you’re stuck with.
So, how do you come? Open, open of mind, open of heart, senses tingling with
anticipation. Obviously, then, prayerful, alert, aware of sights and sounds and the
words and the music and the way the tapestry weaves together and flows and
moves, and ready, then, to be moved along in a spirit of praise and adoration,
engaging with the exposition, arguing with it, sorting it through, finding that
upon which to contemplate, meditate, think, but all of it an honest opening of
one’s life to the Holy, to the possibility, here and now, even now the heavens
might open and angels appear, in word and music, in sight and sound, in the
smoke of incense - all of it, all of it the accouterments brought together in order
to create the occasion in which it just might happen.
And, isn’t it grand? Isn’t it grand to be here in a place like this, a space like this,
with people like this, a community, a human community, the Church, in worship,
where the liturgy holds up the whole of life into the presence of God, where the
newborn are baptized and those who died are given the final blessing, where
young couples are united in marriage and young people are heard to stand and
say, "I believe," and where we have vision clarified, where we are confronted
honestly with ourselves and our flaws and failings, where we hear a word of
grace, where our deepest concerns can be laid bare, where we can be embraced,
where we can sing our hearts out, where our souls can be released to dancing,
where we can have that fully, totally human experience of the Holy Other, full of
grace. My God, I love it!
© Grand Valley State University
�
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/45c779fe3b58b2a5dd1b5eba7aecdd37.mp3
cee2c629671cd9b5cd9a7382b1c9daa3
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
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Richard A. Rhem Collection
Description
An account of the resource
Text and sound recordings of the sermons, prayers, services, and articles of Richard Rhem, pastor emeritus of Christ Community Church in Spring Lake, Michigan, where he served for 37 years. Starting in the mid 1980's, Rhem began to question some of the traditional Christian dogma that he had been espousing from the pulpit. That questioning was a first step in a long and interesting spiritual journey, one that he openly shared with his congregation. His journey is important, in part because it is reflective of the questioning, the yearnings, and the gradual revision of beliefs that many persons in this part of the century have experienced and continue to experience. It is important also because of the affirming and inclusive way his questioning was done and his thinking evolved. His sermons and other written and spoken materials together document the steps in his journey as it took a turn in 1985, yet continued to revolve around the framework and liturgies of the Christian calendar.
Subject
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Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Religion
Interfaith worship
Sermons
Sound Recordings
Creator
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Rhem, Richard A.
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/514">Richard A. Rhem papers (KII-01)</a>
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives.
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Kaufman Interfaith Institute
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Language
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English
Type
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Sound
Text
Identifier
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KII-01
Coverage
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1981-2014
Format
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audio/mp3
text/pdf
Sound
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Event
Pentecost XXIV
Series
The Church: Human Community
Scripture Text
Isaiah 6:1,3, Revelation 5:13
Location
The location of the interview
Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
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KII-01_RA-0-19981115
Date
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1998-11-15
Title
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The Awe of Worship
Creator
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Richard A. Rhem
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
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Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Sermons
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Richard A. Rhem - An Archive of Sermons, Prayers, Talks and Stories: http://richardrhem.org/
Language
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eng
Type
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Text
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Format
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audio/mp3
application/pdf
Description
An account of the resource
A sermon given by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on November 15, 1998 entitled "The Awe of Worship", as part of the series "The Church: Human Community", on the occasion of Pentecost XXIV, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: Isaiah 6:1,3, Revelation 5:13.
Awe
Community of Faith
Divine Mystery
Worship
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/eaffc0ebda3e36798ccf63eb121224ea.mp3
cfafb7a9ff11dc0c63fe34be26ef2ae8
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/71e0200e982e076d0c2c422109477cc6.pdf
a1256cc3cd868296042b959a9ac521a8
PDF Text
Text
The God Who Is There For Us
From the sermon series: God, Our Ally
Text: Isaiah 57: 15; Hebrews 4: 13, 16
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
July 14, 1985
Transcription of the spoken sermon
God, Our Ally.
That is an affirmation of faith.
It is certainly one of the most significant and meaningful statements one could
make and to live with such a conviction is to be in possession of one of the most
necessary truths for human happiness and wellbeing.
God is for us.
Human existence is embraced by grace. So to live is to have a foundation for the
present and hope for the future.
Who is this God? How do we know Him?
These are deep questions whose answers are shrouded in mystery. God is not "at
hand." He is not simply available. To know Him is beyond human capacity; yet
He has made Himself known.
This series of messages is an attempt from a variety of biblical texts and a variety
of angles to say "God is our ally; He is for us." But to speak of God, let alone to
speak of Him in a whole series of messages seems almost presumptuous. How
dare one presume to speak of this One Who is hidden in mystery? Would one not
do well simply to be silent?
Yet that cannot be the answer, for God has revealed Himself; He has made
Himself known. Thus He wills to be known and He wills that we have knowledge
of Him. On the other hand, as I reflect on this task, I am quite certain most
sermons purport to know too much. I am certain as well that there is often a
craving in the human mind and heart to know more than can be known of God
and, rather than acknowledging the limits of our thinking in proper humility, we
tend to cut God down to a size in which we can handle Him.
© Grand Valley State University
�The God Who Is There For Us
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
I make this confession early on in this series because I want to admit to the
impossibility of speaking about God even as I attempt to do so, simply to make
you aware that I am aware of how inadequate are these stammering attempts to
speak of Him. Thus we look to the Spirit to reveal to us truth too deep for us to
grasp through our own power of reason and intuition.
"The God Who Is There For Us." That is the focus. "There for us" in the sense of
being the solid foundation of life, the sustainer of our life, the strong support and
source of comfort for the human pilgrimage which is our life.
I. Let me begin with the simple assertion that we need God.
The consciousness of that fact must be why we are here. Of course, for some of us
this appointment is not a matter of decision. We have made that decision long
since - this is the Lord's Day and it is a day first of all for worship. And so it is not
as though we awoke with a conscious longing for that encounter and communion
that happens in this setting and therefore we have come. Yet, however we happen
to be here, it is reflective of some deep-seated sense that we need God, that we
long for His presence, that we find a fulfillment of life not within ourselves but
only in relationship to One Who is beyond the limits of our time and space and
human rationality.
Were I to make a list of the dozen most influential books that have shaped my
thinking, one would surely be Ernest Becker's The Denial of Death. It won the
Pulitzer Prize for general non-fiction in 1974 and it is one of those works that
gives an overview and summary in lucid fashion of a vast area of human thought
and endeavor. In this case the book focuses on the insights gained from the
movement of psychoanalysis from its beginnings in the work of Sigmund Freud
through the modification of those insights in the work of Otto Rank.
What gripped me in this summarization of the best insight of psychoanalysis into
the nature of the human being was the acknowledgment that what a human being
most desperately needs to be fully human is precisely what the Christian Gospel
offers.
Through the work of Freud, the work of an earlier philosopher and Christian
came to be appreciated for the depth of truth it contained. That thinker was
Soren Kierkegaard. Kierkegaard summarized the human situation profoundly
and found the answer to the human dilemma in the leap of faith, casting oneself
into the arms of God. Kierkegaard held that
Once a person begins to look to his relationship to the Ultimate Power, to
infinitude, and to refashion his links from those around him to that
Ultimate Power, he opens up to himself the horizon of unlimited
possibility, of real freedom. This is Kierkegaard's message, the culmination
of his whole argument about the dead-ends of character ... One goes
through it all to arrive at faith, the faith that one's very creatureliness has
© Grand Valley State University
�The God Who Is There For Us
Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
some meaning to a Creator; that despite one's true insignificance,
weakness, death, one's existence has meaning in some ultimate sense
because it exists within an eternal and infinite scheme of things brought
about and maintained to some kind of design by some creative force.
Again and again throughout his writings Kierkegaard repeats the basic
formula of faith: one is a creature who can do nothing, but one exists over
against a living God for whom "everything is possible." (Becker, The
Denial of Death, p. 90)
From a life-long study of the human psyche in the discipline of psychoanalysis,
Otto Rank concluded Kierkegaard was right.
... Rank joins Kierkegaard in the belief that one should not stop and
circumscribe his life with beyonds that are near at hand, or a bit further
out, or created by oneself. One should reach for the "highest beyond of
religion. ... (p. 174)
Rank recognized that the scientific study of the human being could strip him
bare, expose his delusion and defense mechanism, but could not
allow the person to find out who he is and why he is here on earth, why he
has to die, and how he can make his life a triumph. (p. 193)
He declares,
Modern man needs a "Thou" to whom to turn for spiritual and moral
dependence, and as God was in eclipse, the therapist has had to replace
Him. ...
Becker indicates that these two disparate thinkers, one a Christian of the 19th
Century and one a psychoanalyst of the 20th,
... reached the same conclusion after the most exhaustive psychological
quest: that at the very furtherest reaches of scientific description,
psychology has to give way to "theology" - that is, to a world-view that
absorbs the individual's conflicts and guilt and offers him the possibility
for some kind of heroic apotheosis. Man cannot endure his own littleness
unless he can translate it into meaningfulness on the largest possible level,
(p. 196)
Rank was not a Christian believer nor is Becker. Neither of them espoused the
answer of the Christian faith. Yet they saw that the lostness of the modern person
is precisely that she has been robbed of faith in transcendence.
The one thing modern man cannot do is what Kierkegaard prescribed: The
lonely leap into faith, the naive personal trust in some kind of
transcendental support for one's life. (p. 200)
© Grand Valley State University
�The God Who Is There For Us
Richard A. Rhem
Page 4
The characteristic of the modern mind is the banishment of mystery, of
naive belief, of simple-minded hope. (p. 200)
Perhaps I could summarize Becker's view and Rank's by saying that they believe
that the Judeo-Christian faith provides precisely the view of Reality which a
human being needs to be happy but they also believe it is an illusion.
What they call illusion we hold to be the truth. God is and God is Who we need.
The analysis of human nature and the scientific study of the human psyche
confirm that to be human is to be frustrated and restless as long as one is turned
in upon oneself or imprisoned within the structures and meanings of this world.
There is something intrinsic in the human spirit that longs to leap beyond itself,
to commit itself to a transcendent Reality - in a word - to God.
Israel's God provided a resting place for the soul. In Isaiah 57 God speaks of His
coming in judgment on His people but that judgment here, as is always true, was
in order to turn his people back to Him. The prophet knew there was no peace
except in Him. God expresses His gracious way thus:
I cured him and gave him relief, and I brought him comfort in full
measure, brought peace to those who mourned for him, ... peace for all
men. ... But the wicked are like the troubled sea, a sea that cannot rest,
whose troubled waters cast up mud and filth. There is no peace for the
wicked, says the Lord. (Isaiah 57:19-21, NEB)
Wickedness in the Old Testament is unbelief. It is life lived on a purely human,
secular plane. It is life without trust in God. Such a life says the Lord knows no
peace.
We do need God - to be fully human, to know peace.
II. The Good News is that the God we need is the God Who is there for us. We
have in the text from Isaiah a marvelous capsule summary of the biblical God.
God speaks. He tells Who He is.
For thus says the high and lofty One who inhabits eternity, whose name
is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a
contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to
revive the heart of the contrite.
There is a portrait of the God we need. We see in this statement both the
otherness of God and His nearness.
God is the Wholly-Other.
That is a designation made popular by Karl Barth. He had been schooled in the
classic Liberalism of the 19th Century. Christian faith had become pretty much a
© Grand Valley State University
�The God Who Is There For Us
Richard A. Rhem
Page 5
man-centered affair. The Gospel was reduced to the limits of human reason. It
was Barth who sounded the alarm and called the whole European continent back
to the Otherness of God - the Godness of God; the One Who contradicts us.
He is a God beyond us. He is not like us only a little more so. He is other than we
are. He is the Creator, we the creature. He is not of one being with us but the
source and ground of our being.
God is the exalted One - high and lofty. God is the Infinite One, the Absolute, the
Ultimate Power. God is the Eternal One - beyond the limits of our time and space.
It would be difficult to find a more exalted conception of God.
Yet in the same breath we are told that He dwells with him who is of humble and
contrite spirit. He dwells with the one who is crushed. And he draws near to
revive.
He is thus not only the Wholly-Other, but He is the God Who is near.
He is the God Who in gracious condescension has come near to us to revive and
redeem.
In the classic doctrine of God the theologians have spoken of God's
transcendence and God's immanence. In so speaking they have sought to let God
be God - to honor His Otherness, to recognize that He is beyond us. Yet, in
faithfulness to Scripture, they have spoken of His drawing near, of His being with
His people.
We must never lose that tension.
God is God and, as we have already seen from the analysis of the human psyche,
nothing less can satisfy the human heart or provide a resting place for the human
spirit. God is a mystery. He is not at our disposal. Could we fathom his depths He
would not be God and we would be restless still, striving on to find that Ultimate
One Who limits our existence and grounds our being.
Barth called the world back to the Otherness of God. The 19th Century had
domesticated God and formed Him in the human image. About the same time
another theologian, Rudolf Otto, wrote a book entitled The Idea of the Holy. In a
forward to the English translation, Otto wrote,
This book ... makes a serious attempt to analyze all the more exactly the
feeling which remains where the concept fails. ...
The English translator, John W. Harvey, in his Preface raised the question
addressed in the work.
© Grand Valley State University
�The God Who Is There For Us
Richard A. Rhem
Page 6
Is religious experience essentially just a state of mind, a feeling, whether of
oppression or of exaltation, a sense of 'sin' or an assurance of 'salvation;' or
is it not rather our apprehension of 'the divine,' meaning by that term at
least something independent of the mental and emotional state of the
moment of experience? (p. XIII)
Obviously Otto believed that in religious experience we apprehend the divine or
God. But he recognized that God is not at our disposal. That a God within the
limits of human reason is not God at all. Otto studied the history of religions and
found a common thread. There was an apprehension of the divine which could
only be described as a knowing beyond knowing.
... a unique kind of apprehension ... not to be reduced to ordinary
intellectual or rational "knowing" with its terminology of notions and
concepts, and yet - and this is the paradox of the matter - itself a genuine
"knowing," the growing awareness of an object, deity. ... The primary fact
is the confrontation of the human mind with a Something, whose
character is only gradually learned, but which is from the first felt as a
transcendent presence, ‘the beyond,’ even where it is also felt as ‘the
within’ man.
There you have the text from Isaiah. Otto's classic study names that transcendent
presence the Holy, but the word Holy carries with it such a strong, ethereal
connotation that he needed another word to describe that residue of experience.
He chose the word "numinous" from the Latin numen, the most general Latin
word for supernatural divine power.
'Numinous' feeling is, then, just this unique apprehension of a Something,
whose character may at first seem to have little connection with our
ordinary moral terms, but which later 'becomes charged' with the highest
and deepest moral significance. (p. XVI)
'Numinous' and 'Numen' will, then, be words which bear no moral impact,
but which stand for the specific non-rational religious apprehension and
its objects, at all levels, from the first dim stirrings where religion can
hardly yet be said to exist to the most exalted forms of spiritual experience,
(p. XVII)
It was Otto's contention that in Christianity
The numinous elements, such as the sense of awe and reverence before
infinite mystery and infinite majesty are yet combined and made one with
the rational elements, assuring us that God is an all-righteous, allprovident, and all-loving Person, with Whom a man may enter into the
most intimate relationship.
The paradox of Isaiah's text is maintained.
© Grand Valley State University
�The God Who Is There For Us
Richard A. Rhem
Page 7
It is a real knowledge of, and real personal communion with, a Being
whose nature is yet above knowledge, and transcends personality. (p.
XVII)
One could not hope for a better commentary on the text than the explanation of
the thesis of Rudolf Otto and his book did greatly impact theological
development. The text itself is simply a condensation of the experience of Isaiah
recorded in the sixth chapter of his prophecy where he entered the temple and
saw the Lord "high and lifted up." He heard the angels sing the Sanctus, "Holy,
Holy, Holy is the Lord of Hosts." The vision left him awestruck, smitten with his
own unworthiness. But through the ministry of the angel he was cleansed and
through the voice of God called and commissioned to service. In the midst of awe
and wonder he was addressed, cleansed and given a task. The high and lofty One
stooped to grace His servant.
III. The God Who is there for us is the God with a human face. If we leave Isaiah
we find in the New Testament the same gracious God Whose glory is now
revealed in the face of Jesus Christ.
The writer of Hebrews was concerned for Jewish Christians who had responded
to Jesus, received him as the Messiah, the fulfillment of the Old Testament hope.
They left the Temple and recognized the provisionalness of the Law and
ceremony of the Old Covenant and embraced the Gospel. But now they were
experiencing persecution and they were living under pressure. How normal for
them to wonder if they had made a mistake, if perhaps this was a judgment on
their offering of allegiance to Jesus. This letter addresses that question showing
that Jesus is indeed the fulfillment and the culmination of the whole Old
Covenant system.
He warns them against drifting away or falling off in slackness and disobedience,
as had that generation that was delivered from Egypt's bondage only to lose faith
in the wilderness. He points them to the word of God that is, in this case, the
message of God by which they have been addressed. It is, he claims,
... alive and active. It cuts more keenly than any two-edged sword,
piercing as far as the place where life and spirit, joints and marrow
divide. It sifts the purposes and thoughts of the heart. There is nothing in
creation that can hide from him; everything lies naked and exposed to the
eyes of the One with whom we have to reckon. (Hebrews 4:12-13)
That is a call to faithfulness couched in a word of warning. The One with Whom
we have to do is no marshmallow God, no passive deity or dumb idol. The words
resonate with a seriousness that the thought of God calls forth.
In a word, the writer is saying that one's whole life and existence is an open secret
before the eyes of the living God Who judges according to absolutes of truth,
righteousness and justice. There is no game of charades with Him. In the
© Grand Valley State University
�The God Who Is There For Us
Richard A. Rhem
Page 8
presence of one another we mask the deep intent and purposes of our hearts and
even before our own minds we hardly dare face the truth of our personal
ambiguity, faithlessness and meanness.
But He knows us - better than we know ourselves. What a frightening thought!
But no; it is not so. In the very next paragraph the God Who searches the heart is
described in magnificent fashion as the gracious God Who has drawn near to us
in Jesus and Who bids us come to Him through Jesus to find in his grace timely
help.
Once again as in Isaiah 57:15, we have a marvelous juxtaposition -the Judge Who
might be thought to instill fear and trembling is the God Whose seat is a throne of
grace. To be sure, He is God; to be sure, He is pure light; to be sure, to be in His
presence must inspire awe and wonder and certainly there is a proper reverence
described in Scripture as the fear of God which must be part of any experience of
His presence.
But "fear and trembling" are not the last word; the last word is grace. For the God
with Whom we have to do is the God with a human face. Did not Jesus say,
If you have seen me, you have seen the Father. (John 14:9)
Did not Paul write,
For the same God who said, "Out of darkness let light shine," has caused
his light to shine within us, to give the light of revelation - the revelation
of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. (II Corinthians 4:6)
Quite consistent with the whole witness of the New Testament our writer points
us to Jesus who brings us to God.
Since therefore we have a great high priest ... Jesus the Son of God, let us
hold fast to the religion we profess. For ours is not a high priest unable to
sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who because of his likeness to
us, has been tested every way, only without sin. Let us therefore boldly
approach the throne of our gracious God where we may receive mercy
and in his grace find timely help. (Hebrews 4:14-16)
One could meditate on that gracious invitation for a long time and never fathom
the mystery of love and depth of mercy there set forth. The Eternal God, the
Infinite One, the Ultimate Power, the King of the Universe is full of mercy, ready
to give grace in every time of need. The way is open; access is available at any
moment. The invitation is come.
© Grand Valley State University
�The God Who Is There For Us
Richard A. Rhem
Page 9
The God we need is the God Who is there for us - the God with a human face - the
God we see in the face of Jesus - the God of grace without limit and mercy
without measure.
That is the message - God, our ally is full of Grace. His anger is for a moment, the
other side of His love in order to turn us and return us to Himself. His love is
everlasting and His Grace will finally conquer us with gentle wooing and steady
faithfulness.
But these are words, expressed in stammering fashion, attempting to express the
inexpressible. When all this has been said, it must be said further that words
cannot convict us. That is the Spirit's work. Yet we have this encouragement that,
if with all our heart we truly seek him, we shall surely find him. The longing of
our hearts is already the sign of His early work and those who thirst for God will
be satisfied.
God is our Ally.
He is there for us.
Come to Him through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.
References:
Ernest Becker. The Denial of Death. First published in 1973.
Rudolf Otto. The Idea of the Holy. Translated by John W. Harvey. Oxford
University Press, 1958.
© Grand Valley State University
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Richard A. Rhem Collection
Description
An account of the resource
Text and sound recordings of the sermons, prayers, services, and articles of Richard Rhem, pastor emeritus of Christ Community Church in Spring Lake, Michigan, where he served for 37 years. Starting in the mid 1980's, Rhem began to question some of the traditional Christian dogma that he had been espousing from the pulpit. That questioning was a first step in a long and interesting spiritual journey, one that he openly shared with his congregation. His journey is important, in part because it is reflective of the questioning, the yearnings, and the gradual revision of beliefs that many persons in this part of the century have experienced and continue to experience. It is important also because of the affirming and inclusive way his questioning was done and his thinking evolved. His sermons and other written and spoken materials together document the steps in his journey as it took a turn in 1985, yet continued to revolve around the framework and liturgies of the Christian calendar.
Subject
The topic of the resource
Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Religion
Interfaith worship
Sermons
Sound Recordings
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Rhem, Richard A.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/514">Richard A. Rhem papers (KII-01)</a>
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Kaufman Interfaith Institute
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Language
A language of the resource
English
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
KII-01
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1981-2014
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
audio/mp3
text/pdf
Sound
A resource primarily intended to be heard. Examples include a music playback file format, an audio compact disc, and recorded speech or sounds.
Event
Pentecost VII
Series
God Our Ally
Scripture Text
Isaiah 57:15, Hebrews 4: 13, 16
Location
The location of the interview
Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI
References
Ernest Becker, The Denial of Death, 1973
Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy, 1958
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
KII-01_RA-0-19850714
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1985-07-14
Title
A name given to the resource
The God Who is There for Us
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Richard A. Rhem
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Sermons
Relation
A related resource
Richard A. Rhem - An Archive of Sermons, Prayers, Talks and Stories: http://richardrhem.org/
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Text
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
audio/mp3
application/pdf
Description
An account of the resource
A sermon given by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on July 14, 1985 entitled "The God Who is There for Us", as part of the series "God Our Ally", on the occasion of Pentecost VII, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: Isaiah 57:15, Hebrews 4: 13, 16.
Awe
God of Grace
Immanence
Meaning
Mystery
Nature of God
Revelation
Spiritual Quest
Transcendence