Brian Beck - Sermon Untitled (August 22, 1971)

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	(triumphant organ music)	0:04
-	Oh, come, let us sing unto the Lord.	0:49
	Let us make a joyful noise unto the rock of our salvation.	0:54
	Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving	0:59
	and to make a joyful noise unto Him with psalms.	1:04
	(triumphant organ music)	1:12
	(choir singing)	1:50
	Let us confess our sins before God.	4:24
	Let us pray.	4:27
	Our heavenly Father, who by thy love has made us,	4:31
	and through thy love has kept us,	4:35
	and in thy love which make us perfect,	4:38
	we humbly confess that we have not loved thee	4:42
	with all our heart and soul and mind and strength,	4:45
	and that we have not loved one another	4:49
	as Christ hath loved us.	4:52
	Thy light is within our souls,	4:56
	but our selfishness has hindered thee.	5:00
	We have not lived by faith.	5:05
	We have resisted thy Spirit.	5:08
	We have neglected thine inspirations.	5:13
	Forgive what we have been, help us to amend what we are,	5:17
	and in thy Spirit direct what we shall be,	5:23
	that thou mayest come into the full glory of thy creation,	5:28
	in us and in all men, through Jesus Christ, our Lord.	5:32
	Hear what comfortable words our savior Christ sayeth	5:43
	unto all that truly turned to Him.	5:46
	"Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden,	5:50
	and I will give you rest."	5:55
	Hear also these words of scripture.	5:59
	"The Lord is gracious and full of compassion,	6:03
	slow to anger and of great mercy.	6:08
	The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit.	6:13
	A broken and a contrite heart, oh God,	6:18
	thou will not despise.	6:22
	If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just	6:25
	to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us	6:31
	from all unrighteousness."	6:36
	Let us pray together, the Unison Prayer of Confession.	6:39
	We called to you, Lord, out of our distress,	6:47
	and you answered us.	6:53
	You heard our voices.	6:55
	We said, we are cast out from your presence.	6:58
	How shall we again look upon your holy temple?	7:02
	The waters closed in over us.	7:06
	The deep was round about us.	7:09
	Yet, you brought up our life from the pit.	7:12
	Oh Lord, our God.	7:16
	When our souls fainted within us, we remembered the Lord	7:18
	and our prayers came to you, into your holy temple.	7:23
	With the voice of thanksgiving, we will sacrifice to you.	7:29
	Deliverance belongs to the Lord.	7:34
	Amen.	7:38
	(somber organ music)	7:43
	(woman singing)	8:31
	We are glad to welcome to the pulpit	11:03
	of this chapel this morning, the Reverend Brian Beck	11:05
	of Wesley House, Cambridge, England.	11:10
	This is a matter of peculiar personal pleasure to me,	11:15
	because I count Brian Beck a personal friend,	11:19
	although that is certainly one of his lesser distinctions.	11:24
	He was born and grew up in London, England,	11:30
	and attended Cambridge University,	11:34
	from which he holds the BA and MA degrees	11:38
	in Classics and Theology.	11:42
	He is a Methodist minister	11:46
	and has served churches in England.	11:47
	From 1962 to 1968, he was a professor on the faculty	11:51
	of St. Paul's United Theological College,	11:58
	near Nairobi in Kenya.	12:02
	He returned from there to England, to his present position	12:06
	as tutor of New Testament in Wesley House, Cambridge.	12:10
	He is presently in this country,	12:17
	attending the World Methodist Conference	12:19
	in Denver, Colorado.	12:23
	And, we're very grateful to him for taking time	12:26
	and expending the energy to fly out this weekend	12:30
	to preach at this service and to preach again tonight	12:35
	at 7:30 at Trinity Methodist Church in Durham.	12:39
	The New Testament lesson is from	12:56
	the Gospel according to St. John 13:1-16.	12:58
	(clearing throat)	13:09
	"Now, before the feast of the Passover,	13:12
	when Jesus knew that His hour had come	13:16
	to depart out of this world to the Father,	13:18
	having loved His own who were in the world,	13:22
	He loved them to the end, and during supper,	13:26
	when the devil had already put it into	13:30
	the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray Him,	13:32
	Jesus, knowing that the Father had given	13:38
	all things into His hands and that	13:41
	He had come from God and was going to God,	13:44
	rose from supper, laid aside His garments	13:49
	and girded Himself with a towel.	13:53
	Then, He poured water into a basin and began to wash	13:58
	the disciples' feet and to wipe them	14:02
	with the towel, with which He was girded.	14:06
	He came to Simon Peter, and Peter said to Him,	14:10
	'Lord, do you wash my feet?'	14:13
	And, Jesus answered him, 'What I am doing,	14:17
	you do not know now, but afterward you will understand.'	14:21
	Peter said to Him, 'You shall never wash my feet.'	14:28
	Jesus answered him, 'If I do not wash you,	14:33
	you have no part in me.'	14:37
	Simon Peter said to Him, 'Lord, not my feet only,	14:41
	but also my hands, and my head.'	14:48
	And, Jesus said to him, 'He who has bathed	14:52
	does not need to wash, except for his feet.	14:57
	But he is clean all over, and you are clean,	15:02
	but not all of you,' for He knew who was to betray Him,	15:07
	and that was why He said, 'You are not all clean.'	15:15
	When He had washed their feet and taken His garments	15:20
	and resumed His place, He said to them,	15:24
	'Do you know what I have done to you?	15:30
	You call me teacher and Lord and you are right, for so I am.	15:34
	If then I, your Lord and teacher, have washed your feet,	15:43
	you also ought to wash one another's feet,	15:51
	for I have given you an example that you also	15:57
	should do as I have done to you.	16:02
	Truly, truly I say to you,	16:08
	a servant is not greater than his master,	16:12
	nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him.'"	16:17
	May God bless to our understanding	16:26
	this reading from His holy word.	16:28
	(triumphant organ music)	16:32
	(choir singing)	16:41
	The Lord be with you.	17:17
-	And with thy spirit.	17:18
-	Let us pray.	17:20
	Father in heaven, thou hast encouraged us to ask	17:36
	and to believe that it will be given us,	17:41
	to seek and to find, and to knock in the expectation	17:45
	of acceptance, and so we lay our cares	17:50
	and concerns before thee this morning.	17:54
	We pray especially for this university	17:59
	and for the community of which it is a part.	18:01
	Guide those who seek to generate insight and understanding,	18:06
	as they shortly return to their usual tasks.	18:12
	Grant all wisdom in the conduct of their work	18:18
	and in the day-to-day execution of their responsibilities,	18:23
	as students or as teachers or whatever.	18:28
	May the pursuit of learning never cease	18:36
	to be also the pursuit of truth	18:38
	and of goodness for our own generation.	18:41
	We also ask thy guidance and protection	18:48
	for this city and others like it,	18:52
	as its citizens face old problems with new opportunities.	18:57
	May all those concerned with the education of the young	19:05
	have courage tempered with prudence and generosity.	19:08
	Give those charged with special responsibility	19:15
	for our schools both strength and patience.	19:18
	Grant to all of us, who are involved	19:25
	with the problems thrust upon us by our time and place,	19:28
	persistence and forbearance.	19:33
	Teach us, as members of one human community,	19:38
	that the bearing of one another's burdens	19:42
	is the fulfillment of thy law.	19:46
	We remember now also, oh Lord, all those who are sick,	19:52
	or beset with personal problems or misfortune.	19:59
	Comfort the sick and the grief-stricken.	20:05
	Uphold the weak.	20:10
	And accompany the lonely and bring them	20:14
	into new community with thee and with others.	20:18
	These are petitions we offer in the name of Him	20:27
	who taught us when praying to say,	20:31
	our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name,	20:34
	thy kingdom come, thy will be done	20:40
	on Earth as it is in heaven.	20:44
	Give us this day our daily bread	20:48
	and forgive us our trespasses,	20:51
	as we forgive those who trespass against us,	20:54
	and lead us not into temptation,	20:58
	but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom	21:01
	and the power and the glory forever.	21:06
	Amen.	21:11
-	In the name of God,	21:29
	Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.	21:32
	Amen.	21:36
	The Gospel according to St. Matthew 20:25.	21:43
	"Jesus called His disciples to Him and said,	21:54
	'You know that among the gentiles,	22:01
	the rulers lord it over them,	22:04
	and their great men make their authority felt.	22:07
	This is not to happen among you.	22:14
	No.	22:19
	If anyone wants to be great among you,	22:21
	he must be your servant.	22:27
	And anyone who wants to be first among you	22:31
	must be your slave, just as the Son of Man came	22:35
	not to be served, but to serve	22:42
	and to give His life as a ransom for many.'"	22:47
	Do we have here a touch of sarcasm?	22:59
	As elsewhere in the teaching of Jesus about the rulers,	23:05
	we are given a picture in our minds	23:15
	of the puppet kings of the Roman Empire,	23:19
	those little rulers that the Romans used	23:27
	to govern parts of the near east.	23:33
	Men like Herod the Great and Herod Antipas.	23:39
	We think of them in their fine clothes,	23:49
	with their luxury foods, in their marble palaces,	23:55
	with the crowds of time servers,	24:03
	with their absolute power over life and limb	24:09
	and property of their subjects,	24:14
	their ruthless cruelty.	24:21
	And not only kings like Herod, the Roman governors too.	24:28
	Among the gentiles, the rulers lord it over them	24:39
	and their great ones make their authority felt.	24:45
	But, we should miss the point of this passage.	24:54
	If we thought that the purpose was to attack the great,	24:59
	much as they might deserve it,	25:07
	we should miss the point if we thought	25:12
	that Jesus was merely making fun of the antics	25:14
	of the gentiles, as a typical Jew might.	25:21
	This is a word for the disciples.	25:31
	This is not to happen among you.	25:36
	There are great men in our world too.	25:46
	Dictators like King Hassan of Morocco,	25:53
	who can put down a rebellion by having the leaders shot	25:59
	and spat upon by his troops,	26:05
	and the whole incident broadcast over radio.	26:09
	There are other kinds of great men also,	26:18
	other kinds of dictatorship by individuals and groups.	26:24
	The weapons they may use may be financial power,	26:31
	political pressure,	26:39
	international connections,	26:42
	or just the sheer weight of numbers.	26:46
	There are people in our world who are asked	26:55
	to make decisions which affect the lives of thousands.	27:01
	It is not surprising if some of them should see it	27:08
	as an opportunity to lord it over others	27:14
	and make their authority felt.	27:18
	But again, this is a word not for the rulers,	27:25
	but for the disciples.	27:32
	And, much as it might be justified to give a discourse	27:36
	upon social justice and freedom,	27:42
	the point today is for us.	27:48
	This is not to happen among you.	27:54
	Because, in small ways, it is true of all of us.	28:00
	We all have in us the desire to dominate,	28:07
	to take away the freedom of others	28:12
	by making them fit our pattern.	28:16
	I am in my room, preparing this sermon.	28:23
	My children are outside, playing.	28:30
	And they can be very noisy.	28:35
	And I go out and I tell them to shut up,	28:41
	so that I can do what I want to do.	28:46
	They must fit my pattern.	28:55
	The neighbor, who calls over the fence	29:01
	because the television is on too loud.	29:06
	The man at the office or the committee chairman,	29:13
	who throws his weight about.	29:18
	The lady who has organized the fellowship supper	29:24
	for the last 20 years and done it excellently,	29:28
	but let no one interfere because it is her kingdom.	29:34
	We make our authority felt.	29:43
	We like to lord it over others.	29:47
	And, this can come in so many disguises.	29:51
	Even kindness can become paternalism.	29:57
	We give generously, and every look and gesture says,	30:03
	I am better than you because I am giving.	30:10
	You have nothing to give.	30:18
	Remember to be grateful.	30:22
	And, the church can be like this too.	30:28
	I don't know how it is in your country,	30:34
	but in my own, if the local city council	30:39
	introduces a controversial piece of social legislation,	30:46
	like as not, the church will be curiously silent,	30:54
	but let that council try to restrict parking	31:02
	around the church on Sunday morning	31:06
	and there will be a protest,	31:10
	because our rights have been threatened.	31:14
	Lording it over others, making our authority felt.	31:19
	And, against all of this,	31:27
	Jesus sets the ideal of the servant.	31:30
	Anyone who wants to be great among you must be your servant.	31:38
	This is so revolutionary that it becomes difficult to grasp.	31:50
	It turns all our ideas upside down.	31:57
	We all talk about the man at the top,	32:04
	the man who has gone up in the world,	32:09
	the man who is over others,	32:13
	and for Jesus, greatness lies equally	32:17
	with the man at the bottom,	32:24
	with the man who is content to play second fiddle,	32:28
	with the man who orders no one around,	32:34
	who gets no limelight,	32:38
	for greatness is measured not by social position,	32:43
	still less by power,	32:50
	greatness is measured by one thing only.	32:55
	Service.	33:01
	We see this not only in the teaching of Jesus,	33:09
	we see it in the whole pattern of His life.	33:14
	In His ministry of compassion.	33:21
	In His dealing with people.	33:26
	But, not just in the encounter between Jesus	33:31
	and individuals in His own time, but in the impact	33:37
	of His life in its totality upon history as a whole.	33:44
	As we read it in St. Matthew,	33:54
	the son of man came not to be served, but to serve	33:57
	and to give His life as a ransom for many.	34:03
	And, what is a ransom,	34:10
	but an infinitely costly means of setting people free?	34:15
	And, the whole of the life of Jesus,	34:27
	His death and His resurrection are such an act	34:30
	of self-giving service that humanity might be delivered.	34:36
	And, we are here today because of this.	34:44
	Without Jesus, the word God would have	34:50
	a quite different meaning in our language.	34:54
	Because of Jesus, we can address God this morning as Father.	35:00
	Because of Jesus, we can stand up tall	35:10
	as people who have been cut down to size	35:17
	by the judgment of God and now know that they are forgiven.	35:22
	We are all here today because of the greatest act of service	35:32
	that the world has ever known,	35:40
	by the one whom men called the servant.	35:43
	And, this is the pattern for us.	35:50
	Anyone who wants to be great among you must be your servant.	35:56
	But, this does not say enough.	36:07
	Let us, for the few moments that remain,	36:12
	explore what this idea of service means.	36:17
	Notice that this service, which we have received	36:29
	and which we are called to give,	36:34
	is service without expectation of return.	36:37
	How easily the idea of service	36:48
	becomes confused in our minds.	36:51
	We pick up our magazines and we read,	36:58
	so-and-so's car hire, at your service in every city.	37:06
	(scoffs) If you can afford it.	37:14
	We go out to a restaurant to have a meal,	37:20
	and at the bottom of the bill, 10% service charge.	37:26
	And, do you see service has become a commodity	37:37
	which can be bought and sold like peanuts?	37:42
	And, sometimes we fall for this ourselves.	37:53
	I think of a man who held office	37:58
	in the church for many years,	38:02
	and one day he resigned in anger	38:07
	because he had been out-voted on a proposal	38:12
	that he had put before the church council.	38:16
	For 15 years, I have served this church,	38:23
	and this is all the thanks I get.	38:30
	Is it for this that we give our service?	38:39
	That we may be paid back?	38:45
	That we may have influence?	38:49
	That we may receive our vote of thanks?	38:54
	When we begin a church program of social service,	39:03
	do we give up because people do not seem grateful	39:13
	or because they do not come to church?	39:21
	The service of Jesus was without expectation of return.	39:28
	To put it crudely, when Jesus went to the cross,	39:38
	there was no calculation about whether people would respond,	39:46
	no arithmetic to decide whether the cost was worth it.	39:55
	It needed to be done.	40:04
	He was called to do it.	40:08
	And, He left the rest in the hands of his Father.	40:12
	Service without expectation of return.	40:24
	And then, this kind of service is service to the limit.	40:31
	To the limit.	40:41
	I think of a story which I heard	40:46
	when first I went to Africa.	40:50
	A great and honored missionary,	40:55
	who died a few years ago,	41:00
	one of the great pioneers of the church,	41:06
	to whom the church in Africa owes much,	41:12
	but about whom it was said he never allowed an African	41:18
	to come closer than the porch.	41:28
	If you were a European, you were invited in and you had tea.	41:37
	If you were an African, he came out	41:47
	and spoke to you on the porch.	41:51
	Now, there is no point in condemning him.	41:58
	He was a child of his age, as we are children of our age.	42:03
	The point which I wish to make is simply that for this man,	42:12
	great as he was, there was a place	42:19
	at which his service came to a stop.	42:24
	He said, I will give this much,	42:31
	but no more.	42:37
	I will not give the sanctuary of my home to these people.	42:40
	And, we all do the same.	42:52
	We all say, I will give this and this and this,	42:57
	but not that.	43:05
	I will give my money, but not my active service.	43:09
	I will help another, but not to the point where it hurts.	43:17
	Now, don't misunderstand me.	43:29
	There are often good reasons why we do this,	43:34
	but the challenge of the Gospel	43:41
	is that there is always more that we can give.	43:45
	When we look at the service of Christ,	43:55
	we see service which went to the limit.	44:00
	We see a man who gave and gave and gave	44:07
	until on the cross there was nothing left to give.	44:15
	Service to the limit.	44:29
	And then, finally, this kind of Christian service	44:36
	is primarily the service of God.	44:43
	Do you remember the story in the Gospel	44:56
	of two brothers who had a dispute about their inheritance?	45:03
	One of the brothers appealed to Jesus to settle the quarrel.	45:15
	Here, you might think, was an opportunity for service.	45:25
	Jesus could arbitrate in this quarrel, and so bring peace,	45:32
	not only to the family, but also to the whole community,	45:40
	which must have been affected by it.	45:46
	And, Jesus refused.	45:51
	"Who made me a divider?"	45:58
	And, the implication is that Jesus is the servant of all,	46:08
	but he is not at the beck and call of all.	46:18
	He is the servant of men	46:25
	only because He is first the servant of God,	46:28
	and this determines the program which He seeks to fulfill.	46:34
	In this particular case, no doubt,	46:44
	to take these two brothers behind their quarrel,	46:49
	to the greed which had caused it.	46:55
	We need to emphasize this.	47:05
	Much is being said and written in these days	47:10
	about the church as the servant church.	47:16
	Rightly so.	47:23
	And, everything that I have said this morning endorses it.	47:26
	But, we need to remember that while the Christian	47:34
	is called to be the servant of all men,	47:39
	no man is his master.	47:45
	We serve others, but we are not	47:51
	to take our orders from others.	47:54
	In fact,	48:00
	service, as we are to understand it,	48:03
	can sometimes mean doing the opposite of what people want.	48:08
	It may mean speaking the truth when the truth is unwelcome.	48:16
	It may mean probing into uncomfortable questions	48:26
	that people would prefer to avoid.	48:34
	You cannot, for example, be the servant	48:41
	of an underprivileged minority group,	48:46
	if at the same time you try to be the humble	48:51
	and obedient servant of every other kind of group.	48:58
	And, we can only have this freedom if we are the servants	49:08
	of God, and in his name the servants of our fellow men.	49:15
	To be a servant does not mean lying down	49:27
	like a doormat to be trodden on by others.	49:33
	When Jesus says, do not try to dominate others,	49:41
	he does not replace it by, let others dominate you,	49:50
	but by serve others.	49:57
	Service is not passive submission.	50:04
	Service is an active response to people's need.	50:11
	The only submission for the Christian is to God.	50:21
	And so, a Christian in his service	50:32
	always remains a free man.	50:37
	He makes it his business to serve others,	50:44
	but he does not sell them his soul.	50:51
	And, one of the greatest tasks of the church	50:59
	at the present time, as always,	51:04
	is to preserve her independence	51:10
	from state and other groups and individuals	51:16
	so that she may always be free	51:27
	to serve men in the service of God.	51:31
	And, if you think that this is	51:40
	an easy thing in today's world,	51:42
	remember as you read of revolution in Bolivia,	51:49
	the problem of the church,	51:59
	under attack from the right because it is too revolutionary	52:03
	and under attack from the left	52:12
	because it is not revolutionary enough.	52:16
	Or, think of the church in Rhodesia,	52:23
	trying to find the way	52:30
	to hold together, pressure for justice in society	52:36
	and striving for reconciliation.	52:45
	Here is the Christian's distinctive role.	53:00
	We heard in our lesson,	53:08
	how on the night when He was betrayed,	53:14
	according to St. John, Jesus washed his disciples' feet.	53:19
	The point of this story is not that it needed to be done.	53:31
	It was the custom to provide a servant at the door	53:40
	when the guests came in, and he would wash the feet.	53:48
	In Jewish custom too, a student would wash the feet	53:57
	of his teacher, and how I like to say this	54:05
	in any university setting, a student would wash the feet	54:11
	of his teacher because of the debt	54:17
	he owed for having taught him the law of God.	54:22
	But, with Jesus, the roles are reversed.	54:31
	Jesus does the work of the servant.	54:38
	And, as Jesus and as John saw,	54:45
	this little action sums up the Spirit	54:49
	and meaning of the whole of Jesus' life,	54:55
	and of his disciples too.	55:01
	"If I, the Lord and teacher, have washed your feet,	55:05
	you also ought to wash one another's feet."	55:12
	In the end, the test of the Christian's life	55:19
	is the test of his Lord's.	55:26
	He has the Spirit of his Lord only in so far	55:30
	as he has the spirit of service.	55:37
	Let us pray.	55:47
	Father,	55:52
	accept this offering of mind and feeling and will.	55:55
	Give us the power of the Holy Spirit to renew us,	56:07
	and use us in the service of Christ,	56:16
	in whose name we pray.	56:21
	Amen.	56:26
	(triumphant organ music)	56:28
	(choir singing)	57:05
	(light organ music)	58:40
	(woman singing)	59:57

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Brian Beck - Sermon Untitled (August 22, 1971)

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https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r46d5tc4r

Date:

August 22, 1971

Speaker:

Beck, Brian

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 RR-0584
ref6371_x71
uachapelsermaud
duke:628171
dcrau002571
ark:/87924/r46d5tc4r
08b167b1-65af-49bd-8506-51dda8285fcb

Digital Collection:

Duke Chapel Recordings

Source Collection:

Duke University Chapel recordings, 1954-2005

Language:

English

Location:

United States
North Carolina
Durham (N.C.)

Format:

Provenance:

The Duke University Chapel Recordings were transferred to the Duke University Archives beginning in 1970.

Rights:

Limited Re-Use

CC BY-NC 4.0

Rights Note:

This recording may contain 3rd party materials, such as music or readings that are therefore not covered by the Creative Commons license indicated here. For more information see https://library.duke.edu/rubenstein/research/citations-and-permissions.

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Brian Beck - Sermon Untitled (August 22, 1971)

Transcript

Item Info

Duke University Archives

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