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Let us continue in worship by giving reverent attention to the reading of God's Word as it is recorded in the book of Job, the 31st chapter. I begin the reading at the verse which is numbered 13. If I have rejected the cause of my manservant or my maidservant when they brought a complaint against me, what then shall I do when God rises up? When He makes me inquire, what shall I answer Him? Did not He who made me in the womb make Him? And did not one fashion us in the womb?

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If I have withheld anything that the poor desired, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail, or have eaten my morsel alone, and the fatherless has not eaten of it, for from his youth I reared him as a father, and from his mother's womb I guided him, if I have seen anyone perish for lack of clothing, or a poor man without cover, if his loins have not blessed me, and if he has not been warmed with the feet of my feet, if I have raised my hand against the fatherless because I saw help in the gate, then let my shoulder blade fall from my shoulder, and let my arm be broken from its socket, for I was in terror of calamity from God, and I could not escape his majesty.

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If I have made bold my trust, or called fine bold my confidence, if I have rejoiced because my wealth had raised me, or because my hand had gotten up, if I have looked at the sun and its sun, or the moon, maybe once longer, and my heart had been secretly enticed, and my mouth had bitten it, this also would be an iniquity to be punished by the devil, for I should have been charged with God's abomination. May the Spirit inspire these words on my heart to be entertained evermore.

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Amen. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. The devil has a great deal to say about labor. In Deuteronomy 24, or down in the Biblical 19th verse in A.V.V., "He who is worker is used before the foundation, for he is poor and needs help."

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In the sixth chapter of Ephesians, these words are true. "He must work in ways he laboreth, lest God work in you." In Colossians 4, the words of the Holy Spirit are true. "Pray, worker, that you may be saved." In the great prophecy of Jeremiah, the second chapter, "Woe to him who conducts shady business to you, especially by distorting the wisdom of the people." In the prophecy of Manatheis, the third chapter, "I will testify as righteous against those who distort the wisdom."

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In James 5, "God gives the prize of working people to as Jesus, by those who wrongly use them." And perhaps most powerfully and most eloquently in this passage comes the book of Job, which I have just shared with you. Job says, "If I reject the prize of the laborer, then God will rise against me." God has made and continues both the entrepreneur and the laborer, they have come forth from the same room.

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"If I withhold money from those who need it, if I void myself while others go hungry, if I use force against laborers, knowing that the force will rule in my favor, then, before my arm can strike a blow, may my shoulder blade fall from its scepter. I must not, Job continues, rely on my gold or my wealth as the neighbor of my distress.

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To do such is to bow down before a false god, however, it is to be a hypocrite before the divine." And perhaps Jesus thanks us all for that in a single sentence when he says, and this is how he thanks us in the Bible, "Come unto me, all you that labor, and I will give you rest." So the Bible has a great deal to say about labor.

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It's sad to say that such a brilliant book has not had much to say about it. An article illustration of that can be found some right here in our own area, the upper Ohio Valley. As I'm sure you are aware, more than 60% of the world's Presbyterians live within 500 miles of where we are now gathered. How have Presbyterians in this area treated labor?

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In 1820, the first labor strike that conducted in Pittsburgh was within a cotton mill here. People were being forced to work 12 hours a day, the state passed the Meal Law that they only had to work 10, unless a special agreement had been made with the mill. The mill here wanted to force the workers into working, so it closed the mills for the month of July.

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These people suddenly were without any financial support whatsoever. When the across the valley strike took place, and during all of this, the Presbyterians were set on fire. In 1872, we had the railroad strike here. A great deal of effort was put by the railroad on cutting expenses.

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They doubled loads. They increased the number of hours of work this by. Finally, they instituted a 10% cut in all wages, and as a result, the railroad was now shut. The militia was sent by the governor from Philadelphia.

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By the time they got here, the end of the 12-hour train ride, they were passed on to the encampment in England, and so they had passed the shelter in Philadelphia. The laboring people responded with rocks. Before it was done, 15 men and boys had been killed.

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The President of the United States, Jefferson James Hague, called off the national guard, but seemed to struggle with it. The newspapers in the Pittsburgh area were divided, some supporting the railroad, some supporting the militia. But the Presbyterian ban, and those days we had in this case, it was republished here twice a week.

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It came out with a strong anti-labor sentiment, and those who had reviews in the period of the today have said that it was principally because of the pressure for the Congress to do it, by wealthy Presbyterians. In 1891, we had memorial strikes in a city not more than 40 miles from here.

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In that strike at a coal mine, 50 men and boys using rear-truck-built lighting shot 11 shelters dead, and wounded 75 men. This was done, incidentally, because the shelters had turned down before the time. The Presbyterians were very upset.

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Then in 1892, we had the only steady field left. At that time, Henry Clay Hicks was anxious to do three things, cut roses, and also drive the Union out of the field. So he closed the field and insisted that only those could come back to work who were willing to accept his payback, and to refuse to ever bring a Union.

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This matter was put before the workers on July 2nd. But three weeks before that, Henry Clay Hicks had hired 300 people from them to come to Fisker and close their discovery. He tried to sneak them into the mill, but they would attack him. The result was a riot.

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Three people came in, and seven workers were killed. On July 13th, the Social Security Governor, Alfred Fisker, in his office, ran a large article written by Henry Clay Hicks himself. No other senator knew what the written field said.

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On July 20th, the paper came out with an article against what it called "the folly and the wickedness of the labor institution." And then, and this is made historically important, under the pressure of Fisker's Social Security, the Social Security Board of Home Missions fought all evangelism amongst the labor and staffers of Fisker.

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Not only were they given no support for their positions, they were even denied the benefits. It's interesting to note that at this time, three-quarters of the industry, even in a factory, was owned by Fisker. Now what was the result of that? Increasing poverty, young, disease, foreigners and blacks cut off completely from any economic possibility,

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steel workers laboring 12 hours a day in the mills for $1.65, clerks working 14-hour days to stay with each other, families being forced to send their children into the mills where there was no other way to survive for the family, young girls surrendering to the sexual desires of their employers to keep their critical $3 a week job.

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And in all of this, the Fisker experience was never steady. Life, crime, dirty politics and the antitrust on everything, until one sociologist visiting in this city wrote, and I quote him directly, "Only in Ten-Pond, China, and in the slums of Naples,

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have I seen poverty and degradation compare with confusion in Fisker." And this is what the Fisker experience gave me. Then in the period from 1909 to 1914, the Russell State Foundation selected Fisker to do the sociological and economic study of an industrial city.

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That study was released over the next five years in six volumes, and the fact that the Fisker families were here in this city were depicted so openly, so plainly, and so indisputably in that study, that for the first time, the church arose and heard the Jesus speak there,

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"No man can save him. For either you will serve the one and ignore the other, or you will love the one and hate the other. You cannot serve both God and man." For the first time, the church began to hear the words of the Savior himself,

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"Come unto me, all ye who labor, and I will give you rest." He was God-dispositioned to listen to laborers, as it were. He sent his angels to the laborer's practice. He began a practice ministry in the languages of many people who had begun living for this purpose.

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He set up a school for faithful workers. Our faith ministry hired fourteen ministers who spoke different languages to work amongst the workers of this city, and we established a connection, an industrial and interracial relationship.

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But my friends, God forsook us. Though we did do good, the wrath of separation and self-destruction and labor, formed in those early years, would never cease to be. And it is not known where we stand.

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Now why do I say this is important? Not because I am trying to promote the essentialist in those words. We are not responsible for what our Father did. We are in no way responsible for how those who do it have been buried a hundred years ago.

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There is a statute of limitations in the Church, yet there is a statute of limitations in the world. But I share these things in order that we might be aware of what can happen to a church that focuses on the wrongdoing,

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that focuses on the culture of the powerful instead of the leadership of a loving Lord. We confront now in our city unemployment as you do. It's not as bad as it was a few years ago, but it is still the case.

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And I would respectfully call to your attention that in almost every institution, that unemployment is not the result of personal failure, but the result of social failure. Yes, there is personal tragedy in it,

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but it is also a field for our whole society. We have seen the collapse of the major part of this great institution, and many families and individuals have died. And how are we to respond?

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I would make that very specific, Mr. President. First, I think that we as citizens and as citizens should support legislation which places the citizens on business so that they cannot callously leave an area,

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dropping their workers and all those who have grown up in support of that industry simply because they have not been brought in yet. Not long ago, the chief executive officer of the New York Times wrote these words, "The new marching order for corporate freedom

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exudes loyalty to workers, to products, to corporate structures, to businesses, to factories, to communities, even to the nation. Like a general in an all-out war making life-and-death decisions, all elitism should be viewed as a symbol of under-reliance."

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As a society, we cannot follow those values. I yield to no one when my recognition of that vision is downplayed. Business has saved far more people from poverty than government has ever done. When we hold national exposition or when we enter into world affairs,

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the progress of America is not made by what is legislated, but by what is produced. But at the same time that I say this, I must go on to say that sometimes business can become a challenge and an incentive. And I think we've seen that.

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So make no mistake about it, the rich are getting richer as the poor are getting poorer. Now in the first level of the C.D. of the second chapter, it says that the legitimate authority of government is to come in and exercise its control when those who are part of society continue to abuse it.

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That's what I'm talking about. The state of Maine has already passed such legislation. It's been tested in the Supreme Court of the state. Eighteen other states are now considering such legislation.

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I recognize that when government infuses into business, it's destructive. I hear the cries of my friends in business saying, "The last thing we need is more government regulation." Let's make no mistake about it.

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Business receives much from government. These airports and these airplanes are mostly for the convenience of business. The highways are mostly used for transport. Our natural resources are most widely used by business.

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Our efforts overseas to protect our business people are pro-business, and they should be. And stable government is an imposter for the progress of business. We're thinking now about the 200th birthday of our country. My friends, may I remind you that when the Revolutionary War was over,

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America was in a demoralized state, and for the next 10 years, business did not prosper, and we were in economic difficulty in every single month of every single year. And then we wrote a constitution. And then we set up a stable government.

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And then we elected George Washington as President of the United States, and we fixed the illicit of government in an economic problem in the great country. So I would argue this morning that we should support, together with Matt, legislation which would change business from an attitude in which it says,

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"All allegiances are acceptable." That's a negative statement. Secondly, I would suggest that we need to impose those unemployed persons who were doing everything they could on their own behalf to improve their situation.

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As some of you know, I've just come out of the hospital. I had a nurse in the hospital who was an unemployed school worker. He went to nursing school, got his R.N., and is now going to college at the same time that he is working, getting a B.S. degree.

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He has related himself to one of Pittsburgh's known and stellar industries, the health service industry. Our medical service is second to none. Here was a young man with a young man with vision.

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Where there is no vision, the people perish. Where vision is and perish is, where we rely not on circumstances but upon character and conviction, then there can be progress. Now, in the middle of the prophecy of Jeremiah, 29th chapter,

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Jeremiah writes the letters to some Gentiles. He Israelites, he was taken off into Babylon as captives. Now, these people were known as lost shoppers. They were uprooted.

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They were exiled, and exiled simply means to be where you don't want to be, and that's described by some Seattle sermons. They are where they do not want to be. So this letter that Jeremiah writes to those exiled has strong and powerful relevance

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when implied to the unemployed people. This is what he said in the letter five centuries post, "Don't be a character, you guys. You the best of people recognize that God has given you the capacity to meet

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every emergency, and he's allowed that capacity. Second, you should build houses and live in them. Get away from any of those individuals you have to keep in this world. You're not going to come back to the way things were before.

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So start over again. Third, plant gardens and eat the fruit there. That is, try not to be terrorized by the society. Develop the skills that you have and use them for the right reasons.

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Fourth, he says, take wives and have sons and daughters. Don't separate yourselves from others. Don't wallow in self-pity. Don't see yourself as above others or below others.

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See yourself as part of the spiritual family and do what you can to be a healthy, happy family. Fifth, be a welfarer of the place where you are, and welfare is salami.

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Keep the wholeness and the fullness of that place. Be God's woman. Be God's man. Remember that. And last, be a sinner.

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You've been a sinner in many of our lives, haven't you? And we need to applaud that. We have to be a sinner. And last, we've got to recognize that there are times we can't be there.

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There are days we are old, or we aren't there. We are not in a position to be in a position to be in a position to be there. We do that by plugging the door whenever we're able to, by seeing the groceries that are in place,

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by bringing new businesses up. Remember that. This is the place for you. That's the reason you have a welfare system.

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That's the reason you can speak. That's the reason you can talk to your kids and your children and your parents. That's the reason you have the intention of being a member of the church. That's the reason you can come up into the chalice and be a part of the church.

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That's the reason you have the courage to be a member of the church. We're taking the road to moving the house, to helping the community, to moving the house, to moving the church, to moving the church.

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More than 313 homes, 70% of them with the doors to moving work to communities, 30% to establish new businesses, to build up the historic church. To this date, more than 5,000 families have come up and seven new businesses. That's the foundation.

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The foundation. There are 60 of us in the building. The foundation. This congregation has given more money to the chalice

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than any congregation in the country. We're going to be a part of the church. We're going to be a part of the church. In this last moment, I think about what we're thinking about.

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I'm just saying that I am not just thinking for a moment. I'm not just thinking. I'm thinking about long lines. Long, long lines.

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Soil, steel, government. Those lines we started at the top. And all the soil those lines will reach further into the future. We're all going to be part of the church.

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But in the last moment, we must have a future. We must change as individuals and as congregations. Change, change, change. They are the only way to change.

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But we can change. Can I be a part of the church? I'm going to have to be part of the church. And in the name of the power and the love and the spirit of Jesus Christ.

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Peace. Thank you. (Applause) Father, I don't think the answer to this question is a very good answer.

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I think it's a very good answer. In this society, we've had a very good life. Over the years, I think I've had a good life. I've been a good student.

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I've been a good teacher. I've been a good husband. But I also have a good life. I've learned a lot.

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I've learned a lot. And I think that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to teach you to live in the spirit of the Lord. And I'm going to teach you to live in the spirit of the Lord.

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And I'm going to teach you to live in the spirit of the Lord. And I'm going to teach you to live in the spirit of the Lord. (Applause)