1/30/55

Scripture: Deuteronomy 30: 14-20; 31: 6-8

Text: Deuteronomy 30: 19; “Therefore choose life...”

We usually speak of the Congregational churches as “covenant” churches. By that, we mean that one becomes a member of a Congregational Christian Church by entering into agreement, or covenant, with other members and with God in an act of faith. This is somewhat different from membership in a church wherein membership is based upon assent to a particular creed or upon obedience to the pronouncement of a given church.

The idea of the covenant is an ancient one. Very early in the history of the Hebrew people, they were urged to enter into covenant with God and, under God, with each other, to observe and keep what appeared to be the laws of God. The people were given a choice. But they were pressed, by their leader, to choose. For they could not go along indefinitely in neutral indecision. The full life of a mighty nation waited upon their voluntary, decisive adherence to the will of God. And destruction awaited their refusal to adhere to that will.

Life constantly urges choices upon us -- in politics, in foreign policy, in municipal problems, and so on. It is natural to defer decision where no moral issue is involved. It is sometimes unpleasant to stand up and be counted, for it may cost friendship and understanding; it may destroy peace of mind; it may lay upon us unwanted responsibility.

But when a moral issue is involved, there can be no hesitating. The unending task of prophet, teacher, and preacher is to so present man’s relationship to God that man shall not seek to remain blindly neutral. “Genuine religion is urgent religion.”

“I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day,” says Moses in the Deuteronomic account, “that I have set before you life and death.”

Sooner or later everyone must face a challenge like that which Jesus gave to a certain rich young man: “Sell all that thou hast --- and come, follow me.” [Luke 18: 22]. “He that is not with me is against me” [Matthew 12: 30] or “He that is not against us is for us.”

Important choices, moral choices have to be made in our time. The fact that they are more urgent for some than for others does not alter the fact that we have to choose.

Recently, in the communist dominated east zone of Germany, a half million Protestant Christians attended an Evangelical Church Congress. It was the largest religious meeting in the modern history of that country. And it took place after years of persecution of the church by the communists. While that Congress was in session, it rained, so that some of the sessions moved into the buildings of the Leipzig Industrial Fair. One night, 10,000 people jammed into the Soviet Exhibition Hall.

The organization and leaders of this church movement had been particular objects of attack by the communists. But these young people raised a great cross to challenge the statue of Stalin which was already there. They had a particular refrain which they chanted throughout the service:

“We stand with Christ!

He will not let us be destroyed.”

This is the kind of faith that moves mountains of difficulty. It is the kind of faith that defies and overthrows tyrannies. This kind of conviction turns the world upside down and sets it with the right side up. It is based on a true understanding of the mission of Christ, and of our relation to that mission.

The mission of Christ is to present us with life. “I am come,” said he, “that they might have life, and have it more abundantly.” [John 10: 10]. Not only is it His purpose to present us with life, but His purpose is to persuade us to choose life rather than moral death.

Those young folk in eastern Germany chose life as the free gift of Christ. They chose to stand with Him, confident that He would not let them be destroyed. This was their tremendous faith. And it is the kind of faith that overcomes the wicked ways of the world.

Every person must make his choice. In one sense, the German people at Leipzig had an advantage. They stood in the presence of a real danger. It was immediate, and no one denied it. For them, a decision must have seemed inescapable.

But we must make our choices, just as truly as they, between life and death. And the act of choosing is ultimately a creative deed.

The poetry and reality of the creation story illustrates this truth. Creation was and is an exercise of freedom. Do you remember how the account goes?

Before there was time or space, there was God. How majestic is the poetry that recites, “The earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters. And God said, ‘Let there be light.’ And there was light.” [Genesis 1: 2-3].

The poetic account expresses an accurate conviction: an act of the will, a divine choice, moves in upon the darkness, on the formlessness, on the emptiness, and the universe was born in a blaze of light. Day pushed back the darkness. Form replaced emptiness. Purpose and spirit overcame nothingness.

Probably this oversimplifies the fact. But what we’re after here is a perception of truth. Consider an artist, about to paint a picture. His spirit stirs restlessly. The creative will within his being moves to overcome a lack. Then he begins to act. He finds canvas and paint, if those are his media, and starts to work. The doors of his imagination swing wide open, and the process of creation begins.

As the artist works, his spirit is liberated. With excitement and joy, he brings into being something that did not exist before. He might have been driven to despair or depression preventing him from creating. That is the death he might choose. And his capacity to create will die if he chooses this death. On the other hand, it will live, going from strength to strength, if it is intelligently nurtured.

This capacity is basically spiritual, born of inner life. If it dies, it leaves its former possessor a poorer and weaker person. I once met a man who was engaged in those practical pursuits that were commonly called welfare work, on a great sugar plantation. He saw to it that there were adequate recreational facilities, decent housing and living conditions, a certain amount of opportunity for people to go to some church of their choice, and so on. It was the kind of work that somebody has to do and that some do very well indeed.

But this fellow had been made for something else. Basically, he lacked the happiness he had once known. As I heard him talk with someone else, I learned that he had formerly been a Christian minister. I do not know whether or not he had had some kind of moral lapse or had otherwise chosen spiritual death. It does seem that his home had broken up, but for what cause I do not know. At any rate, the tragedy of his particular situation, in the midst of outward appearance of prosperity and well being, and even the appearance of worthwhile endeavor, appeared in one sentence, when he said to the other man in our party, a minister, “I’d give anything to get back my sense of message.” That, for him, had been life. Somewhere along the line of his experience he had lost it or had chosen something else. And he was as pathetic as the leading character in the drama titled “Death of a Salesman.”

Most of us have what seems to be a built in set of frustrations. We know from sad fact how difficult it is, though we’d like to fly, to get off the earth. Our purposes are often no more than “good intentions,” whose fulfillment takes more persistence, more wisdom, more will and courage than we can muster to put into them. The essential problem, in getting a firm grip on life, is to learn to stand where one is caught up in the purpose which transcends oneself.

It is somewhere along this line that Jesus Christ becomes so meaningful. His purpose was to help people live. He came to point the way, and to be the way to life. It can hardly be better phrased than in the gospel of John where one reads, at the 10th chapter and the 10th verse: “I came that they might have life, and have it abundantly.”

Some weeks back, a human interest story stirred the city of Chicago as it was reported in the newspapers. A man who was a respected resident of a suburban community disappeared. His anxious family notified the police department. The police were looking for this 60 year old man when someone found a suicide note. The search was redoubled, but no body was discovered.

His family was unrelieved in their terrible anxiety for a couple of days. Then he was found sitting on a bench in Grant Park right near the downtown area. His shoes had been stolen while he slept. He had eaten nothing for days. He had not touched liquor in his wanderings, but he had spent his time in wandering around. All he could say to his discoverers was that he meant to take his life, that he felt that “he was not getting anywhere” with living, that he was a failure.

Well, his family, greatly relieved to have him found alive, took him back home with open arms. To those who inquired about possible reasons for the man’s behavior, they explained that nearly a year before, he had been very abruptly dismissed from a position he had occupied for many years with a corporation in Ohio. He had secured another position, and a respected one. But the shock of his dismissal had been too great for him to tolerate. Finally, worry had set him to walking; not walking with a purpose, but wandering with no aim except to seek extinction. And then even death eluded him.

What difference might the Prince of Life have made to this man? Christ might have given him a scale of values which would have helped him to appraise more realistically the worth of his former position, and his own attachment to it. Christ could have given him other interests in family, church and community which would have protected him from too deep absorption in his business. At the same time it would have made him better able to contribute to right human relations within that business. Christ could have given him more inner security, more endurance, more faith and love.

In addition, the Prince of Life could have helped this man to stand outside himself and try to put his life into God’s purpose for all our lives. He could have helped him to know forgiveness, and to be reconciled with himself.

The Second Assembly of the World Council of churches spoke on “Christ the Hope of the World.” For it is the whole world, and all its people, as well as one solitary citizen of a suburban village, that is wandering today, in need of the Christ.

Literature without plot. Chooses death.

Art without form or design or color gives itself over to death.

Politics drives toward self destruction in nihilism. Marxism robs men of freedom in the name of economic determinism. And at the other extreme, the most violent forces of opposition to communism are trapped into destroying freedom in the attempt to save freedom. We must face these manifestations and choose life in all our corporate lives as well as in our personal lives.

Let us set ourselves against immorality, cruelty, idolatrous greed, and big and little lies. And let us choose compassion, kindness, patience, forbearance, not obsolete but wonderful qualities in human affairs.

Forgiveness as God forgives; love as Christ loves; thankfulness;

doing our work heartily.

“Choose therefore life.”

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Dates and places delivered:

Wisconsin Rapids, January 30, 1955