This Sunday is All Saints Day. This is a historic part of the Christian calendar, and one of the reasons the holiday Halloween exists. The original name of All Saints Day was “All Hallows’ Day” and the day before was known as “All Hallows’ Eve” which slowly morphed into Halloween. All Saints Day is a day of remembrance for the people we have lost in the last year. It’s one of those Sundays where worship feels a little more solemn, a little more somber, a little heavier.
We will be reading 1 John 3:1-3. It’s a short passage, so I’ll leave it here for you to reference:
1 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. 2 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. 3 And all who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.
It is beautiful language, as is the entirety of that epistle (my favorite description of God is a chapter after this passage). It is also language that shows up in our United Methodist funeral liturgy. It speaks to the mystery of what waits for us beyond death, the hope that love engenders within us when we let it work, and the continual presence of God who is everlastingly with us moment by moment.
This passage’s presence in the funeral liturgy also offers us the opportunity to talk about grief. Because any Sunday wherein we do deliberate acts of remembering our lost loved ones is going to be filled with grief. For some, this might be the first time a loved one’s name has been read or spoken aloud since their funeral. For others, it is the closing of one chapter of grief, and the beginning of the rest of the book. Grief is often seen as an exclusively problematic and difficult emotion. I don’t deny that it is painful to grieve. It hurts, sometimes in a very special way.
However, at each and every funeral I have the opportunity to preach, I offer the chance to reframe grief. Because I have come to know grief not exclusively as pain, but as a consistent reminder of the love of God which was present for a time in my loved one, and which they now know directly. In fact, I believe that grief is a gift of the Holy Spirit, a yoke which we carry that tells us how deeply loved we are, by others and by God through others. Grief is a painfully persistent reminder of this great cloud of witnesses by which we are always surrounded.
So, this Sunday, we will remember. We will ring bells, light candles, take flowers, and read names. We will grieve. But may we grieve as people who see the gift that grief can be. The gift of a persistent God whose loving presence goes with us everlastingly.
See you Sunday, friends.
In Grace,
Rev. Tim
