Signs of the Times

Robert H. Hamill

The Reverend Robert H. Hamill, D.D.
Dean-Designate, Marsh Chapel Boston University in an address to a hoard of The Methodist Church
Washington, District of Columbia

The Bible draws no sharp distinction between God's will for individual men and his will for public life. When a man acts alone, and when he acts in concert with fellowmen, he is free, responsible and accountable to God.

Observe the difference it makes when men do believe profoundly they are children of God, and accountable to him .... People will not do something unless first they be something. People will not behave without belief, not move without motivation. Let it be the business of the church to help people see who they are before it instructs them what to do. Theology precedes ethics.

Sound decisions in business and government require bifocal vision: the ability to see both the realities of the problem and their moral implications. This task cannot be done by the clergy, who do not know the inner necessities of the issue; nor by the laymen who are indifferent or uninformed about the moral implications, for the moral dimension of a solution helps determine whether it will be workable. This task falls then to informed and disciplined laymen.

The test of an effective church is not whether it is "right" and vocal on social issues, but whether it is gathering a company of disciplined laymen to ask what it means to work out their faith "out in the world."

The whole Bible looks to a time when justice will flow down like a mighty river, and peace be established over the whole earth as waters cover the sea .... Moral man and moral society ... are not a dream at all, but stern necessity, and no one profits by postponing it.

No doubt the basic need of the church is for spiritual renewal, ... not to enlarge but to purify her membership, for the cause of Christ is not served by churches full of people, but by people full of God. Only faithful and obedient people can embody the gospel and convey it persuasively to a world that desperately needs it ... a world which for is own safety must be brought to believe and obey the gospel.

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May 30, 1964

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