Transcript
M: Our Scripture reading this morning is from the opening versus of Acts. "In the first book of Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach until the day when He was taken up. After He had given commandment through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom He had chosen. To them, He presented Himself alive after His passion by many proofs, appearing to them during 40 days and speaking of the Kingdom of God.
And while staying with them, He charged them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, He said, 'You heard from Me, for John, baptized with water, but before many days you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit.' So, when they had come together, they asked him, 'Lord, will You, at this time restore the Kingdom of Israel?' He said to them, 'It is not for you to know the times or seasons which the Father has
fixed by His own authority, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.' And when He had said this as they were looking on, He was lifted up and a cloud took Him out of their sight. And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes and said, 'Men of Galilea,
why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw Him go into heaven.'"
(music)
UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER 1: The board of trustees (inaudible) theological seminary. [On?] recommendation of the five (inaudible) and the President has elected [Doctor Allen Meade?] (inaudible) Professor [Sharon Cully?] with her colleagues in teaching and research (inaudible). And in addition, the [congressional?] response of the (inaudible) chorus (inaudible) will participate in the
educational work of [the institution?]. We now proceed to give formal recognition to this professor, [Grace Hermanez?]. The Board of Trustees responds to (inaudible) requirement of the (inaudible) [seminary?], specifies that every person elected to [wait?] professorship or an associate professorship in this institution, answer affirmatively the following questions. Do you believe in one God,
Father, Son and Holy Spirit and do you confess [in union?] the Lord Jesus Christ as your savior and Lord and acknowledge your (inaudible) for all things to the church, which is [in God?]? And do you accept the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments to be the unique and authoritative witness of Jesus Christ and of the church of (inaudible) and find the Holy Spirit in God's word to you? Amen. Will you perform
(inaudible) of a professor in this seminary in obedience to Jesus Christ under the authority of the Scripture? Have you been [induced?], as far as you know in your own power, to accept the call into office into which you are now being inducted with a sincere desire for local [glory of God?] and the gospel [at His side?]? And are you willing to undertake the work of the professor in this seminary and do you promise
to [restart?] (inaudible) which are [incumbent?] on using this character as God shall give you strength? I ask you now that -- to step forward and inscribe your name on the book that bears the signatures of generations of trustees and professors who have been elected to serve in this institution.
It is my pleasure to announce that this professor is now formally installed to this office and I pray upon the blessings of the great head of the church as he is [charged with?] sacred responsibilities.
UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER 2: Please join us in prayer. God of grace, we thank you for the gospel of Jesus Christ and for the Spirit of power poured out from on high onto our church. We thank you for sisters and brothers of all races and nationalities, of many [sects?] and regions -- many
denominations [with this family?]. We thank you for those who hunger and thirst for justice, for the [poor?] in Spirit, and for those who (inaudible) in your name. We thank you, especially, this day for (inaudible), for this call to the seminary for his gifts, his love of
Christ and of the church. And his (inaudible). We pray that you will pour down upon him and we'll all learn and study with him. Your Holy Spirit, that this seminary (inaudible) may grow in [vision?] of Your nation and Your church and [in one form?] through Jesus
Christ, our risen Lord and savior. Amen.
CONGREGATION: Amen.
UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER 3: Professor [Neely, what in the world can one who claims only to be a student of the New Testament say to a professor of ecumenics and mission. It seems appropriate to read, on this occasion, the opening versus from the acts of the apostles because the mandate there,
plus others in the New Testament, are what have gotten us into all this business of ecumenics and mission. The opening words of the acts of the apostles have long intrigued me. What intrigues me is the little word "began". In the first book, "O, Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do
and teach until the day He was taken up." Why doesn't it read, "I have dealt with all that Jesus did and taught?" Period. It's possible to construe the sense of the texts as the clear [indication?] that the so-called gospel of Luke's represents only the beginning of the doing and the teaching of Jesus -- a beginning
which concluded on the day when he was taken up. The implication of such a reading is that the present work continues the story only begun and focuses not upon the acts of the apostles, but upon the acts of the exalted Jesus through the Spirit in the life and the mission of the early church. If so, then Luke's contribution to the New Testament is
not really a two-volume work at all, the first being cast in the gospel genre and the second in the literary type known as a praxis. Rather, it is, perhaps, a one volume work in two parts -- the first bearing witness to the beginning to the doing and the teaching of Jesus and the second to the continuing of the doing and the teaching of Jesus,
which is to say that the story of the church is itself the story of Jesus and is, thus, included in the gospel story. Because part two of Luke's version of the gospel is open ended, the story has a beginning, but, not yet, an ending. The gospel story continues to unfold, not only in the life of the early church, but in the life of the church through the
ages and indeed, now, across the world. What Jesus does, today, by the Spirit in the life and through the life of the church is a part of the good news. Like the beginning of the story, the story of the church is a story of human faithfulness and human unfaithfulness to Jesus. It's a story of obedience and disobedience to the word of Jesus. But it is, primarily, the
story of Jesus who acts and speaks through the Spirit in the community that confesses him more-or-less adequately and bears witness to him more-or-less effectively. On the human side, it is the story of the community that lives under the promise that you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. And under the mandate, you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem
and Judea and Samaria and to the end of the Earth. I think it's this promise and this mandate which legitimates our combining ecumenics and mission in a single discipline of theological reflection. Ecumenics, because it deals with the reality of the church is its historical and geographical extension from Jerusalem literally to the end of the Earth, the church in the ecumene-- the inhabited Earth --
and mission, because the church in the ecumene lives still under the mandate to bear witness to Jesus Christ in the power of the Spirit. Doctor Neely, you have been installed now as the Henry Winters Luce Professor of Ecumenics and Mission. The teaching task you now undertake here at Princeton Seminary is, as you know and I know and anyone else who knows anything knows, not an easy one.
Our modern age honors cultural pluralism and, thus, religious pluralism because religion is considered as a cultural phenomenon. It looks upon the Christian mission to the world as a form of religious intolerance at best and religious imperialism at worst. Large segments of the church itself have lost their nerve with regard to the truth of the gospel and its
redemptive power in human life. Many prefer dialogue to Evangelism, conversation to conversation. Moreover, the divisions within the church itself discredit, in the minds of many, the very witness to Jesus that we seek to bear ourselves in word and in deed. And, yet, for all of the problems and all of the excuses and all of the lack of nerve, to this task you have been called, not
merely by the faculty and the trustees of this institution, but, as I know from our conversations, by God. Indeed, to this task we have all been called. So, we look to you for leadership in our common response to our risen Lord, not to you alone to be sure, but to you nonetheless. Help us, Doctor Neely. Help us all. Find a way to bear
a common witness to Jesus Christ in the modern world that is both credible and compelling and, thus, redemptive. This morning, we welcome you officially to Princeton Theological Seminary and we pledge to you our friendship and our support in the task, which is not yours alone, but belongs to the church in all the inhabited earth. May God richly bless your
teaching ministry here among us. Amen.