Sermon – John 11.32-44, Isaiah 25.6-9, AS, YB, November 7, 2021

Tags

All Saints Sunday, All Souls Day, death, God, hope, humanity, Jesus, Lazarus, loss, necrology, new life, promise, saint, Sermon, soul, strength, tears, weep

Most Sundays we talk about Jesus’ life and witness and how we can emulate the Son of God.  Many years ago, there was even a campaign with the letters WWJD:  What Would Jesus Do.  But what we rarely talk about is how incredibly hard that ideal is – how hard as everyday humans emulating the Savior, who was both fully human and fully divine, really is.  So, in theory, a day like today should be a relief.  All Saints Sunday is a day we shift gears and talk about emulating people who were fully human.  Of course, that notion is tricky too.  By “saints” the church means those “persons of heroic sanctity, whose deeds were recalled with gratitude by

later generations.”[i]  These are people like St. Francis who shed his every earthly possession and obtained the stigmata, Mother Teresa who nursed this sickest of the sick and poorest of the poor, or even St. Margaret, who slayed her way out of a dragon after being tortured for her faith. 

I think that is why we often conflate All Saints and All Souls Day – the latter being a day when we remember all of those who have died in the hope of the resurrection.  These are the saints or souls who may not have been marked by heroic sanctity, but certainly had an impact on our lives.  These are the moms and dads, the spouses and friends, the children and lovers who may not have always been holy, but certainly taught us about the Christian faith and who we entrusted to the hope of the resurrection as we sat by their deathbeds or mourned their sudden deaths from afar.

We conflate the notion of All Souls Day into All Saints Day because there is something more human about All Souls Day – not only because we can relate to ordinary human life and death, but because the celebration today makes us feel like our humanity can be enough too.  That’s why I love the gospel lesson we get today.  In all the texts about Jesus’ healings, outwitting the challengers, and his ultimate sacrifice for us on the cross, today we get a text about Jesus being very human.  Before the amazing miracle of raising Lazarus from the dead, we are told, very simply, Jesus wept.  Caught up in the grief of his friends Martha and Mary and lost in his own overwhelming sense of loss, Jesus cries; not just a single, artistic tear, but a full-on bout of weeping.  In that solitary moment of grief, Jesus feels deeply, tangibly human.

I do not know about you, but that is what I need from Jesus today.  Later in our service we will list the names of the beautiful souls from Hickory Neck who died in the last year – those who made us laugh, sometimes made us angry, who put a smile on our face, and sometimes made us weep.  In the Prayers of the People, we will pray for the over 750,000 people who have died of COVID in the United States, mourning not just their loss, but the loss of our old “normal” and all that this pandemic has taken from us.  We mourn the ways in which many of the funerals we celebrated in the last year cheated us from each other’s presence – a reality that has still not be fully remedied.  In the midst of what has been a time of significant trauma, we need a Savior who weeps with us – and not just for the dear friend who has died, but also for the fact that his raising Lazarus will soon mean his own death.[ii]

That very gift of Jesus’ humanity today is what empowers us to boldly proclaim hope[iii] in the midst of sorrow, in the midst of trauma, in midst of this strange in-between time.  The words of Isaiah remind us of the promise, the promise that, “the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear.  And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever.  Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken.  It will be said on that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, so that he might save us.  This is the Lord for whom we have waited; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.”  On this All Saints Sunday, that is our hope for the week – the promise that the Lord God will wipe away tears – because God’s Son has known our tears – and that we will enjoy that rich feast with our loved ones again.  This in-between time is just that – a time in-between where the promise of new life is a rich promise indeed; one that gives us strength for the not-yet time.  Thanks be to God!

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[i] Holy Women, Holy Men:  Celebrating the Saints, (New York:  The Church Pension Fund, 2010),664.

[ii] Debie Thomas, “When Jesus Weeps,” October 28, 2018, as found at https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/1999-when-jesus-weeps on November 5, 2021.

[iii] Kathryn M. Schifferdecker, “Mourn Loss, Proclaim Faith,” November 1, 2021, as found at https://www.workingpreacher.org/dear-working-preacher/mourn-loss-proclaim-faith on November 5, 2021.

On Grief, Grace, and God in a Pandemic…

Tags

cope, Coronavirus, emotion, freedom, God, grace, grief, Jesus, loss, lovingkindness, pandemic

Photo credit:  https://www.timeshighereducation.com/student/blogs/how-deal-grief-while-university

This week, I hopped in the car to pick up an order of food from a local restaurant.  We’ve been trying to support our local businesses, and this has become a weekly treat.  On my drive there, I suddenly felt a sense of freedom.  I was totally alone in the car, I was blasting music only I like, and I was free from the confines of our home.  The whole trip was probably only 20 minutes round trip, and I have been out of the house many times, as I am the designated person to pick up necessities, but something about this particular drive was so gloriously freeing that the release of blissful emotion almost made me cry with longing.

As I thought about the drive later, I began to understand the surprising surge of emotion.  Intellectually, I know we as a world are suffering a tremendous amount of grief.  But I had not fully acknowledged my own grief – grief over seemingly small losses.  In my case, the loss of freedom to structure my day, create space without children around for contemplation or accomplishing work, to go about daily rituals (work, shopping, dropping off kids), or even the ability to just hop in the car and go wherever I want.  I suppose I had not acknowledged my grief because there is much bigger grief all around me – grief over the death of loved ones whose funerals are indefinitely postponed, grief over lost livelihoods and the threat of financial ruin, grief over the incapacitating of the body from this virus, grief over lost milestones, such as graduations, weddings, and baptisms.  In the face of such enormous grief, my feelings felt petty or unmerited.

I have counseled more families than I can count after a loved one has been lost.  We talk about how important having a funeral as soon as possible is so the grief process can begin.  With church members, we send a series of four books over the following year to help them as their grief evolves.  But in the midst of a pandemic, grief is a strange animal.  There are ways in which we are hesitant to acknowledge or give credence to our grief.  There are ways in which we stuff our grief because we are just trying to survive.  And there are ways in which our grief simply cannot be processed because of the elimination of our normal rituals.

All of that is to say, I hope that you can use this time to give yourself the same amount of grace and lovingkindness that our Lord gives us.  This time is unlike anything most of us have faced, and our normal coping mechanisms may not be sufficient.  And that is okay.  The good news is that Christ is walking with us in this time, holding our fragile selves together (and staying nearby with the fragility shatters).  Our invitation is to accept that tenderness for ourselves, and, when possible, extend that tenderness to others – our loved ones, our neighbors, and strangers.  As always, you are in my prayers.  Today I especially pray that you can feel God’s loving arms surrounding you on every side.

On Fragility…

Tags

cycle, death, fragile, God, hidden, life, loss, prayer, pregnancy, thin space

Photo credit:  www.extremetech.com/extreme/191233-new-nanoparticles-get-us-closer-to-artificial-photosynthesis-mass-carbon-capture

I have talked before about how, as a priest, the life cycle is ever present in my work [see post here].  Simultaneously celebrating new life and honoring earthly death can sometimes happen within days or hours.  But this week I have been reminded of how sometimes we do not even see or think about that thin space between life and death because, all too often, we have the privilege of not having to think about it.

This week, one of my close friends celebrated the fifth anniversary of the birth and death of her child.  The baby died in utero around twenty weeks.  That event was formative for our entire community of friends.  Suddenly, pregnancy was no longer a happy, idyllic time, when everything always turns out okay.  We all began to see the dark side of pregnancy, and understand how much we take a “normal pregnancy” for granted.  In thinking about baby Ella this week, and the impact she had on so many of us, I find myself humbled by how much her death gave us.

And like any other cyclical week in the priesthood, what news should I learn but of a friend who was surprised to discover she is pregnant after having lost her first pregnancy over a year ago.  I was equally elated and terrified.  Elated, because I knew how much the couple hoped that maybe, just maybe, they might be blessed with a successful pregnancy and birth.  But terrified because they, and I, know how fragile these next thirty-four weeks will be.

So this week, my prayers are with all of those who walk through the journey of life, death, and pregnancy.  I especially lift them up, because all too often, their joy, grief, and anxiety are hidden.  For fear that life will not be viable, many couples elect to keep their pregnancy quiet for as long as possible.  Whether they share or not, the couple faces consequences.  When everyone knows about a pregnancy that is lost, the couple can have to retell the painful story over and over again.  When no one knows about the pregnancy, the couple can feel isolated and alone in their grief, because to share their story, they have to tell you that they were pregnant and are now no longer pregnant.  There are no easy ways forward, and so for those in our midst walking the path of longing to create new life, fearfully growing new life, birthing new life, and mourning lost life, our prayers are with you.  You live in a fragile reality that we honor and hold with love and that we lift to God.  You are not alone.

Journeying in the darkness…

Tags

abundance, church, darkness, grief, light, loss, mourning, pregnancy

October is Pregnancy Loss Awareness Month.  In some ways, it seems like a strange month to choose.  In October, we are often focused on the harvest.  We have harvest-themed door wreaths and table decorations.  We enjoy a taste of the harvest ourselves – picking apples and pumpkins.  This is a time we celebrate abundance, and yet this is also the month when we honor when abundance is taken away.

As a child, I knew very little about pregnancy loss.  I had an aunt who sometimes referred to infant she lost by name, but no one besides her talked about it much, and the subject was so hushed and confusing that I never asked many questions.  As a chaplain, I experienced my first pregnancy loss with a patient.  A whole new world of darkness invaded what had developed in my mind as a world of joy.  I was at the age that my friends were starting to have babies.  But no one had ever talked to me about the dark side of pregnancy.  The darkness still felt very “other.”

Finally, a dear friend – one with whom I had shared many confidences – lost her pregnancy.  We lived far away, but I had just seen her pregnant belly at a reunion of friends for the weekend.  We had laughed and shared dreams about the child.  It had been a weekend of light.  And suddenly, that weekend was washed away with darkness.  We all rallied, sending flowers, meals, and cards.  We prayed and we cried.  And we listened.  My friend was very good about being vocal and honest about her pain.  We journeyed with her through the darkness.

During our mourning period, I shared with a few coworkers about my grief.  Slowly, the stories poured out.  Of pregnancies lost, of an infant loss, and even of the grief of trying to get pregnant.  No longer could I go on pretended that the world of pregnancy and babies was all roses and sunshine.  There is a darkness, a fear, and an uncertainty that haunts every pregnancy.  Most of the time those fears are unrealized, but unfortunately, not always.  And sometimes that darkness crashes down on those who never even realized the darkness was lurking.

We don’t talk about pregnancy loss much in church.  We have a liturgy for blessing a pregnancy.  We have a liturgy for giving thanks for a healthy birth.  And we have a liturgy for an infant baptism.  But the liturgies for infant loss are scattered and hard to find.  They are modified versions of other liturgies, often unauthorized by a liturgical committee.  They are like the darkened corner room of the maternity ward where they try to hide away the mom who has to deliver her stillborn.

Today, I want you to know that I am willing to talk about pregnancy and infant loss.  As a priest in the Church, I am willing to journey with you through the darkness – even if that darkness has been lingering for twenty years or more.  Or if you are trying to get pregnant, or even if you are pregnant and are afraid of the darkness – I am here.  You are not alone.  I will stand in the darkness with you – for however long you need.  And for those of you who are just now becoming aware of this issue and want to be supportive, I recommend this video.  You will find great resources on the website, as well as a link to an amazing book of devotions.  Join me in being the Church – a Church willing to sit in the darkness until we can find the light again together.

Sermon – 2 Samuel 18.5-9, 15, 31-33, P14, YB, August 9, 2015

Tags

Absolom, Christ, confession, cross, David, God, guilt, judgment, loser, losing, loss, redemption, sin, tragedy, victory, We Are Marshall, winning

I recently watched the film We Are Marshall.  The film details the true story of a tragedy in 1970 that happened to Marshall University.  After an away football game, most of the team and coaches, as well as several boosters, took a private plane back to the university.  The plane crashed just minutes from landing, killing everyone onboard.  The town was bereft as they mourned their sons, friends, boyfriends, wives, husbands, and teammates.  The University’s Board was set to cancel the 1971 football season, when the few surviving players petitioned to play anyway.  The president was then tasked to find a coach who would be willing to step into this tragic situation – coaching a season that many thought was inappropriate given the deaths, to find enough players when Freshmen were not yet allowed to play per NCAA rules, and to find a supporting coaching staff, including trying to recruit the only assistant coach who had not been on the plane.  The season moves forward and after the first game, which Marshall loses, the head coach and the surviving assistant coach have a heart-to-heart.  The assistant coach explains that the deceased former head coach had always said that the most important thing in football was winning.  And if the current team was not going to win, the assistant didn’t want to coach, because they would be dishonoring the former coach’s memory.  After a long pause, the current head coach confesses that before he came to Marshall, he would have said the same thing:  that winning is the most important thing.  But now that he was there, in the midst of the Marshall community, the most important thing to him was simply playing.

We are a society that glorifies winning.  Not just in sports, but in all of life, we want to be winners.  No one likes to lose because losing, when we are really honest, is not fun.  Of course, we try to teach our children that we cannot always win.  Many a play date argument is settled by the conversation that sometimes we win and sometimes we lose.  We even have a word for being comfortable with losing.  We say we are being “good sports.”  But being a good sport takes work.  We do not like losing.  Losing itches as something deep inside of us – both internally and externally reinforced.  We want to be winners.

Of course no one knows more about losing than King David.  History labels him as a winner, but as we reread his story, we know that David was an intimate friend of losing.  We hear the deep pain of his losing in his final words today, “O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom!  Would I had died instead of you, O Absalom, my son, my son!”  We know the pain of losing a child – the sorrow and the grief of that kind of losing.  But David is not just mourning the loss of his child in these words.  He is morning the loss even more deeply because he knows he is indirectly guilty of his son’s death.[i]  If you remember, in the reading we heard last week, Nathan told David that because of his sinfulness with Bathsheba and Uriah that his household will be plagued by a sword.  Through Nathan, the Lord proclaims, “I will raise up trouble against you from within your own house; and I will take your wives before your eyes, and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this very sun.  For you did it secretly; but I will do this thing before all Israel, and before the sun.”[ii]

God stays true to God’s judgment.  Between last week’s reading and this week’s reading, David’s family starts to fall apart.  His first child with Bathsheba dies.  One of David’s sons rapes his half-sister.  When David does not punish that son, another son, Absalom, takes action, killing his half-brother.  Absalom then flees, and spends years amassing a revolution against David.  Absalom manages to take Jerusalem, and further humiliates David by sleeping with ten of David’s concubines in front of everyone.  David is forced to battle against Absalom to restore the kingdom, but he does so begrudgingly.  Today we hear David trying to make victory as painless as possible, asking his men to deal gently with Absalom.  But Absalom had made too many enemies in the family and kingdom, and when the time came, he was killed in battle.  Though many saw Absalom’s death as a victory, David knew the truth.  Victory in this case was not winning for David.  Victory was just another reminder of the ways in which David’s life had become about losing – about the painful reminder of his sin hanging over his head.

David reminds us of what we have all learned about losing.  Though none of us like losing, we know losing is a necessary and probably valuable part of life.  You see, losing helps us in many ways.  First, losing reminds us of our finitude.  Though we might like to think we are without limits or we can control everything, losing reminds us of the “futility of our personal striving and the frailty of our existence.”  Second, losing gives us the opportunity to reexamine our goals and outlook on life.  Losing can help us see when perhaps we have become overly self-serving, have developed unrealistic expectations, or we have just become distracted by the wrong things in life.  Finally, losing reminds us that our lives are in need of redemption.  Losing can give us a much-needed opportunity to renew our relationship with God.  As one scholar explains, “In this moment of realization, we are liberated to renew our trust in God’s power and in [God’s] purpose for our lives.”  That does not mean we should give up, stop trying, or be overcome by the fear of losing.  Instead, maintaining our trust in God gives assurance that “ultimately, there is no losing without the possibility of redemption.”[iii]

Think for a moment about the ultimate symbol of our faith – the cross.  The cross is both a symbol of loss and victory.  We always remember the victory of resurrection and redemption, but first, the cross was a symbol of death and defeat.  The cross was a humiliating reminder of the brutal death of the one we insist is the Messiah.  Our main symbol was the symbol of ultimate loss – the place where losers go to lose:  lose their life, their dignity, and their power.  That symbol of being a loser is only redeemed because the Redeemer redeems it.  Of course, we should not be surprised.  Every week, we as a community gather and remind ourselves at how we are losers when we confess our sins.  We kneel down and young, old, male, female, single, partnered, good, and bad confess that we lost.  Every single week we confess how, once again, we have lost.

I sometimes wonder how David coped with the sword in his house.  Sure, he had moments of redemption.  Solomon taking the helm at David’s death was one of the best redemptive moves in his family.  But I wonder, on that deathbed, how all the losing in David’s life weighed on him.  In last week’s lesson, David did what all of us do.  He confessed.  He confessed, “I have sinned against the Lord.”  His confession did not make Absalom’s death any less painful.  But his confession, like ours, is redemptive.  Like David, when we acknowledge and confess our senses of incompleteness, “we are able to be freed from the entrapments of a win/lose culture.  God accepts us despite our failings.  This relationship is not earned; [this relationship] is a divine gift.  Accepted and forgiven, we are liberated to celebrate life.  Affirmed and fulfilled by God, we are released to care for others.  These affirmations point to the redemptive side of failure, to the God who accepts losers.”[iv]

When we wear a cross, or we reverence the cross in church, we reverence both the winning and the losing of the cross.  We honor the ways in which the cross represents not just the loss of Christ, but also the brokenness in each of us – the ways in which we have failed.  Only when we honor that loss can we then hold that cross as a symbol of victory.  That cross becomes a symbol of the ways in which Christ redeems us, but also the ways in which we too made new through our losing.  When we embrace the cross in its fullness of expression, we also recognize the fullness of our lives – the good, the bad, and the ugly.  We know that without the embracing of our losing we can never fully claim the victory of our winning through the cross.  Amen.

[i] Ted A. Smith, “Commentary on 2 Samuel 18:5-9, 15, 31-33” 2009, as found at http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=365 on August 6, 2015.

[ii] 2 Samuel 12.11-12.

[iii] The ideas in this paragraph and the quotes within come from Carnegie Samuel Calian, “Theologizing in a Win/Lose Culture, Christian Century, vol. 96, no. 32, October 10, 1979, 978.

[iv] Calian, 979.