Transcript
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Let us pray. Almighty and all-loving God, we are overwhelmingly grateful for the joy of being humble servants of God. We pray thy blessing on these scholars and servants who are installed today as professors of the theological center. We pray, dear Lord, that you will give us your unlimited love and distance, and help us to radiate peace to all
thy other children today and every day of our lives. Amen. Let us hear the word of God from Paul's letter to the Ephesians, the fourth chapter, beginning with the first verse. I, therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all lowliness and meekness, with patience, forbearing one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace.
There is one body and one spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all. But grace was given to each of us according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore, it is said, when he ascended on high, he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to all. In
saying he ascended, what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is he who also ascended, far above all heavens, that he might fill all things. And the gifts were that some should be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, for the equipment of the saints, for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity
of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature adulthood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the cunning of others, by their craftiness in deceitful wiles. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from
whom the whole body, joined and knit together by every joint with which it is supplied, when each part is working properly, maketh body growth and upbuilds itself in love. The word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.
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The Board of Trustees of Princeton Theological Seminary, upon the recommendation of the faculty and the president, has elected the following persons to the rank of professor. Dr. James Hamilton Charlesworth, Dr. Craig Richard Dykstra, Dr. Patrick Dwight Miller, Jr. Upon similar recommendation, it has elected to the rank of associate professor, Dr.
Freda Ann Gardner, Dr. Geddes Whitney Hanson, Dr. Thomas Grier Long, Dr. James Howell Moorhead, Dr. Katharine Doob Sakenfeld, and Dr. Cullen I K Story. And I would invite these to step forward and form a line in front of the book. Throughout the generation, those persons inducted as trustees or as professors have signed this book to witness their agreement. So if you would form a line here now, please. And in signing the book, you sign only your
name. Associate professors and professors share fully with their colleagues in teaching, research, and planning the obligation and special responsibility in providing for our succession of scholars to participate in the educational work of the institution. In view of this responsibility and in recognition of the commitment made to these persons by the seminary and the church, everyone appointed to such ranks must be approved by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church USA. Through actions taken over several years,
the General Assembly has confirmed the action of the colleagues presented today, and we now proceed to give formal recognition to their place among us. The board of trustees responsive to the requirements of the plan of the seminary specifies that every person elected to a professorship or an associate professorship in this institution answer affirmatively the following questions. I will read all six questions, and the normal response at the end of the six is to say, I do.
Number one, do you believe in one God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit? And do you confess of you, the Lord Jesus Christ, as your Savior and Lord, and acknowledge him head over all things to the church which is his body? Do you accept the scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be the unique and authority witness to Jesus Christ in the church heaven, and by the Holy Spirit God's word to you? Will you perform the
duties of a professor in this seminary in obedience to Jesus Christ under the authority of the scriptures and under the continuing instruction and guidance of the confession of the Presbyterian Church of the USA? Do you approve of the government and discipline of the Presbyterian Church of the USA? Have you been induced, as far as you know, with your own heart, to accept the call to the office in which you are now being conducted with a sincere
desire to promote the glory of God in the gospel of his Son? Are you willing to undertake the work of a professor in this seminary, and do you promise to discharge the duties which are in conflict on you in this character as God shall give you strength? I do.
(inaudible; silence)
It is my pleasure to announce that these professors and associate professors are now formally installed in their offices, and I pray upon them
the blessings of the great Holy Spirit as they discharge their sacred responsibilities. First of all, I would like to thank and pray. Lord, you are the truth we seek to learn and teach. You are the life we want to live. You will own our power by which we can do anything good. We thank you for these faculty members that you have given to our seminary, and for the gifts you have given to them, for the equipment
of the saints for the work of ministry, and for the building up of the body of Christ. In particular, this day, we thank you for their call to think and learn and to share that experience with others, for their acceptance of that call, and for your promise that undergirds them in their work. We pray that you will reign with power and with grace in their studies and their classrooms, that they may be filled with the Spirit
and the love of Christ, with faith and intellectual integrity, with the humility and openness of Christian friendship for students and colleagues. Use them, Lord, in opening to all people the good news of salvation, in manifesting your kingdom of justice and peace, and in helping us all to grow a complete majority in measure of the stature and the fullness of Christ. And grant them always to be fed themselves by the bread of life as they share it
with others. Through Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, to whom with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, ever glorious in truth, be praise and honor in saints on earth and in heaven, and in the whole creation, forever and ever. Amen.
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We have today now officially installed four new colleagues and five who have been with us for various lengths of time, and you
may be wondering about that, but in preparing to install our new faculty members, it became clear that associate professors on the faculty had not been installed, although tenured by the faculty and approved by the General Assembly, and so we use the occasion today not only to make our relationship with our four new faculty official, but also to legitimate those who have been here a while. And we appreciate your good sportsmanship in all of this. My charge
to you this morning will be brief and merciful, and maybe that should be mercifully brief. It's pastoral in nature, and it's two-fold. I charge you first to remember and to take seriously a word from Dietrich Bonhoeffer. It comes in the course of his correspondence with Eberhard Bethge in the letters from prison, and as he is unfolding his ideas of what a religionless Christianity might look like and mean, there comes a short letter in which he
says to Bethge, Today I am content to enjoy the Christian faith and not to worry about its problems. And I charge you to make sure that in your life, as a professor here, there are such times, that there are days when you are content to enjoy the Christian faith and not to worry about its problems, even though you had been called by the Church through the voice of the Spirit to worry about its problems. But remember
that underneath all the problems there is the reality that has gripped each of our lives and sustains us and gives us the freedom to enjoy as well as to worry. Secondly, a word from the Apostle Paul. I charge you to take seriously the affirmation that human life is justified by grace through faith and not by performance through success. My pastoral experience over 29 years was an interesting hermeneutical discovery with relationship to the venerable doctrine of justification
by faith. I soon discovered that there really isn't anyone out there who today is seeking to justify his or her life by moral performance. That really is not a problem in the Church. But I soon discovered that most folks are indeed worried about justifying their lives. Only the standards have changed. They aren't the Ten Commandments, but now they're the standards of achievement, success, wealth, power. I remember the man who said to me one day, you must
call on my new neighbor. He's a young couple. They're a young couple and they're very substantial people. Or they're people of substance. And I knew exactly what he meant. But the question in my mind was, are other people who are not so substantial of less substance? A lot of our people in the Church really do understand who they are and the value of their life in terms of their personal worth, in terms of their net worth.
But then I discovered that it's not just the people, it's the folks in the pulpit that have the same problem. I don't know of any profession that is more tempted and perhaps even prone to understanding who we are and how valuable our lives are than ministers with regard to whatever success we may achieve or experience in ministry. The preaching of the Word is followed by the standing at the door and listening to all those things, those
inane things that are said to us as they go out, and yet how disappointed we would be if they weren't said. It's a sort of weekly assurance that I'm okay. And I suspect that is true of the academic world too. You are called to an important task, and yes, publishing is important and research is important, and you're standing with your colleagues and you're standing with your peers and you're standing with the students. It's all very important,
but I want to tell you it isn't ultimate. It really isn't ultimate. Who you are and the value of your life has already been established by God's love in Jesus Christ for you, and there isn't anything that you can do to add one ounce of weight to what has been given. Now from the times of Paul's own preaching until now, people have heard that and taken that to mean an invitation to slothfulness, and so they have
moved out to relax in all the world. But for Paul it was a freedom, it was a freeing up of life to know that life is right with God. Life is valuable because God says it's valuable. My life is valuable because it is a gift from God. Now I'm free to use the gifts, the buried gifts, which God has given to each one of you, to each one of us in the service of Christ and his
church. So in the midst of all the infighting that goes on in the guilds and who thinks what of whom and who's cutting the edge and who's made the groundbreaking breakthrough, just remember that your life is justified by grace through faith. And I hope that will free you for a wonderful career of teaching and ministry in this place. God bless you deeply. The final hymn is 332.
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Now, in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, And the communion of the Holy Spirit, Be with you all. Amen. (music)