November 4, 2007

             (Jimmie Johnson)

Revelation 7:9-17

After this I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands. They cried out in a loud voice, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!” And all the angels stood around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, singing, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.” Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, “Who are these, robed in white, and where have they come from?” I said to him, “Sir, you are the one that knows.” Then he said to me, “These are they who have come out of the great ordeal; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. For this reason they are before the throne of God, and worship him day and night within his temple, and the one who is seated on the throne will shelter them. They will hunger no more, and thirst no more; the sun will not strike them, nor any scorching heat; for the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of the water of life, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”

I John 3:1-3

See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and that is what we are. The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is. And all who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.

Matthew 5:1-12

When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain; and after he sat down, his disciples came to him. Then he began to speak, and taught them, saying: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.”

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Certainly, in our worship at First Pres, we are centered in hope and joy. The very nature of Easter faith is possessed by hopeful joy.  But, our worship of God also has room for sorrow as a natural response to death and loss.

Yes, we believe in the humanity of Jesus. God’s love becomes the death of death, and, yes, we believe those who mourn shall indeed be comforted. But this does not obliterate from our Christian experience the emotions of sorrow.

This All Saints Sunday is about recognizing sorrow as a legitimate part of our Christian experience. Sorrow is part of Christian faith, too, as is joy.

Today we especially recognize in our worship the sorrow and grief of those who have gone through the loss brought by death. We do indeed believe that death is real and potent, but we believe it lacks finality.
We believe what is final and ultimate is God’s love for all of us. We believe in heaven, not so much as a place but as a relationship. Heaven is the symbol of God’s presence. Heaven is not about God being “up there” or “above us.” Rather, heaven is about God’s ability to “light us up” with love. Heaven is the symbol that any love given and received is never lost forever in darkness.

Darkness is not in the heart of God. If Jesus is God’s heart made flesh in our humanity, and that is a central belief of this assembly, then in the humanness of Jesus God gains “hands on experience” in what it is to be human.

If Jesus is God’s heart within our heart, then every moment where we remembered to give mercy, to show love, to sacrifice -- none of this is lost. All moments of life, even the flight of a single bee to a flower, are kept in God’s memory forever.

Whether the experience is that of flowing molten rock or your own loving, warm heart filled with sorrow, God’s love and fascination for it all ensures permanent meaning for even the briefest moment, or the tiniest life form, or the face for which we could not wait to come through the door at the end of the day. All is kept forever in God’s experience of creation.

So both our joy and our sorrow are God centered, seeking a fulfillment of meaning because there is so much more going on than what we see. So, yes, it is in the security of God’s love and companionship that we remember our dead.

They are dead to us but alive to God.

But, sorrow remains for the defeat of death is both here now but still on the way as well. So if you still feel and incomplete sorrow, you are not alone. We all know your experience and honor it in one another. The work of Easter is still underway, so we grieve but not as those without hope.

And lastly, this day recognizes a sorrow over our own shabby humanity, too.

This past Wednesday, at Uncle Calvin’s, the noon adult Bible study for adults, we looked at the beautiful life that our common human experience could be if indeed we lived as described by Jesus in Luke’s gospel lesson. How beautiful and creative our lives would be, and how safe a world it would be for all children were we all possessed by the simple desire to do to others what we would desire be done to us.

Imagine, as John Lennon, would sing. Imagine such a world of beauty. And because ours is not this imaginative world but a fallen world, we sorrow over our human shabbiness.

We grieve the sins of our common humanity this day. And this is why we sing hymns.

Singing is the only way to imagine such a world where there is no more revenge, nor spite, nor meanness, nor inhumanity, nor hate, nor selfishness. Singing is the only way to imagine a world where no relationship is characterized by brokenness or futility.

So, yes, part of our sorrow this day is the realization of what could be or could have been, and our awareness of the reality of what is or was.

Sometimes I will think of my mom and dad in comparison to lives lived so well and beautifully by some of you their age, and I will think to myself, “If only mom and dad could have been so happy even in the face of our common human suffering.....”

So today, as the names are spoken and remembered, and the church bell is rung, we feel the sorrow over our losses, and the sorrow over what might have been instead of what was.

But, even more than these emotions of sorrow, we believe the emotions of hope and joy are more true and real for our destiny and the destiny of God’s world. For we believe out of the conviction of the closeness of the saints, the closeness of our loved ones, that death is not so much a departing from life as a returning to its heart.

One night in New York at a conference, I could hardly believe my luck. I saw George MacLeod, the Scottish Lord and world class theologian, who was such a giant for Christianity in Scotland and around the world, the one who led the rebuilding of the Abbey on the tiny isle of Iona. There he was at this party sitting alone while others mingled around the room. He was 87 at the time. Perhaps this is why no one was monopolizing him.
I quickly seized the opportunity and sat by him. We enjoyed a glass of wine and sat together mostly in silence. I held him in such high esteem that I could hardly speak more than “Good evening, Lord MacLeod, my name is Jimmie and I am pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Waco, Texas.”

I think it was the word “Texas” that piqued his interest and gained a smile.
I can’t remember what he said to me. All I can remember is I got to sit beside him.

This week, I rediscovered a prayer of his I once treasured. It reads:

Be thou, triune God, in the midst of us
as we give thanks for those
who have gone from the sight
of earthly eyes.
They, in thy nearer presence, still worship
with us in the mystery of the one family
in heaven and on earth...
If it be thy holy will,
tell them how much we love them,
and how much we miss thee

and how we long for the day
when we shall meet with them again....
Strengthen us to go on in loving service
of all Thy children.
Thus shall we have communion with thee,
and, in thee, with our beloved ones.
Thus shall we come to know
within ourselves
that there is no death
and that only a veil divides,
thin as gossamer.

I believe it is true that death is not a departing from life but a returning to its Heart. And, what’s more, I believe our shabbiness and whatever was theirs is not forever-- but indeed, by the love of God, someday all shall be well, all manner of thing shall be well. And we will forever be lit up with the light of God’s brilliant love.

For God has come so close to us and remains so close to us through Jesus that the veil is indeed as thin as gossamer between them and us and the reality of whom we are now and who by Grace we shall one day be.