Stuart C. Henry - "Prisoner of Grace" (April 30, 1967)

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	(soft gentle music)	0:07
-	In the name of the Father	0:30
	and the Son	0:32
	and the Holy Spirit.	0:33
	Amen.	0:36
	The sight of another's defeat	0:47
	affects us far more	0:51
	deeply than any thought of his success.	0:53
	Moment by moment,	0:58
	each one of us stands upon the razor's edge	1:00
	of possible destruction.	1:03
	We are never quite certain that it may not happen to us.	1:06
	Never assured	1:11
	that that awful, fearful, unnameable thing	1:12
	someday,	1:17
	this day,	1:19
	any day	1:20
	may not overtake us.	1:22
	Nor have we confidence that death's bright angel	1:24
	will stay his beckoning summons to us long enough.	1:27
	And so we walk softly.	1:31
	Or if it comes to that,	1:34
	who can be sure ever that he will not someday,	1:36
	for all his effort and brass and banter,	1:38
	say	1:42
	or do	1:43
	or be the thing	1:44
	that will bring his private world crashing about his head.	1:46
	We are moved with pity	1:51
	and then with terror	1:53
	when we look at the defeat of another.	1:55
	But we may not allow ourselves the luxury of tranquility,	1:58
	because it might,	2:03
	it just might happen to us.	2:05
	And far more deeply than any greedy ambition	2:09
	which stirs the heart as we look at the victor's march	2:12
	is the fear that we ourselves might fail.	2:16
	And failure is for us so often symbolized	2:21
	by the notion of the prisoner himself,	2:25
	who has been defeated	2:28
	and has been so acknowledged	2:30
	and designated.	2:32
	But for that matter, we are never quite able to	2:35
	resist the attempt to discover why the prisoner	2:38
	and the symbol of this fettered man	2:41
	arrest our attention	2:44
	and makes captive of our heart.	2:46
	When Joan of Arc led a hesitant dauphin	2:50
	to the very order of the cathedral of Reims	2:54
	all the bells of France went mad for joy.	2:57
	In splendid armor, she rode through the streets	3:01
	of the religious capital of the land.	3:04
	And when the awesome ceremonies	3:07
	of the coronation were finished,	3:09
	men shouted for the maid until they were hoarse	3:11
	and all the people knelt.	3:15
	But this is not the Joan we think of	3:18
	nor the morning we remember.	3:21
	Rather it is a later,	3:23
	another day.	3:25
	On a fair spring morning such as this,	3:27
	when the woods were green	3:30
	but the tide of the battle had turned against her.	3:32
	The last to retreat	3:36
	from an unfortunate sally against the English.	3:38
	Joan was the last to come	3:41
	and too late to enter the place of refuge.	3:44
	The gates of the city were shut and locked against her.	3:47
	She was dragged from her horse	3:51
	and imprisoned.	3:53
	First in a tower, and then in a dungeon.	3:55
	Bound to a beam and the ceiling	3:59
	by a chain about her waist.	4:01
	Shackled to the floor, fetters upon her feet.	4:04
	And here she is,	4:08
	and it is this Joan that we remember and think of.	4:09
	And that which alarms our breath	4:13
	is not that she suffered so mean of fate.	4:16
	If it could happen to this pious, gentle creature	4:21
	it could happen to me at any time.	4:25
	No, this is not that which disturbs our hearts.	4:27
	Rather it is the undeniable knowledge	4:31
	that in a situation which well might be our own	4:36
	she was free as the air they denied her.	4:40
	And kept neither by war nor wife.	4:44
	What was it that she knew?	4:48
	The figure of the prisoner attracts and disturbs us	4:51
	partially because of its familiarity.	4:55
	The second world war is not so distant.	4:59
	Nor the present conflict so self-contained.	5:02
	That we can afford to relax	5:06
	in the confidence of our own security.	5:08
	I can still remember the looks on the faces of men	5:11
	who came from behind the wired walls of concentration camps.	5:15
	I can.	5:19
	And so can you.	5:20
	Not many days pass	5:22
	without some reporter spilling into the press the details	5:24
	or part of them.	5:28
	Even in this good year of grace	5:29
	of how a man is wakened in the night	5:31
	or manacled in the daylight.	5:34
	It happens.	5:37
	Spring has come 'round again this year	5:39
	but the weary old earth has turned ourself	5:42
	with bombs bursting over the rice paddies of Asia.	5:45
	And threatening again the olive orchards of Greece.	5:49
	Do not ever, ever forget	5:53
	that the conflict could expand	5:55
	even to your place of dwelling and mine.	5:58
	It could happen here.	6:02
	And so the figure of the prisoner	6:04
	alarms and disturbs us.	6:06
	And yet we think of Joan and we see her	6:09
	remembering the captive who was once the victor.	6:13
	Seeing the simple maid	6:18
	playing please God	6:21
	that she might return to tend her sheep.	6:24
	Not knowing already that the shadow of the stake	6:27
	had fallen long upon her.	6:31
	But can you not see her, this picture that we have	6:34
	when badgered by her jailers and weakened in illness	6:38
	just for a moment for an instant she falters.	6:43
	And recanting denies her voices	6:47
	but almost at once is again the Joan of light and legend.	6:50
	Rushing to the desk she cries out,	6:55
	Give me that writing!	6:58
	And as she tears the paper to fragments	7:00
	she says in calm solemnity,	7:03
	light your fire.	7:06
	This is the indication that she knew something.	7:09
	This is the Joan that we do not understand.	7:13
	This is the Joan to whom we would like to relate and cannot	7:16
	because the outward seeming of the prisoner	7:20
	who is thrust into the cell	7:23
	is moving to us.	7:26
	For it is finally but the externalization	7:28
	of that sickness of the heart.	7:32
	Because at core, all of us know ourselves	7:34
	to be imprisoned by a power colder than any steel.	7:38
	We are, God forgive us, all of us prisoners.	7:43
	Prisoners to ourselves.	7:48
	To our times.	7:50
	Hopelessly bound in the now and powerless to be elsewhere.	7:52
	We are prisoners to our fellows,	7:57
	to our communities,	8:00
	to our weaknesses.	8:02
	But most of all we are prisoners	8:04
	to our own sorry, sinful selves.	8:06
	Is there no word for us?	8:11
	Aye, there is a word	8:13
	spoken by another in another age	8:17
	who understood the meaning of freedom.	8:19
	But when I speak of prison now	8:23
	I do not think of a place where felons are kept.	8:26
	I think of the denial of freedom.	8:30
	Though he knew much about the frustration of the human state	8:33
	this one who was free.	8:39
	The good that I want to do, he said, I never seem to do.	8:41
	And that which I do not want to do,	8:46
	this is exactly that of which I am guilty.	8:48
	I am such a wretched man.	8:51
	And at once we know that he understands.	8:54
	For we too are wretched creatures	8:58
	torn by the civil war of our inward strife.	9:00
	Oh, it is not that we are heartless	9:04
	or brutal,	9:07
	or mean.	9:08
	But it's just that life is short and the light is dear.	9:09
	And just this once,	9:14
	or before spring,	9:15
	or before we die.	9:17
	No, we are not really unkind or brutal.	9:19
	We are simply weak	9:22
	and harassed	9:24
	and pressured	9:25
	and human	9:27
	and sinful.	9:28
	For if it comes to that,	9:30
	we are almost sentimental about the misery that we can see.	9:32
	Eager to make a summer Christmas for a dying child.	9:36
	Childishly delighted by a beggar woman	9:40
	who is crowned queen for a day.	9:43
	No, we are not ugly or evil.	9:45
	Indeed, we often assure others	9:48
	and ourselves	9:51
	that we aren't like other people.	9:53
	We are different, but we aren't.	9:55
	Weak and human, all of us.	9:58
	And our best aspirations are never written into our history.	10:00
	And our sorry tale of failure is repeated	10:04
	time and time and time again.	10:07
	The good that we do, we do not do.	10:10
	And so, we are encouraged by Paul's confession.	10:13
	And we are emboldened to hear him out.	10:17
	Yes, he knew about being captive to human failure.	10:20
	And he knew too something of being thrown	10:24
	literally into jail.	10:26
	For Paul spent due time in the slimy, vermin-ridden,	10:29
	dank cells of Roman prisons.	10:34
	He knew something of the agony of flesh	10:37
	eaten in two by the shackle.	10:40
	And he was human enough to become lonely	10:42
	and to complain of it.	10:45
	And yet never for long did he forget	10:47
	that the jailer of the spirit	10:50
	is more sinister than any, any centurion,	10:52
	I and more powerful too.	10:56
	Do you remember the time when he,	10:59
	along with Silas his traveling companion,	11:01
	was thrown into a prison cell?	11:04
	An odd couple that.	11:07
	Here they sit unjustly in stocks	11:09
	singing joyfully far into the night.	11:12
	Little wonder folk thought them mad.	11:15
	But about midnight, as Paul and Silas	11:19
	were singing hymns and praying to God,	11:23
	and all the prisoners were listening,	11:26
	a captive audience surely,	11:28
	there was a mighty earthquake	11:31
	and the very foundations of the prison were shaken.	11:33
	And all the doors were open.	11:36
	And everyone's fetters were burst apart.	11:38
	Just at this time, the jailer rushed in	11:42
	knowing himself to be undone,	11:46
	had asked Paul the question that lets us understand	11:49
	Paul's knowledge which shines through	11:53
	the circumstance of his own time.	11:55
	Because in the often brutal	11:58
	but usually effective justice of Rome	12:01
	the machine always had its culprit for its crime.	12:04
	A man was charged with the safety of his captives	12:09
	even to the point of his own life.	12:14
	And if a man's captive escaped,	12:17
	if the jailer lost his prisoner,	12:20
	Rome took his life.	12:22
	It was as simple as that.	12:24
	Rome did not lose many prisoners.	12:26
	And the jailer, knowing the future that was before him,	12:29
	and fearing even a worse fate,	12:33
	drew his sword and would've killed himself immediately.	12:35
	But Paul said, do yourself no harm.	12:38
	We are all here.	12:41
	And so they were.	12:42
	And so they stayed and the jailer asked the question,	12:44
	what must I do Paul, to be like you?	12:48
	What is it that you know?	12:52
	You are imprisoned Paul, even literally	12:54
	and I am caught in circumstance, but we are not alike.	12:57
	You know something Paul that I do not know.	13:00
	What is it that you know?	13:03
	Tell me, what must I do or say or be?	13:05
	What can I do or say or be?	13:09
	To save myself, to become free again.	13:11
	For you, Paul are so free that	13:15
	you do not even have to try to escape.	13:17
	Tell me what you know.	13:20
	More than once, Paul referred to himself	13:22
	as a prisoner of the Lord.	13:26
	Oh I know some of the references are suspect	13:27
	as to their Pauline authorship.	13:31
	And yet they do stand in the camp	13:33
	as a testimony and a witness	13:36
	to what the Christian community has thought	13:39
	was part of the essence of being a Christian.	13:41
	This is one of the hallmarks	13:45
	that one becomes a prisoner of Christ.	13:47
	And if it comes to that,	13:51
	some of the expressions are Paul's.	13:52
	Even in the opinion of the leanest critics.	13:56
	I am a prisoner of Christ, he says.	13:59
	What does he mean by this?	14:03
	Well now, beyond all question he meant in part	14:05
	that he had been for the gospel's sake,	14:09
	thrown into jail.	14:11
	But such an understanding	14:13
	does not exhaust the meaning of the words.	14:15
	For Paul meant two.	14:18
	That the power of Christ had as it were,	14:20
	arrested him and thrown him into a cell	14:23
	and kept him there.	14:26
	Kept him there because only Christ had the key.	14:28
	It is not enough that we mention this figure.	14:32
	It is not enough that we remind ourselves	14:35
	that the traditions of Peter and Paul,	14:39
	so different in many ways	14:42
	as the new testament has preserved them for us.	14:44
	The traditions of Peter and Paul are one	14:48
	at least at this point.	14:51
	Where there is the memory of a jail deliverance	14:53
	which simply freed man from a cell.	14:57
	That he might be more safely kept in bondage to grace	15:00
	to become a prisoner of grace.	15:06
	And here finally is the phrase toward which we move.	15:09
	For this is exactly what Paul was.	15:13
	And herein is the indication of his freedom.	15:16
	Here is the echo of Christ who said to his chiefest friend	15:20
	that the time would come	15:25
	when in his old age he should be bound.	15:27
	And another should command him saying,	15:32
	go this place for that.	15:33
	Here is the oblique reflection	15:36
	of the goodness of those	15:39
	who identified themselves with prisoners.	15:41
	And so in the end, could hear the lord of history	15:44
	saying unto them, I was in prison and you visited me.	15:48
	What does it mean to be a prisoner of grace?	15:54
	Let me tell you	15:58
	again and again and again.	15:59
	Jesus endeavored to get this lesson across	16:02
	to the man who heard him speak.	16:06
	That a man was as powerless to deliver himself	16:09
	as he was helpless to extend his own height.	16:13
	This is that which a man could not do.	16:17
	Those who rest on their own accomplishments	16:20
	or their piety, or their wit,	16:23
	they have no place in the kingdom of God	16:26
	and no access to it.	16:29
	This is why he could say and say quite frankly	16:31
	that the publicans and the harlots	16:35
	would go before the scribes and the pharisees	16:37
	into the kingdom.	16:40
	For the outcasts knew	16:42
	that they had forfeited all right for a place with him.	16:44
	If they were ever, ever to enjoy this	16:49
	it must be because it was given to them as a gracious gift.	16:52
	They could not ever say or do or be	16:57
	anything good enough to merit salvation.	17:01
	They could find no place in the kingdom of heaven	17:04
	because of themselves, it must be given them.	17:07
	But this is exactly what happens, says Christ.	17:11
	We talk so much about self-acceptance	17:16
	but we have forgotten that in Christ,	17:19
	God has shown us man acceptance.	17:22
	And it takes a deal of doing.	17:26
	If this offends us, and if that knowledge scandalizes us,	17:28
	then it is fair.	17:33
	But if it reaches the heart,	17:35
	then by this we know.	17:37
	That man does receive grace	17:39
	and so becomes a prisoner bound to Christ.	17:42
	For he understands in this way	17:46
	that there is thereafter no light save in him.	17:48
	This is Joan waiting for the flame.	17:53
	This is Paul waiting for the headsman's ax.	17:57
	In the knowledge that one may accept	18:01
	himself and his universe	18:04
	because the universe and its creator have accepted him.	18:07
	Or shall you say it this way?	18:12
	There is a prisoner who is defeated.	18:15
	And there is a prisoner who is free.	18:18
	The prisoner who is free is that prisoner of grace	18:21
	who knows something.	18:25
	We are all of us in prison by our times,	18:27
	our weaknesses,	18:31
	our failures, our ambitions.	18:32
	But some men there be who become prisoners of grace	18:35
	and so escape.	18:39
	They know that the body is more than raiment	18:41
	and that life is more than food.	18:46
	If you see,	18:50
	the fool knows the truth because he is an outcast.	18:52
	And the man who stands outside the game	18:57
	always sees more than the one who plays it.	19:00
	And the saint knows the truth	19:04
	because he has no special ax to grind.	19:07
	And so he is free to accept it	19:10
	wherever he discovers it.	19:13
	The prisoner of grace knows the truth	19:15
	because he has understood in himself	19:19
	this power that transcends the world and the flesh.	19:22
	If you be a prisoner of grace,	19:27
	you may well be called a fool.	19:29
	You will less likely be called a saint	19:34
	for it takes a saint to discover one.	19:37
	But you, God bless and pity you,	19:41
	will be free if you be a prisoner of grace.	19:44
	And history has said it.	19:48
	Here is the Christ.	19:51
	They bring him as a prisoner in Caesar's court.	19:53
	And they nail him to the tree	19:57
	but he outlives	19:59
	and he outlasts Caesar.	20:01
	And ironically his vitality	20:03
	is attested by the very effort to deny it.	20:06
	No one dares to cry or bothers to say the death of Caesar.	20:09
	It is too manifestly a fact.	20:15
	But Christ, well,	20:18
	rather let Paul have the last word	20:20
	for the prisoners of grace who endure as conquerors	20:24
	and as more than conquerors.	20:28
	Triumphant over life and death	20:30
	and principalities and powers.	20:33
	And things present and things to come.	20:35
	Hear Paul's final word	20:38
	for he speaks it and we endorse it.	20:41
	Not in weatherness,	20:44
	but in the knowledge that this way alone lies peace.	20:46
	Paul,	20:51
	I, a prisoner of Christ.	20:52
	Paul, I, a prisoner of grace,	20:56
	appeal to you.	21:00
	Almighty God,	21:15
	bind us by thy love.	21:18
	Forgive us in thy compassion.	21:22
	Support us in thy grace.	21:26
	And enfold us in thy providence.	21:31
	Through Christ, our Lord.	21:35
	The Lord bless you and keep you.	21:38
	The Lord make his space to shine upon you	21:41
	and be gracious unto you.	21:43
	The Lord lift up his confidence upon you	21:46
	and give you peace.	21:48
	Both now and in the life	21:50
	everlasting.	21:52
	(choir sings)	22:00

Item Info

Title:

Stuart C. Henry - "Prisoner of Grace" (April 30, 1967)

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https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r48915s0d

Date:

April 30, 1967

Speaker:

Henry, Stuart C.

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Duke University. Chapel

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UA.17.01.0003 RR-0381
ref5965_t4q
uachapelsermaud
duke:627896
dcrau002376
ark:/87924/r48915s0d
afd0af26-7770-4af1-8300-2a3a7c5218c1

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Stuart C. Henry - "Prisoner of Grace" (April 30, 1967)

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