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Transfigured: Face-to-Face in Freedom
From the sermon series: Until We Take the Shape of Christ
Text: II Corinthians 3:17-18
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
Trinity Sunday, June 14, 1987
Transcription of the spoken sermon
Have you ever had an absolutely marvelous vacation in an idyllic spot, and come
back and tried to tell people about it and found them to smile and say, "Oh, that's
nice." Have you ever been to a retreat or to a seminar where you were just
energized and turned on and inspired and came home and tried to tell your
colleagues about it and have them say, "Oh, that's interesting." Have you ever
been in love hopelessly, wonderfully in love, and tried to put it into words, in
rational discourse that could be conveyed to someone, communicated to
someone? Of course you can't do that. And if you have had an experience like
that, then you can identify with the Early Church, with the Apostles. If Paul
sometimes seems scrambled in his New Testament writing, just remember he
was trying to express the inexpressible, and if the Early Church Fathers
formulated their doctrinal understanding in philosophical language that seems
rather arid and awkward and doesn't move you, then understand the problem
with which they were dealing. They were trying to say what cannot be said, to
make comprehensible that which is incomprehensible, to lay out the mystery that
transcends our human understanding.
On Trinity Sunday, I am not going to attempt to give you definitions of God. I'm
not going to attempt to give you some doctrinal dissertation on our
understanding of God, because to do that is an exercise in futility. But what I do
want to do is take you to the Second Letter of Paul to the Corinthians, where you
have the intertwining of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit
without any attempt to formulate philosophically the relationship. We really are
better off with God if we stick to biblical expression.
In this chapter we have an interesting discussion of God Who is the Creator and
the Redeemer understood by us as our Parent, our Father. We have that God
Who has revealed Himself in the face of Jesus, Jesus, the Word made Flesh; and
we have the ministry of the Spirit of Christ, or the Spirit of the Lord, or the Spirit
of God, or the Holy Spirit. And Paul weaves all of these together without any kind
of systematic formulation.
© Grand Valley State University
�Transfigured: Face-to-Face in Freedom
Richard A. Rhem
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It was inevitable for the Church to try to give some kind of systematic form to this
data, to try to articulate this experience, but that articulation always falls far short
of the reality of experience which is given witness to in the Scriptures.
Paul's apostleship being under attack, he says to them, "Look, I don't have to
authenticate myself. You are my authentication. You are a letter from Christ,
written not with ink on tablets of stone, but written rather by the Spirit of the
Living God." In the opening paragraph of the third chapter we have reference to a
letter of Christ written by the Spirit of the Living God, and so you have the action
of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, but in a way that is very
practical, in the way in which God has revealed Himself and made Himself known
and impacts our human experience. Paul looked at the congregation of folks like
you and he said to them, "You are really the authentication of my apostolic
ministry because, to the extent that your lives have been transformed, it is a
witness to a work of God wrought through Jesus Christ, by the Spirit. The
transformation of your lives, your move from darkness to light, your move from
brokenness and the darkness of superstition and fear and guilt to the joy and the
liberty of the Children of God is the indication that my ministry has been
authentic. I'm not sufficient for these things, and I haven't 'written' you, but
Christ has written you. You are a letter from Christ written by the Spirit of the
Living God."
That reminds him of that whole ministry which is his in the wake of Jesus' death,
resurrection, ascension and the gift of the Spirit, and he begins to contrast that
with the old Covenant, the time of Israel through the ministry of Moses. He goes
back to that old Exodus story where Moses, having been in the presence of God,
returns to the people and his face is aglow, and the people are afraid. And
interestingly, in Paul's use of that passage, Paul says that Moses put a veil over
his face so that the people would not see the glory fade. It was like the glow would
wash off eventually, and Moses, not wanting to have them see the departure of
the glory, veiled his face.
Paul uses that as an analogy, as an illustration of the contrast between the old
Covenant and the new, and he says the old Covenant, the religion of Israel, which
was preparatory, which was authentic and genuine, but which was not complete,
was a ministry whose glory faded. It was a ministry of the letter; it was a kind of
religion that was imposed from the outside. It involved Law. Law can point to life,
but cannot empower life. Law can show the way, but cannot motivate one to walk
the way. The old Covenant was a covenant of rules and rituals, of religious
observance. Paul says the new Covenant is a covenant of the Spirit. It is a
covenant of the Spirit Who creates freedom in the individual so that inwardly
there is a motivation to become all that God has created one to become. In
contrasting the old and the new – the ministry of Moses and the ministry of
Christ, the ministry of the Letter and the ministry of the Spirit – Paul presents to
us the tremendous promise of human transformation. Through the ministry of
the Eternal God Who has come to us in Jesus and dwells with us by His Holy
© Grand Valley State University
�Transfigured: Face-to-Face in Freedom
Richard A. Rhem
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Spirit, we, His people, are being transformed, and that transformation has as its
goal our conformity to Jesus.
We saw that in the previous message. We have been predestined to be conformed
to the image of Christ. That is God's goal for us. With all of the diversity, with all
of the multiplicity of our human experience, there is yet a commonality, which is
a reflection of Jesus Christ from the core of our being because we belong to him
and have been transformed by him. So, the thing that God is about, this Triune
God, the thing that He has been about from the beginning and will finally finish
in the end, is the shaping of His children to be the brothers and sisters of Jesus,
and that is being effected by the Spirit of God. In the marvelous 18th verse, he
says,
…because for us there is no veil over the face, we all reflect as in a mirror
the splendor of the Lord; (that is, Christ) thus we are transfigured into his
likeness from splendor to splendor. Such is the influence of the Lord Who
is Spirit.
We, gazing at Jesus, are changed into the likeness of Jesus. The calling of the
Christian is the contemplation and the reflection of Jesus Christ, the imbibing
and the reflecting of the reality of Jesus Christ. It is our calling as people to be
transfigured, face-to-face in the wonderful freedom that the Spirit creates. Not
with cramped, heavy, onerous religion, but with the life-giving Spirit.
Have you ever painted by number? If you have painted by number and enjoy it,
keep at it. It's great! It's a lot better than biting your fingernails. But, on occasion
I have seen a painting that was painted by number. I can paint by number. I'd
probably go out of the lines, because I'm not a person who easily lives within the
lines, and I probably would grow impatient and blue here and here. But, I could
paint by number. In fact, that's the only way I could paint, being color-blind and
without artistic skill. I would number the paints and I would read the number
and it would not take a great deal of creativity, a great deal of skill or artistry to
paint by number. It's not a bad pastime. But you never mistake a painting by
number with a painting of an artist.
The last time that I was in New York, I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art
because there was a special display of French Impressionism, a private collection
that was about to be shipped off to England and probably would never be seen
publically again. Some Renoirs, some Monets, and others of that movement.
Now, that was a revolutionary movement in art, in painting. When you look
closely you see they put the paint on heavily, and they dabbed it on. It's a very
rough surface. And there is not a line that is straight. There's not a human form
that is carefully formed. There's not a tree that is like any tree I was ever taught to
make in elementary art! Nothing looks like anything in terms of an exact
facsimile. But, when you see the painting, it jumps off the canvas! There is a use
of light which causes, for example, the sun dancing on the ripples of a lake, to
seem as though they are shimmering and moving. The Impressionists really
© Grand Valley State University
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revolutionized painting. One of my favorite artists (not at all because he's Dutch)
is Vincent Van Gogh, who wasn't accepted at all in his day and died in terrible
poverty. One of his paintings was sold recently for millions of dollars! I hope God
is making it right for him in heaven. His figures are grotesque! If you really study
it closely and just focus on a figure, it's grotesque! But, stand away and you see
that somehow or other the freedom of the artist created a reality far beyond what
any photograph could reproduce!
What we are called to, through the God Who revealed Himself in Jesus Christ, in
the power of the Holy Spirit, is not to live our lives painting by number with the
scrupulosity that makes religion a heavy burden, that binds the human spirit and
makes it all an onerous duty. No, the God we celebrate on Trinity Sunday is the
God Who would set us free! Set us free to live as artists in this grand universe of
His in order that the full potential of our humanity could be exploded and we
could become all that He has intended us to be. He, the Divine Artist, Who has
created us in His image, is calling us to become like Jesus. So, Paul says not in a
crimped and cramped, heavy religion, but face to face with Jesus we are being
transformed by the working of His Spirit within us and we are beginning to take
on the shape and the measure of Jesus Christ in the fullness of our human
experience.
There is no way in the world that I can make that happen for you, or you can
make it happen for me. I said last week on Pentecost I'm always most acutely
aware at this time of the year of both the promise and the impossibility of
preaching. It is like trying to tell you about a vacation that you didn't experience
and that just turned me on; like trying to tell you about a retreat experience that
energized me and excited me that I can't possibly communicate; like trying to tell
you in rational discourse what it means to be dizzily in love. But, maybe as we
talk about it, as we sense that it is God's purpose for us to have us blossom forth
into beautiful human beings, maybe at least we'll be clearing the ground and
getting rid of that crotchety idea of religion – form and ritual and law and legality
and condemnation – and see that God loves us with an everlasting love, and He's
gone to the depths of the earth, to Hell itself, to set us free and let us be!
It's like healing. You cut your hand, put salve on it and say that that will heal it.
The salve won't heal it. Salve may cleanse it, may keep it soft, may get rid of the
bacteria. Salve may remove the impediment to healing, but healing is the body's
function; healing is a mystery. The ground can be cleared, but only the body can
heal itself, because there is a healing, recuperative power within the body, which
is there by the grace of God Who made us.
So with our human spirit. So with the transformation of our lives. Here and there
it happens. Now and again. It happens most often when we're looking for it, when
we're thirsting for it, when we're in the place where God has promised to meet us.
To be transformed into the likeness of Jesus comes about more readily if we're
gazing into his face. That is, if the portrait of Jesus painted for us by the great
© Grand Valley State University
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Richard A. Rhem
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Impressionists, the Gospel writers, is always playing through our being; if we
sense the mastery with which he lived, the devotion, the commitment, the
communion, the compassion, the love, the grace, the beauty of who he was, and
with an openness and a prayer that his Spirit will be effecting that in us. It does
happen, from splendour to splendour, from degree to degree - people moving
toward the realization of God's purpose, which is conformity to Jesus Christ.
Michelangelo was commissioned by Pope Julius II, who was not the finest Pope
in Church history. He had a great ego and a desire to have the grandest tomb in
Rome. Michelangelo was commissioned to sculpt some huge, gigantic, heroic
figures that would be a part of his tomb. Michelangelo was his own person as well
as Julius, and they got into an argument. The tomb never happened, and some of
the figures that Michelangelo was working on can be seen in Florence, Italy in the
same place as his statue of David. The huge blocks of granite are still there, and
the figures are beginning to emerge. There's been enough chiseling and sculpting
so that you can see what the figure was going to be. They are heroic figures, and
you can see them as though they are trying to get out of the block! Get free from
the granite! Free to move! Free to be human! They are called "The Prisoners."
Many of us, much of our lives, are prisoners. There are stages in our lives when
we'd like to just kick it all over and find freedom. We'd like to divest ourselves of
every form of human control, every human bondage, every responsibility and
obligation and find freedom. The French Existentialist Jean Paul Sartre spoke
about that kind of freedom, and he was a nihilist. That means one ends up where
nothing means anything. That is a possible end of freedom, understood as
autonomy. Some of us give it a shot once in a while, but it never fulfills its
promise. But the freedom that the Spirit engenders is not a freedom just to do
whatever we want, but freedom to become what we were intended to be. Icons of
Jesus, that's the Greek word, icons of Jesus reflecting his beauty from the inside
out. That's really who we are - the beauty of Jesus, our Elder Brother, shining
through us. Transfixed, face to face in freedom.
Let us pray.
God, our Father, give us a taste for that high purpose for which you have made us
and to which you call us, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
© 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
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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>
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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>
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English
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Sound
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KII-01
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1981-2014
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audio/mp3
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Event
Trinity Sunday
Series
Until We Take the Shape of Christ
Scripture Text
II Corinthians 3:17-18
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/.
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KII-01_RA-0-19870614
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1987-06-14
Title
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Transfigured: Face to Face in Freedom
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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
The topic of the resource
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
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Sound
Text
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audio/mp3
application/pdf
Description
An account of the resource
A sermon given by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on June 14, 1987 entitled "Transfigured: Face to Face in Freedom", as part of the series "Until We Take the Shape of Christ ", on the occasion of Trinity Sunday, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: II Corinthians 3:17-18.
Experience of God
God's Inclusive Love
Spirit
Transformation
Trinity
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https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/d916475d1810010de6185473f7eb935d.pdf
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PDF Text
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Our Destiny: Conformed to Christ’s Image
From the sermon series: Until We Take the Shape of Christ
Text: Romans 8:11, 29
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
Pentecost Sunday, June 7, 1987
Transcription of the spoken sermon
If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he …will give
life to your mortal bodies also through the Spirit which dwells in you.
Romans 8:11
…predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be
the first-born among many brothers and sisters. Romans 8: 29
On this Pentecost Sunday we inaugurate a brief series of message entitled, "Until
We Take The Shape of Christ." The message was expressed very beautifully in the
song and movement of a moment ago, for it is true of us in our Christian
experience that we are no longer what we were before, nor are we what we yet
will be. We live in that tension between what we were and what we are destined
to be. And what we are destined to be is to be conformed to the image of Jesus
Christ, to be shaped like Jesus Christ. I would like that image to burn into your
minds and consciousness for the next couple of weeks as we reflect on God's
purpose for us who are diverse in so many ways and come from so many different
places and who yet in Jesus Christ are called to a common destiny - to be shaped
like him, to realize in our own human experience the marvelous freedom, the
total confidence, the joy that was present in Jesus Christ, our Lord, who is the
model of what God intends us to be.
Until we take the shape of Christ. We are people in process. We are people on the
way. We are caught in that tension between what we were and what we yet will be
and, in the meantime, we have the assurance that God is with us, for today we
celebrate the gift, the presence of His Spirit. Today on Pentecost we celebrate the
fact that the Eternal God has made Himself known to us in the face of Jesus
Christ and, through the Spirit of Jesus, indwells us, permeating our every pore,
pervasive throughout our world - that God is with us.
© Grand Valley State University
�Our Destiny: Conformed to Christ’s Image
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
Pentecost is the day which brings to my mind more acutely than any other time
the promise and the impossibility of my task. Pentecost is the day in which I
know the impossibility of my task, for I point you to a reality and to an experience
which is beyond the possibility of knowing and which is beyond the possibility of
defining in rational discourse. There are many things that I could teach you and I
try from week to week to speak in a reasonable and in a rational manner so that
there is a kind of logic and movement and so that the message is understandable,
so that there is some point to it that may be grasped and understood. And yet the
impossibility of preaching is that I point you to an experience that is beyond
knowing. Preaching is the attempt to express the inexpressible, and our attempt
to know God is an attempt to comprehend that which is incomprehensible. There
is no time like Pentecost in which I am more acutely aware of the impossibility of
this task to speak rationally of that which lies beyond reason, to speak reasonably
of that which can only make itself known to us, being apprehended by us beyond
the intellectual grasp of which we are capable.
And yet, Pentecost is also the day when I am aware of the promise of preaching,
because I know that the very God Who is beyond our knowing sometimes takes
the expression which points beyond itself to the inexpressible and creates the
experience of His presence. So, today we stand before the impossibility and the
promise of preaching that points to God in order that God may be experienced
and our lives, thereby, transformed.
Our religious practice is not just a social custom; it is not just a duty and an
obligation. Our search after God, our quest for God is not just a matter of
intellectual knowledge. We long for our lives to be changed, that our
consciousness may be altered, that our inward life may be developed from the
inside out, that we, as persons, may be transformed into the image of Jesus
Christ. And it is God's intention that that human transformation be occurring in
the ongoing experience of our lives - that we may be changed until we take the
shape of Christ.
It is a fascinating idea. The theme runs through the New Testament. A week from
today on Trinity Sunday, we will look at that word from Paul to the Corinthians
when he said that we all reflect as in a mirror the splendour of the Lord. We
reflect as in a mirror the splendour of the Lord. Thus we are transformed into the
likeness, from splendour to splendour. Such is the influence of the Lord Who is
Spirit. And when he was writing to the Church at Galatians with whom he had a
controversy and about whom he cared so deeply, he said at one point, "I am in
travail, labor pains with you over again until you take the shape of Christ." And in
this eighth chapter of Romans, he says that we have been predestined to be
conformed to the image of Christ.
On this Pentecost Sunday I am pointing you to a great biblical truth which is
beyond our comprehension – and beyond my ability to effect in your life, beyond
our human possibility to trigger and to cause to happen. And yet a great mystery
© Grand Valley State University
�Our Destiny: Conformed to Christ’s Image
Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
that through the grace and the power of the living God, does happen and can
happen and will happen. Our human personality will be invaded, penetrated,
permeated by the presence of the Living God Who is Spirit and thus we will be
transformed and moved on the way until, finally, we take the shape of Jesus
Christ. We are no longer what we have been, and we are not yet what we will be,
but we are a people in process who are being shaped by the Spirit of God more
and more to reflect Jesus Christ, our Lord.
I stand before an impossible task, and yet I keep doing it because of the promise
of Pentecost. In preaching, one is always pointing beyond one’s possibility to a
mystery that now and again, here and there, in this one and in that, erupts into
the fullness of the presence of God.
A couple of weeks ago when I visited my son Joseph at his headquarters I saw
what I expected to find - total chaos. There were computers all over the place,
some of them were all together, some of them looked as though they had
disgorged their bowels. There were computer chips and wires and cables and
pieces and parts sprinkled liberally with empty Diet Coke cans and unwashed
coffee cups. The scene of frantic activity in the midst of a setting that would make
a mother cry. And as I saw it all, I thanked God that now my life is nearly over
and I think I will escape having ever to touch one. But, as I looked at the bowels
of the computer with their circuitry and all of their mystery, I said to myself, "If
my life depended on it, I could master this technology. If my life depended on it,
and I were willing to give the time and the energy to it, I could come to
understand the computer inside and out." Being as old as I am, now in the
springtime of senility, I don't even have to face that problem. But, I know that
that mystery which is so terrifying to all of us who were born before 1950 - that
mystery can be handled. That knowledge can be harnessed. It would be possible
for all of us in this room, given the time and the energy and the instruction to
master the mystery of the computer. Because finally there is no mystery. Finally it
is reducible to the laws of electricity and whatever else is involved in the physics
of that phenomenon.
Son Joseph is fortunate because he deals with a mystery that is solvable. His
father is not so fortunate, because he deals with a mystery that will always elude
him. And so, one is destined to face that impossibility. But on Pentecost, the
possibility, the promise that God will make Himself known, that we will
apprehend what we cannot comprehend, that we will catch what we simply
cannot research and master, that God, the Living God, will be present to us
changing us, shaping us after the image of Jesus Christ.
As we embark on that effort we are not left in a vacuum as though God has not
spoken, as though there is no place to turn, as though we might just close our
eyes in a vacuum and have something hit us or strike us or dawn upon us. What
we are about as we look to that mystery is involved with a great tradition, with
data that we can look at, that we can think about and reflect upon and believe in.
© Grand Valley State University
�Our Destiny: Conformed to Christ’s Image
Richard A. Rhem
Page 4
In the eighth chapter of Romans and the 11th verse, for example, we have Paul
pointing to those events in our history that we have just so recently celebrated.
He says there that if the Spirit Who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in us, then
the Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead will also enliven our mortal bodies. And
if you would read that text carefully, you would find all jumbled up God, Spirit,
Jesus. If you read the New Testament carefully you will find that Paul is
indiscriminate in his designation of the active presence of God in our midst.
Sometimes he talks about the Spirit of God, sometimes he talks about the Spirit
of Jesus, sometimes the Spirit of Christ Jesus, sometimes the Holy Spirit,
sometimes just the Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not a person apart from God, but
simply the presence and the power of God active, here and now. And what Paul is
saying in that 11th verse, which is the joy of our Pentecost celebration, is that as
we have just celebrated the Easter glory and life from the dead in Jesus Christ
effected by the Spirit, that same Spirit of God is present and available to us to
move us from mortality to immortality, from death to life, to enliven us.
As we quest and thirst for experience of God, it is not as though there is not some
hard data for us to look at and to be exposed to and to open ourselves up to. Paul
is saying that something has happened in our history - God raised Jesus from the
dead. God raised Jesus from the dead by Spirit, by breath. And that breath of God
that raised Jesus is the breath of God that makes us alive. If we are in Christ, we
have the Spirit - that's the promise. We have to take God at His word. We have to
trust that, as we have entrusted our life to Jesus Christ, that the Spirit of Christ
dwells in us, making us alive, giving us new life, getting us underway, moving us
toward that high destiny which is to be shaped, conformed according to the
image of Christ.
There is a tradition then, there is a biblical tradition, there is a story of the action
of God through Jesus Christ our Lord. And as we hear that, as we open our lives
to that, it is that story that becomes a vehicle, the message through which God
dawns upon us and His grace is experienced.
Perhaps the most important book published this year, and the most critical look
at America's society in a long time is the book, The Closing of the American
Mind, by Allen Bloom of the University of Chicago. It is an especially close look at
the college and university generation and the work that colleges and universities
are doing. It's a very frightening analysis of the loss of clear thinking and philosophical understanding in our academic centers. He was at Cornell in the 60s
when the students came and took over the administration and the campuses
generally went wild, and his comment is that the students, through their
rebellion, gained freedom of speech, only to find that they had nothing to say!
Now, we who are in the Christian tradition don't just babble on in a vacuum.
There are certain data that is the raw material, the exposure to which puts us in
the place where we might suddenly feel a fire in the belly and the dawning of life
and the experience of God. Paul says the God Who raised Jesus from the dead
© Grand Valley State University
�Our Destiny: Conformed to Christ’s Image
Richard A. Rhem
Page 5
dwells in us by His Spirit, bringing life to our mortal bodies, in order to move us
on the way to that high destiny which is ours. He says we know that all things, all
of the ingredients of our lives, God works together for the good of those who love
Him, those who are called according to His purpose. God knew His own before
ever they were, and predestined that they should be conformed to the image of
Christ in order that Jesus might be the elder brother with many brothers and
sisters in the family of God.
Pentecost is about the presence of God, the Living God, full of Grace, here to
transform us, to change us so that we can sing, "We're no longer what we were,
nor are we what one day we shall be, but we are a people on the way," the most
mature of us but a babbling infant. And yet, even a babbling infant is beginning to
learn the language that one day will open the richness of all of history and the
promise of heaven.
If the Spirit by which God raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, then that
Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead will enliven you, will bring life to your
mortal body, and you will be on the way, all the ingredients of your life working
together for the realization of that purpose which is God's for you, that you might
be shaped in the image of Jesus Christ.
Pentecost is the day of that great freedom and liberty of the children of God.
Pentecost is that day when we break loose and celebrate our freedom, and
celebrate our trust in the goodness of life and the future that God has for us. The
Church of Jesus Christ has become, in its institutional form, the most
conservative institution in the world. We had the graduates here at the first
service, and as I saw them sitting before me, I realized what we do to the younger
generation. We try to hold them down. We try to save them from all the pitfalls
that we experienced. Believing in their potential and loving them so deeply, we
would like so much to be able to guide them in very narrow tracks for the
ultimate realization of their full humanity. But, of course it doesn't work that way.
The Church has become a very conservative institution. There are those who
don't even want to be a part of the Church, but who believe that the Church is
important because it's the glue of society and keeps the chaos at bay.
But, haven't we come a long way from Pentecost, when the Wind of God swept
through the upper room, when those disciples were absolutely consumed by the
fire in their belly, when they went out in their generation to turn the world upside
down? Haven't we tamed the beast? Haven't we domesticated the Spirit? Haven't
we sought to bring God down and fit Him into a neat little box, tied up with a
ribbon, so we can say, "There, we can handle that. We can control that. We can
manipulate this mysterious power." Not so. God is Spirit! God is alive! God is in
the business of human transformation. God says to us, "Turn over the traces!
Break out! Break loose! Open your life to a mystery beyond yourself!" Allow Him
to realize through you all of the potential with which you were created, because
you were created in the very image of God! You have been destined to be
© Grand Valley State University
�Our Destiny: Conformed to Christ’s Image
Richard A. Rhem
Page 6
conformed to the image of Jesus, and so open yourself to the Living God Who,
here and now, even in a moment like this, in a setting like this, can somehow or
other break through to us, illumining our minds with that which we cannot grasp,
but which we can sense.
A very important sentence which has always stayed with me from Rudolph Otto is
this: "The experience of God is the feeling that remains when the concept fails." A
sermon can only deal in concepts. Rational discourse can only point beyond itself,
and then it is that we all stand helpless, waiting, waiting, waiting 'til God makes
Himself known to us, and there is a surplus of meaning beyond the content of the
concept. Pentecost is the promise that there will be a feeling that will remain
when the concept fails. Open yourself to the transformation of the Spirit, as the
Living God would turn you inside out and shape you into the image of Christ, that
you might know the fullness of being fully human, fully alive.
Let us pray.
O Holy Ghost,
come down from heaven's height, give us Thy light.
O Father of the poor,
all gifts to us are Thine. Within us shine.
O Comforter beyond human comforting,
O Stranger sweet, our hearts await Thy feet.
In passion, Thou art peace,
rest for our laboring, our cooling spring.
O Solace of our tears,
upon the secrets of our sins and fears,
pour Thy great light.
Apart from Thee,
we have no truth unfamed, no good unstained.
Our hearts are dry.
O River, flow Thou through the parched ground.
Quicken those near to die.
Our hearts are hard. O bend them to Thy will, Eternal Lord,
to go Thy way.
Thy sevenfold power
give to Thy faithful folk who bear Thy yoke.
Give strength to endure,
and then to die in peace
and live forever in Thy blessedness,
through Jesus Christ, our Lord.
Amen.
(Prayer of Stephen Langdon, Archbishop of Canterbury, c. 1200)
© 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
Series
Until We Take the Shape of Christ
Scripture Text
Romans 8:11, 29
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
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
KII-01_RA-0-19870607
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1987-06-07
Title
A name given to the resource
Our Destiny: Conformed to Christ's Image
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 June 7, 1987 entitled "Our Destiny: Conformed to Christ's Image", as part of the series "Until We Take the Shape of Christ", on the occasion of Pentecost, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: Romans 8:11, 29.
Experience of God
Mystery
Pentecost
Presence of God
Worship