2/8/53

Scripture: (Read Psalm 121)

(The first section of this sermon was added for the second delivering, on 2/14/1960.)

[This past week has been Boy Scout Week. The Scouts have continued their activity and service under the slogan, “Onward For God and My Country.” In most cases last Sunday was marked as Scout Sunday. Since we were involved in the Pilgrim Fellowship LEC last week, we have chosen to mark today as Scout Sunday. The week was made significant by the Court of Honor held in our dining room last Wednesday when many earned merit badges were presented to Scouts, one boy was advanced to Tenderfoot rank and another one announced as nearly ready, one boy was made a Star Scout, and two boys received their award of Eagle rank.

Boy Scouting came to this nation 50 years ago. Some individual troops were started before then, but in 1910 the National Council of the Boy Scouts of America was organized and incorporated on February 8th. In mid-summer of that same year, some men of the First Congregational church in this city applied for the necessary papers to get a Scout troop started here. The Rev. Fred Staff, Mr. T. W. Brazeau and Dr. Don Waters were troop committee, with Mr. Guy Nash as Scout Master. The troop was actually organized in the late summer only about 6 months after Scouting came to the United States. So it was one of the very first troops in this neighborhood, one of the first in this part of the state and probably one of the first troops in all of Wisconsin.

1960 is not only the 50th anniversary of Scouting in the USA, but it is the golden anniversary of the troop which is sponsored by this church. From 1910 to 1919 it was really Troop 1. Then from 1919 to 1947 it was known as Troop 2; in 1947 it became Troop 72, and in 1958, Troop 172.

Last Wednesday, a fine plaque was presented to the church from Mr. J. J. Plzak through Mr. Boyer. Mr. Plzak and Rev. Dr. Stevens used to edit a church paper called “Congregational News.” In the November 1931 issue of that paper, there appeared an article by Mr. Guy Nash on the history of the Scout troop. Mr. Plzak had this article photographed and enlarged and beautifully framed for our church. You may see it at the back of the room today after the service.

Cub Scouts were organized here in 1937 when Pack 17 became the first Pack in Wisconsin Rapids, with Mr. Delbert Rowland as leader. In 1947 the Pack became Pack 72 and in 1958, Pack 172. This, then, is but a brief bit of the history of Scouting in our town. Now I should like to speak for a while about the 12th Scout law.]

One of the first requirements for a Boy Scout, before he can begin on the progress that marks his Scouting experience, is that the boy know by memory the Scout law. The Scout Law enumerates 12 traits of good character which the Scout is expected to know and to live. “A Scout is trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent.” He gives some thought to the meaning of each of these traits at the time he memorizes the Scout law, for it is amplified and explained in his handbook. At meetings of his troop, sometimes at meetings of his patrol, occasionally at public ceremonies, he repeats aloud the Scout Law.

But far beyond memorizing a list of words, he makes those twelve qualities part of his life, if he is a good Scout. For they are not only a description of a Scout, but of a good citizen, a good churchman, a good family member. There is no outside compulsion on a Scout to live that way. He does it because he wants to; because he is on his honor to do so; and because that is the way for him to develop his own boyhood into good, mature citizenship.

Today, Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts attend the services of their churches in uniform. Some take part in leading the worship. They gather not alone here in this church, but in the churches of this community and all over the nation on Scout Sunday which is a part of National Boy Scout Week. They do so as a visible sign of a Scout’s obligation to do his duty to God.

Of course there is much more to doing one’s duty to God, than merely to put on a uniform and go to church some Sunday. That is a symbol of something that must be going on in a boy’s life all of the time, if he is really doing his duty to God. His whole duty to God includes regular worship at his church; includes living all of the Scout Law, all of the time - since that law is right, and righteousness is of God. It includes remembering his honor in the way he talks and acts. Because it includes reverence for God and for the personal rights and fundamental worth of other people, it is well to think for a while today on this twelfth trait of character in his Scout law.

“A Scout is reverent. He is reverent toward God. He is faithful in his religious duties, and respects the convictions of others in matters of custom and religion.”

Recognizing that God is his creator, that God is his heavenly Father, he respects the very name of God. He remembers something also that he had learned at his church or in his home when he read, and perhaps memorized, the Ten Commandments: “Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shall not make unto thee any graven image of God. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain” (that is: lightly, foolishly, uselessly or profanely). These, and the others of the Ten Commandments, which are our guides to right living, are a part of what we learn and practice in being reverent.

As a matter of fact, the whole Bible is that kind of guide. For it is the record of God’s dealings with people, and of people’s dealings with God. It is very honest and frank in telling how some have found great happiness and usefulness in doing what is the righteous will of God, and how others have found despair in living wrongly; and how some of the evil and some of the good get mixed up in the lives of all of us mortal people. It is a good idea to know the Bible, to read from it regularly -- either in the language of the seventeenth century, when the translation we have used more than any other was made, or in the language of the twentieth century now that a new, revised standard version is made available.

It is a good idea to know how widely the Bible is used by other people. Every hour of every day, 1800 copies of the Bible, or parts of the Bible, are being delivered where they are most desperately needed. They are printed in English, in Korean, Spanish, German, Greek, Russian, Japanese, Chinese, and 150 other languages and dialects. More copies of the Bible are printed and distributed and read than of any other book, published anywhere in the world, at any time.

The bible is the source of far more of our ideas and of the best in our way of living than most of us realize. For some time it was a slogan in Scouting to go “Forward on Liberty’s Team.” A good deal of Scouting activity has held this is mind. During some election years, Scouts and Cubs have distributed door-knob replicas of the Liberty Bell, reminding all citizens that it is their duty to vote. Some Scouts wear neckerchief slides shaped like a small Liberty Bell. Scouts were interested, like all other people of our town, when a full sized replica of the original Liberty Bell, mounted on a large truck, visited our city several seasons ago. Some of the Scouts who went to the Jamboree at Valley Forge may have seen the original Liberty Bell.

Inscribed on the Liberty Bell are the words: “Proclaim liberty throughout the land, unto all the inhabitants thereof.” Is that an American idea? It certainly is! Is it original with our country? It certainly is not! Those words are from the Bible in the book of Leviticus, Chapter 25, verse 10; and they were written when those ancient people were planning a fiftieth year jubilee celebration. But the reason those words are so fine is that they speak of something that is precious to all people- whether they are folk of several thousands years ago, or people of today, or people not yet born who will be living in the world of tomorrow.

The Bible, and the religious faith it teaches, has had a tremendous influence on our lives. Our national constitution is based on its principles. Lawyers tell me that the whole system of law in our country, and in England too, is based solidly on the Ten Commandments. You see, the Bible is the spiritual Word of God to us. And part of our reverence for God is to know His word, and heed it, and guide our lives by it.

Of course the Bible is not easy reading in the same sense that a cheap comic is easy reading; or a western adventure story; or a fictional novel. It is far more real than those. It takes reading, and some study of its meaning to understand some of it, and to appreciate and love it for what it is.

So reverence is not just something one feels when he is standing at attention repeating the Scout Law. It is also something one learns at work, studying this word of God, living its principles in the way we act on our jobs or at school or at play. It is something we know when we are at worship in the church, or in our own personal prayers.

There was a prophet of the Old Testament whose name was Isaiah. A prophet in the Bible is not just a predictor of something that is going to happen. A prophet, in the Bible, is one who tells people about the will of God as he understands it; warns people of the awful trouble they will have if they continue to live evil lives; tells them of the mercy and love of God if people live rightly as God wills them to do. Sometimes a prophet would warn his people, and his king, of enemies and what they would do to the Hebrew people unless the Hebrews lived rightly in the sight of God and kept themselves physically strong, mentally awake and morally straight.

One of the sayings of the prophet Isaiah is this: (and it is found in the 40th chapter of Isaiah, the 30th and 31st verses) “Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted. But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.”

Now I suppose that somebody could say: “Look, here in the Bible, the Old Testament, the book of Isaiah is a prediction that man will fly. See, the prophet there was forecasting the airplane. Didn’t he say that those who wait for the Lord shall mount up with wings -- fly?” Well, that is not what the prophet is saying at all. His words are not a prediction in that sense. They are not an old copy of some magazine like Science and Mechanics. They are more like poetry. They remind people that it is perfectly possible that people shall get weary; shall fall down in their living; even get to a frame of mind where they say “what’s the use of trying all this goodness stuff? It’s too hard. And anyway there’s something else I want to do and I’m going to do it whether it’s right or wrong, whether it helps or hurts anybody else, just because I want to.” And Isaiah says that even strong young men can fall, can be weary in well doing, can become exhausted.

1) But those who wait on the Lord, who rest from their moral weariness by paying attention to what God wants of them, shall have their strength renewed. They shall mount up like eagles in flight, shall run without weariness, walk without faintness. The eagle is a mighty bird; chosen as one of our national American symbols. Scout patrols in many troops are named for the eagle. It is an inspiring, poetic way of saying that one feels strong again, thrilled again to be alive, lifted up as though he were walking on air or flying, when he had waited for the Lord, has decided after all to do what God wants him to do, so that he is self respecting and useful. When a person gets up in that frame of mind, he can really look around! The world looks different to him - bigger, broader, steadier.

Did you ever think how differently the earth might appear to a frog or to an eagle? For all a frog can see, the whole universe, may just be a muddy little pond, some grass and rushes at its edge, with a little patch of blue sky or gray clouds overhead. No wonder his song is just a croak! But an eagle, up where he is, can see trees and mountains, lakes, rivers, roads, fields. He can see a rat or a snake or a rabbit; but after all they are just little specks on the earth. And more than half of his universe is the limitless sky overhead! No wonder his song is a scream of exultation! It is a marvelous thing to wait upon the Lord for a spirit that enables one to soar like the eagle.

2) But not all living - even good living - is flying. A lot of it is running on solid ground. There is a lot of good worthwhile work to do. Some of it needs to be done in a hurry. [And pity the Dutch people who are still huddling on their broken dikes if somebody doesn’t run, and keep on running, to get them boats and blankets and food and medicine, until the danger is over and the repairs are made, and the fields drained and the way cleared back to their houses.]

There are those who will run and not be weary.

Our Christ taught people to care. He taught us to be concerned about people. That is the meaning of love when the Bible speaks of love.

One of the Boy Scout’s duties is to do his “daily good turn.” By practicing the daily good turn, he trains his mind to be alert to the needs of others. The purpose of the good turn is not just for the Scout to get credit for himself. If that were all he had in mind, the Scout would only be training himself in selfishness. The purpose of the good turn is to remind him to be constantly on the look-out for the needs of others where he can help, without any prospect of getting something for himself except, maybe, somebody’s gratitude and friendship. And sometimes the good turn is an emergency kind of thing that requires running without weariness.

The world of people just aches and groans for more grown people, solid citizens, government officials, statesman and voters, who care about other folk. And we all need to understand the attitude that opens our eyes and understanding.

One of the Psalms has this to say: “I will run in the way of thy commandments when thou enlargest my understanding!” [Psalm 11l: 32]. “They who wait on the Lord shall -- run and not be weary.”

3) But I suppose that more of life is just straight walking than of either flying or running. The greatest figures of the Bible were great walkers. Abraham and Moses trudged many a mile in search of a country. Our Lord, Jesus Christ, and his apostle Paul walked great distances. In fact very few people rode much of anything. And the walkers had time to think, to talk, to look at what they passed and to stop for a better look or a longer visit if they wished.

It would be fun to fly over a forest, but one would see very few trees, or ferns, or flowers that way. The tiny brooks would flow unnoticed. The bee tree would never be spotted, nor a rabbit hole, nor the deer paths, nor the nest of a meadowlark. In fact many of those things are not seen by one who, for some reason or other has to run past a grove or a field.

Probably a Scout learns more of what is really going on around him as he goes on a hike, walks over the meadow and through the woods, than in any other way. A great many of life’s discoveries, of the greatest thoughts, of the clearest vision and understanding, comes to us at a steady, walking pace. For this is the pace at which Christian maturity is attained. That is the way people grow.

The very little boy may wish that, all on a sudden, he could be a man, so that he could ride a horse or drive a locomotive, or be a mayor or build a television set. If a four-year old boy were suddenly to be a 34-year old man, he would be in a terrible fix! For he would then have the size of a man, but none of the learning, strengthening, experience and understanding that make one able to be a man and do a man’s work. This business of growing from childhood to manhood and womanhood takes a lot of “walking,” if you see what I mean. For that is the way of growth and developing strength.

[much of life demands walking--Christianity vs. communism; race relations, etc.]

But the way of those “who do wait on the Lord,” even if they have wearied, fainted and fallen in spirit, is the way of renewed strength so that they have the character to fly like the eagle when they have chance, to run without weariness when necessary, and to walk without fainting through the days and duties of regular living.

This is the kind of reminder; the kind of grand ideals; the good solid stuff of living that you find in the Bible. By it, by our attendance at church, by our remembering to pray with open mind, as well as by the words of the Scout Law, we are reminded that a Scout, at his Scouting best, is always reverent.

We remember that he is reverent, not only as he stands repeating the Scout Law at troop meeting; not alone when he attends his church; not just until he grows into a man. But in all of his life, all of the time of every day, week and year, while he is a Cub Scout, a Boy Scout, and even more especially when he had grown to full, responsible manhood, he is reverent toward God and appreciative of other people.

(end)

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Dates and places delivered:

Wisconsin Rapids, February 8, 1953.

Wisconsin Rapids, February 14, 1960.