1/13/52

Scripture: Acts 3.

Text: Acts 3: 6;.....“In the name of Jesus Christ.”

The third chapter of the book of the Acts of the Apostles relates the story of one unusual cure, and its consequences on the minds of people who saw or heard about it. A man who had been lame from birth and whom no one, even he himself, had supposed could do anything to help himself, except to beg of others, was cured of his malady, enough so that he could get around by himself. What he got from Peter and John, when he asked for alms, was not the money he requested, but a transforming spiritual experience. Not that he had not been told, “Now pull yourself together and see if you can walk.” He was not told to have confidence in himself. Neither Peter nor John said, “I can help you.” What they did say was: “In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.”

It is significant that Jesus himself had been able to say, “I say unto thee, arise” [Mark 2: 11] -- and one might be cured in marvelous fashion. Jesus was confident of that power of God which resided in him. But his apostles did not do likewise. With them, it was not “I say unto you,” but rather “In the name of Jesus Christ.” Some startling and marvelous things happened, but when they did happen, it was “in the name of Jesus Christ” -- and not by any power or magic of their own. The apostles were effective in their dependence on him. For, by themselves, they were just unlearned and ignorant men.

But, “In the name of Jesus Christ,” with no selfish thought involved, some marvelous things occurred. A multitude of “wonders and signs” occurred, among which the author, possibly Luke, here singles out just one to be told. This one led to the first persecution. For if you will read on into the fourth chapter of Acts, you will see that the leaders, who wanted no revolutionary upset of the status quo, had Peter and John arrested and confined, tried to intimidate them with the command that they teach no more. But Peter’s answer was so straightforward that there was what might be called a mass conversion of about 5000 people who heard him.

Whatever the apostles accomplished was done “In the name of Jesus Christ.” In those words there was once courageous command. In the name of Jesus Christ, the apostles could endure threats, hardship, imprisonment, torture for themselves, and even face violent death. But their words and deeds done in Christ’s name and spirit baffled their enemies and tremendously inspired multitudes who heard them gladly.

The expression: “In the name of Jesus Christ” once proclaimed Christ’s authority over all of life. Today, we are prone to mumble the words without meaning. This is partly because they are familiar. We have to apply our attention to keep the familiar words of the doxology, or of the Lord’s prayer, from becoming repetitions without meaning. It is so with these words, when we end a prayer, “In Christ’s name” out of mere habit.

Sometimes the words have little meaning for us because we are in reality unwilling to let them be real. They are no mere adornment; they are not just a pious declaration; they have no inherent magic. “In Jesus’ name” means, “In his spirit, by his power to rule the hearts of people.”

The words, “In Christ’s name” are the gospel in a gem, a faith in one phrase, a commitment to a way of life. This expression proclaims Christ’s authority, his power of spirit, his purpose. It demands his practice.

To revitalize these words in each Christian life, and in the Christian church, is imperative. And this means reinstating Jesus as Lord of life. We have dethroned him from our hearts when we give allegiance to all the “sacred cows” of our society. We have nullified his power when we keep him from our daily decisions and deeds. Any gulf between our profession and our practice is alarming. And there are tremendous gulfs of this sort in our time and in our practices.

In our current search for un-American motives among some of those in public life are we committed to the Prince of Life? Is it possible to express some concern over the economic system many of us prefer in America, a system of great freedom in enterprise --- can one be concerned over it or offer criticisms of it without being labeled “communist?” Some say that being basically brotherly is bad manners in half of our nation. To be reverently revolutionary is to earn one the opprobrium of being called radical.

In the area of peace, we think and act, presently, chiefly in terms of the military. In brotherhood, Caucasian and gentile supremacy rules. In religious circles, we are apt to be preoccupied with my church, my bible, my salvation, with these things altogether overshadowing Jesus, the Christ.

Modern life tries to relegate Jesus Christ to a lesser, or minor, role. Modern Christians, like the Christians of any age, must exalt Christ as Lord of life. In the experience of Christians, the gods of our secular ways must be supplanted by the enthroned authority of the Living Christ.

Few of us keep aware of the dominance of the military mind in the affairs of the world. We are used to it; though reluctant about it, we consider it a necessity; choice young men of our community are in military service; we see military threats against our way from abroad, and we see little enough solution of major conflicts except by military methods.

The mind of Christ is no matter for serious discussion in Moscow, in Paris, in London. I do not suppose much thought or prayer are put upon it in the Pentagon. For years, we have thought of the force that accomplishes things in military terms or upon military basis.

During depression days of about 18 years ago, there were a great many people in this country who were undernourished. In a certain town where little children lacked milk, the father of twins saw one of them die. The doctor assured him that the basic cause of the little one’s death was undernourishment. When this became known, aroused citizens, among them a Christian minister, went to the governor of their state and appealed for larger relief allowances.

The press report of this appeal was headed: “Pastor and Labor Leaders Want Dole.” An important pillar of the community later met the minister on the street, stopped to talk and said, “You ought not to be associated with such people in such causes.” The minister asked him for his answer to the problem and was utterly unprepared for his reply as to what he would do for hungry children. Calmly the man said, “All we need is a good war. Then things will boom.” Apparently in that man’s opinion it was all right to trade the blood of the young men around the world for the economic production that might mean enough jobs to earn daily food for the rest. The horrors of war’s destruction must have been for him as nothing beside the comforts of enough for those who might escape the destruction.

Now I do not suppose that any person in this room really wants “a good war” as a means of keeping up the food supply for hungry children -- at least some hungry children. And we are all at least dimly aware that millions of children who have survived bombs and homelessness in battle scarred areas are far more hungry right now than they were before the latest police action began. But we are all tied in to a program that puts the overwhelmingly major portion of our nation’s corporate expenditure on the means of warfare. Our Christian consciences ought to be most disturbed that we find ways of building better living, economically and spiritually, for people everywhere.

Along with our billions spent (or at least appropriated whether raised or not) for military purposes, extending the arm of Mars around the world, there has gone, unhappily, a limiting of the right to speak freely at home, to associate freely, to learn as one wishes to learn. Men in government service, who might work boldly for constructive programs, are made cautious and compromising by the fear that they may make the wrong contact, and be denounced as an associate of the wrong people.

It need not always be that the mind of physical and political force is the dominant mind. There was a time when a spiritual force, expressed through one man’s life, turned a tide away from the brutal gladiatorial combats of Roman life. In 404 AD one Telemachus, a Christian saint, came to Rome to see for himself if it were true that, for the sport of lords and ladies, human beings killed each other in gladiatorial contests. Telemachus found that the rumors he had heard were mild compared to the bloody butchery he saw. What he did not know was that the gladiators were prisoners condemned to death. Dressed in red and purple garments, they were slaughtering each other for the promise that he who was victorious would be released from the prison and saved from the certain execution of the death sentence.

Telemachus sat in the amphitheater and saw the first act of the long program on this Roman festal day. He restrained himself as best he could, and made his way to the balcony over the gladiatorial stage. Before the fourth act, he jumped to the stage, raised his hand, and cried: “In the name of Jesus Christ, stop it!” The leading lord leaped up and ran his sword through the old saint’s stomach. Back where the old man had been sitting men murmured, “He was a defenseless old man.” “They need not do that!” “Bloody business!” Some left at once. Presently the balcony was empty. After a while the amphitheater emptied. There remained the leading lord and the old saint impaled on the sword.

But that day marked the end of those gladiatorial contests! Does anyone have the vision to guess what would happen if those who are armed with nothing but the spirit of Christ should speak up in this latter day? Would our mind of violent force crucify our church? Would there be a resurrection of the mind of Christ?

Is not our first duty to be disciplined by the mind of Christ?

There are numerous areas wherein it would be healthy, even though uncomfortable, to see ourselves as some others see us. In the United Nations, there have been two men named Malik, one from Soviet Russia, the other from Lebanon. It was the minister of Lebanon, chairman of the Lebanese delegation, Dr. Charles Malik, who said in a moment of candid expression: “There are many phases of Western life which are repulsively materialistic. The spirit of business and gain, the maddening variety of things exciting your concupiscence; the utter selfishness of uncoordinated activity; all this is not something to attract and inspire. There is little to choose between the soulless materialism of the West and the militant materialism of the East. There is a general weakening of moral fiber. Quality is in eclipse. Quantity and size are dominant. Not the better and truer, but the larger and physically stronger --- these call forth moral approbation.”

That is not easy to accept. But it is evidently the fair appraisal of one who has often voted with the west as against the east in United Nations differences, and yet is critical of much that we take for granted. Well, what ought we to expect to see if we open our eyes “in the name of Christ?”

A young artist studying in Chicago painted with great accuracy a section of the slum area on Wells Street. In colors of dirty gray, his canvass showed the grime and grease, the dirt and gruesomeness of the area. Between dilapidated buildings, a woman hung out her wash in the scummy smoke. Children played a game on the sidewalk. One child is the focus of attention in the picture. Each time this little girl in a green dress tries to kick the can, bigger boys come from parked autos to steal the can. So she never makes a score. She stands in the midst of this misery, both hands rubbing tear-filled eyes, and cries, “‘Tain’t fair!”

Of course, ‘tain’t fair! ‘Tain’t fair that millions are born in slum conditions with no effort on the part of anyone else to do a thing to improve the conditions. ‘Tain’t fair that there should be malnutrition among masses of folk in the world and even on American soil. Last year we are said to have had an aggregate American income of something like $236 billion. Last year, slums in 13 of our largest cities were overcrowded. ‘Tain’t fair.

We are informed that four-fifths of the world’s people go to bed hungry every night -- not all of them starving. Most of them have eaten, but not enough. Some of us have uneasy consciences that we can find no better way than the destruction of surpluses and the limiting of crop-raising to keep our economy in balance when others are desperate for food.

An American Church World Service worker sat in a rubble restaurant in Europe next to a starved victim of war. Both were eating rationed food; neither had enough. They read and shared a rationed paper. Suddenly the European pushed his part of the paper before the American’s eyes. There was a picture of mountains of potatoes being burned on an American field, lit with gallons of oil. The American tried to explain how under the free system of America, it became necessary to destroy over- production to keep prices up, so people could stay at work, so people could eat. It didn’t sound too good. The European said nothing, but scraped his plate. He got up, hungry, his stomach growling. The American thought he heard the fellow say as he walked out, “American people - beasts” -- or was it feasts? -- or was it just an uneasy American conscience?

What would happen if we stood and said: “In Jesus Christ’s name bear ye one another’s burdens”? Do you suppose we can spare enough attention from our preoccupation with fear of aggression and production of physical strength to tackle also the human problems that feed the world’s alarming unrest?

“In Jesus’ name, all men are brothers!” If we were to utter that telling truth, where would it start us in our country where an overdose of salt tells Negroes they are not wanted in some restaurants, and a card and a knowing nod informs one that in this vacation spot, those of some religious preferences are not encouraged.

Is not the drive away from ruthless competition toward cooperation? Those efforts of the church that are headed toward cooperative effort are headed in the right direction -- “One Great Hour of Sharing”; city-wide Lenten services; Union Thanksgiving and Reformation Day observances. Whether our Christian actions are undertaken in union or in simultaneous parallel effort, it is time for us to jump on the world’s stage and shout, “Let us exalt his name together.”

For there is transforming power in that name sincerely uttered, and obediently followed.

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Delivered in Wisconsin Rapids, January 13, 1952.