William H. Willimon - "The Great Resumption after the Grand Intrusion" (December 27, 1987)

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	(choir singing)	1:18
	(flute and organ playing)	3:40
	(choir singing)	4:35
	(boys singing)	7:45
	(choir singing)	10:03
	(organ music)	11:58
Host	Grace and peace to you	14:32
	in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.	14:33
	We welcome you to this service of worship here at Duke	14:36
	University Chapel on this first Sunday in Christmas.	14:39
	Recognizing that many of you are visitors today	14:43
	we welcome you and wish you a very pleasant stay	14:45
	here in the Durham area.	14:49
	We also extend special holiday greetings	14:50
	to those of you in our radio and television audiences.	14:53
	The preacher for this morning's service is the Reverend	14:57
	Dr. William H. Willimon, Minister to the University.	14:59
	We are indebted to the Raleigh Boychoir	15:03
	and their directors Mr. Thomas Sibley and Mr. Terry Poe	15:06
	for their musical contribution to our service today	15:09
	and this their regular Christmas season appearance	15:13
	here at the chapel.	15:16
	Please note the remaining announcements	15:18
	as they are printed in your bulletins.	15:20
	And now, let us stand as we read responsively.	15:22
	(footsteps tapping)	15:27
	Blessed be the Lord God of Israel.	15:41
Congregation	(indistinct murmurs)	15:45
Nancy	And hath raised up a mighty salvation for us.	15:48
Congregation	(indistinct murmurs)	15:52
Nancy	As he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets.	15:55
Congregation	(indistinct murmurs)	15:58
Nancy	That we should be saved from our enemies.	16:01
Congregation	(indistinct murmurs)	16:04
Nancy	To perform the mercy	16:07
	promised to our forefathers.	16:08
Congregation	(indistinct murmurs)	16:11
Nancy	To perform the oath	16:14
	which he sweared to our forefather Abraham.	16:15
Congregation	(indistinct murmurs)	16:18
Nancy	That we being delivered	16:20
	out of the hands of our enemies.	16:22
Congregation	(indistinct murmurs)	16:24
Nancy	In holiness and righteousness before him.	16:27
Congregation	(indistinct murmurs)	16:30
Nancy	And thou child shalt be called	16:32
	the prophet of the highest.	16:35
Congregation	(indistinct murmurs)	16:37
Nancy	To give knowledge of salvation unto his people.	16:42
Congregation	(indistinct murmurs)	16:45
Nancy	Through the tender mercy of our God.	16:48
Congregation	(indistinct murmurs)	16:51
Nancy	To give light to them that sit in darkness	16:55
	and in the shadow of death.	16:58
Congregation	(indistinct murmurs)	17:01
	(organ playing)	17:05
	(Everyone singing with organ accompaniment)	17:53
Host	Oh almighty God,	20:23
	who by the birth of Thy holy child Jesus	20:25
	has given us a great light to dawn upon our darkness.	20:28
	Grant, we pray Thee, that in his light, we may see light.	20:33
	Bestow upon us we beseech Thee	20:39
	that most excellent Christmas gift of charity	20:42
	to all men and women,	20:45
	that so the likeness of Thy son may be formed in us	20:47
	and that we may have the ever brightening hope	20:51
	of everlasting life.	20:54
	Through Jesus Christ our Lord, amen.	20:57
Host	Let us pray.	21:10
	Open our hearts and minds oh God	21:13
	by the power of your Holy Spirit	21:16
	so that as the word is read and proclaimed,	21:20
	we might hear with joy what you say to us	21:24
	this joyous day, amen.	21:28
	The first lesson is taken from the book of Isiah.	21:33
	I will greatly rejoice in the Lord.	21:38
	My soul shall exalt in my God	21:42
	for God has clothed me with the garments of salvation.	21:46
	God has covered me with the robe of righteousness	21:52
	as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland	21:56
	and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.	22:00
	For as the earth brings forth its shoots	22:06
	and as a garden causes what is sown in it to spring up	22:11
	so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise	22:17
	to spring forth before all the nations.	22:22
	For Zion's sake I will not keep silent	22:26
	and for Jerusalem's sake I will not rest	22:31
	until her vindication goes forth as brightness	22:35
	and her salvation as a burning torch.	22:40
	The nations shall see your vindication	22:45
	and all the rulers your glory	22:48
	and you shall be called by a new name	22:51
	which the mouth of the Lord will give.	22:55
	You shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the Lord	22:59
	and a royal diadem in the hand of your God.	23:04
	This ends the reading of the first lesson.	23:10
	(organ playing)	23:28
	(choir singing)	23:39
Reverend	The gospel for this first Sunday	27:55
	in the Christmas is from Luke.	27:58
	And when the time had come for their purification	28:03
	according to the law of Moses	28:07
	they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord	28:10
	as it is written in the law of the Lord	28:13
	every male that opens the womb	28:16
	shall be called holy to the Lord	28:18
	and to offer a sacrifice according to what is said	28:20
	in the Law of the Lord,	28:23
	a pair of turtle doves or two young pigeons.	28:25
	And there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon;	28:29
	and this man was righteous and devout,	28:33
	looking for the consolation of Israel;	28:36
	and the Holy Spirit was upon him.	28:39
	And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit	28:42
	that he should not see death	28:46
	before he had seen the Lord's Christ.	28:47
	And inspired by the Spirit, he came into the temple;	28:50
	and when the parents brought in the child Jesus,	28:54
	to do for him according to the custom of the Law,	28:58
	he took Him up in his arms, and he blessed God, and said	29:01
	Lord, now lettest thy servant depart in peace,	29:06
	according to thy word.	29:10
	For mine eyes have seen thy salvation,	29:13
	which thou hast prepared in the presence of all peoples.	29:17
	A light for revelation to the Gentiles,	29:21
	and for the glory to thy people Israel.	29:23
	And his father and mother marveled	29:27
	at what was said about him.	29:29
	And Simeon blessed them, and said to Mary his mother,	29:31
	"Behold, this child is set for the rising and fall	29:35
	"of many in Israel	29:39
	"and for a sign that is spoken against,	29:41
	"and a sword will pierce through your own soul also,	29:44
	"that thoughts out of many hearts may be revealed."	29:49
	And there a prophetess, Anna,	29:53
	a daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher.	29:56
	She was of a great age having lived with her husband	30:00
	seven years from her virginity	30:03
	and as a widow til she was eighty four.	30:04
	She did not depart from the temple,	30:07
	worshiping and fasting and prayer night and day.	30:09
	And coming up at that very hour,	30:14
	she gave thanks to God and spoke of him to all	30:16
	who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem.	30:20
	And when they had performed everything	30:24
	according to the Law of the Lord,	30:26
	they returned to Galilee, to their own city, Nazareth.	30:28
	And the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom.	30:35
	And the favor of God was upon him.	30:39
	I wish that all of you might have been here	30:47
	a few evenings ago for our annual celebration	30:49
	here in the chapel of Christmas Eve.	30:55
	How many of you were here?	30:56
	Those of you who were here can certainly testify	30:59
	that it was as usual a grand occasion	31:02
	with choirs and candles and crowds to overflowing,	31:04
	had to turn people away.	31:08
	But of course, that was Christmas Eve,	31:11
	and this is the first Sunday after Christmas.	31:15
	That was Christmas Eve, the time of great expectation,	31:20
	and this is the time after Christmas,	31:26
	the time of great dissipation.	31:28
	Oh we're still singing Christmas carols.	31:32
	The decorations are still beautiful.	31:36
	We are blessed by the presence of the Raleigh Boy Choir.	31:39
	But somehow, nothing matches	31:44
	that expectancy of Christmas Eve.	31:48
	That time of anticipation	31:54
	before the event, before Christmas.	31:56
	And few things match the letdown after Christmas.	32:00
	For now we're in the season of crumpled wrapping paper	32:05
	and overstuffed trash cans and visits from Uncle George.	32:09
	For another Sunday, we will still be singing	32:14
	about the advent of the Master at Bethlehem	32:17
	but we'll be thinking about the advent	32:20
	of the Mastercard bill in January.	32:23
	For many of us, today marks the end of Christmas holiday.	32:28
	The resumption of business as usual	32:33
	in the office or the classroom or the shop.	32:36
	Christmas, when the child is born at Bethlehem	32:40
	is the grand intrusion of God	32:44
	into our midst.	32:50
	The great interruption with angels	32:52
	rending the skies with their songs.	32:55
	But today, the Sunday after Christmas,	32:59
	we're on the verge of the great resumption.	33:04
	As I recall, we felt much the same	33:09
	on the first Sunday after Easter.	33:11
	The Sunday after Easter is traditionally called	33:15
	in the church Low Sunday because that's how it feels	33:17
	after all of the glory and the trumpets of Easter, low.	33:21
	Why can't we somehow keep it going for the whole year.	33:29
	Every year before Christmas	33:35
	someone pulls out that beloved chestnut	33:37
	that Christmas reading by Henry van Dyke, you know it.	33:40
	Are you willing to forget what you have done for others	33:45
	and to remember what others have done for you?	33:49
	Are you able to stoop down	33:52
	and to help the needs of little children?	33:54
	If so, then you can keep Christmas	33:58
	and if you can keep Christmas for one day,	34:01
	why not keep it for all the year?	34:05
	If you can keep Christmas, if you can be peaceable	34:09
	and loving and charitable for one day of the year,	34:12
	then why not for the other 364?	34:15
	Of course, you know why.	34:20
	Nobody could live take that.	34:22
	Christmas is fine but part of the fun	34:25
	of our Christmas celebration is that	34:27
	it takes us out of the ordinary and away from the everyday	34:31
	and the mundane and the routine.	34:35
	Why if you made it every day and routine,	34:39
	then it wouldn't be Christmas anymore.	34:42
	And though a part of us hates to part with Christmas,	34:47
	isn't there a part of you	34:52
	that's almost glad	34:53
	for the Sunday after Christmas?	34:58
	Late on Christmas afternoon,	35:01
	when all the wrapping paper is strewn across the floor	35:04
	and you've had your tenth piece of turkey,	35:08
	your tenth piece of fruitcake,	35:10
	your last chat with Uncle George,	35:13
	isn't there a part of you that's glad to be headed back	35:16
	toward the everyday and the routine.	35:19
	The great resumption of the everyday	35:25
	after the grand intrusion of the extraordinary.	35:29
	How fitting then that today's gospel from Luke	35:35
	for this Sunday after Christmas should be Luke's account	35:40
	of Mary and Joseph and the babe returning to Galilee	35:44
	to their hometown of Nazareth	35:50
	after presenting their child Jesus	35:53
	at the temple in Jerusalem.	35:55
	You see the holy family is going back home,	35:58
	back to business as usual.	36:01
	With all of the other great passages	36:06
	which Luke tells of the nativity,	36:07
	particularly in the second chapter of Luke,	36:11
	this passage is not well known nor is it well loved.	36:15
	Because after you've heard angels singing,	36:21
	Mary's singing, Elizabeth's singing,	36:24
	Zachariah's singing, everybody's singing,	36:26
	after you've seen such strange wonderful goings on	36:30
	at Bethlehem, it's a bit of a letdown,	36:33
	this account of baby Jesus and his parents	36:38
	running into old Simeon up at the temple	36:43
	when they'd gone to offer two turtle doves	36:46
	in thanks for their new baby	36:49
	and then going back home, back to Nazareth.	36:51
	And let's face it,	36:58
	Nazareth was not much of a place to go back home to.	37:00
	A dusty, out of the way sort of place was Nazareth.	37:04
	Can anything good come out of Nazareth?	37:09
	You remember one of the disciples asked	37:12
	when they introduced him to Jesus?	37:14
	Nazareth.	37:16
	The heavenly hosts are gone,	37:18
	their songs filling the air are heard no more,	37:20
	you can't get an angel when you really need one in January.	37:24
	And now, Mary and Joseph have a child to raise.	37:29
	Religious obligations to keep and that long dreary journey	37:34
	through the rain back to Nazareth.	37:38
	And what could be more ordinary	37:44
	and less inspiring than that.	37:47
	We need a little Christmas right this very minute.	37:52
	We sing, but it's over.	37:55
	The starlit December skies of Bethlehem	37:59
	are a very long way from Nazareth in January.	38:02
	Among the points that Luke wants to make with this story	38:09
	of the holy family's going back home	38:14
	to their rather ordinary town.	38:16
	Among the points that Luke wants to make is that	38:19
	Jesus is new, yes, but he is also	38:22
	part of something which is very old, very ancient.	38:26
	Simeon and Anna appear,	38:32
	an old man, an old woman,	38:35
	waiting in the ancient temple,	38:39
	clinging to the ancient hopes of ancient Israel.	38:41
	They represent the best of all that is gone before.	38:47
	They wait and they pray, they search the scriptures daily	38:51
	as Israel has done for centuries.	38:56
	And Joseph and Mary are up at the temple	38:59
	obeying in Luke's words the law of the Lord,	39:03
	fulfilling religious obligations, meeting religious rituals,	39:06
	sacrificing a pair of turtle doves.	39:10
	Wealthier people sacrificed a lamb	39:13
	when their children were born.	39:15
	All Mary and Joseph could afford, two turtle doves.	39:17
	Now one might think ,with all of the excitement	39:22
	that went on in the past few weeks,	39:25
	his fiancee becoming pregnant by the Holy Spirit,	39:29
	the angels, the star, the magi and all the rest,	39:33
	Joseph might be doing something a little more spectacular.	39:39
	Joseph might be out starting his own new religion	39:42
	like Shirley MacLaine, something of the new age.	39:45
	After all, think of all that Joseph has been privileged	39:48
	to see in the last few months.	39:51
	Why should he go back up to the temple like everybody else?	39:54
	When he has heard the angels sing.	39:58
	But no, there he is at the temple,	40:03
	in accordance with Jewish law,	40:08
	dedicating the child to God.	40:11
	Welcomed there by two pious old people	40:16
	who have been waiting and praying	40:18
	for the fulfillment of the hopes of Israel.	40:20
	Luke seems to want to say that	40:25
	lest anyone think that Jesus has come to destroy tradition	40:27
	to overturn everything that's gone before,	40:31
	to destroy centuries of belief and fidelity,	40:36
	to disrupt to disjoin Israel from its faith,	40:40
	we see right at the beginning that will not be his way.	40:44
	He comes as the fulfillment of the hopes of Israel	40:49
	in continuity with what has been done before,	40:53
	in fulfillment of centuries of prayers	40:57
	of pious people like Simeon and Anna.	41:01
	I think if you will focus for a moment on that image	41:06
	of that old man holding that little baby in his arms,	41:09
	you will see what Luke is about in this story	41:15
	of Simeon greeting the little baby at the temple.	41:19
	You see there's a rhythm to this story.	41:24
	There's a rhythm to the story of Jesus.	41:27
	A rhythm of continuity and discontinuity,	41:30
	of change mixed with tradition,	41:34
	of intrusion and resumption.	41:38
	And when you think about it, your life is that way too.	41:43
	Oh we might like to have it all new	41:48
	and fresh and spontaneous.	41:51
	Margaret Mead once called us Americans	41:53
	neophiles, lovers of the new.	41:56
	We're in love with what's new.	42:00
	We want the new and improved model.	42:01
	We want something that is fresh,	42:03
	the latest fashion, the newest craze.	42:06
	We tend to dislike sameness	42:09
	and tradition and history and habit.	42:10
	I hear this about religion; people get bored in church.	42:15
	They don't like reading prayers from bulletins,	42:20
	doing the same things in the same order of worship	42:23
	every single Sunday.	42:26
	You hear it about the Bible.	42:29
	We don't like going over the same old stories	42:31
	about those same old people again and again.	42:33
	Why should we read it?	42:37
	Whatever seems most spontaneous, most free, and unrehearsed,	42:41
	always seems the most sincere, the most real.	42:46
	From the heart, not read from some book.	42:50
	As the Spirit moves us,	42:53
	not as the preacher tells us to stand up and sit down.	42:55
	But I don't care how spontaneous you think you are,	43:00
	there's nobody here that is able to live life	43:05
	without habit, ritual, sameness, continuity.	43:09
	This is the glue that holds life together.	43:16
	I know when I go on a trip to some unfamiliar land	43:20
	like Iowa, I always when I get to the hotel	43:24
	and take out my toiletries kit,	43:28
	I always unpack my toothbrush and toothpaste	43:30
	and put them in the same place they are at home.	43:33
	Because travel in a distant place is confusing enough	43:36
	without knowing where your toothbrush is.	43:39
	It's a ritual, it's a habit.	43:43
	Such ritual keeps life manageable, ritual orders life.	43:47
	Sometimes people say,	43:54
	the service in this chapel is ritualistic.	43:55
	But of course, this service is no more ritualized	43:59
	that is patterned, predictable, repetitious	44:03
	than a service at a Pentecostal church	44:06
	or a Black Baptist church.	44:08
	Because anthropologists have long noted	44:11
	that every religion tends to live by ritual.	44:13
	It tends to do certain things	44:16
	the same way over and over again.	44:18
	Why?	44:21
	Oh we say, well we're creatures of habit, true by why?	44:23
	We're creatures of habit because you learn early in life	44:28
	that there's some things in life that are just too important	44:31
	too deep, too threatening to be left to chance.	44:34
	Too scary to be done spontaneously.	44:41
	If everyday at church were like Christmas Eve,	44:48
	then nothing would be like Christmas Eve.	44:51
	Show me a church where everything is happy and upbeat	44:55
	and smiling and the preacher is always grinning,	44:58
	I'll show you a church out of touch with reality.	45:01
	And I don't care how developed your spiritual sensitivities.	45:07
	There's always peaks and valleys in life, sunshine and rain.	45:12
	Life is a rhythm,	45:17
	like the rhythm of the story of Jesus.	45:19
	If your religion is only a faith for Christmas Eve	45:24
	or Easter Sunday, it isn't much,	45:27
	because you know that life has a lot of low times too.	45:32
	And most of us spend more of our days in very ordinary ways	45:37
	than in inspiring and spectacular ways.	45:42
	Oh it's great to go up to the temple at Jerusalem.	45:47
	It's a wonder to be on some mountaintop of a place,	45:50
	some Bethlehem to witness the heavens opening	45:54
	and to catch a wisp of angels' wings,	45:58
	but that can't be for always, that's not life.	46:03
	Be honest now. I know that the fruit cake	46:09
	and the cookies were great,	46:12
	along with those little hard things	46:14
	that are dusted in powdered sugar.	46:16
	You know, they're so good, you eat them,	46:18
	they go all down the front of your suit.	46:19
	What are they called?	46:22
	Those things are great, pre-Christmas drop-ins.	46:24
	But isn't there a part of you that's glad to be moving on?	46:28
	Glad to be going back to the ordinary.	46:32
	Isn't there a part of you that will be almost grateful	46:34
	for cornflakes and even oatmeal	46:37
	tomorrow morning at breakfast.	46:39
	Religion, at least the Christian one,	46:42
	is not simply about warm, spontaneous feelings	46:46
	and mountaintop experiences,	46:50
	or about miracles that stupefy the imagination	46:53
	and overwhelm us with their strangeness.	46:57
	The Christian faith is also about keeping the faith,	47:01
	about the habit of prayer,	47:08
	the daily practice of Bible reading,	47:10
	of doing what you're supposed to do	47:14
	even when you don't feel like doing it.	47:18
	Like Simeon and Anna, of quiet waiting.	47:21
	Of going to church on the first Sunday of Christmas,	47:26
	even though you know it's more likely that you will meet	47:30
	a Methodist preacher there than an angel.	47:33
	Continuity amidst change,	47:37
	the ordinary returns after the extraordinary	47:40
	and everyday life resumes.	47:43
	And today's scriptures says	47:48
	that is where God meets us.	47:50
	Here is an affirmation of Emmanuel	47:57
	as much as Luke's story of the nativity at Bethlehem.	48:00
	God is with us now here,	48:05
	going to church on a dreary Sunday morning,	48:10
	doing what you're supposed to do, obeying the rules,	48:14
	minding your habits, returning home after the holidays,	48:18
	getting the pine needles out of the living room rug,	48:22
	dragging a denuded tree out to the curb	48:25
	and turning back to the office, back to the pots and pans.	48:28
	God is with us, as much as God is with us at Bethlehem.	48:34
	On their way back to Nazareth,	48:40
	silently walking along the dreary road I expect,	48:43
	Mary and Joseph wondered to themselves,	48:49
	what does all this mean?	48:53
	I wonder, will this go the way	48:56
	of so many other short-lived momentary religious outbursts	48:59
	that make you high for a short period of time	49:04
	before they dump you back into the muck of January?	49:07
	In the midst of everyday life, back in Nazareth,	49:13
	will all this joy and all this hope	49:17
	just be engulfed by the ordinary?	49:20
	Will we come to that time in our lives	49:25
	when we wistfully say, ah, to be back in Bethlehem.	49:27
	Ah, those were the days.	49:32
	On Monday, Mary was standing over her sink washing	49:36
	baby bottles, looking out on a gray end of December day	49:42
	as the baby took his morning nap	49:47
	and Joseph was back in the carpenter's shop.	49:50
	All in all, it was a typical ordinary	49:54
	everyday mid-winter day in Nazareth.	49:57
	Everyday life had resumed.	50:02
	Nothing, it seems, had changed.	50:05
	Everything was normal, routine, business as usual.	50:09
	There was work to be done, a child to be raised,	50:14
	an uncertain future to be prepared for.	50:18
	But listen, listen as Mary works,	50:23
	she sings.	50:29
	She's humming a tune, haven't we heard the tune before?	50:31
	Is it a Christmas carol?	50:33
	No, it wasn't taught to her by the angels.	50:36
	It's an ancient song but one given new meaning	50:41
	by events of past days.	50:45
	A tune taught to her by an old man whom she met	50:47
	when she and Joseph and the baby were up at the temple.	50:52
	Listen, listen to the song,	50:56
	breaking into the great resumption of our everydayness,	51:00
	with its promise of grand divine intrusion.	51:06
	Let it be your post-Christmas melody.	51:12
	Lord, letest now thy servant depart in peace	51:17
	according to thy word, for my eyes	51:23
	hath seen thy salvation.	51:28
	(organ playing)	51:39
	(everybody singing)	52:24
Nancy	The Lord be with you.	55:32
Congregation	(mumbles)	55:34
Nancy	Let us pray.	55:35
	Oh God, who art our light and our salvation,	55:49
	we pray that Thou wouldst enable us to enter and to abide	55:56
	in the secret place of the most high this Christmas season	56:00
	and may the shadow of the Almighty	56:06
	be our ever shrewd defense.	56:08
	Bring us near to the things that are infinite and eternal.	56:11
	Grant us grace to behold the heavenly vision	56:16
	that in the strength of Thy light	56:19
	we may go about the living of our days	56:22
	with humility, with joy, and with heartfelt gratitude,	56:24
	remembering that Thou hast chosen	56:32
	the weak to confound the mighty.	56:34
	We pray creating God for those who feel powerless	56:37
	in our world, for those who bear the trials of hunger,	56:40
	of homelessness, of loneliness.	56:47
	For those who suffer the indignations of prejudice,	56:52
	greed, and lack of opportunity,	56:55
	for those who must endure the oppression of war,	56:59
	of grinding poverty, and of inescapable disease.	57:04
	And circle these Thy children, with Thy healing power.	57:10
	Remembering, redeeming God, that Thou didst send Thy Son	57:17
	that the word might be made flesh among us.	57:22
	We beseech Thy blessing upon those	57:25
	who seek to live out the gospel in our own time;	57:28
	for all who honestly work for peace;	57:34
	for all who deliberately live on less	57:38
	in order to share with those who have less than they need;	57:41
	with those who plead the cause of the orphan,	57:46
	the prisoner, and the forsaken;	57:49
	for all who stand up in any company to challenge injustice.	57:54
	Help us all gracious God to become steadfast incarnations	57:59
	of Thy love in this broken world of ours.	58:03
	Remembering the example set forth	58:10
	by Thy servant Mary who said unto the angel Gabriel,	58:12
	let it be to me according to thy word.	58:16
	We dare even to pray for ourselves sustaining God,	58:20
	that her example of discipleship might inspire us	58:25
	to give so completely of ourselves,	58:30
	our wills, our desires, our fortunes.	58:33
	Even as she sang my soul doth magnify the Lord,	58:38
	may we so intensely desire	58:42
	to obey Thy word and glorify Thy name,	58:44
	that we would be willing to pay the price.	58:48
	We humbly beseech Thee this Christmas season.	58:52
	Sustain us an awareness	58:56
	of Thy gracious bounty and Thy eternal love	58:58
	in the place of superficial holiday merriment.	59:03
	Grant us the true joy that comes	59:07
	only when our souls find their rest in Thee.	59:10
	Let it be enough that Thy art for us,	59:15
	with us, and within us.	59:19
	Through Jesus Christ our Lord we pray, amen.	59:23
	And now with grateful hearts for the gift of the incarnation	59:31
	let us offer our gifts and our ourselves unto God.	59:35
	(organ plays)	59:46
	(choir singing)	1:01:14
	(boy singing)	1:01:34
	(organ playing)	1:04:50
	(everybody singing)	1:05:05
	Almighty and ever living God,	1:06:12
	You have poured upon us the new light of the incarnate word	1:06:14
	which we celebrate this Christmastide.	1:06:19
	As we behold the wonderful exchange You have made with us,	1:06:22
	we truly adore You with our praise.	1:06:26
	Make us ever joyful that You have revealed	1:06:29
	your eternal love for us in the form of a tiny babe	1:06:32
	in a manger who came to save us.	1:06:36
	This we pray in the name of Jesus Christ	1:06:39
	who taught us boldly to pray.	1:06:41
Everbody	Our Father, who art in heaven,	1:06:44
	hallowed be thy Name,	1:06:47
	thy kingdom come, thy will be done,	1:06:49
	on earth as it is in heaven.	1:06:52
	Give us this day our daily bread.	1:06:55
	And forgive us our trespasses,	1:06:57
	as we forgive those who trespass against us.	1:07:00
	And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.	1:07:03
	For thine is the kingdom, the power,	1:07:08
	and the glory, for ever, amen.	1:07:11
	(organ playing)	1:07:22
	(everybody singing with organ accompaniment)	1:08:05
	And now may the peace of God which passeth all understanding	1:12:35
	keep your hearts and minds in the love and the knowledge	1:12:38
	of God and of our Lord Jesus Christ this Christmastide.	1:12:41
	And may the blessing of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit	1:12:46
	be with you all, now and forevermore, amen.	1:12:50
	(organ playing)	1:12:58

Item Info

Title:

William H. Willimon - "The Great Resumption after the Grand Intrusion" (December 27, 1987)

Description:

Sermon start time: 30:47. Sermon end time: 51:33.
The preacher argues that God is not only with us in the extraordinary moments, but also in the ordinary routines of everyday life. (Abstract created by Duke Divinity School staff.)
Key quotation: “Jesus is new, yes, but he is also part of something which is very old, very ancient.”

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r49w09d6t

Date:

December 27, 1987

Speaker:

Willimon, William H.

Liturgical Calendar:

Christmas

Biblical Book:

Luke

Chapter and Verse:

Luke 2:22-40

Subject:

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 VHS-0064
ref8433_dso
uachapelsermaud
duke:321730
dcrmv001064
ark:/87924/r49w09d6t
71dfdc3b-fae9-459a-b631-0c7819024ac9

Digital Collection:

Duke Chapel Recordings

Source Collection:

Duke University Chapel recordings, 1954-2005

Related Resources:

See below

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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William H. Willimon - "The Great Resumption after the Grand Intrusion" (December 27, 1987)

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1. William H. Willimon - "The Great Resumption after the Grand Intrusion" (December 27, 1987)

Duke University Archives

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William H. Willimon - "The Great Resumption after the Grand Intrusion" (December 27, 1987)

Transcript

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Duke University Archives

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