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A Family Christmas Prayer
Richard A. Rhem
Christmas, 2013
O God,
Mystery beyond us,
Mystery within us,
Sacred Presence enveloping our lives
in all that is good and true and beautiful,
we are gathered here in this home
we have loved for over 30 years
as a family first formed forty-one years ago
on Christmas.
We remember the little church,
the tree, the poinsettias, the reception at the Brysons
in their warm and lovely home
and can hardly believe
we have shared forty-one Christmases as a family,
grown from eight to twenty-six –
a family we treasure,
so warm, so caring –
simply Love embodied.
Today we welcome Robbie into the embrace of this family
as he and Sarah dream a future together.
And today Richard is in the circle,
having been given a place in Dan and Susan’s family,
welcomed by Dani, Sarah and Sam.
Gathered here,
we hold in our hearts those absent from us:
Katie, Jonathan and Brenda, Joseph and family.
How blessed we are.
In these moments, O God,
we know that the Christmas story is true.
It goes to the heart
of what is truly human, truly divine –
Love and Joy and Peace,
the Light that scatters the darkness,
a vision of an alternative world
that can find expression in nothing less than
a choir of angels singing,
“Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace.”
�Once a year this annual festival calls us
to stop, to reflect,
to penetrate the mists of our muddled thinking,
so caught up with matters of only passing concern,
to see what is truly ultimate,
what truly matters,
what is finally true –
that vulnerability invites trust,
that humility invites embrace,
that love begets love.
O God,
we worship and adore
in the Presence of the Christmas Babe.
Amen.
�
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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
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
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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English
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Sound
Text
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KII-01
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1981-2014
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audio/mp3
text/pdf
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A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Event
A Prayer at a Rhem Family Gathering
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RA-1-20131225
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2013-12-25
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Text
Title
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A Family Christmas Prayer
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Richard A. Rhem
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eng
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An account of the resource
Prayer created, delivered, or published by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on December 25, 2013 entitled "A Family Christmas Prayer", on the occasion of A Prayer at a Rhem Family Gathering. Tags: Prayer, Christmas, Family, Presence of God, Love.
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application/pdf
Christmas
Family
Love
Prayer
Presence of God
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PDF Text
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A Tale of Three Cities
From the Advent Series: God in the Mirror of Christmas
Micah 5:2-5a; Revelation 19:1-6; Matthew 2: 1-6, 16-18
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
Advent II, December 9, 2001
Transcription of the spoken sermon
Advent 2001 would be similar in some respects to Advent 1941, for we celebrated
on Friday sixty years of the attack on Pearl Harbor, which would have been the
crisis of the world at the time that Advent was celebrated in ‘41, and once again,
our world is in crisis in this 2001 Advent season. It is a season in which we are
particularly thoughtful about history, about the calendar of God, about where
things are and whether or not there is something going on which is more than
meets the eye.
I remember a story told me by Bruce Thielman, who is a pastor of the First
Presbyterian Church of Pittsburgh, a great pulpit historically, who had a great
preacher of a former generation, Clarence McCartney. Bruce Thielman said he
was rummaging around in the attic of old First Presbyterian, Pittsburgh, one day
and he came across some sermons, including the sermon that McCartney
preached on the 14th of December in 1941 and he said from reading the sermon
there would have been not the slightest hint that the world was in crisis, which
perhaps is a symbol of the oftentimes irrelevancy of the pulpit.
Certainly in Advent we cannot escape contemplating the meaning of the events
that have pressed in upon us because it is the theme of this season of the year
when we particularly wonder about the course of human history and the
engagement of God in that history. The Christian faith inherited that concern
about history from the womb of Judaism from which it emerged, for the Hebrew
prophets are credited with causing the world to think historically, to think in
terms of beginning and process and consummation.
The prophets lived by a dream. I don’t know what it was, call it the inspiration of
the Spirit of God, call it the intuition of a particularly blessed people who were
living as a very small and beleaguered people through most of their existence, but
in any case, the Hebrew prophets had a magnificent dream of an alternative
world. You remember that dream - of a world of human wellbeing, when the lion
© Grand Valley State University
�A Tale of Three Cities
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
and the lamb would lie down together and they would not hurt or destroy in all
God’s holy mountain, that dream of shalom.
The early Jesus Jewish movement, of course, were the children of that dream,
that dream which was so powerful in its provision of hope for a people who had
suffered so much and so long, and there were those in the early movement, the
Jesus movement, who said certainly this one, Jesus, was the designate of God. He
must be the anointed one of whom the prophets spoke. The Hebrew word for
anointed is messiah, of course, and so they were saying this Jesus is the messiah.
That so characterized, so marked Jesus, that he became known as Jesus Christ,
but Christ is simply the Greek word for anointed. Jesus, the anointed, Jesus the
messiah, Jesus the Christ - what the early Church was saying was that that one
the prophets foresaw, that one who would come and bring justice and
righteousness and peace to the earth, that one was none other than Jesus. And so,
the Christian Church came into its future expectation honestly, out of the womb
of its Hebrew mother.
Then, of course, there was a surprise, for that anointed one was crucified. Who
could have thought it? Who could have dreamed it? And yet, the crucified one
they experienced alive in their midst, and they spoke of resurrection. And
certainly, then, this time of Jesus’ absence from them would be a brief interim in
which the good news could be proclaimed, and then certainly, soon, he would
come again. The Book of Revelation from which I read a moment ago ends with,
“Come quickly, Lord Jesus,” and he says, “Behold, I come quickly.” So, the early
Church lived in that expectation of the imminent return of the one who had
come. And the Church’s celebration of Advent historically has been a celebration
of that expectation of the one who came, coming again, and Advent has been
particularly the season in which we have thought about the movement of history
and history’s culmination and history’s end events. And here we have
reinterpreted that coming again, that second coming, so to speak, for we have
come to acknowledge that an imminent return after 2000 years can hardly be
compelling. Certainly that early interpretation of where the world was in the
timeline of God erred, although understandably so.
David Hartman, the rabbi from Jerusalem, has re-interpreted the prophets’
dream, as well, so that that shalom on earth, David Hartman says, is not
necessarily some future time and place, but rather, the critique of every
movement of history. Every human arrangement, every historical arrangement,
every age, every epic, every moment comes under the judgment of that dream of
shalom, and every human arrangement is shown to be inadequate compared to
the intention of God according to the dream of the prophet.
But, here we are in another Advent season, making our way toward Christmas.
What I’d like to do today and for the next couple of weeks is to have us think
about Christmas as a mirror that reflects the nature of God. What kind of a God is
reflected in the mirror of Christmas? From what we know about the event, what
© Grand Valley State University
�A Tale of Three Cities
Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
kind of a God is revealed from the Christmas mystery? Think with me this
morning about A Tale of Three Cities as we reflect on world history, its course,
and perhaps its culmination.
Three Cities: Rome, obviously, the seat of imperial power, a city still today
magnificent as evidenced by its ruins. Rome, who ruled the world as the ancient
world had never been ruled before, ruled by the most powerful empire that the
world had known. The Roman Empire. The Roman Emperor. Imperial Rome, on
top of the world, its empire stretched far and wide, and it held peoples and tribes
in subjection. It was the occupying power at the time of the birth of Jesus.
Luke tells us the story of Jesus in reference to Caesar Augustus, for it was Caesar
Augustus who proclaimed an edict that all the world should be taxed, and that
was the way by which Luke brought Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem for the birth
of Jesus. But, here in this far out province, the lives of people are implicated by
the decree of an imperial ruler who lives in Rome.
Roman law, Roman order - it was a great civilization. There was much to
commend it. It was, perhaps, the finest human arrangement in terms of
government and rule and the ordering of society. Rome, famous for its law,
famous for the magnificent civilization that arose under its aegis. Rome was an
empire not without its own dreams and ideals. After Julius Caesar was
assassinated, there ensued a fifteen-year civil war, a civil war which was bloody,
indeed, but which culminated finally with Octavian coming to Rome in 29 before
Christ as the sole ruler. Before that, the Roman poet, Virgil, had written in his
Fourth Eclogue a tribute to Augustus, Caesar Augustus, who was one declared, on
his birth, as a savior, as a son of God. In 1890, in Asia Minor in a little village,
there was an inscription found, “To Augustus as the Son of God, the Savior of the
World.” Virgil had dreamed about the birth of one who would bring the world
peace, and the Roman world began its new year, subsequently, on the 23th of
September, which was the birth of Octavian who became Caesar Augustus. So,
the Roman calendar was gathered around the birth of this one who was
purported to be son of God. He was the great nephew of Julius Caesar. Julius
Caesar had been elevated to deity. This one was understood as son of God, and
the word savior was applied to him. And so, in 29 before Christ, there is one on
the seat of authority in the Roman empire, one who is understood as son of God,
Savior, a bringer of peace and wholeness to the brokenness of the world.
As I say, Rome, this gigantic empire, was not without its integrity, it was not
without its idealism, it was not without its dream, and yet, it was the super power
of the day and it was committed, above all, to the perpetuation of its preeminence
and power. And so, when it came down to it, it may have a man of peace on the
throne and, incidentally, the first official act of Caesar Augustus was to close the
Temple of Janus, the double-faced god of war, and he dedicated a gigantic altar to
peace, the Augustan Altar of Peace. So, again, it is not as though this people was
without its ideal, its hope and its dream. It is not as though the Roman hierarchy
© Grand Valley State University
�A Tale of Three Cities
Richard A. Rhem
Page 4
did not understand that which was good for humankind. But, when push came to
shove, it was the Roman legions that ruled, and by military might and the power
of the sword, Rome enforced the Roman peace, the Pax Romana. That’s the irony,
isn’t it? This powerful, powerful human institution with high ideals enforced by
the power of the legion and the sword.
I suppose you’re already suspecting that I might suggest that Rome’s situation in
that ancient world 2000 years ago was not so different than our situation in our
world in 2001. We, too, are the world’s one great super power, and we, too, are a
people of a high idealism. There’s a kind of moralistic strain, even in our foreign
policy. We are a people who engage in a military action and are more concerned,
really, about humanitarian aid. All of the ambiguity of our present situation, eh?
A mighty power with high ideals and humane concerns and yet, of course, if we
would be honest, we, too, are a people like Rome whose hands are dirty, with
alliances and coalitions with regimes who are oppressive of their own people, but
good for our own preservation of power and preeminence.
Oh, the world is a messy place, and the human story is full of such ambiguity.
Here we are, the world’s great power, so reflective of Rome in the days of its
glory, struggling, I suppose, with that tension between idealism and real politic,
the rough and tumble of national, international affairs. Ah, 2001 - not so different
than year one.
And there was Jerusalem, of course, a bit of a different situation and yet, also so
reflective of the human situation. There a man named Herod who was both
Jewish and Edomite, so he had Jacob and Esau in his veins – there Herod got
himself into the good graces of Rome and was appointed governor in 47 before
Christ and in 40 before Christ became king, King Herod the Great. And he was
great. We’re told the story of Herod having melted down his own personal gold in
order to buy corn to feed people in time of famine. Another time of crisis, he
remitted the taxes of the people. He was a builder; people came from the ancient
world to examine the glories of Jerusalem, the building projects of Herod the
Great. And Jerusalem was ruled well.
There was the other side of Herod, though. He was a paranoid individual,
ruthless and brutal. Herod had his wife Alexandra and her mother put to death.
When he came to power in 40, when he was crowned king, he had the Sanhedrin
slaughtered just to remove the old guard, so to speak. Another time, 300 court
officials were slaughtered at one fell swoop. He had his own eldest son murdered,
and two others of his sons were murdered. Caesar August said it would be better
to be Herod’s pig than his son. And after his long, long rule, knowing that he had
not endeared himself to the people, he retired to Jericho, knowing he was about
to die, and he had the finest of Jerusalem arrested and imprisoned so that when
he died, they could be put to death, because he said, “When Herod dies, no one
will cry. But, when Herod dies, tears will flow.” There’s a nice fellow for you. That
was Herod the Great.
© Grand Valley State University
�A Tale of Three Cities
Richard A. Rhem
Page 5
Jerusalem. And Herod is so representative of those who are in power, who worry
about keeping power, for when the magi came, inquiring about the birth of a king
because they had seen his star, Matthew tells us that Herod was greatly troubled,
and all Jerusalem was frightened with him. You see, when you have an
established order and when you are on top, you have always to worry about
maintaining that order and preserving your position and your pre-eminence. So,
Herod, this brutal, paranoid ruler, when he realized that the magi had gone home
another way, simply had all the children two years and under slaughtered. We
call it the “Slaughter of the Innocents.” A brutal act for the preservation of power
and the removal of any possible threat to his authority.
And, of course, Jerusalem wasn’t only marked by that kind of civil king, but also
entwined in the ruling establishment of Jerusalem was the Sadducean party, the
high priestly party, and we know from the story of Jesus that when this prophet
made his way and made his point, and proclaimed in the center of Jerusalem that
which he believed to be reflective of the will of God for this people of God, it was
the collaboration of the Herodian party and the Roman government, Pontius
Pilate, that Jesus was killed. So, Jerusalem was that city, too, that knew in all of
its dimensions that vying for earthly power, the political games that people play,
the vying for position and the preserving of preeminence - that was Jerusalem in
the days of the one who was born on Christmas.
I read from the Revelation to give a sense of the biblical story, the outcome of that
kind of power play, for the 19th chapter of Revelation is that from which comes
the Hallelujah Chorus. But, when you read the 19th chapter, you have to be
shaken just a bit because there is such vengeance in that chapter, and what is
being celebrated? Well, it is the devastation and the ending of Rome, called
Babylon, the great harlot, the great whore. Babylon, standing for Rome,
represents in the biblical perspective that whole gamut of human arrangement
that is set on power, and the enforcement of rule by force and military might,
economic domination, all sorts of domination systems, and in the 19th chapter of
Revelation, she is overthrown and the smoke rises and there is this hallelujah
celebration. And there is this great affirmation, “The Lord God Almighty reigns.”
You can understand, perhaps, the vengeance, because this people has suffered. It
has suffered terribly at the hands of imperial power, and so they rejoice in the
dream of that ultimate overthrow because the revelation of John is again in that
biblical tradition that believes finally Almighty God will bring it out right.
It is rather amazing to me, when I realize that that picture is in tension with the
Christmas miracle, because that picture in Revelation is the kind of expression
for that human desire for vengeance, and that human desire for God Almighty to
take charge and to damn the darkness and to establish the righteous. And yet
that’s not at all what I see in the Christmas miracle, because there is a third city –
Bethlehem.
© Grand Valley State University
�A Tale of Three Cities
Richard A. Rhem
Page 6
Micah speaks of Bethlehem, “Least of the tribes of Judah.” Little Bethlehem, from
you will come a ruler and he will be a shepherd to his people, be a man of peace.
Now, you can feel it coming. This is the typical sermon cant. This is the naive
preacher’s talk, because Rome will be overthrown and Jerusalem will be
devastated, but the one who comes out of the poverty and the obscurity of
Bethlehem will be established as the Lord of Lords and the King of Kings. And
yet, that Christmas miracle reveals a God who comes out of the most unexpected
place, and in the most unexpected way, a God who is embodied and reflected in a
human face and, for God’s sake, as a child.
But, do you see what I am trying to put before you? The paradox of the God
reflected in the mirror of Christmas? The God reflected in the mirror of
Christmas is not the God of Revelation’s almighty triumph. The God reflected in
the Christmas mirror is a God of vulnerability, born as a child, become a man,
crucified for God’s sake, crucified violently by the power structures, the human
power structures of this world. The Christmas mirror reflects a God who is
vulnerable, whose supreme revelation is in a human face and in the form of a
child, because the revelation of Christmas at its heart is that human, historical
arrangements will not finally prevail. They will prevail and prevail and persist
and persist, but finally, they all come to nothing. And so, I talk naive preacher
talk this morning, because we all know that finally, it is a power game. Finally,
you can have humanitarian concerns, but the bottom line is still military might
enforcing our will, preserving our position, and yet - Christmas is about a God
who can be crucified, God embodied in a child. And you see, I am aware of how
naive is this talk.
But, remember – Rome fell. Because no matter how strong you are, no matter
how many legions, no matter how many swords, there comes a point in the
human story when you tire of trying to preserve a position of preeminence. There
comes a time in the human story when people worry, weary of protecting
themselves and projecting themselves. There comes a time when every great
power finally fades, sometimes in devastating fashion. And in the meantime,
people have been consumed with the power game, with the preservation of
preeminence and the perpetuation of position. And so, dear friends, 2001. We
have fought the totalitarianism of Fascism under Hitler’s regime and prevailed,
we have outlasted the Communist experiment under the USSR and we have
prevailed, and we are engaged now in a war which will not be won by military
might. We know that, don’t we? And we are a people who are at the top of our
game and we know no people has ever stayed there. And from that third city,
Bethlehem, came one who was like a shepherd, who was a man of peace, and that
really is what Christmas reveals about the nature of God. God is love. Love can be
crucified. Love is vulnerable. Love is patient and kind. And love never fails. Every
other strategy finally will fail. Christmas reveals the God who will prevail –
because love never fails – but who is the opposite of all of our human domination
systems.
© Grand Valley State University
�A Tale of Three Cities
Richard A. Rhem
Page 7
I’d like to have sent you out with a cozy little Christmas message this morning.
Forgive me for that. But, there is enough for you to think about here to disrupt
your whole Advent season.
© 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
Advent II
Series
God in the Mirror of Christmas
Scripture Text
Micah 5:2,3, Matthew 2:3, Revelation 19:2
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-0-20011209
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2001-12-09
Title
A name given to the resource
A Tale of Three Cities
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
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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 December 9, 2001 entitled "A Tale of Three Cities", as part of the series "God in the Mirror of Christmas", on the occasion of Advent II, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: Micah 5:2,3, Matthew 2:3, Revelation 19:2.
Advent
Followers of Jesus
Hebrew Prophets
Love
Nature of God
Shalom
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An Invitation to Life
From the series: A Fresh Look at an Ancient Story
Scripture: Psalm 16:5-11; I Peter 1:3-9,19-29; John 5:1-9 Text: John 5:24
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
Easter Sunday, April 15, 2001
Transcription of the spoken sermon
There is a lot available to you today and tonight on Easter and Jesus - television
specials and programs, one dealing with the face of Christ. Apparently there is an
archeologist that has studied Jewish skulls going back through all the diggings, a
couple of thousand of them, and then a medical artist whose specialty is putting
flesh to bone, and now there is another head of Jesus to compete with Salman's
"Head of Christ," which is so famous in our experience.
Last year the National Catholic Reporter had a contest for the image of Jesus for
the Third Millennium, and the winner was a woman by the name of Janet
MacKenzie who painted an African American woman, and, of course, that caused
a little bit of stir among the faithful. But her point, of course, was Jesus as the
liberator in that image, and what was being conveyed was that there are still
those who need to be freed, liberated. So, there is going to be this long special
about images of Christ tonight.
There is another one, 'The Face of Christ in Art," and in all of these it is
interesting that we should be concerned about it, if we are, because as I reflected
on it in terms of Easter this morning, I was struck by the fact that the important
thing is not what Jesus looked like, but that he was, indeed, human. That is the
critical matter.
I say that in the light of our understanding of the reality of which we are a part. A
cosmic process that they tell us has been going on for some 15 billion years,
perhaps, and that that cosmic process with all of the complexity and all of the
fascination of that development should issue in creatures like us, human beings,
human beings who are conscious and aware, who give the universe a voice,
creatures who are able to reflect on that whole process, and to wonder at it, that
among those human beings there should have been one Jesus, the Christ. Now,
that is amazing. If you want to speak of miracle, that is a miracle, that this
process has eventuated in the human and that, among the humans, there should
have been one Jesus. That is the wonder of it all and that is the critical matter,
© Grand Valley State University
�An Invitation to Life
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
not what he looked like, but that he was genuinely bone of our bone and flesh of
our flesh.
You might have already seen this weekend another television special that is
created by the Coral Ridge Ministries. I have made reference to it an earlier time
when I saw it, perhaps around the Christmas season, about who is this real Jesus.
This is produced by D. James Kennedy, and if you would catch that you will see
that the concern about what Jesus looked like is not evident at all. There is no
concern. But there is a concern and that is the factuality of the resurrection, that
Jesus who was crucified, as a matter of fact, walked out of the tomb. This word
“fact” comes through often. The point is, of course, in this evangelical
understanding of the Easter miracle, that it was Jesus who died as the sin-bearer
for the world, who was raised by God as an indication that that sin offering was
accepted, and, if you would watch that video, it will conclude with the Sinner's
Prayer where you will acknowledge that you are a sinner, that you believe that
Christ died for your sin, and that you ask for forgiveness and claim the promise,
then, of heaven. That, of course, is the old, traditional conception of the
crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. So, you can see that tonight, too, and that
still speaks to millions and millions of people.
I was reminded of the fact that when I went to Europe in 1967 the resurrection
was the hot topic. There had been 100 years of European scholarship in which no
one hardly dared speak about the resurrection. There was still the impact of the
Enlightenment and miracle was not one of the possibilities, and so certainly no
one dared speak about the resurrection of Jesus. But, about the time I got there,
there was a whole class of students who were the students of the great Barth and
Bultmann, and they were beginning to think again and speak again about the
resurrection, and that the New Testament really could not be understood apart
from the resurrection, and their emphasis, what they had hold of, was not like the
Coral Ridge video– Jesus dying for sin and being raised again– but rather, Jesus
being raised in the midst of history as the illuminator of history, and I can
remember how powerful that was at the time. A theologian named Moltmann
spoke about the theology of hope, and there was this whole emphasis on the
resurrection of Jesus as the sign of the future consummation and all of the
promises of God would be realized, and the kingdom of God would come fully
into view. That was an important moment for me, frankly, personally, that
resurrection in the midst of history. In fact, I came back to this congregation in
1971 under false pretenses. They thought I was the same one that left in 1964 but,
anyway, the one thing that I did say to them early on was "Give me Jesus and the
resurrection, and the rest is negotiable."
As I have been thinking about Easter 2001 and this morning, I realize that my
conception of things continues to grow, my sense of God, my appreciation for
Jesus, and my sense of what the whole cosmic drama is about, so that it is not
that sin offering and it is not even the fact that in the midst of history there is a
sign of history's ultimate culmination. As I thought about it, the important thing
© Grand Valley State University
�An Invitation to Life
Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
for me is that life of Jesus, as I said a moment ago, that in the course of this
cosmic process, out of this tapestry of swirling energy there should have arisen,
not only a human being, but one like Jesus. And as I thought about it, I realized
that Easter at one time for me meant the solution to the problem of death, and
the resurrection of Jesus was to be celebrated because it signed the conquering of
death. But, that isn't nearly so important for me today. What is really important
is that life, that life that was lived in the midst of our history, that life that
confronted power with truth, that spoke truth to power, that spoke against all
systems of domination and oppression, that life that revealed the heart of God
full of mercy and compassion, that spoke for justice and equity. Jesus, that
magnificent life - that is the important thing: that he died trusting God, of course,
but that he lived out a vision, the vision of what he believed was the divine
intention. That is the amazing thing to me today.
And then, as I thought about that, the question came: "Well, then, what is
Easter?" Easter is what happened when his followers had the same experience I
did. After the disappointment of his death, the fear and their fading into the
woodwork, they began to come together again, and they said, "My God! He's still
with us. He's alive. He's alive with God, and he is present with us." What they
began to see was that what he was is what God is, and they knew that what he
was, which is what God is, can never finally be defeated, can never finally be
executed, can never finally be rubbed out. For one way or another, in one form or
another, what Jesus was was a reflection of the divine intention. It was a
reflection of that love and that mystery at the heart of things, and you can crucify
it, you can execute it, you can try to put it away, you can stamp it out only so long,
and it rises again. What he was is what God is, the divine Lover, the divine
Intention, the Sacred at the center of things that will not be defeated, that will not
finally be overcome.
That is why we live with an indomitable hope. That is why we have this annual
celebration, this affirmation of faith that all the wonder and the beauty and the
truth, the integrity and the magnificence of that one life can never be overcome,
never be defeated, never finally be put out, for the light will shine in the darkness
and continue to shine, and finally, no matter how dark the abyss, life will return
and Jesus is an invitation to life. You can get all of the images in the scripture,
you can get the Coral Ridge image, you can get the Hope and History image, and
even in John's gospel there is that paragraph back to back, the word of Jesus that
gives life to the dead, some of them the living dead. And in the next paragraph,
the dead in the tomb. It is all there, all of the images are there, all of the scenarios
are there. But, for me, on this Easter, I celebrate Easter because of the life of
Jesus and what he was is what God is, and that is why I follow him. Not because
he died, but because he lived, and when I come to this table, I take bread and cup
in order that I may be in solidarity with him and, taking bread and cup, I receive
that promise that, to the end of the age, he will be with me. The lure of love at the
heart of things came to expression in one Jesus. Now, there's a life and an
invitation to true living.
© Grand Valley State University
�
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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.
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Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Religion
Interfaith worship
Sermons
Sound Recordings
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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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Easter Sunday
Series
A Fresh Look At an Ancient Story,
Scripture Text
John 5:24
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Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI
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2001-04-15
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An Invitation to Life
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Richard A. Rhem
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
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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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Description
An account of the resource
A sermon given by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on April 15, 2001 entitled "An Invitation to Life", as part of the series "A Fresh Look At an Ancient Story, ", on the occasion of Easter Sunday, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: John 5:24.
Divine Intention
Love
Resurrection
Sacred
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/d0bc9ca59dd2adf2dfa6fbadaeb752d9.pdf
ea4c24f74cc086cfe9e800b20bc42720
PDF Text
Text
Face To Face, Now and Then
A Service of Worship
In Celebration of the Life of Norman J. Campbell
(October 7, 1937 to January 20, 2014)
Psalm 16: 5-8, 11; I Corinthians 13: 4-13
Richard A. Rhem
First Congregational Church
Muskegon, Michigan
January 24, 2014
Transcription of the written sermon
Let me begin by expressing my appreciation to First Congregational Church for
giving the honor and privilege of sharing in this celebration of the life of Norman
J. Campbell and to Pastor Tim Vander Haan for graciously allowing me to share
in this service with him. It means a great deal to me to be able to be part of
Norm’s funeral service; he was such a dear friend and for many years one of my
faithful parishioners at Christ Community Church, with Maureen and their
daughters.
Over the past year we were in touch, hoping to go out to lunch. We even had a
date but as the time came had to cancel; Norm’s health continued to deteriorate
and treatments did not have a positive outcome. I think it was December 9 I sat
with him and Maureen and Wendy. He had received the dreaded news – his body
could not tolerate the only measure that might save him. It was a sober moment.
For the first time we spoke of plans for where we are today – celebrating his life,
he having gone on before us.
Shortly before Christmas Nancy and I stopped in. In the course of our
conversation, Maureen said, “Are you going to Florida?” I said, “Yes, only a short
get-away, January 4 to 19.” Then I looked at Norm and said, “and you behave
yourself!” That’s the way it was with us; even pointing to his end we shared a bit
of humor. He was so easy to be with.
Well, we went to Florida and returned last Sunday evening. At 8:00 am Monday,
Maureen called. Norm had breathed his last at 4:52 am. Maureen said, “He knew
you had returned and he could let go.” I found it remarkable. The last week was
very difficult but he held on until he knew all would be in order, thinking not of
himself but his loved ones.
© Grand Valley State University
�Face to Face Now & Then
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
Your presence here attests to what I think would be universally agreed on – This
was a beautiful human being. Being human, he must have had an imperfection or
two but I never detected it. I admired and respected Norm and held him in deep
affection. He was so easy to be with, his wry sense of humor and lightness of
being. And he was always the same – easy, comfortable, natural – even speaking
of what he desired for this service.
From the moment I hear of a death and know I will be bringing the funeral
meditation, I begin to think of the person and the Scriptures. That’s probably a
peculiar preacher’s thing, but I always desire to paint a portrait of the person in
the framework of the biblical story that has shaped us. With someone like Norm
one could go in many directions but finally one must choose the contours of the
character one would paint.
I have chosen two scriptural passages from which to reflect with you on the life of
this one we loved and have lost awhile.
From the Psalms, Psalm 16: 5-8, 11. Psalm 16 is one of my favorites. Beginning
with verse 5, the Psalmist expresses a sense of deep wellbeing.
The boundary lines have fallen to me in pleasant places;
I have a goodly heritage.
He is full of gratitude for his human situation – referring to Israel’s coming into
the land of Israel when the tribes divided the land by casting lots. The Psalmist is
pleased with his human situation. But his wellbeing is rooted in something
deeper.
I keep the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand
I shall not be moved.
In the Hebrew “before me” is literally “before my face.” That being so, he is
steadfast whatever human experience brings him.
His heart is glad;
His soul rejoices.
So confident is he that he cannot conceive of being given up to Sheol – the realm
of the dead. One commentator writes:
It can be read as the general prayer of the faithful who, without any
doctrine of resurrection or eternal life to explain just how, nonetheless
trust the Lord to keep them with such total confidence that they cannot
imagine a future apart from life in God’s presence. (James L. Mays,
Interpretation: Psalms, p. 88)
Again the Psalmist exclaims,
© Grand Valley State University
�Face to Face Now & Then
Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
You show me the path of life.
In Your presence there is fullness of joy;
in Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.
Were we to read this poem in the original Hebrew we would see a beautiful
juxtaposition. In verse 8, as noted above, “before me” is literally “before my face.”
In verse 11, “in Your presence” is literally “before Your face.”
God before my face;
I before God’s face.
Further, God at my right hand keeps me secure. At God’s right hand are pleasures
forevermore.
The Psalmist lived with a vivid sense of God’s presence. That awareness kept him
steady in all the vicissitudes of life. That sense of trust was so strong even the fear
of death, of loss, was transcended. He lived with fullness of joy. He was present to
the presence of God.
You must sense why I would select such a scripture when thinking of Norm – He
lived with God before his face – with a God-consciousness woven into his being
from a child, and it made him steady, strong and confident.
Like the Psalmist, God-consciousness made him a rock, gave him a place to stand
and not be moved.
My second text is Paul’s Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 13, verses 4-13. Often
called Paul’s Hymn of Love, it is familiar and beloved. Verses 4 to 7 give love’s
marks, its aspects –
Kind, not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its
own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing,
but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all
things, endures all things.
Comment is hardly needed; Love’s portrait is Norm’s portrait, is it not? That is
simply who he was – Love embodied.
But the passage goes on –
Love never ends.
And then St. Paul speaks of our human situation. What called forth this beautiful
portrait of Love was the situation in the Corinthian congregation. There seemed
to be a game going on regarding who possessed the greatest spiritual gifts. And
Paul does not put those gifts down even though they are causing division in the
congregation. Instead he says,
© Grand Valley State University
�Face to Face Now & Then
Richard A. Rhem
Page 4
…I will show you a still more excellent way.
And that way is the way of Love, a way he contrasts with the various spiritual gifts
that were competing with each other in Corinth. Paul writes, “Love never ends.”
But that is not so for the other gifts – prophetic gifts, the gift of speaking in
tongues, knowledge, prophecy – they are limited and will come to an end.
But not Love.
Paul compares the present state of the congregation at Corinth to that of
childhood, using himself as an example.
When I was a child, I spoke like a child,
I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child;
when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.
And then he comes to the point I want to make in regard to our beloved Norm.
For now we see in a mirror dimly
but then we will see face to face.
Now I know only in part; then I will know fully,
even as I have been fully known.
There you have it – Face to Face Now and Then.
Norm knew the Psalmist’s secret – The Lord before my face, rock solid,
unmovable, steady, deep assurance. He knew as well that all he knew and
experienced were partial, in process, a dim glimpse of the Ultimate Mystery.
But for him all he glimpsed dimly has come into sharp focus – now he sees fully,
clearly, for he sees “face to face.”
Face to face – for us who grieve, in trust we see but only dimly – our “now” sees
in faith. We long for the “Then” of full vision but, in the meantime, we are
confident that our beloved Norm sees clearly and is lost in wonder, love and
grace.
Face to face in the Presence in fullness of joy.
Well done, good and faithful servant!
© 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
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>
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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
A resource primarily intended to be heard. Examples include a music playback file format, an audio compact disc, and recorded speech or sounds.
Event
Funeral Service for Norman Campbell
Scripture Text
Psalm 16: 5-8, 11, I Corinthians 13: 4-13
Location
The location of the interview
First Congregational Church, Muskegon, Michigan
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KII-01_RA-0-20140124
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2014-01-24
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Face to Face, Now and Then
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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>
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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
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Text
Description
An account of the resource
A sermon given by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on January 24, 2014 entitled "Face to Face, Now and Then", on the occasion of Funeral Service for Norman Campbell, at First Congregational Church, Muskegon, Michigan. Scripture references: Psalm 16: 5-8, 11, I Corinthians 13: 4-13.
Format
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application/pdf
Funeral
Love
Presence of God
Trust
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/d97c24fd462fe79bf66c65813cf8428d.pdf
9e467acb12c4513d6e3c141e6a3a20d3
PDF Text
Text
God, Humanity and Cosmos
From the sermon series on the Cosmos
Text: Psalm 8: 4-5
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
November 15, 1981
Transcription of the spoken sermon
What is man that thou art mindful of him, …dost care for him? Yet thou hast
made him a little less than God. Psalm 8: 4-5
Through a happy coincidence, this was an exciting week in the old U.S. of A. as
we once again accomplished a great triumph of science and technology, sending
into space again our Spaceship Columbia, watching it blast off with all of the
drama of those moments, and then, in order that we might report its safe return
this morning, the mission was shortened, and they came back yesterday. Exciting,
really, isn't it? And doesn't it boggle the mind to think about the human potential,
to think about what human intelligence is able to effect? Isn't it amazing, really,
when you contemplate the nature of such events? Truly it is thrilling. Yet we
become so easily accustomed to the dramatic and the sensational. If we were to
tell our forefathers that these things were happening, they wouldn't believe it.
They would say it was impossible. At best they might say, "Well, it's a miracle."
Well, it is a miracle, in a sense. But in another sense, it is simply that the human
mind has been able to probe the secrets of reality in order to accomplish a
mission like that and continue the exploration of the cosmos.
I kidded about them bringing the spacecraft home early so that we would know
this morning that they were successful, but, as a matter of fact, that decision was
made, though not for that reason. As I was thinking about Psalm 2 and the
psalmist's reflection upon the cosmos and then upon himself, who he was in
relationship to God, I thought that decision was a rather nice illustration of the
second Psalm, for a choice was made in favor of human life over the probing of
the cosmos. If the psalmist was impressed with the cosmos, then how much more
you and me? If he was impressed with what he could see, which was but an
infinitesimal fragment of what there is, if he was impressed with his smallness
over against the vastness of space and the eons of time, which are becoming more
and more clear to us, then how much more must we be impressed with our
smallness and our insignificance? And yet, when one of the three fuel cells of that
spacecraft failed, a decision had to be made as to whether to let the mission run
its course, or to bring it home early. Two fuel cells were enough to allow the
© Grand Valley State University
�God, Humanity and Cosmos
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
mission to take its full run. But then, down to two, if one should fail, the mission
and human life would be in jeopardy. And so, at headquarters, discussion was
held and the decision was made. They came home early, even though involved
were scores and scores of people, and millions and millions of dollars and all of
that which is at stake. They brought that mission home early because in this
nation, standing in the biblical tradition, we know the value and the sanctity of
human life. And when it comes to taking a risk and succeeding with a few more
scientific experiments, but placing at the same time, human life in jeopardy, there
is really no question, because we know in the face of space's immensity and time's
ever-rolling stream, that there is still one thing that counts supremely, and that is
a human being.
Now that is really the same kind of conclusion that the psalmist came to. On the
one hand, he said,
Lord, when I consider the heavens, the moon and the stars which you
have ordained, what is man that you are mindful of him? And the son of
man, that you care for him?
He felt his smallness and his insignificance. He was overwhelmed by the
immensity of the heavens overhead, and he recognized that his days were but a
brief span of time. His littleness in the vastness of it all gave him such a sense of
insignificance and smallness.
As I said, if he felt small, how about us? We have to say that in our own day there
have been a lot of people who have been unable to move with the modern
conception of the universe and maintain a faith in God the Creator. The psalmist
had a correct intuition. I mean, who are we, really, when you think of it? Fifteen
to twenty billion years in the process, and now we are here, threescore years and
ten, perhaps. Why, our lifespan is a blink of the eye. And when you realize, as Carl
Sagan says in his book, Cosmos, that the earth is a speck of dust, circling a
humdrum star, our sun - just an average old humdrum star - you begin to realize
the vastness of the cosmos. We are on a speck of dust circling a humdrum star in
a corner of an insignificant galaxy; and if we are on but a speck of dust in the
vastness of space, so are our days but an instant in the eons of time. When you
really stop to think about it, I mean when you really stop to contemplate it, can
you still believe that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth?
You see, there have been many of our contemporaries who have not been able to
make that move and that adjustment. We have opened up the mysteries of the
cosmos, and it is a most exciting day in which to be alive. But what has to happen
is not only that the cosmos expands before our eyes, but our conception of God
must grow commensurately. As J.B. Phillips wrote so many years ago, Your God
Is Too Small.
We have to admit, too, that in the Church we have not been very good at helping
people to make this adjustment.
© Grand Valley State University
�God, Humanity and Cosmos
Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
In the most recent issue of Science '81, an excellent magazine which was placed in
my hands, there is a centerfold on Creationism – Creationism as opposed to
Evolutionism, and all of the controversy that is being stirred up by the
fundamentalist wing of the Christian Church today. It recounts how several states
have gone to court to get equal time for the doctrine of Creation in their schools.
It is a very interesting development. This is a science magazine. And in this report
it was stated what we have been saying here over and over again, that all of the
scientific investigation of the cosmos, whether in biology or physics or geology or
in whatever field - all of these investigations really do not impinge upon whether
or not God created the heavens and the earth, and whether or not I can still
believe that this is my Father's world. That really isn't at issue. But the problem
with the fundamentalist wing of the Church that is stirring up all this controversy
is that it is creating, once again, that overagainstness with science, and that
mindset in much of the Christian Church that there is something destructive to
faith in all of this explosion of knowledge in the natural sciences. That is tragic.
We do ourselves a great disservice.
If you feel good when you see some television evangelist pounding the pulpit and
talking in terms of creation over against a godless, atheistic evolutionism, don't
clap, because he is not on your side, if you are on the side of God and Truth. That
is a false distinction, that is a false antithesis, and it is deadly. It is deadly because
it offends the best minds and the best spirits, and it creates the illusion that to be
a Christian you have to take off your head, shut down your mind and refuse to
survey the vast amount of data that is there for anyone with any common sense.
We can't play that game any longer. We have to admit that what the psalmist saw,
the immensity of the universe and the eons of time and all of this which has
become even more clear to us will necessitate an adjustment of our
understanding of God.
We simply cannot have this neat, secure little world, little planet Earth and our
few thousands of years and our literal, biblical account of things, because, you
see, the biblical writers were not writing physics, were not writing biology, were
not talking about geology. The writers of the Bible thought that this was a threestory universe, with heaven above and the waters under the earth. God didn't
whisper in their ears and give them some revelation of the mysteries of physics.
This is not a science textbook, and you cannot find out about the process of the
created order, you cannot find out about the stages which have brought us to this
present point by going to the scriptures. The only thing the scriptures will tell
you, and of course the only thing that really matters, is that in the beginning was
God, and that He will be in the end, and that He is with us in the meantime.
When the psalmist looked up and thought, "Oh my goodness, I'm not much,"
then how much more we, and we simply have to recognize that we need to do
some readjusting because, as a matter of fact, this old, cosmological, evolutionary
process has been going on for a long, long time. There is no doubt about that. And
it has been following a course of natural development which now is more and
© Grand Valley State University
�God, Humanity and Cosmos
Richard A. Rhem
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more understood, with many mysteries still to be unraveled, but which will be
unraveled. We live in a day which is right at the crest of a breakthrough that will
continue to explode and explode and explode all around us. The more we learn,
the more access we have to deeper mysteries, and when you saw Columbia come
in and land right on the second and right on the line, that is simply a sign and a
finger pointing beyond itself to the most fantastic dreams that are even now
welling up in human hearts and minds. Never say never! Because before you die,
it will have happened.
But the psalmist had another insight, and that is the critical insight, for he not
only experienced his smallness and his insignificance, but he went on to say,
"Thou hast created him a little less than God. Thou hast crowned him with glory
and honor. Thou hast given him dominion over the whole created order." That is
the biblical insight. That is the significant fact. That is the uniqueness of being
human. That is the religious issue, for it doesn't really matter how long it's been
going on, and it doesn't really matter how vast the immensity of space. The fact is
that we are here now at this point in the process, and we are human. The psalmist
recognized that there is something about being human which is nearly divine.
And if I were to put it in a sentence, I would say to you this morning that the
message is simply this - You are really something. That's the biblical message.
We may be impressed with distance, and we may be impressed with age, but what
we really ought to stand in awe before is the mystery of being human, the wonder
of what it is to be man and woman, created in the image of God, for what the
psalmist was saying here when he said, "Thou hast made him a little less than
God," was what the writer of the Genesis account was saying when he said, "God
created man and woman in His own image." God created a creature over against
himself and made him almost divine. He created a creature with selfconsciousness and with a measure of freedom and self-determination, and with
responsibility and the opportunity to fall in worship and adoring praise before the
Creator of it all.
You are really something! To be human is the greatest mystery reflecting the
deepest majesty of the whole cosmological process.
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? Yet thou hast made
him little less than God, and dost crown him with glory and honor. Thou
hast given him dominion over the works of thy hands… Psalm 8: 3-6
We are created to be the co-laborers with God, partners with God in this creative
process. We are endowed with gifts, with human potential, and we have the
powers and the ability to reflect the divine image. We can think His thoughts
after Him, and we can enter into His creative activity, and with the things that
have already been accomplished through the exercise of human intelligence, who
© Grand Valley State University
�God, Humanity and Cosmos
Richard A. Rhem
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would dare say what the frontier finally would be? You are really something, and
good religion will affirm human personality.
Now, we need to hear that in the Church, too, don't we, because for too long we
have spoken disparagingly of human personality. Nothing I say this morning
would in any way detract from the fact which we have faced honestly that there is
something desperately wrong with us all and we fall short of the glory of God.
There is a meanness about us and a contrariness; someone, somewhere has
thrown a wrench in the works, and man's inhumanity to man is given eloquent
testimony from beginning to end. But in the Church, so often that is where we
have left it. We talk about our misery and fail to talk about our grandeur. We talk
about our fallenness and fail to take in the destiny to which we have been called.
God has dealt with our sin, and by His grace, calls us to realize our destiny and to
develop the full potential with which he has endowed us, and to reflect the divine
image. You are really somebody. You reflect God. You were created in His image,
a little less than Him, and He has created us in order to be in relationship with
Him, to live in communion, and to live not only in communion with Him, but in
communion one with another, and in interpersonal relationships where there is
love and care and forgiveness and grace. There is a little bit of heaven. God and
His creature, living in fellowship and communion, one with another and with
Him, define the ultimate miracle and the meaning of the whole process.
Now, that is terribly important to affirm and it ought to make you feel really good
about yourself, because you really are somebody. You have potential untapped,
you have gifts yet undreamed of, you have possibilities without limit. You are
almost divine, and God calls us to that upward way more and more to respond to
that destiny for which he has shaped us, to be prepared for the future that He has
for us.
Now, when you watch Carl Sagan on Cosmos, be enrapt with him in the
excitement of exploring the mysteries of the physical world. And I affirm that,
and I love it, and when you study it, as I have more and more, you are so
impressed with the simplicity on the other side of complexity. The complexity of
the cosmos and humankind seems so apparent. But once the smoke has cleared
there appears a simplicity in the created order. All of us and all matter is made up
of the same building blocks, the same atoms, the same fundamental elements,
whether here on planet Earth or the moon or Jupiter or the sun or your beating,
human heart. Everything, being composed of very simple and fundamental
elements, seems to reflect a divine intelligence which can hardly be conceived of.
But when you watch Carl Sagan and he begins to suggest that that process that
has moved through all of the eons of time and all of that evolutionary process to
the present moment is purposeless, the product of chance, when he begins to
suggest that you are the latest and highest expression, and that there is no one
beyond, then don't you believe him, for then he is no longer a scientist; then he is
in the sphere of religion. He suggests that maybe the universes are not the
© Grand Valley State University
�God, Humanity and Cosmos
Richard A. Rhem
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dreams of God, but rather, that God may be the dream of man. He is saying that
we have come to this point and then we have simply projected out, beyond
ourselves the God that we wish were there.
When he begins to talk that way, he has lost me. Then he has said that I am
simply the consequence of all of that process of development having really no
freedom and no unique spiritual character, related to all that went before but
missing completely that relationship to Him Who is beyond and above. Then I
know that he has missed the ultimate truth. Nothing that he says about our
relationship to the cosmos is in any way in conflict to that relationship we have
with a God Who spoke and called it into being. But to deny that God and to end
up here is to leave me alone without a home and without meaning. Human
existence, then, is the chance result of spontaneous reactions along billions of
years. His explanation for the first development of life is that in a primeval soup
one cell got the ability to reproduce itself and then through billions of years,
organizing by perhaps a light ray striking a cell and causing a change, a mutation,
and finally organizing and gathering and getting more and more complex, until
finally one glob of cells woke up and said, "Well, here I am." Now, that takes faith
to believe.
When we contemplate what it is to be human, then we need not deny that whole
process. But to me, it makes far more sense to believe that in the beginning there
was an Intelligence that said, "Let there be..." with a purpose, and a purpose of
love that moved the process to a point at which one day there was someone who
looked into the face of God and experienced relationship, communion.
For finally, what is ultimate and what is important?
At NASA this week they made a decision, and a correct decision, for there is really
nothing in the whole cosmos, there is no experiment, there is no technological
breakthrough so important and so pressing that it would be worth placing in
jeopardy one human life, one human life that knows itself as free and in
relationship, able to love and to care.
A couple of weeks ago when Nancy and I were at Mayo's, we did a lot of sitting
and waiting for our names to be called. You watch a lot of people and a lot of
people in various states of difficulty and need. It's always obvious when, for
example, a son or a daughter has brought an aged parent, maybe in a wheelchair
or helping them along to the desk. You think a lot about people and you watch
them. Nancy was telling me about two old gentlemen, the one helping the other,
hobbling along, finally getting to the desk because his name had been called, and
the other who was helping said to the nurse, "Is it all right if I go in with him?
You know, he's my brother."
Well, you know, to me that's more impressive than a thousand billion galaxies.
Isn't it, really? What finally counts? We stand not in any conflict with any
scientific probe of the depths of reality. Half of the physicists are mystics, trying
© Grand Valley State University
�God, Humanity and Cosmos
Richard A. Rhem
Page 7
to determine the nature of what is. That is an exciting venture; it is a human
venture. But we do stand in the midst of the darkness of space and the eons of
time to say that, whatever else may be, this is ultimately important — we are, and
we know one another, and we have learned to love and to care because into our
lives, in our own flesh, has appeared Jesus. Jesus, in whose face we have seen the
light of the knowledge of the glory of God, and found Him to be gracious.
Ah, you are really something! You are really somebody. There are no limits to the
possibilities that await you and, as the writer to the Hebrews recognized, what we
see now is only a part. We see Jesus, not yet all things put into subjection to him,
but the whole tenor of that New Testament, in the wake of Jesus, tells us that
there is a future, the contours of which we have not yet begun to dream about.
For eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, nor has it entered into the heart of
man to conceive of the things that God has prepared for them that love Him.
See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children
of God; and so we are. I John 3: 1f (RSV)
And what we shall be has not yet appeared, but we know that when He appears,
we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. And throughout all Eternity
we will be brothers and sisters with our Lord, lost in wonder, love and praise of
the God Who spoke and called all things into being. Blessed be His holy name.
Amen.
© 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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Kaufman Interfaith Institute
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1981-2014
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Scripture Text
Psalm 8, Hebrews 2:5-9
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Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI
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1981-11-15
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God, Humanity and Cosmos
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Richard A. Rhem
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Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
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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 November 15, 1981 entitled "God, Humanity and Cosmos", at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: Psalm 8, Hebrews 2:5-9.
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Community
Cosmic Evolution
Creation
Creator
Creature
Grace
Image of God
Love
Nature of God
Nature of the Human
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/58cbc752fc19a8f4a296703f1a919ffb.mp3
c368ecc2b174bd1dd13484a4ac66ca9a
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/bac49a7e03e462a3fd1d9de15a443619.pdf
549fb85b9ce91a3392929dfc85828974
PDF Text
Text
God’s Love: A ‘Yes’ That Conquers Our ‘No’
From the Lenten sermon series: Love Story
Text: Corinthians 15:21, 22, 28
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
Easter Sunday, April 15, 1990
Transcription of the spoken sermon
Has our Lenten experience convinced us that the universal human response to
God is “No”? Have we faced the issue squarely? Have we come to see that the
crucifixion of Jesus was not an aberration, an exception to the rule of the way of
human history? Have we come to see that there is more of Caiaphas and the
dignitaries of the Sanhedrin in us, in our religious institutional selves, than of
Jesus? Have we come to see that there is more of Pilate in us, in our national
identity as Americans, than of Jesus? Have we come to see the human situation is
hopeless?
I hope so.
That is not just pulpit talk intended to beat you down. It is an honest conclusion
reached on the basis of the whole tragic tale of human history. Power politics,
coercion, oppression, injustice resulting in human suffering, helplessness, fear,
despair, the violence of terrorism perpetrated by those who have nothing to lose.
That is the human story.
In the biblical narrative, Israel’s history is not just one history among others; it is
a special history because Israel was a specially chosen people living in the light of
God’s revelation - a representative people on behalf of all people. God’s purpose
in calling Abraham and Sarah and from them forming a special people, was not to
leave the rest in their alienation and darkness, but, rather, that Israel might be a
light to the nations and that all nations might come to Mount Zion to learn God’s
Law - the Torah - the way of life.
But it was not to be. The story of God’s special relationship with Israel – the
Covenant of Grace – was the story of a broken covenant and that history ended in
deadlock, impasse. It was obvious that Israel would not be the historical
demonstration of God’s Kingdom as God intended.
© Grand Valley State University
�God’s Love: A Yes That Conquers Our No
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
During our Lenten biblical journey we have reviewed the one story of the Bible.
In Genesis 1-11, the first section of biblical narrative dealing with the great
universal themes of creation, humankind, judgment and grace, we saw at least
once that God brought judgment and started over.
Remember the story of Noah and the Flood? Did not God begin again with
righteous Noah? But it was to no avail.
And then, as I just mentioned, the call to Abraham was a new beginning, a new
strategy, through the one to win the many. But the result was dismal.
Finally, when it seemed hopeless, God loved the world so much that God gave a
Son - Jesus. John’s Gospel has given us our series’ theme - God loved the world
so much that God gave... From the first letter of John we heard those simple and
profound words,
“God is love. And God’s love was disclosed to us in this, that God sent his
only son into the world to bring us life.”
We followed the story of Jesus which reached its climax this week past. He
entered Jerusalem amid the clamor of the Passover pilgrim crowd, hoping he
would be the national liberator, and Friday we remembered his death by
crucifixion. He had come in God’s name; he had proclaimed God’s Kingdom; he
had fully followed the will of God as he understood it, even when it was leading
inevitably to his death. He did not swerve from the course, although he pursued it
with fear and trembling.
And he died.
Jesus, the revelation of God, the one righteous person ever to live, the disclosure
of God’s radical love, crucified. Love is vulnerable and crucified in history
because history is not about love; it is about power and coercion and oppression.
Jesus was crucified.
But, that death, rather than the tragic end to a noble vision, was perceived and
proclaimed as the supreme demonstration of God’s love and in that death God’s
love is seen in all its radicality. The death of Jesus has become the proclamation
of the most radical love possible - God’s love for the ungodly, for God’s enemies.
God demonstrated His love for us in that while we were yet sinners,
Christ died for us.
But, the death of Jesus as the supreme disclosure of God’s love redeeming the
world was not evident on Good Friday. Darkness covered the earth as Jesus died,
symbolic darkness – for the crucifixion of Jesus by Jerusalem and Rome, by
Caiaphas, the High Priest, and Pilate, the Roman official, representing the whole
© Grand Valley State University
�God’s Love: A Yes That Conquers Our No
Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
world, was the final human “No” to God, to God’s way, to God’s Kingdom, to
God’s love.
If Jesus had died and only died,
if the biblical story had ended in darkness on Golgotha amid the jeering
crowd, the heart-broken disciples and women,
the anguished groaning of the victims,
then the story would be simply one more episode in human history
of goodness rejected and righteousness crucified,
of a visionary tragically cut down.
But the story did not end on Friday. After an interlude of numbness during which
the disciples cowered in fear and the faithful women awaited opportunity to do
their final loving service, God, the Source and Grace of Life, raised Jesus the
crucified to life. To the resounding human “No” God gave an even more
resounding “Yes,” and the destiny of the world was changed from darkness to
light, from death to life.
Paul put it this way as he reflected on the life, death and resurrection of Jesus in
light of the whole biblical story:
It was through one man that sin entered the world, and through sin
death, and this death pervaded the whole human race... But God’s act of
grace is out of all proportion to Adam’s wrongdoing. For if the
wrongdoing of that one man brought death upon so many, its effect is
vastly exceeded by the grace of God and the gift that came to so many by
the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ (Romans 5:12-15)
Or, to bring it to the proclamation of the event we celebrate today, the
resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, we hear the words of St. Paul in our
text taken from the Epistle, reading,
... Christ was raised to life – the first fruits of the harvest of the dead. For
since it was a man who brought death into the world, a man also brought
resurrection of the dead. As in Adam all men die, so in Christ we will be
brought to life.
Then follows Paul’s vision of what is presently occurring, Jesus, the risen,
reigning Lord, putting down the enemies of God’s Kingdom. Finally Paul affirms
this triumphant faith:
God will be everything to everyone.
Paul’s discussion of the resurrection of Jesus in I Corinthians 15 is long and
involved and I will not attempt to give a detailed analysis of it, but rather simply
concentrate on this one brief paragraph. The 20th verse is the clear, unequivocal
statement.
© Grand Valley State University
�God’s Love: A Yes That Conquers Our No
Richard A. Rhem
Page 4
But, in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead.
This is the central affirmation of Christian faith. This is what makes Christian
faith gospel – good news. That God raised Jesus from the dead is the ground of
our hope. It is the ground of our hope for the redemption of the world – for a new
world, a new day free of all that saddens us, hinders us, defeats us. In a word,
the resurrection of Jesus gives us hope in our hopelessness.
Let me run the scenario past you one more time. Established political power and
institutional religions combined to crucify Jesus who lived out in concrete human
existence the love of God. And, as we have seen from week to week throughout
the season of Lent, what happened in Jerusalem on Good Friday has happened
over and over again in human history and it is happening still today.
What will be Lithuania’s fate?
We entered this season with Allan Boesak in this pulpit in the euphoria of
breakthroughs in South Africa. Will our hopes be realized? Will our prayers be
answered for justice and peace in that land?
Will Iraq threaten the Middle East with a new wave of terror with germ warfare?
As I raise this question, and they could be multiplied, is it not obvious that as
much as we pray for peace and justice and work for the humanization of this
world, our hope must be grounded in something or Someone beyond the roller
coaster of history, beyond the fickleness of popular movements, beyond the selfserving egotism of world leaders? Must we not trust something more substantial
than the present popularity of a world leader, the cleverness of human planning,
the good will and faith of nations to treaties, world organizations such as the
United Nations? Is it not obvious that any arrangement that rests alone on
human capacity or human decency is no solid ground for human hope?
If you have followed me through the Lenten Season, you might conclude that I
am a pessimist; that I do not belong to the positive thinkers’ club. And you would
be right. I have done my best honestly to mirror the human situation, the real
historical condition and I can only conclude that the human situation in and of
itself is hopeless.
But, I am not without hope. I am rather filled with hope. But only because my
hope is in God. And my hope is in God because God raised Jesus from the dead.
When we said our final “No” to God Who visited us in Jesus, we undercut any
possibility of hope in any purely human project. And precisely at the point of our
final “No”, God uttered a resounding and irreversible “Yes”.
© Grand Valley State University
�God’s Love: A Yes That Conquers Our No
Richard A. Rhem
Page 5
God’s “Yes” conquered our “No” because God raised to life the one our “No” had
crucified. And just as God conquered death in giving Jesus life from the dead, so
God’s “Yes” proves stronger than our “No.”
As in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive.
What of our world, then? What can we expect as the drama of history goes on its
perilous way? We cannot set any dates. We cannot predict the immediate
outcome of the tensions in South Africa, the Middle East, Latin America. We
cannot foresee the consequences of the democratization of Eastern Europe or the
apparent unraveling of the Soviet Union. We pray for wellbeing. We know that, as
quickly as barriers fall and walls are torn down, new crises could develop. But we
also know that outside Jerusalem when Church and State – representative of the
whole world – crucified Jesus, God raised him up as a sign that God will not give
up on this world. With the writer of Revelation, therefore, we look for and pray
for and hope for the day when
The Kingdom of this world will become the Kingdom of our God and of
His Christ and the angelic hosts sing in chorus,
“Hallelujah! The Lord God omnipotent reigns!”
We live that vision - in hope.
But, as we gather to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, it is not only the broad
world scene, not only the matters of cosmic dimension that press upon us,
important as those are. As we gather, we are a people who all have a story that is
being written.
For some of us it is the pain of one we love that we carry in our hearts. A daughter
calls, crying convulsively because her heart has been broken, her love betrayed
and a parent’s heart is crushed wishing somehow that he could take that pain
from her and make it all right. In the abyss of hurt and brokenness, when there
are no words to assuage the pain, wherein does one find hope to go on?
The nation was inspired by the courage and grace of Ryan White who this week
died of the AIDS virus contracted through a blood transfusion. In his dying, the
nation was galvanized in grief. And what do we say? Was that life worth the
living? Certainly. Was that life fruitful in its impact? Surely, more so in his brief
life than most of us who will live to an old age. But, is that all? Is Ryan dead and
any remainder of his life will be through the remembrance of those on whose
lives he had an impact? Is that all there is?
The question is much more poignant for some of you, for since Easter last you
have stood by the casket of one dearly loved and sorely missed. Is there now only
the memory and the void? Is dead simply dead?
© Grand Valley State University
�God’s Love: A Yes That Conquers Our No
Richard A. Rhem
Page 6
Some of us have received a serious medical diagnosis since last we gathered in
Easter joy. All of us carry within our bodies cells potentially lethal, but for some
of us at this time they are latent; for some, they are ravaging. What does one say
when one’s mortality is not simply part of the general universal reality of all
humankind, but when one is faced with one’s own personal, lonely encounter
with death? Life is a precious gift and fiercely clung to. Is there some way to relax
one’s grip or, better, to grasp with hope something made of surer stuff?
Each of us is writing her own storyline and few there be that escape the
interweaving of that tragic thread which is so ubiquitous in the human tapestry,
so dominant in the plot of our personal stories.
Wherein then lies the ground of hope? How can one escape cynicism, despair,
futility? How does one cope when faced with betrayal, brokenness, loss and the
last enemy, death itself?
For Christian faith, that ground of hope is in the God Who raised Jesus from the
dead. For Christian faith, the ground of hope is the God Who, in the text from St.
Paul,
will be everything to everyone,
because that God refuses to give up on this world; that God will never give up on
you. That God’s “Yes” was spoken on Easter morning in response to the final
human “No” spoken on Good Friday.
Who is this God?
This is the God Who loved the world so much that He gave His only son – not to
condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. This is the
God Who is love and Who disclosed the radical nature of that love in sending
Jesus who lived out that love so that in his life one sees into the very heart of God,
the God Who was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, going to the limit in
that while we were yet enemies, Jesus died for the ungodly, thus disclosing the
radical, unconquerable love of God.
God is love and God is writing a story, too; it is a love story, a story of an amazing
love that simply will not be turned away, a love that will never let up, a love that
will never let you go. Whoever you are, wherever you are coming from –
returned on Easter from a long dropout,
cynical in general, but find the music and flowers inviting,
despairing, almost going under,
hoping against hope,
seeking, longing to believe –
© Grand Valley State University
�God’s Love: A Yes That Conquers Our No
Richard A. Rhem
Page 7
God loves you and God would write you into the script of the love story He is
writing. God offers you life, having promised through Jesus Christ forgiveness,
peace, joy and the assurance that you will be kept by God’s power now and
forever.
God has spoken a “Yes” that conquers our “No.”
I invite you to say “Yes” to the God Who has said “Yes” to you through Jesus
Christ our Lord.
© 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
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
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives.
Contributor
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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
A resource primarily intended to be heard. Examples include a music playback file format, an audio compact disc, and recorded speech or sounds.
Event
Easter Sunday
Series
Love Story
Scripture Text
I Corinthians 15:21, 22, 28
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-0-19900415
Date
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1990-04-15
Title
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God's Love: A "Yes" That Conquers Our "No"
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
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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
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Text
Format
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audio/mp3
application/pdf
Description
An account of the resource
A sermon given by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on April 15, 1990 entitled "God's Love: A "Yes" That Conquers Our "No"", as part of the series "Love Story", on the occasion of Easter Sunday, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: I Corinthians 15:21, 22, 28.
Easter Sunday
Forgiveness
Love
Resurrection
Transformation
Universal Grace
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b7be61b1d531e27356aa3566d19f3f01.mp3
694f590459d6f60d2cbec393f470ce50
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/7fc9a1931c55f7ba5134056d3428ef95.pdf
3a6b67ccb6e39ca5ff2b463abb1870f1
PDF Text
Text
I Wish Someone Had Told Me That – Or, Did They?
Baccalaureate Sunday
Text: Romans 8:31,39
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
Eastertide, June 4, 2000
Transcription of the spoken sermon
This morning I want to speak to you graduates. These remarks are for you, but
the congregation is invited to listen in because there may be a thing or two for
them, as well. In this year 2000, when you get a diploma, I received a Medicare
card, and that may qualify me as a sage. Having lived this long, I have acquired
some wisdom, and I thought there were some things I would like to share with
you. In fact, they are the things that I wish someone had told me - or, did they?
There are some things that I wish that someone had told me as I was growing up,
some things that could have saved me some anxiety and some mistakes, some
things I wish I had known.
I wish someone had told me that - or, did they? Maybe they did, because you
don't always listen, nor did I, and sometimes the wisdom that flows just rolls off
your back, and later on, maybe, this conversation will come into focus. I have no
illusion that just another sermon is going to change your life, but I didn't really
think you wanted another sermon, either, so I thought I'd just tell you some
things that I wish somebody had told me, or if they did, I wish I had caught on to.
At this commencement season, I am aware of the fact that these young people
and countless others across the country receive all kinds of encouragement and
challenge, in motivational speeches we'll hear from Presidents and Generals and
significant people who will address all kinds of graduating classes and all phases
of education in these days. We'll get little snippets on the television news and, by
and large, they will be words of encouragement; they will be words of motivation
to achieve, to pursue your goals, to pursue your dreams and to work hard and to
accept the challenge of life, and that's good, because it is true that you will kind of
slide through if you can, but you also do respond to challenge when it is
significant and meaningful. So, I think all of that is good, but I also had the strong
feeling as I contemplated Baccalaureate Sunday that we do put a lot of pressure
on our graduates. As parents and as pastors and as teachers, we create a lot of
pressure for them and we are not always totally honest with the way life really is.
There are some things we don't tell you, and I thought that this morning I would
© Grand Valley State University
�I Wish Someone Had Told Me That – Or Did They?
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
like to tell you some things that I wish that I had understood. It's a little different
from the voices you're going to hear at this time of graduation. I hope you get a
lot of challenge, a lot of encouragement. I hope you are stirred and motivated, but
this is going to be an alternative voice.
First of all, what I wish someone had said to me is: Relax a little bit and take time
to live, and don't let the pressure squeeze you into a mold, meeting everybody
else's expectations, the expectations of all the people in your life who are
important and society in general. Take some time to live. Have a bit of humor
about your life. Relax a little bit; let up a little bit.
I suppose there's not another church in the country that would ever print that
poem on the front of its liturgy by Jenny Joseph about wearing purple, but the
poet suggests that when she gets old, she's going to wear purple, she's going to do
all kinds of outrageous things, all kinds of silly things, all kinds of foolish things.
And the only reason that poem sells, the only reason we read it and we smile at it
is because in all of us we spend an awful lot of time toeing the mark, living up to
expectations, doing the thing that is wise and respectable and responsible and in
all of us there's a little something that needs to break out of that once in a while.
If the poet is going to wear purple and be outrageous when she's old, she does
suggest that maybe she ought to start practicing so it wouldn't be such a shock
when she got old, and it occurred to me that we're not always honest with our
children and our youth. We push pretty hard and our society creates a lot of
pressure on young people. I think they're working very hard. I'm very impressed
with what our young people are doing these days and I think it even goes farther
than that. There are probably a few Baby Boomer parents that need to hear what
I'm going to say this morning, also, and that is that we can get into a mode of
drivenness about achieving and succeeding. We are bombarded by the media
with the fact that we ought to be consumers, we ought to purchase and possess
and acquire, and there is a groundswell in our society, I sense, that it's not easy to
live up to, not easy to meet the expectations, and we start with young people like
this and we simply try to push them and not say to them, "Once in a while it's
okay to wear purple and to dance in the rain and to do something foolish, just for
the sake of it, because it's a part of living and, God knows, it's not easy and you're
going to have to be responsible and work hard and do all of that which you have
been encouraged to do by the many voices that you have heard." That is all good,
but hear me this morning: Don't be driven. Learn to relax. Learn to live fully and
let that whole beautiful person you are come to blossom.
There is another thing I want to say I wish someone had told me: Don't expect
that you are going to acquire Truth with a capital T. Don't ever expect that, in
whatever field you enter or whatever kind of life you lead, you are going to have
Truth, absolute Truth in your possession, because, being human, that is
impossible, and I wish someone had told me that because I was trying to nail it
down, to get it right, to have all the ducks in line. I thought that I could come to a
possession of the Truth and stand in the Truth. I wish somebody had told me that
© Grand Valley State University
�I Wish Someone Had Told Me That – Or Did They?
Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
is not possible. It is not possible because of the nature of our human experience.
We are people in process. We are a part of a cosmic process. We are a part of an
evolving process with a new emerging reality all of the time and, for God's sake, it
is 15 billion years already and who knows where it's going, and if we are creatures
in process, if we are people on the way, as we certainly are, then we do not
possess absolute Truth. That means that we ought to live with an open mind for
expanding knowledge and humility before the things we don't know.
Let me give you an example. I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that I was invited
to be a part of the Diversity Day at Grand Haven High School, and it was a stellar
event in which some of you were exposed to the diversity of race, culture,
ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion. It was exactly the kind of thing that you
should be exposed to because you are entering a world that is full of diversity and
diversity comes closer to home all the time. I mention this as an illustration
because in the local newspaper we're carrying on a battle of words about the fact
that that should not have been done and, of course, the sticking point is the
question of sexual orientation. Some are saying these young people should not be
exposed to the fact that sexual orientation is a given of our human nature. The
scientists are studying it and all the information is not in. It's certainly obvious to
anybody who has an open mind at all that sexual orientation is a part of the
constitution of the human being and it is as diverse as are people, and yet you
would think by reading the newspaper that you could quote a Bible verse that
seems to condemn a same-sex union and that God has spoken and that's all there
is to it! That really is not the case at all.
The problem, you see, is that this Bible is used for some kind of absolute rulebook
that has information in it rather than recognizing that this book is an ancient
book, a marvelous book of the story of the spiritual experience of people, the
people of Israel and the people who followed Jesus as a record of their
experience, their encounter with God, their devotion to God. Instead of
recognizing that, it becomes a kind of moral guidance book with rules in it. Now,
the Bible says a lot about your sexuality. It says it to all of us, no matter what our
orientation may be. It says be faithful and responsible in the exercise of this
wonderful gift. But, the questions that we are aware of in our day about sexual
orientation weren't even in the purview of this book. It doesn't address it at all! Of
course, there were abusive sexual practices then and they were condemned and
there is abuse of sexuality today and it should be condemned. That has nothing to
do with whether a person is homosexual or heterosexual or somewhere inbetween, and to refuse to know that, to admit that, is simply to close your mind to
what is obvious to all of us. So, one would live in ignorance, and one living in
ignorance could become arrogant, and when ignorance and arrogance combine,
the potential for violence is there. This is not a sermon about sexual orientation.
Don't forget my point: You are never going to have absolute Truth with a capital
T. I use the other only as an illustration of the disruption and the disharmony and
the alienation and the violence that can occur when people think they have the
absolute Truth spoken by God rather than recognizing that we are people on the
© Grand Valley State University
�I Wish Someone Had Told Me That – Or Did They?
Richard A. Rhem
Page 4
way, but that knowledge is expanding and we must be open to new knowledge,
and then change our mind where necessary, but always be humble because the
capital T Truth is God's, never the possession of the human. Dear God, I wish
someone had told me that.
There is another thing somewhat related and that is that life isn't neat. It is
complex and full of ambiguity. It is not simple to find your way. It is not easy to
be human. It is full of questions and if we're honest it is full of struggle and
wrestling within, and I use as an example of this my hero, Dietrich Bonhoeffer,
who was executed by the Nazis in 1945 just before the camp where he was
incarcerated was liberated. Bonhoeffer was a pastor and a theologian and he was
really in his heart a pacifist. He really believed that to follow Jesus was to be nonviolent. But, he was in that situation of the rise of Hitler and Nazism, and he
recognized that if Nazism were to prevail, Western civilization would be lost, and
so Bonhoeffer as a pacifist made a decision to join a conspiracy to kill Hitler.
Now, do you see the conflict? I'm a pacifist; I don't believe in violence and now I
join a conspiracy to kill the head of state, which is treason as well as murder.
Can't you see the conflict? Can you not see that this man wrestled within himself
and he has this strong conviction about being non-violent and yet he sees what he
has to do. He has to act. In the human arena, you are going to have to act and you
are not always going to know that it is exactly this or that; you are going to have
to act with limited knowledge and limited insight and sometimes you are going to
make a mistake and you are going to do something wrong, because life is difficult
and life is complex and life is full of ambiguity, and you have to act without
knowing everything, and you cannot know everything, but you have to follow
your conscience and follow your heart and do what you think you have to do,
knowing that it is a judgment call. Read Bonhoeffer's poem in the back of the
liturgy, "Who Am I?" This brilliant, deeply spiritual person -was he cock-sure,
self-righteous? Not at all. He said, "Who am I?" Those in the prison whose life he
lighted up because he led them in prayers and worship, they admired him and
respected him. He was a fragrant presence there, but he said, "They think of me
that way, but who am I? Am I that, or am I what I feel inside me, with all the
struggle and all the distress and all the turmoil in my soul. Am I a hypocrite? Am
I one thing one day, one thing another day?" And finally, "Thou knowest, O God,
I am Thine!"
That statement came out of the cauldron, that came out of struggle, because life is
not easy. The corners are not neat; loose ends are not all tied up and you are
going to have to live with that.
That brings me to a final word about God. I put some things in the liturgy, in the
insert by St. Augustine, Thomas Merton, Elizabeth Barrett Browning. I wish
somebody had told me that God was in everything and present to me in every
moment, in every experience. Don't get me wrong - I had a deeply sensitive and
devoted home and church and I am grateful for that, but what I am saying is the
impression of God I had was like a super-policeman up there keeping records.
© Grand Valley State University
�I Wish Someone Had Told Me That – Or Did They?
Richard A. Rhem
Page 5
Even St. Paul said that we come into this world at enmity with God. I felt there
was an adversarial relationship with God and that if I didn't keep in the tracks
pretty well I would incur guilt and then I'd be alienated from God and it seemed
to me that there was an awful lot of that in my nurture, my growing up. I don't
know how to tell you something different, except that I don't know how
important God is to you right now, but God will become important to you and
when that moment comes, I want you to know that it's the God of Hosea, the
Hebrew prophet who spoke about Israel and Israel's rebellion and disobedience
and all of that, even though God had tenderly nurtured them and cared for them,
and in this very human presentation of God, the prophet speaks of God as being
angry with them. Then, however, the prophet has this deep, deep insight, for he
puts these words in God's mouth:
How can I give you up, 0 Israel? How can I give you up?
I should give you up, but how should I give you up?
I can't give you up because I love you.
The cosmic lover. I'll never give you up. I can't give you up. I'll never abandon
you. I don't care where your road takes you, what experiences you have,
remember Hosea's God, because Hosea got it right in the midst of a lot of other
stuff where he spoke of the God who is a lover who will never let you go and is as
present to you as your breath is, in some burning bush or flaming sunset or in
some human relationship in which you find yourself made whole. In all of that,
God is. God is the God that Paul pictures in the 8th chapter of Romans who is for
you. If God is for us, who can be against us? And then he gives us that picture
which you hadn't ought to literalize, but the picture of Jesus who dies crucified,
risen, ascended, and sitting at the throne of God and making intercession for us.
In other words, you have an advocate at the throne of power of the universe.
That's the picture; that's the image. But the idea of it is that there is something in
the heart of things that is for you, for you, on your side, that will never let you go.
Nothing can ever separate you from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. I
don't care how ambiguous your situation, how poor your judgment, what wrong
path you may take, how much you stand in confusion before all of the options
that hit you in your life, God is with you, win be with you, will never let you go.
I sort of knew that, but God wasn't so user-friendly for me, and I want you to
know there is no adversarial relationship between you and the Creator of the
heavens and the earth, and so relax a bit, open your mind to truth wherever you
find it, act in your life according to your vision and your values, in the midst of
the ambiguity in which you don't always know the answers, and love God, love
God, because you are loved of God, and that will never change and that's the
greatest thing in the world. God bless you.
© 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
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
Baccalaureate Sunday, Eastertide VII
Scripture Text
Romans 8:31, 39
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-0-20000604
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2000-06-04
Title
A name given to the resource
I Wish Someone Had Told Me That - Or, Did They?
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 4, 2000 entitled "I Wish Someone Had Told Me That - Or, Did They?", on the occasion of Baccalaureate Sunday, Eastertide VII, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: Romans 8:31, 39.
Diversity
Immanence
Inclusive
Love
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/1176b9f3952e7bdc571f685e86b951ab.pdf
336b528adbcaf306f9b056935b81f250
PDF Text
Text
Incarnation Here and Now
From the series: The Presence of the Future
Text: John 1:14; I John 4:12; 16
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
Advent, December 20, 1998
Transcription of the spoken sermon
The Advent season is a season whose theme traditionally has been "The One who
came is coming again." A main emphasis in the Christian tradition and a clear
biblical teaching is that the one who was born in poverty and humility is the child
who will return in power and glory to judge the nations and issue in the end and
the consummation.
On the second Sunday in Advent, I suggested to you that we have to rethink that:
that Jesus is not coming again in that sense. As someone said to me, "You’re not
usually that dogmatic." I said, "Well, I’m not usually that sure." Well, I didn’t say
that. Nancy said to me, "Why do you say things like that? You don’t know
everything." Amen.
But, I said it the way I said it because I wanted you to hear me. I could be the
perfect heretic and preach all my life and you would never know it. All one has to
do is fudge a bit, use vague terms, dance around, and I don’t want to do that. I’m
too old; I’ve got too little time left. I want to be simple and I want to be clear. I do
not think that the Christian model, the biblical model of history coming to an end
with the appearing of the Lord from the clouds of heaven is, as a matter of fact,
the way it’s going to be. I think history is going to continue to unfold and to
develop, and going I know not where. But it is a part of a cosmic process of 15
billion years, unfolding in this cosmic wonder and majesty all those years, until
finally there was the arrival of the human, the unfolding, then, of the story of
history, even to the present moment, and I do not know where it is going, but I
suggested to you that the good news is that, though I don’t expect Jesus to come
from the clouds of glory, Jesus has come. Jesus has come again and again and
again, and the key to our understanding, I believe, a more profound biblical
understanding beneath that structure of things is a sense of Immanuel, God with
us, here and now.
Thus, Jesus with us, in spirit. "If you ask anything in my name, I will pray the
Father, and God will give you the Spirit, the advocate, one to stand with you, one
who will lead you into all truth, one who will call to remembrance the things that
© Grand Valley State University
�Incarnation Here and Now
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
I have said." And so, the present has within it the seeds of the future. The present
is pregnant with the future. The vast potential beyond our conception is already
incubated in the present, in the cosmos, in our history, in our humanity. But that
future that is already in our present, is always under threat.
We noted last week that the future that is trying to be born is always threatened
by the present establishment for, if we have achieved a position of prestige and
power and affluence, why in the world would we work for the transformation of
tomorrow? And that’s the story of human history. As I said last week, if nature is
red in tooth and claw, then human history is a veritable river of blood, violence
and destruction, war and death, most often because the future that is trying to be
born will be crucified by the present that is established and very happy with the
way things are.
Herod, on the throne, wanted to hear nothing of a royal child that might threaten
his position and so, not being able to find the child, simply decreed that all
children two years of age and under should be slaughtered. The Slaughter of the
Innocents is the subtitle of the story of history. It has always been thus, for the
future that would be born, the dawn that would break in this unfolding story of
history which is the unfolding development of the cosmic reality, will always be
threatened by those who would vie for power and position and stifle the spirit
and crucify tomorrow. That’s human history.
But, that’s not the whole story. If we are not to wait for someone to come and
clean up our mess, then, as I said to you last week in concluding, it is our
responsibility. History is our responsibility. The future is our responsibility. It is
for us who have caught a glimpse of the vision, who’ve dared to dream the dream,
to engage in the ongoing story, to stand for justice and righteousness, to live with
compassion and to work for peace. The transformation of tomorrow is incubated
in today and it is our task to midwife it into birth.
The old model, that really doesn’t work anymore because it’s inconsistent with
our experience of history and our knowledge of the cosmos, the old model would
have us at this season of the year look for the big event somewhere out in the
future, another place and another time. My Advent theme is a plea to you to find
it here and now. Incarnation here and now. For that is the radical and profound
declaration of the Gospel - that God has been embodied in human flesh.
In the beginning was the word, reminding us of the first chapter of Genesis, "In
the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." John, in telling the story
of Jesus, is trying to connect the whole cosmic reality from the beginning with
that historical manifestation in the midst. The Creator of the heavens and the
earth is embodied and enfleshed in the humanness of Jesus. The word became
flesh and dwelt among us. Incarnation, here and now. Human history now
manifesting divinity in the concrete. Paul said we have seen the light of the
knowledge of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Jesus, in John’s Gospel, is
purported to say, "If you have seen me, you have seen the Father." The
© Grand Valley State University
�Incarnation Here and Now
Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
incarnation here and now in human history, and the image that Paul uses in his
letter of the body of Christ simply says that that was not a one time happening.
That was not a once-for-all-event. That was an emergence into history which
continues in the body of Christ, where you are the body of Christ, you are the
flesh of God in the world. You are the concrete manifestation of God in this
marvelous, awesome, wonderful, unraveling of cosmos and history and
humanity. Incarnation, here and now. The big event is not in the future. The
future is incubated in the present and the present is pregnant with the future, and
it’s for us to allow it to come to birth. That’s our task as humankind, in history,
the children of the Big Bang, stardust children of cosmic reality manifesting our
life in an ongoing story of history.
I don’t want you to lose the moment. I don’t want you to live with anything less
than awe and wonder at the gift of life and the marvel of the ongoing drama. How
can I speak with such glowing terms on the Sunday after the week through which
we have just lived?
As I thought about this message and I thought about Christmas and incarnation,
I was all too well aware that, unless something is said this morning about the
debacle that has been played out in our midst as a nation, then I will simply give
credence to the widespread sense that the pulpit is the epitome of irrelevancy.
But, how does one speak about the crisis of our times? How does one speak with
some objectivity and sensitivity without partisan bias? It’s impossible. So, let me
warn you at the beginning that anything I say is no word from the Lord; I have no
word from the Lord. Let me speak about it, however, as one responsible to say
something in the face of that which faces us, is in our face. Someone who simply
broods on these things and muses on these things, let me say a word, if I may,
and let me share with you something that’s been very helpful to me in giving me
some perspective.
Andrew Sullivan is a journalist. He writes in The New York Times Magazine of
October 11 a marvelous article in which he addresses the present situation and,
although he is himself a liberal, he speaks very fondly of Conservatism at its best
and the great tradition of Conservatism historically. He suggests that the
Conservative movement today is betraying itself and its own finest principles. Let
me read you a few paragraphs, even though I know that’s a boring exercise, but it
says it better than I can say it, and I want it said here. Speaking about the
Conservatives, he says,
... Conservatives have always been concerned with morality - and rightly
so. They have long understood that political order rests upon a vibrant
civil society, and on the morality that such a society sustains. But
conservatives have also always been aware of the dangers of excessively
policing that morality, and of the evils that can occur when the morally
certain gain power. Hence the apparent conservative paradox.
Conservatives want morality but they don’t want the big government that
© Grand Valley State University
�Incarnation Here and Now
Richard A. Rhem
Page 4
could effectively enforce it. For true conservatives, the evils of moral chaos
are usually outweighed by the evils of a moralizing big brother.
And so conservatives have learned over the years to live with a little
paradox. They have resisted the temptation either to become morally
indifferent libertarians or to become morally repugnant ideologues.
Although they have worried about moral and social trends, they have
resisted easy pessimism and the jeremiad. And they have left the
impositions of morals to the churches and preachers and mothers and
fathers and teachers and friends of America to sort out. When it comes to
preaching, true conservatives would much prefer to praise the examples of
Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa than to demonize the likes of Dennis
Rodman or Marv Albert.
Above all, true conservatives have not been depressed by freedom. This,
after all, is where the modern conservative movement in America started
in the 1950's - in a revolt against the creeping power of the postwar welfare
state. When American conservatives lose sight of that central strain in
their philosophy, when their love of freedom becomes an afterthought to
their concern for morality, then they lose sight of what makes them both
conservative and quintessentially American. They lose sight of what
distinguishes them from the darker history of European conservatism...
Truly American conservatives would not recoil at the greater liberty
enjoyed by women, racial minorities and homosexuals, as the truly
American conservative Barry Goldwater showed. In the last decade, true
American conservatives would have been heartened by the declines in
divorce, crime and teen-age births, and encouraged by the move among
gay people for more stable, responsible relationships. They would have
been elated by the collapse of collectivism and totalitarianism abroad, and
encouraged by the return of fiscal prudence and social responsibility at
home. They would have seen in Bill Clinton a dangerous proclivity for
dishonesty and abuse of power, but they would not have seen him as the
degenerate apotheosis of an entire generation - let alone an entire nation.
And they would have seen the emergence of religious dogmatists on the far
right as a threat to constitutional order and political civility, not as a boon
for votes.
Above all, they would not have fatally overplayed their hand and tried to
impeach a President not for illegality but for immorality, and they
wouldn’t have shredded the virtues of privacy and decency and common
sense for the emotional release of a cultural jihad. ...
Well, he goes on, and I find what he says to be profoundly true, for what has
happened in this nation is that, in the debacle we’ve experienced before a
President that should have resigned a long time ago, I suppose, Andrew Sullivan
suggests the same, but nonetheless, we have come to focus on that which is
© Grand Valley State University
�Incarnation Here and Now
Richard A. Rhem
Page 5
miniscule, in light of the constitutional tragedy that is being played out in our
midst. And the Congress has stooped so low that Larry Flynt can remove the
Speaker-elect of the House of Representatives, not because Larry Flynt has
become a major player in the American political scene, or somehow or other risen
from his normal arena of operation, but because the Congress of the United
States has descended into that arena for partisan mean-spiritedness, and that
decrying of the social condition of America which is rampant in conservative
intellectual journals in our day fails to take seriously the Christmas miracle of
incarnation.
In this day, on the threshold of another Christmas, I want to speak of incarnation,
here and now. I want to say that what has happened in our nation’s capital is a
betrayal of that which is highest and best and most noble in the American
tradition. I want to say that I refuse to join in the bitterness and the cynicism and
decry this present moment. This is human history; human history is messy!
Whoever said it was anything else? It is violent, it is destructive, it is deathdealing, it is power hungry, it is all of that, and it is also the arena into which God
has emerged.
I want to give you another image, the old Christmas image of love coming down
at Christmas is an image of intervention from beyond. That won’t work anymore.
It is not love came down at Christmas. It is that love emerged in the incarnation
2000 years ago in Jesus Christ, the embodiment of God emerged out of the
process and has been emerging ever since. It is trying to be born, the spirit of the
flesh of Jesus trying to be born in this world of ours. I don’t give up on it. I have
hope in history, as did the prophets who didn’t blind their eyes to anything that
was wrong, to the darkness, to the evil, to the destructiveness. But, nevertheless,
because they believed that God was in the process, God was in the midst, they
believed in God, trusted in God, hoped in God, and therefore, dreamed a future
and a vision.
I do not believe that America is going to hell in a hand basket. I know you. I know
too many people. I believe in the basic decency, honesty, civility of the American
public across the board as well as around the globe. I do not believe that this is
the worst of times. There have been good times and bad times vying for position
throughout the whole spectrum of human history. This is a time at Christmas to
remember that, not an intervention from beyond, but an emergency from within
has resulted in one like Jesus in whose face one could see the heart of God. The
heart of God is like the face of Jesus. Jesus is the human flesh – a concrete sign of
God with, Emmanuel – the same kind of human flesh that you and I possess. I
believe in you. I know you well. I believe in the future; I believe in history because
history has emanated from cosmology that has emanated in the beginning from
the God who said, "Let there be ..." I believe in the future; I believe in Christmas;
I believe in you.
© Grand Valley State University
�Incarnation Here and Now
Richard A. Rhem
Page 6
This is a great day in which to be alive; this is a day to believe. We know all too
well all of the dissembling - dishonesty, lack of integrity of a William Jefferson
Clinton, and we don’t know it because we’ve seen it in him. We know it because
we’ve seen it in our own hearts. When will we stop this kind of moralism and
judgmentalism? Isn’t that perhaps why Jesus said, "Judge not, lest ye be judged?"
Is it not we need a word of hope, a word of courage? Hope in history, hope in
history’s God, confidence that we’ve not come this way through thousands and
billions of years to end up in some fiasco of human conjuring. Oh, I think we have
the potential to ruin it all, but one of the surest ways to do it is to become
meddlesome, mean, small, and forget, by God, it’s Christmas! God in human
flesh! God in flawed human flesh! God in your face and mine.
God is love, and if one abides in love, one abides in God. God is present where
two human beings love each other. Where love is, God is. I’ve seen God because
I’ve seen you. I’ve experienced God because I’ve touched your flesh, and by God, I
believe! I believe.
© Grand Valley State University
�
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/4d561c3f94442bddf3ebd4a11ab78d0c.mp3
f15d3cf618295bb94005e1c09d53cf50
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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.)
Religion
Interfaith worship
Sermons
Sound Recordings
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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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Event
Advent IV
Series
The Presence of the Future
Scripture Text
John 1:14, I John 4:12,16
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Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI
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KII-01_RA-0-19981220
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1998-12-20
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Incarnation Here and Now
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Richard A. Rhem
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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>
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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
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audio/mp3
application/pdf
Description
An account of the resource
A sermon given by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on December 20, 1998 entitled "Incarnation Here and Now", as part of the series "The Presence of the Future", on the occasion of Advent IV, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: John 1:14, I John 4:12,16.
Advent
Emergence
Love
Presence
Spirit
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/2e77299cfd9d97c25c0133fb43b0b169.pdf
fb2dd89eada85e918d593461a9395bdd
PDF Text
Text
Jesus and the Other Names:
Christian Mission and Global Responsibility
By Paul F. Knitter
(Orbis Books, 1996)
Review By
Richard A. Rhem
Minister of Preaching and Theological Inquiry
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
Publication of Review Unknown
In his foreword to Jesus and the Other Names, Harvey Cox speaks of “two urgent
movements” in Christian theology which “shook him to his roots”, requiring him
to completely rethink his theology. The first, impacting him in the 60’s, was
liberation theology. The second, a decade later, was the persistent question of a
Christian response to other faiths. For too long he felt that those two movements
were like two separate conversations. Those interested in the one concern, had
little interest in the other. Paul Knitter, he suggests, has found a way to blend the
two conversations – conversations concerning the religious other and the
suffering other.
Jesus and the Other Names focuses Christian theology on the issue of “globally
responsible, correlational dialogue among religions”. His discussion bears the
hall marks of the classic liberal persuasion, as do the discussions of John Hick in
The Metaphor of God Incarnate and S. Wesley Ariarajah in The Bible and People
of Other Faiths. And like them, he draws heavily upon his own human
experience. This I believe has always been the strength of the liberal position.
Paul Knitter knows the discussion of Christian mission in a pluralistic society
from both ends of a spectrum. In the late 50’s after four years of Catholic
seminary high school, he officially joined the ranks of the Divine Word
Missionaries (“SVD” or Societas Vergi Divini). Those were the years of
missionary “adaptation” and “accommodation” in Catholic circles. Missionaries
on furlough were often invited to speak to the novitiates. Knitter was struck by
the time spent in speaking appreciatively of the other faiths and other ways
encountered on the mission field. Such appreciation and accommodation
disturbed the ardent young Knitter. Yet by the time of his college graduation in
1962 it was becoming clearer, “that the old exclusivist model of Christianity as
light and other religions as darkness didn’t fit the facts” (p. 5).
What to do with that dawning realization became clearer to Knitter at the
Pontifical Gregorian University. He arrived just two weeks before the opening of
© Grand Valley State University
�Paul F. Knitter, Jesus and the Other Names, Review by Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
the Second Vatican Council. There Knitter took a course from Catholic theologian
Karl Rahner, who was a visiting professor at the time. He was deeply impressed
by Rahner’s concept that even those individuals who did not know or profess
Christ, even those followers of another religious persuasion, were nonetheless
saved by Christ’s sacrificial death. Thus they were, without at times even being
aware of it, “anonymous Christians”.
Knitter chose to write his doctorate under Rahner on the theme of Catholic
attitudes towards other religions. A year and a half later, to his “devastating
surprise” he discovered that someone else had not only chosen the same
dissertation topic, but had published it that year in Rome. It was this which
prompted Knitter to apply to Marburg University (and was the first Roman
Catholic ever admitted to the Protestant Marburg), in order to pursue the topic of
a Protestant theology or religions. Though he must admit to a biased Rahnerian
Catholic perspective, Knitter does not deny the validity of his conclusion:
In their efforts to recognize the value of other religions, Protestant
theologians, I claimed, were stymied by the Reformational insistence on
“faith alone” through “Christ alone” (see Knitter 1975). Protestants such as
Paul Althaus, Emil Brunner, and even Wolhart Pannenberg, could
recognize “revelation” in other faiths, but never “salvation.” This was, I
concluded, to go only halfway in their efforts to reach out to other religious
believers (p. 7).
This move towards an “inclusive” understanding would ultimately be but a bridge
to “the other side” - where lay a more pluralistic understanding of world
religions. To move across this bridge he found he must sublate a christocentric
approach with one that was theocentric. Thus in his book No Other Name (1985)
he would claim “the possibility (and nothing more) that other religions may have
their own valid views of and responses to” (p. 9) the Divine Mystery we call Theos
or God. Now in Jesus and the Other Names he attempts to correct some of his
earlier conclusions (seeing a need to emphasize the soteriological issues rather
than theocentric), as he continues to move in the direction of pluralism.
In the midst of his wrestling with “the religious other”, Knitter, like Cox, was
impacted by the issues of “the suffering other”. Becoming involved with the
Sanctuary Movement, he entered into discussion with those for whom suffering
takes precedence over doctrinal disputes. He found himself increasingly aware,
along with friend and colleague Hans Küng, that as religious persons we bear
responsibility for a global ethic. Inter-religious dialogue becomes not simply a
question of how to discern God, but even more urgently the question of how to
bring about God’s reign.
...the avalanche of dangers forming on the slopes of economic injustice,
environmental devastation, and military build-up will not be stayed unless
the nations of the world come together to formulate and endorse some
kind of shared ethical convictions and guidelines. But such a task will not
© Grand Valley State University
�Paul F. Knitter, Jesus and the Other Names, Review by Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
be accomplished unless the religions of the world, in dialogue, make their
contribution. In other words, inter religious conversations must make
their most pressing agenda the ethical issues behind the mounting
suffering of humans and Earth (p. 12).
Having described the autobiographical journey which led him to a pluralistic (he
prefers the word correlational to pluralistic) perspective, Knitter turns to the
theological underpinnings which support such a view. He suggests that all of our
theological understandings must be defined and shaped both by human
experience and Christian tradition.
Human experience has some common aspects Knitter believes, at least in
Western cultures. Whether interacting with co-workers, gathered socially around
a dinner table, attending our children’s school programs, or sharing a marriage
bed, we are becoming more intimately and acutely aware that there are others for
whom another faith persuasion has enriched and transformed their lives. To
suggest that ours is the only possibility for grasping religious truth is no longer
possible. Pluralism, whether we advocate it or not, is a cognitive reality for most
of the Western world. Thus awareness of “others” is one aspect of our human
experience.
A second is a historical consciousness that recognizes the limitations of
knowledge. Says Knitter, “There is no such thing, we know today, as factual
knowledge; it is always interpreted knowledge” (p. 29). He quotes Langdon
Gilkey:
...in order to preserve their integrity, they must accept theologically what
they have long accepted culturally. Given the context-conditioned,
“theory-laden”, socially constructed interpretative limitations of every
grasp and statement of truth, and given also the ever-changing, always
confining flow of history, Christians (and all religious persons) have to
admit honestly that, within our human condition, there can be no final
word, no one way of knowing truth that is valid for all times and all
peoples (pp. 29-30).
George Lindbeck (The Nature of Doctrine, 1984) and David Tracy (The
Analogical Imagination, 1981 and Plurality and Ambiguity, 1987) are also cited:
(They) remind their fellow Christians that to think that they have a fixed
source of truth, an unchanging criterion they can apply in all cultural
situations in order to decide what is true or good, a foundation that
transcends the process and pluralism of history, is to fly in the face of
reality, to lust after the unreal. There is no fixed place of truth outside the
fray of historical process and continuous dialogue...which means that
Christianity is one of the many, limited religions of the world (p. 30).
© Grand Valley State University
�Paul F. Knitter, Jesus and the Other Names, Review by Richard A. Rhem
Page 4
A third component which supports a pluralistic or correlational theology is the
moral imperative. Knitter insists that we cannot know our own truth except in
dialogue with others. To know only one religion is to risk that it will tend toward
a “barbarous or self-indulgent abuse of our own truth” (p. 32). Humorously,
Knitter suggests that, just as we need someone to tell us when we have bad breath
(!), we need the dialogue partner, the other perspective, to open our eyes - to
enable us to see not only how others see our “truth” and also how it affects them,
which is perhaps even more important.
And finally, human experience recognizes our responsibility for the welfare of
the world. Knitter believes that we have a moral obligation, bequeathed to us by
God, to participate in the coming of the reign of God. We are God’s physical
hands and heart in this world and thus are obligated to aide in the Divine work of
Shalom.
Aspects of the Christian tradition which support a correlational dialogue are
again four in Knitters listing. First, says Knitter, the traditional understanding of
the nature of God requires such a pluralistic posture. God is beyond our
comprehension. Hence, to say that we have a final or exclusive understanding of
the Mystery that is Theos is idolatrous. Moreover, Knitter contends that our
understanding of God as Trinitarian implies plurality. Christian ethical incentives
provide a basis as well, he claims. Here he relies almost exclusively on the
commandment which calls us to love our neighbor as God loves us. To exclude
our neighbor from salvation seems to Knitter the epitome of inhospitableness
and lack of love.
Whenever we hold up a truth or a revelation and insist that according to
the will of God it is the only or the absolutely final norm in which all others
have to be included, then we cannot treat them as our brothers and sisters
in God. Such a norm does enable us to confront them, as love sometimes
requires, but it does not allow us to be confronted by them, as love also
requires. Whenever we are not disposed to learn as much from our
neighbors as they can from us, we cannot love them. We may help them,
we may build hospitals and schools for them, we may lift them from their
poverty - but we are not loving them (p. 39).
Pastoral concerns must be honored in conjunction with supports of the Christian
tradition. We do a disservice to those who struggle with these questions if we
simply cite doctrine and creed as final answers. We must wrestle along with them
in order to give satisfaction to their “cry from the heart”.
And then there are the scriptural incentives for correlational dialogue. Along
with Krister Stendhal and John Hick, Knitter suggests that we must understand
much of the biblical language as metaphor. The grand and divine appellations are
really “love talk” (Stendahl). And while he wants to honor and respect texts such
as Acts 4:12 – “There is no other name given to human kind by which we can be
saved than the name of Jesus Christ”, he begs we remember the context (these
© Grand Valley State University
�Paul F. Knitter, Jesus and the Other Names, Review by Richard A. Rhem
Page 5
words for example are spoken in connection with a specific healing), as well as
the polemic nature of other passages such as “I am the way the truth and the
life...”.
We must always distinguish between the universal and the particular, says
Knitter, citing Schubert Ogden’s understanding that we must locate “the
particularity of Jesus within the universality of God’s self-revelation, rather than
locating God’s universality within the particularity of the historical Jesus”(p. 42).
It is that understanding of universality that drives us towards correlational
dialogue.
Why the term “correlational”? Here Knitter honestly admits that inter-faith
dialogue is not easy. He takes issue with those who suggest that we come together
easily around issues of “common essence” or “common experience”. Such
suggestions are “gossamer theories spun out by academicians who most likely
have never felt the hard, obstructing reality of otherness” (p. 13). And yet, his
actual inter-faith dialogue experience has convinced him that, despite what are
often chasms of perspective, there remains a relatedness. This, he trusts, is a sign
from God to persistently pursue areas of “correlation”, and those ways in which
we can go forward together in the global work of peace and justice.
In the face of his critics’ real and valid concerns ( 1 - that the ambiguity of
pluralism jeopardizes a firm foundation of meaning and purpose, 2 - the
difficulties of prophetically resisting evil in Christ’s name, 3 - the corrosion and
possible destruction of missionary outreach), Knitter maintains that he is still
able to conceive of Jesus as unique for Christians and for the world. Stressing
ortho-praxis (doing as he did) rather than orthodoxy, Knitter claims that Jesus is
truly & fully all that the Newer Testament witnesses profess that he was. Yet this
does not require that he was the only one, who solely embodied the selfrevelation of God.
Whatever it is that brings a person to be a Christian and follower of Jesus,
by its very nature it must enable the person to say that Jesus is truly and
effectively the vehicle of the Divine Presence in his or her life. For this
person Jesus is truly the Son of God, the savior, mediator, word of God,
messiah, the living one. Without the feeling - without an experiential
awareness - that inspires the “truly,” one cannot be, one would not want to
be, a Christian.
But I don’t think that is true of “solely.” When one knows that Jesus is
truly savior, one does not know that he is the only savior. One’s experience
is limited and has not been able to take in the experiences and messages of
all other so-called saviors or religious figures.
But if Christians do not or cannot know that Jesus is the only savior
neither do they have to know this in order to be committed to this Jesus.
The experience of Jesus that has enabled them to say “truly” enables them
© Grand Valley State University
�Paul F. Knitter, Jesus and the Other Names, Review by Richard A. Rhem
Page 6
to keep following him. That there may be others is not an impediment to
faithful following. Discipleship requires “truly”; it does not seem to require
“solely” (p. 73).
With similar logic he concludes that Jesus need be neither fully definitive nor
unsurpassable. Rather he proposes that Jesus is universal (not limited to one
people), decisive (in that he challenges us) and indispensable (which flows
naturally from acceptance that he is universal and decisive).
Christians bring to the table the uniqueness of Jesus’ interest in inclusivity and
relationship. In representing that Christ-like uniqueness they will share with
others the Christian value of contemplatives in action, says Knitter. Prompted by
love of neighbor (which is, according to the first commandment, the
manifestation of their love for God), Christians believe in the value of “historical
involvement”. Believing that the God whom Jesus served has a preference for the
poor and oppressed, Christians are concerned for those who suffer due to
injustice, engaging in work to alleviate that injustice as they are able. And to the
dialogue Christians bring a deep and abiding hope, a hope that enables them to
believe that the world can be saved. Says Knitter, a “distinguishing mark of the
disciples of Jesus and co-workers in God’s reign is that they don’t give up” (p.
97).
To enter into dialogue with other faiths does not require that we abandon our
understanding of Jesus’ uniqueness, or abandon a conviction that his way is an
ethically important way.
Insofar as Christians proclaim the “pure, unbounded love of God” at work
in the world and therefore do not insist that Jesus is God’s full, final, or
unsurpassable Word, they expect that for the most part their relationships
with sincere believers of other paths will indeed be complementary. But
insofar as Christians also experience God’s presence in Jesus to include
universal, decisive, and indispensable claims, they will also be ready to
take strong stands, sometimes in opposition, to the claims of others. (p.
82).
But what of missions? This is perhaps the most critical issue for those who fear
the goals of correlational or pluralistic dialogue. Throughout the centuries the
Christian church has been motivated and animated by a sense of having been
“sent” with good news of salvation. It believed it had a necessary role to play in
God’s unfolding drama. But if the content of that good news is not for all people
in all times, then is the missionary focus of the church still necessary or vital?
Knitter claims that it is. And he contends that a pluralistic or correlational
posture is still able to beckon disciples who will be sent out to speak good news
that they believe is for everyone. It will however require a revision of the
missionary mandate.
© Grand Valley State University
�Paul F. Knitter, Jesus and the Other Names, Review by Richard A. Rhem
Page 7
Knitter contends that pluralistic missionary disciples will still continue to affirm
Jesus’ divinity. But by this he means (along with Karl Rahner, Paul Tillich,
Edward Schillebeeckx, Hans Küng and Monika Hellwig) that
To feel and proclaim that Jesus is divine is to encounter him as God’s
sacrament, as the embodiment, the historical reality, the symbol, the story
that makes God real and effective for me (p. 105).
The message of salvation that they bring will encourage others to join in bringing
about God’s reign (as opposed to desiring that they join the Christian church).
The wellbeing of all creatures must be the mission’s foremost goal. More than
Christological missiology, they will be concerned with pneumatological
missiology which, Knitter believes, allows one to grasp the universality of God’s
saving purpose, without dissolving the distinctive uniqueness of Jesus for
Christians. Pneumatology allows for the moving of God’s spirit into realms and
through mediums that doctrinal Christology disallows.
Though it is a revisioned understanding of missions, Knitter believes that his
missionary passion is as ardent today as it was in his earliest years of missionary
work. The urgency of its goals can indeed beckon future generations to bear
witness to the way of salvation and the good news that God is still engaged with
us in saving work, albeit through a multiplicity of religious mediums. Missions as
dialogue then, is Knitter’s image of missiology into the third millennium.
Perhaps Knitter’s most intriguing and practical suggestion is his call for a
dialogical model of theological education. Seminary students need opportunities
to learn about traditions other than their own. In as much as dialogue with those
of other faiths will become more and more the norm, there should be required
courses in Islam, Asian religions and indigenous spiritualities. These courses
should be taught not in an abstract informational way, but by professors and
guest speakers who can present material experientially. Students must be called
to enter “the other’s world of experience” (p. 162). There should be personal
encounters fostered by “experimenting with the truth of - or at least observing the spiritual practices of other religions” (p. 162). Another way of engaging the
“other’s” voice might be to engage certain issues from a variety of faith
perspectives - “Courses on ‘Religions and Peace’ or ‘Buddhism, Christianity and
Ecology’, or ‘Feminist Voices in Muslim- Christian Dialogue’ (p. 163).
Such perspectives should be mainlined into all courses of Christian history,
doctrinal, ethical and social issues. By this, Knitter means...that in teaching a
standard course on evil or redemption or church or the question of God, teachers
will inject into the discussions what other religious perspectives hold, how they
sometimes radically differ, and how they provoke Christian tradition to further
reflection. Naturally, given the expertise and general background of most
theological faculties, such dreams of mainlining an interreligious conversation
into the general curriculum cannot be realized overnight. But they will never be
realized at all unless the ideal is affirmed (p. 163).
© Grand Valley State University
�Paul F. Knitter, Jesus and the Other Names, Review by Richard A. Rhem
Page 8
To this end, he would propose that all seminaries should include one or more
faculty members trained in a non-Christian tradition. And students should be
encouraged or required to sub-specialize in the “history, beliefs, and spirituality
of another non- Christian religious path” (pp. 163-164).
Paul Knitter envisions a new world of missions, one where the ultimate goal is no
longer salvation through Christ to eternal life. Rather, the focus is on the reign of
God emerging in our here and now. “The Kingdom of God is among you,” Jesus is
purported to have said. Paul Knitter is eager, as a Christian, to join hands with
those of other faiths in order to realize that very possibility.
© 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.
Subject
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Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Religion
Interfaith worship
Sermons
Sound Recordings
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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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References
Paul Knitter, Jesus and the Other Names, 1996
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RA-4-19960101
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1996-01-01
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Text
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Jesus and the Other Names, Christian Mission and Global Responsibility
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Richard A. Rhem
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
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eng
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Book Review created, delivered, or published by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on January 1, 1996 entitled "Jesus and the Other Names, Christian Mission and Global Responsibility", on the book Jesus and the Other Names, Christian Mission and Global Responsibility, written by Paul F. Knitter. Tags: Theology, Interfaith, Pluralism, Non-exclusive, Love, . Scripture references: Paul Knitter, Jesus and the Other Names, 1996.
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application/pdf
Interfaith
Love
Non-exclusive
Pluralism
Theology
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/e9544dd6f9c56e3cd9e408f266edf161.pdf
9be0b735e8df3e9659e8e3effafac6ea
PDF Text
Text
Mystery Embodied
From the series: Aspects of God
Text: Exodus 25:8; I John 4:16; John 1:14
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
June 21, 1998
Transcription of the spoken sermon
With the Pentecost storm, we had to move Pentecost up to a week later, which
was Trinity Sunday, which made Trinity Sunday a week later, which meant that
my series on Aspects of God would have three aspects collapsed into two. But,
you can bet I’ll get them all in.
Last week we spoke about that aspect of God as Mystery, the ultimate Mystery of
everything beyond our knowing, beyond the possibility of our knowing. There
was a phrase in one of our hymns this morning which spoke about the cloud of
unknowing that comes from a Christian, mystic, medieval time. The cloud of
unknowing. Entering into the cloud of unknowing is to experience God, Mystery,
not in the sense that eventually we’ll figure it out if we keep working at it long
enough, but Mystery as that which is beyond human comprehension or the
capacity of the human mind to get itself around.
Last week we talked about Mystery Experienced, because that ultimate mystery of
everything is experienced. There is that seemingly universal human experience of
the Ultimate, of that Mystery, that ultimate mystery that we cannot comprehend
but yet which we sense, experience, which we say is none other than the breath of
God or the Spirit of God, so, that Ultimate Mystery is experienced.
Today I want to say that that Ultimate Mystery has also been embodied. Last
week we looked at Moses in that interesting story where he says to God, "Don’t
lead this people up if You won’t go along," and God says, "I’ll go along." Then,
Moses, emboldened, says, "Show me your glory," and God says, "No way, Moses.
You can’t see my glory. That would blow you away. Get into this cleft in the rock
and I’ll put my hand over you and I’ll pass all my goodness past you and you’ll see
my backside. But, you can’t see my glory."
We also listened to the conversation between Phillip and Jesus where Jesus was
talking about going to the Father and Phillip said, "Oh, just show us the father
and we’ll be satisfied." And Jesus said, "You don’t get it yet. You can’t see the
© Grand Valley State University
�Mystery Embodied
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
Mystery. You’ll never penetrate the Mystery, but if you’ve seen me, you have seen
the Father."
That is today’s emphasis. That is the aspect I would stress today, and I want to
say that every religion needs some concretization; every religion needs something
to hang on to, something concrete, something to give that Mystery specificity and
directionality.
The little child that was baptized in the beautiful little kimono - I was thinking
about the Buddhist temple. The Buddhists understand that God is Mystery better
than we could ever begin to, because their whole tradition is based on the idea of
the void. God as the void. Emptiness. For them to try to put some concrete shape
to that or some content to that is to deny the core of their religious understanding
which is God as the emptiness or the void. But they need a temple, too, and they
use beautiful little kimonos for children and they bless the children, and the
temples are places for meditation because every human religion needs
concretization.
The Incarnation of Jesus Christ and what the Christian tradition has done with it
philosophically has been an offense to the Jews because Judaism at its core is
monotheistic and it has seen in the deification of the son an idolatry mixing with
God Who is absolute and ultimate. But, as a matter of fact, if we could stick to the
New Testament data itself, there should not really be a problem for Judaism,
because they themselves also recognize the need for that concretization,
something that you can get your hands around.
Going back to the story of Moses, in that conversation on the mountain, God says,
"Build me a sanctuary," the word that comes from the root word to mean holy. In
other words, that which is set part. Create for me a sacred space. And do it in
order that I may dwell in the midst of my people. And that word to dwell in
Hebrew is really to pitch a tent, literally. And it’s very interesting that in Exodus
in the founding story of Israel you have the tension that was within Israel’s faith
all along. It is that tension between the need for the sense of the abiding presence
of God and yet the refusal to say that God can become a permanent possession set
in stone, that God can become domesticated by the cultic actions of a priesthood.
The freedom of God to be there was always guarded in Israel, and yet, they
understood that God would dwell with them and they needed that tabernacle in
their midst, that tent. God would pitch God’s tent in the midst of the community
in order that there might be a place for this Holy One Who was not just easily
accessible, yet always there as a sign of the abiding presence of God, the
constancy and the faithfulness of God, the God Who led them out of Egypt, the
God Who would go through the wilderness with them, the God Who would bring
them into the Promised Land. In the sixth century B.C. when they have been
taken from their land and brought to Babylon and given up on God and lost their
faith, some prophet comes to them and says, "Remember our founding story. Our
© Grand Valley State University
�Mystery Embodied
Richard A. Rhem
Page 3
God is a God who is mobile and light. He pitches his tent. He goes with his
people. God is here in exile as God was there in Jerusalem and the temple."
So, Israel, too, had that tangibility of God because we share with Judaism and
Islam the idea of God as absolute Mystery, yet present in Spirit. But there is then
this nuance that distinguishes Christian faith - it is that Mystery experienced
spiritually is given a human face. It is that which makes Christian faith what it is.
You could have a mystery and you can sense the mystery, but what is its nature?
Or, what is the nature of God? It is so critically important that we have the proper
conception of God because the God we worship will shape the lives we lead. Tell
me who your God is and I’ll tell you the kind of person you are. And I want to say
this morning that that Mystery in our faith’s story has been embodied because,
just as God pitched a tent in the wilderness with God’s people, so according to the
Christian gospel, John now, the first chapter, that word that was with God, that
created intention of God, became flesh in the face of Jesus Christ. (Jews writing
now, as Jesus was a Jew.) That God Who dwelt in the midst of the people in a
tent that was pitched in the wilderness now pitched a tent in human flesh, for the
same word is used. The word was made flesh and dwelt among us. It could be
literally translated, "The word was made flesh and tabernacled in our midst." God
went camping. God in the tent, now the tent being the shape of a human person.
And there was no denying all of Israel’s faith from which this little Jesus
movement stemmed. They said the Torah came through Moses. The gift of Torah
was a gift of God, a previous gift of God. But, grace and truth came to expression
in Jesus. And those words, the words behind grace and truth are two of the most
beautiful words in the Hebrew Bible - hesed, steadfast love, limitless mercy, and
emet - truth, but better, faithfulness to covenant promises. In Jesus, says John,
the God of Israel has taken the shape, the human form that has communicated
the glory of God. That which Moses wanted to see has now become veiled in flesh,
a tangible concretization of the nature of that mystery that we cannot fathom but
which in the good pleasure of God has taken a shape, then given a face. So, the
nature of the mystery is love. That’s what a writer of the same Johannine circles
concluded, the first letter of John, the fourth chapter. He says no one has ever
seen God. That’s always the problem, isn’t it? "Just show us the father," says
Phillip. "Show me your glory," says Moses.
The writer says no one has ever seen God. But God sent Jesus Christ, and on the
basis of the sending of Jesus Christ, what came to expression there is that God is
love. And, he says, "The one who abides in love, abides in God, and God abides in
that one. He does not say "Abide in God," because how can we abide in God? We
can’t get a handle on that. What would we do, challenged to abide in God? But, to
abide in love, to love one another, that’s tangible and concrete. I can do that. And
then, does he say, given the love of God, God so loved us, then we ought to love
God? No. God, having so loved us, we ought to love one another. And miracle of
miracles, when we begin to love one another, on the basis of that revelation which
says that God is love and therefore, having loved us, we ought to love one
© Grand Valley State University
�Mystery Embodied
Richard A. Rhem
Page 4
another, miracle of miracles, when we do that in relationship, in community, God
is there! And the Mystery becomes experienced in a new and fresh way.
And if you want one more marvelous text from II Corinthians, third chapter, Paul
says that where the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom, and we, beholding as in
a mirror the image of that face, are being transformed into that same image
through the spirit of God.
You see, the Mystery has been embodied. The Mystery has a face and, beholding
that face by the ministry of the Spirit of God, the breathing of the Mystery in us,
we are being shaped into that same face. Because what the embodying of the
Mystery is all about is to give us standards and norms by which to orient our
lives. What the mystery of the Trinity is all about is very practical living.
Beholding the face of Jesus and seeing therein that God is love, we are called to
be a people who love, affecting therefore attitudes, determining our actions,
suggesting those things to which we passionately commit ourselves. It makes all
the difference in the world. This is our story. This is what it means to be in the
Christian tradition. This is what it means to be in the Christian church.
It is to have that Ultimate Mystery of things experienced somehow inwardly,
shaped and defined by Jesus, and following in the way of Jesus. Then, I believe,
according to my story, that I am living with the grain of the universe, that I am
living out in the practical arenas of my life the intention of God, because God is
love. And that love, that mystery having come to expression in Jesus, shaping me
into that image by the Spirit of God, gives me a way to go, gives me a way to live,
it shows me what my values must be, it shows me that to which I must commit
myself, that about which I must be passionate. This is down-to-earth, practical
stuff.
What shapes our lives? What shapes our community? What kind of people are
we? Are we people of love, people of grace, people full of mercy, people ready to
forgive, people for reconciliation? Are we people who will love our enemies?
That’s what being Christian is all about. And it’s all about that because in our
story, that ultimate Mystery was embodied in Jesus who showed us the way.
I don’t have any proof for that. I don’t believe it because the church teaches it. I
don’t believe it because the Bible teaches it. I probably believe it because my
mother and father believed it. I probably do believe it because I’ve found it here. I
probably do believe it because my whole life has been lived in the Christian
community. But, I don’t believe it because my parents believe it. I don’t believe it
because the Bible teaches it. I don’t believe it because the church affirms it. I
believe it because, by God, it’s true.
© Grand Valley State University
�
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/648d6748ccc272e0e395b7dbfcc67d5c.mp3
569377f95ccc4bbb05212fc3b20c426f
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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
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
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives.
Contributor
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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
Type
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Sound
Text
Identifier
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KII-01
Coverage
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1981-2014
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audio/mp3
text/pdf
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Event
Trinity Sunday, Pentecost III
Series
Aspects of God
Scripture Text
Exodus 25:8, I John 4:16, John 1:14
Location
The location of the interview
Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI
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KII-01_RA-0-19980621
Date
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1998-06-21
Title
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Mystery Embodied
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>
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Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Sermons
Relation
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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
Sound
Format
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audio/mp3
application/pdf
Description
An account of the resource
A sermon given by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on June 21, 1998 entitled "Mystery Embodied", as part of the series "Aspects of God", on the occasion of Trinity Sunday, Pentecost III, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: Exodus 25:8, I John 4:16, John 1:14.
Divine Intention; Embodiment of Love
Love
Mystery
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/6b9380d9f151674aab6496812d91858d.pdf
cf5e0cee8926ae7ab201596357bb60a3
PDF Text
Text
Mystery’s Face and Flow
Trinity Sunday
Text: Job 23:3; 11 Corinthians 4:6; and, John 14:9
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
May 25, 1997
Transcription of the spoken sermon
It is Trinity Sunday; the Sunday after Pentecost, and it's the time when we focus
on God. It is God Who brings us together week after week, and we have many
things about which to think and speak together. On Trinity, however, we go right
to the core, to God, and to focus on that conception of God which has been
shaped by the Christian tradition and has, indeed, shaped the Christian tradition,
that conception of a Triune God, God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy
Spirit, One God blessed forever.
God in the modern period has become a problem, and although high percentages
of people affirm their faith in God, in the intellectual centers of reflection and
deep thinking that eventually impact popular opinion, God has had hard times in
the last two or three centuries. We no longer simply take for granted the existence
of God, and the nature of God has been thought about a good deal. The religious
quest will always be there. But, God has become a problem. That statement of the
problem was probably set forth as profoundly and as critically as anywhere by the
German philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach. You've heard me refer to Feuerbach, on
occasion, over the years, because his critique of the idea of God goes to the heart
of the matter. It is his idea that God is the projection of our human needs unto
the screen of reality, after which we bow down and worship, that God is the
consequence of human need and that God is a human construction or a
projection. It is certainly true that when we ask about God, we are asking about
ourselves. The questions about God are really questions about our own existence.
Whence have we come? Whither are we going? And in the meantime, what is the
meaning of it all? Is there any purpose? Is there any direction?
The human situation is fraught with peril. We are threatened creatures; our
human existence is perilous. At any moment we well know that we could be
wiped out. We stand at the side of those we love, helplessly seeing them die. We,
ourselves, are vulnerable to a medical diagnosis at any time that could be fatal.
The human condition is one of contingency; it is a perilous life we lead, and the
religious quest is quite a natural quest after some anchor, some place to stand,
some place of comfort, some place to rest the soul. And so, when Feuerbach said
© Grand Valley State University
�Mystery’s Face and Flow
Richard A. Rhem
Page 2
that God does not exist except as we have created God and objectified God and
constructed God out of our own human needs, he was putting his finger on
something that was true. He was roundly criticized, of course, and the Church
rose up with great defensiveness at such a suggestion, that God is a human
creation. Feuerbach, nonetheless, had looked at the human person and the
human situation, had sensed the fearfulness and the anxiety and the fragility of
human existence and detected within the human person a kind of weakness that
longed for some strong source of support and comfort and strength. Feuerbach's
mistake, which is a mistake all of us often make, was to absolutize his claim, that
is, that God is nothing but... To say that God is nothing but the projection of
human need is to say too much. But, his insight is telling and you must be aware,
as I am, of that which goes on in your own soul and heart and you must observe
as I do all about us those for whom God is a crutch, a safety blanket, a security
measure. God, for many of us, is the God we need. But, that's not all there is to
say.
I point that out because we are downstream from that movement of modern
atheism. From Feuerbach came Freud who said that religion is an illusion, Marx,
who said that human life is nothing but economic determinism, Nietzsche, who
said all is nothingness. The nihilism that is laced within contemporary society is
the consequence of that conception of things that has ruled out God, that
conception of a Feuerbach who saw so much of human need projected into God
that he simply wiped God away. But, as Nietzsche said, God is dead, and
everything is permissible. And I would say that the 20th century is probably a
good example of the fact that, when God is dead, anything is permissible, and
very soon the fabric of society begins to unravel.
Karen Armstrong, in her lecture a couple of weeks ago, spoke of the future of
God, and she alluded to the contemporary atheism that pervades the lives of so
many, even though they might answer a Gallup Poll, "Oh, yes, I believe in God."
But there exists a practical atheism, living without any engagement or any regard
to God. Karen Armstrong, said we are in one of those periods of history when we
are simply waiting in the darkness for some future image to arise. But atheism,
she said, is not to be feared, for it is not a rejection of God, but it is a rejection of
inadequate conceptions of God. And so, we are in this present darkness, waiting,
confident that there will yet emerge that understanding of God that can call forth
from us worship and commitment to the ways of love and of justice.
We have had inadequate conceptions of God. We have archaic, naive and
primitive ideas of God, which we have not updated with everything else that we
know in our world. With all of the explosion of knowledge, we have not done
much with our idea of God.
Yesterday it was a nice day and I was beckoned out of the loft to contemplate
God. I went out on the bluff to soak up a little sunshine, thinking that I could
think there or not think at all there, and lo and behold, God got me there, too, for
© Grand Valley State University
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Richard A. Rhem
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as I sat down there was a little table in front of me, one of those little, low tables.
It was made of slats of wood and those slats of wood had little spaces between
them, and as I contemplated the table, there was an ant. So, I will now tell you
the story, "The Ant and I."
The ant went all the way up one board to the corner, and then he made a left turn
and went down the short side and got to another corner, came all the way down
the long side, came to the corner, went up the short side. And I thought, "Now,
what will you do? You've been all the way around the perimeter. Now, what will
you do, little ant?" He did it all over again. Got to every crisis point, made his
turn, in his case, always the left turn, and got back to the starting point. And then
one time, as I was about to drift off, he came to the edge and he went down and
he found the supporting board underneath which created a bridge for him to get
to the next board. He came up on the next board and then he went all the way
down on the board, across, all the way up, down, and he did that several times.
And I thought, "You know, ant, you ought to give me some interesting plot to
follow because I don't have time just to watch you continue to traverse all these
boards."
But, then I realized that God had placed me there in order to contemplate God,
not the ant, for my contemplating the ant is that old image of God that we've
grown up with that has come to us out of an ancient past where there was a
heaven and an earth and the waters under the earth, the three-storied universe,
where God was a being on the throne "out there," in heaven somewhere, and we
were here, and God, although totally apart from us, would come down into our
history and affect circumstances and then return back to heaven. I thought to
myself, if I contemplate the ant, I am like that childhood idea of God which I had.
Here I am, totally unengaged, just a spectator, observing. Now, I thought to
myself, I could take a piece of dune grass and I could wiggle it in front of the ant,
seeing whether or not I could influence the pattern of its peregrinations. But, I
didn't do that. Then I thought to myself, I could crush that bugger! But, I didn't
do that. And then I thought, I could help him. I could save him; I could redeem
him from his dilemma. He is on the surface of a table and the poor dear really is
trying to find the sand. He's trying to find the sand where there is sustenance,
where there is community, where there is home. He's trying to find his brothers
and sisters. I could actually pick him up and put him down on the sand. I didn't
do that, either. When I left him, he had gone down into one of those deep valleys
between the boards, he was down on that foundation piece which probably was a
deep, dark valley of the shadow of death for him. I was half-tempted to pick him
up and put him down, but I thought, "No, I think I'll just leave you there."
Then I thought to myself, "I am like my old image of God, sovereign, absolute. I
can do what I will with that ant. I can crush the ant. I could redeem the ant. I
could observe the ant. I could get engaged with the ant. But, I'm totally apart
from the ant, even though I have the prerogative of getting involved with it, but I
live a separate existence far superior and beyond the ant."
© Grand Valley State University
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Richard A. Rhem
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That's the God I learned in Sunday School. How about you? And then I thought to
myself, "That isn't the God that makes sense of my universe at all today. That's
not how I understand human existence, the world, the cosmos." Oh, I understand
how that old system worked and if we wouldn't be literal about it all, it would still
work for us because it tells us, according to Paul, of God Who said, "Let light
shine out of darkness." In other words, the Creator God Who, in the fullness of
time, shined into our hearts the light of the Gospel of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. And Paul, in his writing to the Corinthians, was talking about the
fact how we even look at that mirror of Jesus mirroring God, and how we, as we
contemplate that image, are changed into that image by the Spirit of God. So, I
see what Paul meant. In the biblical material, I can understand that God, the
incarnation of God, the Spirit of God shaping me into the image of that incarnate
One according to the purposes of God. Or, as John witnessed, really quite simple.
Jesus said, "I'm going to leave you." Thomas said, "We don't know the way."
Jesus said, "I am the Way. I am the Truth. I am the Life. No one comes to the
Father but by me."
Phillip said, "Ah, I've been wanting to talk to you about that. Just show us the
Father and we'll be satisfied."
It's that deep longing. I don't sense that Phillip was in any particular crisis.
Job was in a crisis! Job said, "Oh, that I knew where I might find him!" In the
midst of his burning anguish, Job was in a crisis, with the problem of suffering
and of tragedy in the world that has wrenched that cry out of the human heart
down through the centuries.
Phillip? Phillip's just, well, still longing, though. He said, "Just show us the
Father. Oh, if I could just know, if I could just see."
Jesus said, "Look, how long have I been with you, you still don't get it. You see
me, you see the Father. There's no other access. There's no other map. There's no
other possibility except as you behold God in my face."
So, Paul saw God in the face of Jesus. John saw in his witness to Jesus, God in the
face of Jesus. I can understand that. But then, as I was thinking about the
inadequacy of my King of the Universe model over against the ant, I realized that
that old model wouldn't work anymore, because that table is not just a thing.
That table is dammed up energy, because we know that for 15 billion years it has
been a cosmic river of energy expanding time and space as it moves, and we know
that that table is simply energy, for a time coalesced, gathered into material, but
that material can as well be transferred back into energy because energy and
matter are interchangeable; they're all one reality. It is not as though I have a life
other than that ant; the life of the ant is the life in me, as well. It is God's Spirit,
God's breath that enables the ant to live and me to live, and I am just a cut above
© Grand Valley State University
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Richard A. Rhem
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the ant in that I am conscious of the ant and the ant is not conscious of me, but
consciousness is that uniquely human capacity. But, the human, although having
that consciousness, that self-awareness, that ability to observe the process, is not
apart from the process, for that table and that ant and my body are all one reality,
and all of it alive because of God. Nothing exists except God's Spirit, God's breath,
God's enlivening presence.
So, I have to do away with that old King model of a God, "out there" ruling, some
sovereign Absolute Who can dip down, Who can save or damn. I have to get God,
somehow or other, into the reality of my world, to see that my world is because
God's breath is or God's Spirit is, and behind and beyond that cosmic drama
there is a mystery, a mystery that we cannot fathom, that totally Other, that
wholly Other, totally transcendent, Ultimate Mystery that is the Source. I don't
know how to say anything more. And even to say that is an article of faith. There's
no empirical proof that there's any Source! But, I cannot believe the marvels and
wonders of the cosmic drama, except I think of a fountain of creativity that
continues to pour forth and that the cosmic drama itself continues to be laced
with that creativity as that develops in all of its diversity in a thousand directions
with possibilities unlimited.
But then, I think to myself, "So I have an Ultimate Mystery. But, what is the
nature of that Mystery other than a creativity. And I have a cosmos of tables and
chairs and bricks and bodies and everything existent, and all of that diversity what does it mean? What is the nature of the Mystery? And what is the meaning
of the manifold diversity of my reality?
And then I see a face. I see the face of Jesus. And suddenly I'm back at an old
Triune God. Suddenly I see the Trinity with new eyes. Suddenly I see the Ultimate
Mystery totally hidden from us, but totally present in all that is, defined in a face,
the face of Jesus. That enables me to have a sense of the nature of the Mystery, to
sense that that Mystery which is creativity is driving things toward an order of
love and justice, because if that face, that representation in history, that
concretization, that incarnation - if that incarnation of Jesus is really a reflection
or a mirror of the Mystery, and as I reflect on that reflection in the face of Jesus,
if I am being thus shaped like Jesus, then perhaps it is the intention of that whole
cosmic drama that there be those who be human who are thus shaped, who are
joining in those currents that lead to justice and to love.
Suddenly I have a three-pointed God again. I have the Ultimate Mystery, the
Source of it all; I have the enlivening presence of God in all that is, and I have a
definition, I have a specificity, I have an image, an icon, a concrete shape that
calls me to meaningful living.
The way of Jesus. The way of justice. The way of compassion, moving, moving, I
trust and hope, to the Kingdom of God, Shalom, the Cosmic Harmony in perfect
pitch.
© Grand Valley State University
�Mystery’s Face and Flow
Richard A. Rhem
Page 6
Now I have a sense of my whence, although I cannot penetrate the Mystery. I
have a sense of my aliveness, thanks to that breath, wind, Spirit that's been
flowing now for 15 billion years, and I have a marker, I have a way, I have a face,
and it's because of that face that we gather here, lost in wonder, love and praise,
before the Mystery, and go out of here to live a certain way.
My economic decisions are not just economic decisions. They are economic
decisions that I make in light of my call to follow Jesus.
My political decisions are not just arbitrary political decisions; they are decisions
that I make in the light of the face that I see.
The total way that I am is not arbitrary. It is a way of commitment, following the
one whose commitment led him to death and resurrection, by the Spirit, moving,
moving toward that final Kingdom.
In the light of all that we know about that cosmic river of energy that now and
again is dammed up into material stuff like chairs and tables and bodies, I can't
believe that, caught up in that process, I still need three points of light, or a
Triune God, or a God creatively present, concretely representative of that life to
which I am called.
The Church is a place where we gather where all lobbying ceases, all selfish
ambition comes to an end, all personal advantage ceases as we commit ourselves
to the cause of the Ultimate Mystery Whose clue we've found in a face. It's just as
simple as that.
© Grand Valley State University
�
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/f5ee153b1d90bcd0f4e5fe453500b75f.mp3
f8469e813eebb54263761fe5fcf98317
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Richard A. Rhem Collection
Description
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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.
Subject
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Clergy--Michigan
Reformed Church in America
Christ Community Church (Spring Lake, Mich.)
Religion
Interfaith worship
Sermons
Sound Recordings
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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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Event
Trinity Sunday
Series
A Cosmic Symphony
Scripture Text
Job 23:3, II Corinthians 4:6, John 14:9
Location
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Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI
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KII-01_RA-0-19970525
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1997-05-25
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Mystery's Face and Flow
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Richard A. Rhem
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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>
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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
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Description
An account of the resource
A sermon given by Richard A. Rhem (Dick) on May 25, 1997 entitled "Mystery's Face and Flow", as part of the series "A Cosmic Symphony", on the occasion of Trinity Sunday, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: Job 23:3, II Corinthians 4:6, John 14:9.
Justice
Love
Mystery
Nature of God
Religious Quest
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/dbe36d1c42c3340e1b4fdb0bcc32a5ac.mp3
0de8f44af70f1f599749585a5301089e
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/993a0284743ca0a1602d753c2b69aca6.pdf
0740458f6bebd4bafcc47a5dc71499e2
PDF Text
Text
Observing Sabbath: Celebrating Grace and Freedom
From the series: The Sacramental Character of the Church
Text: Deuteronomy 5:15; Colossians 2:20
Richard A. Rhem
Christ Community Church
Spring Lake, Michigan
Pentecost VI, July 19, 1992
Transcription of the spoken sermon
Remember that you were a slave ... and the Lord your God brought you out ...
Deuteronomy 5:15
If with Christ you died ... why do you live as if you still belonged to the world?
Colossians 2:20
The call to Israel to observe the Sabbath is contained within what we call the Ten
Commandments: the Law. Sometimes the first five books of the Old Testament
are called the Law. But that translation, “Law,” is really inaccurate in terms of
conveying how Israel received that teaching. Torah was the word. The first five
books were the Torah. Torah means “a way of life,” and Israel received that word
as a gracious gift of God, an invitation to fullness of life, a way in which life could
be lived most richly, and human potential realized most fully. But because the call
to observe Sabbath is in what we call the Ten Commandments, the Law, there has
always been that tendency among us to legalize that command as though it had a
kind of compelling compulsion about it that forced us into a ritual of servants and
we often failed, I think, to sense the gracious gift that was the Sabbath.
The original Ten Commandments, is in the book of Exodus, the 20th chapter.
There, as we noted last week, Israel was called to observe Sabbath in order to
recall week by week the creative act of God, in order to be reminded one day in
seven, in order to have their being permeated with the realization that the whole
world was alive with the life of God, to understand that the whole reality was to
be viewed as a sacrament, as a source of knowledge and a cause for worship, that
the world, what we call nature, the cosmic expanse, was to be received as a means
of grace.
It is only in the last couple of hundred years, in the wake of the Enlightenment,
that we have spoken about nature as something over against us and as a kind of
self-contained reality that could exist on its own. The breakthroughs in scientific
understanding and technological advance have tended to reduce nature to a
realm out there, as though it had independent status and was a self-contained
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existence. How many hours haven’t we argued fruitlessly about whether or not
there is such a thing as a miracle? Have you ever been in a heated discussion
about whether or not “prayer changes things?” I think that those very questions
are the wrong questions. They propose a model in which there is the whole realm
of nature, with God out there somewhere, having to break in. We speak of
intervention, breaking in, as though all of this kind of exists on its own and now
and then, on occasion, here and there, God drops in but, if God would be
involved, would impact, would influence, God must come as permeating, as
breathing in, as the life of the cosmos being the consequence of the breath of God.
“You breathe and give them life,” said the psalmist.
The last couple of hundred years in modern culture we have lost that sense of the
world as Sacramental. Israel was called to pause at the end of every week, to stop,
to look, to listen and to delight in creation as the gracious work of the good and
gracious God; to rest, to let go, to cease their ceaseless striving and struggle, their
desire to control and to manipulate; to give them a sense that they were not after
all indispensable for the sustaining of all things. God is quite able to keep the
planet in motion and the stars in the sky. God is beyond us; God is in us, with us
and in all things so that all things must become a Sacrament that points us to
God. To stop on Sabbath and smell the roses and luxuriate in the prodigal
goodness of God who made the world, whose intention is for us to live in the
world as if it were a Garden of Eden, a place of delight - that is the call of Sabbath.
In a wonderful essay entitled “On Common Prayer,” Catherine Madsen makes the
point that there is a holiness there - there! It is a given. She makes the point that
holiness, that otherness, is in us intimately, permeating every atom of our body.
God can’t abandon us. God is with us, in us, permeating the whole of reality,
holding all things together. And then she goes on to make this wonderful
connection to that sense of God that haunts us whether we name God or not. That
presence of God that permeates us whether we are conscious or not is that which
gives rise to unrest and the dream of redemption.
She writes that “there is something that loves you in the world. ...there is
something that loves you in the world.” A voice that speaks to you within, in the
worst despair, is not different than the voice that called the world into being.
What makes your body give off heat? It is the same fire that sleeps in the rocks
and is changed from light into matter by the plants. The fire that lights the sun
and the other stars. Holiness is there and there is “something out there in the
world that loves you,” and the world is a means of grace if we would pause to take
it in, to give heed, to pay attention with a kind of regular, rhythmic discipline.
Observance of the Sabbath – resting, pausing long enough to dream another
dream, and to allow our imagination to connect us with that which is not simply
beyond us but is woven into the very fabric of our being.
But that raises a question for us. There is something that loves you out there in
the world - how would one name that love? God created the heavens and the
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earth, and so nature is not some independent existence but is in-breathed by the
breath of God. But God is not only the God of our space, but the God of our time.
Israel was called to observe Sabbath in Exodus 20 to be reminded of the spatial
dimension of its home in God. But in the second giving of the Law, in the book of
Deuteronomy in the 5th chapter, the verses we read a moment ago, Israel is
called to observe Sabbath - not to remember creation, but to remember its
liberation from Egyptian slavery. There God calls Israel to remember the
Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath in order to be reminded one day in seven that
they were slaves one time and God set them free. The God of creation is the God
of covenant faithfulness. The God of creation is the God of redemption. The
something that loves you out there in the world – that which is intrinsic in the
very fabric of reality – has a name and a face. It is a God who is for us, who would
always liberate and set us free, the God who is gracious and who is on the side of
God’s people.
And so Israel was called every seventh day to stop, to rest and to worship. And in
that pause, in that oasis at the end of the week, to have its perspective shaped
once again. To know that it lives in the environment, the spatial expanse brought
forth by the Word of God, and that it lived as a people graced by the God that
would set all humankind free.
The God of Creation. The God of Redemption. And we can see how Israel
annually in its Passover Feast celebrated that release from bondage, from the
slavery in Egypt – but not only annually in the Passover Feast, but every Sabbath.
Every week in the rhythm of labor and liturgy, in the rhythm of work and worship
it was called to remember and to hope. God is not only the God of creation, but
the God of history, the God of our time. So Israel was called always to remember
that the God of its past would be the God of its future, and Israel was the one who
gave to the world a whole sense of history - of movement.
The ancient Eastern cultures lived in the eternal cycle of the coming and return.
Israel gave to the world the idea of a beginning, and an end, and a meantime, and
in its festival celebrations, it remembered and it hoped. It had already received
and it had a promise of more to come, and it lived always in that remembering
and hoping. Christian worship is patterned obviously on that as well, for we are a
people who come together weekly. We celebrate one great central event, when
God raised Jesus Christ from the dead. We celebrate on the first day of the week
because on the first day of the week God raised Jesus from the dead. We call the
first day of the week the Lord’s Day. And we come together, not only on Easter
Sunday to celebrate the Resurrection, but we come together Sunday by Sunday by
Sunday, because every Sunday is a little Easter. Even the Sundays in the season of
Lent are not Lenten days, they are Sundays in Lent, because in the inside of the
church it was recognized that, after Easter, you cannot keep Lent on Sunday.
You know I see how difficult it is for churches to make changes, but twenty years
ago we changed our name to Christ Community Church. For twenty years pastors
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have contacted me to ask, “How in the world did you do that? We had a “Name
the Church contest and everybody got offended and we lost the whole thing.” I
don’t know how we did it, but we did. But most of the time churches can’t do
anything. Most of the time you can’t change anything in the church because it is
all absolutized and made sacred as though it is God’s way once it’s done. And it
seems the greatest blasphemy to violate the principle “we have always done it
that way.”
I would have liked to have been there in the early church when they moved the
Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday. Can you imagine the discussions around the
table as they were breaking bread and pouring the cup? For centuries, for
generations, it’s in the Bible, the seventh day.
When I was a kid there was an old man in the north end of Kalamazoo who had a
stake truck with big sides. It looked like that house over on Jackson in Grand
Haven, where it’s written all over you know - verses, and you can read the news
by going by the house. (Laughter) This truck was plastered with writing. I
remember as a little kid that he offered so much money to the person that could
prove that the church should move from the seventh day to the first day of
worship. I always wanted to take up that challenge, but the prize wasn’t enough
to validate the work. But I will never forget that, and I wondered about that as a
kid. But now I wonder about how they were ever able to do it. Can you imagine?
Moving from Saturday to Sunday? And, obviously in doing that, they were
moving to the first day of the week as the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus
Christ from the dead because they knew now that the center of their life was in
Christ. “Your life is hid with Christ in God, if then you will be raised with Christ.”
Their whole life was in Christ. The whole ball game was the new life, the new
creation in Jesus Christ.
And so they moved from that Sabbath observance to the observance of Sabbath
on the first day of the week, the Lord’s Day, Little Easter, in order, week by week,
by week, to remember. It wasn’t enough once in the springtime to come together
in a great press of people in the resurrection. Once every week, the first day of the
week. Every time we gather here it is because God raised Christ from the dead.
And because he lives, you too live! Every week we come here in order to have
confirmed again in the depths of our being “that there is someone out there that
loves us,” that the God that we serve is the God of grace and liberation and
freedom, who would break the shackles of every form of human bondage and
servitude. The God whom we worship is a God for us, the God who brings us joy
and springs forth from us - doxology and praise and hallelujah.
The whole worship of the Church is celebration of Easter, and that was so
overwhelming that they were able to break with that deeply imbedded tradition.
Something written in the Word of God to observe the seventh day - moved to the
first day, which shows that they were liberated. They were freed from religion.
© Grand Valley State University
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Oh, to be free from religion. Religion binds and cripples. Jesus was so angry at
the religious leaders who piled legalism upon legalism, regulation upon
regulation. He said, “You make these people seven times more the children of hell
than when you began with them.” Paul writes after the resurrection and after
Easter to those who were disturbing the Easter at Colossi. And he said to the
believers, “Don’t let anybody upset you and deceive you with philosophies about
don’t handle and don’t touch, and don’t taste. Don’t let anybody lay on you some
kind of ironclad rule that says you’ve got to do this on Sunday or Saturday or on
Monday or Tuesday. Are you not free? Have you not died with Christ and been
raised again? If then you be with Christ, set your mind on the things that are
above, while your life is hid in Christ with God. You are free by God’s grace, and
don’t forget it.” The only way not to forget it is to observe Sabbath, to pause in the
regular rhythm of one’s life. Instead of six and one it becomes one and six. And it
is the same principle. It is that we might never doubt that there is a great,
gracious life force permeating into the whole of reality and every molecule and
atom of our body that could never abandon us.
“Something out there loves you in the world,” and that love has a name and a
face, and it has appeared in our midst as Jesus Christ our Lord, who was raised
from the dead.
As I was thinking about this I realized how important it is. I confessed to you last
week and said that being raised as a kid amid the heavy legalism of Sabbath
observance, I was tempted to kick the habit. Going into this profession that was
difficult, but I did everything possible to convince myself that I wasn’t really still
bound in that kind of legalism. Then I began to see that the observance of
Sabbath was such a great gift and grace, and that the only way that the people of
God have continued through the generations is that they have been a people who
have never forgotten because they have always been called to remember.
And unless there is a discipline and a routine and a rhythm in our lives, we will
soon forget. It is easy to forget. God will not cease loving you, but you will cease
being conscious of it. And what is it to be loved and not be conscious of it. And so
we are called to take heed, to pay attention. So I grumble a bit about ugly
Sundays, but as a kid I did know that there was a special day, and as a kid I did
know who I was and to whom I belonged.
The only problem is, I think in the western tradition of the Christian church, we
somehow or other got our focus off Resurrection and Easter, and moved it to the
cross and Good Friday and our sin and our guilt. You say, “Well isn’t that what
the Bible says?” No. Not the only thing the Bible says. You say, “Well isn’t that
Christian?” No. It’s western, medieval, Catholic Christianity that permeates our
Reformed Protestantism as well. The focus of the Western Church – Roman,
medieval, filtering into Reformation, Protestant – has its center in the cross. Its
fascination is with sin and guilt as the major problem, and the atonement.
© Grand Valley State University
�Observing Sabbath; Celebrating Grace Richard A. Rhem
Page 6
Now if you were raised in the Eastern Orthodox Church in Istanbul, if you were a
child of the Eastern Rite, you wouldn’t know all about that cross and heavy sin
and guilt, and strong emphasis on atonement. You would come into this church
and it would be foggy. You could hardly see me - and that might be a means of
grace. (Laughter) But the reason that you wouldn’t be able to see me clearly is
because there would be these clouds of incense. If you went to San Sofia in
Istanbul in this marvelous, marvelous place you would see an old mosaic of the
victorious Pentocrater, the triumphant Christ. And from the altar there would be
billows of smoke going heavenward and there would be priests everywhere in all
kinds of flowing garb. There would be all of the warmth and sensuousness of that
which is human, poised and praising in Doxology the Creator who had raised
Jesus from the dead.
A totally different feel. A different focus. A different center. Which is right? Well,
you need a little of both. But I would have to vote with the Eastern Rite because and this is my basis for saying that – in the Eastern Orthodox Church, with its
focus on Easter, on Resurrection, on a risen Christ and Doxology as worship and
praise, you still experience the original intention of moving off Saturday to
Sunday, rather than moving off Saturday to Good Friday. Now I have never read
that anywhere and I can’t swear it is true, but I wonder. Isn’t that interesting? In
the instance of the infant Christian community, they did not make their sacred
day Friday, they made it Sunday because the central thing is not sin and our guilt
and the cross, it is the life-giving gracious God who raises Jesus from the dead
and permeates us with life, who promised “because I live, you too shall live.” So
Sunday is a celebration. It is a day for Doxology. It is a day for incense. It is a day
for pulling out all the stops. For dancing and singing. (From the congregation “Amen.”) All right - I have been waiting twenty-five years for that. (Laughter and
applause.) I’ll bet you I am right. I bet I’m right. And I’ll bet you church going
wouldn’t be just a heavy obligation, a legalistic demand, if it were such that one
came just one day in seven into this place and was lost in wonder, love and grace
and praise, knowing that the whole world is resplendent and shot through with
God’s life, that the something out there that loves one is the Creator and the
Liberator, the God revealed in the face of Jesus. Then Sabbath observance would
become the gift and the joy that I suspect that God always intended it to be.
Paul said, “Don’t let anybody lay a lot of legalistic clap-trap on you, but don’t
forget to remember.” As I said, I grumble a bit about all those ugly Sundays. They
nearly killed me as a kid. But I’ll tell you what, parents and grandparents. You
bring your kids here regularly Sunday after Sunday, bring them to the Eucharist
Sunday after Sunday, kneel with them. Let them hear you sing and watch you
pray, and they’ll be as hopelessly addicted as I am. The center of Christian
worship is Doxology, and the central act is Eucharist, which is a Greek word for
thanksgiving. And on Easter this past year I celebrated the bread and the wine as
Eucharist for the first time in my life - I took Holy Communion on Easter and
suddenly understood its true heart: the presence of the risen, living Lord. That that’s worship. That’s good, huh? I like it.
© 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 VI
Series
The Sacramental Character of the Church
Scripture Text
Deuteronomy 5:15, Colossians 2:20
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-0-19920719
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1992-07-19
Title
A name given to the resource
Observing Sabbath, Celebrating Grace and Freedom
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 19, 1992 entitled "Observing Sabbath, Celebrating Grace and Freedom", as part of the series "The Sacramental Character of the Church", on the occasion of Pentecost VI, at Christ Community Church, Spring Lake, MI. Scripture references: Deuteronomy 5:15, Colossians 2:20.
Creation
Easter
Immanence
Love
Sabbath
Sacrament
Worship