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Aug 27, 2023

Ursula Niebuhr

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I have served my entire ministry with a church aligned with what many regard as a liberal mainline denomination. H. Richard Niebuhr critiqued the liberal social gospel in 1937 with stinging words, “A God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without the cross.” Keep in mind Niebuhr was a card-carrying member of the Protestant liberal establishment back in the day. I’ve observed a similar tendency in our time to quietly set aside biblical concepts like wrath, sin and judgment to talk only of God’s love and mercy. God shows us mercy beyond our wildest dreams but love also requires indignation against all forms of evil and injustice. Otherwise, we are left with what Tertullian wrote two thousand years ago, “A better god has been discovered, one who is neither offended nor angry nor inflicts punishment…He is merely kind.” We mustn’t minimize the cross in Jesus’ atoning ministry. The cross displays the seriousness with which God regards sin.
I came across an article written by another member of the Niebuhr family, Ursula Niebuhr (1907-1997), married to Richard’s brother Reinhold and quite a theologian in her own right. Her 1947 essay was critical of sappy Easter messages that reduced resurrection to the joy of spring and the hope of immortality. She lamented the tendency to preach Jesus’ resurrection without the cross. She asked why preachers avoided the events leading to Calvary in favor of the empty tomb? She reminded readers of Jesus’ words, “If any would come after me, let them deny themselves, take up their cross and follow me” (Mark 8.34). “The only way to live is to die to yourself,” she wrote.

Ursula’s prayer entrusts work, rest and family to God’s care and provision:

O God, who has placed us in a world You and we constantly create, we give thanks as we work and as we pray. We praise You for the day of light and life, for the night which brings rest and sleep, and for the ordered course of nature, seedtime and harvest. We bless You for the joy of children and the wisdom of the old. We thank You for the love of God and people which shines forth in commonplace lives, and above all, for the vision of You in silent meditation, in fellowship, in the sacrament of the shared life, and in prayer. We praise Your name now and forever more. Amen.

Rev. Dr. Peter James served 42 years as the senior of Vienna Presbyterian Church in Vienna, VA — 21 years in the 20th century and 21 years in the 21st century. He retired in 2021 and now serves as Pastor-in-Residence at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.

Even as a pastor, prayer came slowly to Pete. Read Pete’s story.