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Sermon 12/12/2025 – All that God Requires

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

The Gospel Lesson                                                            Matthew 3:13-17

Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan, to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now, for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented. And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw God’s Spirit descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from the heavens said, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”

Sermon Text

Today we gather together to celebrate Christ’s Baptism in the River Jordan. Though we sometimes replace this celebration with an observance of Epiphany, remembering the visitation of the Magi, it is always important to take time to remember that Christ was Baptized. Why is it important? Well, we have to look at the text itself to find out.

As John the Baptist says, it is a strange scenario to see Jesus be baptized. Jesus, who is God, did not cease to be God in his incarnation – just to be fully human alongside his divinity. Yet, in Baptism Jesus receives the Holy Spirit from the Father. The Trinity is always acting in concert with each other, never making decisions without the participation and input of the other members of the union, so this has to be an intentional act. When Jesus comes and is washed, we have to see that Jesus was doing something important. The Spirit gives its power to the God-man, and that Father affirms he is blessed… But why?

Was it just an act? I do not believe so. God is not a showman, although Jesus is a powerful presence wherever he speaks. His power is not in being entertaining or in orchestrating a good scene, it is in his authentic authority. Jesus speaks and you know that Jesus is being true to himself, and therefore showing us the truth of who God is and how God is. To come here and receive baptism, Jesus is doing something that is truly and authentically good, as Jesus says here to John, “it is proper not to fulfill all righteousness.” Jesus is doing something for the good of us in being baptized, and the specific good that this achieves is usually separated into two schools of thought.

The first, and the more general and mystical idea, is that Jesus made all water holy through his baptism. Rather than there being strict requirements for what kind of water someone should be baptized in, Christianity would allow all water to be used to bring people into the Church. One of the earliest texts we have in the Church The Didache, gives us a series of preferences for baptismal waters. The best is cold river water, the next best is warm river water, then a cold stream, then a warm stream, and so on and so forth. All water, even just a sprinkling of water, is sufficient to baptize a person, and availability of that water defines the mode of baptism used. I prefer affusion, dumping large handfuls of water onto people’s heads, but I don’t fault folks for choosing to sprinkle and save the mess.

We are also blessed by this to be able to give thanks for our baptism anytime we interact with water. In washing out face, in drinking a cup of water to start our day, in the rain that falls from the sky… All these thing give us an opportunity to reflect on God’s grace. Wherever there is water there is grace, and wherever there is grace there can be baptism.

The second thing that Jesus did in being baptized, the one that holds more water (heheh,) is that Jesus gives us an example of how to live. Jesus was not washed because he had to atone. The sinless son of God did not need to be washed to be part of God’s family. Yet, Jesus shows us how we are supposed to make our way home to God. Jesus “fulfills all righteousness,” by taking part in all aspects of life that we as sinful humanity must take part in. Jesus is technically exempt from the requirements of faith, being the author and perfector of faith itself, yet he gives it to us as a gift.

Baptism is the starting point of our faith. While many of us in our tradition will have received Communion before our Baptism, it is baptism that properly makes us part of God’s Church. When I gave my baby son the dripping juice off my finger when I took Communion, he received God’s grace in that sacrament, but when he is baptized in six months he will be properly joined to God’s church. It is a position he will affirm when he is older, deciding whether or not he will continue on in God’s family, but it is a gift received directly from God from beginning to end.

In Baptism we are reborn into God’s Kingdom, God’s family, and as such we in the Methodist Church only baptize once. We are born into life once from the womb and we are baptized into God’s Church once. Whether we receive that washing at birth, at six months, and eighty years old, or in the moment we leave this world – our baptism marks that we are part of what God is doing. Baptism reflects that God has been working with us our whole life ahead of our rebirth, that God’s grace is all over every part of our life. When we commit ourselves to the Church, or else our family makes the commitment to raise us in up the faith, we receive a special kind of grace.

Jesus showed us what Baptism means, by showing us that our work continues beyond being washed of our sins in the water. When we join the Church fully, whether in baptism for the first time or rededication of ourselves to God’s will at any point of our life. We like Christ need to take time, periodically, to go out into the wilderness of our lives and prepare for what God is doing. When we study, when we practice righteousness, when we “fulfill all righteousness,” then we do what God requires of us. Still more, it is important for us to show others what it means to live this life. To raise up children to know the love of God and neighbor, to teach them the doctrine of the faith, and to model faith such that they find joy in living within God’s family.

Today we celebrate Christ’s baptism, the washing that set in motion our own entry into God’s kingdom. Let us praise God for paving the way ahead of us, and let us live fully the life we are called to as member’s of God’s divine family. – Amen.

Sermon 11/10/2024 – How Easily we Brag

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

Mark 12:38-44

As [Jesus] taught, he said, “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets! They devour widows’ houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.”

He sat down opposite the treasury and watched the crowd putting money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums. A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which are worth a penny. Then he called his disciples and said to them, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”

Sermon Text

Pride is one of the most dangerous things that exists in this world. We’ve talked before about how our language does us a major disservice in not separating out, “pride,” as a sinful state of being from “pride,” as having high esteem for something good in our life. I think, however, that the two are more related than even I would like to admit. There is not a huge leap between legitimate feelings of happiness about something good in our lives and an unhealthy fixation on it. Sometimes even legitimate pride become an unwillingness to acknowledge our individual and corporate failings or even our to see our dependency on God.

Throughout scripture one of the most consistent opponents to God’s good work are prideful people of faith. The prophets were usually up against the priests and fellow prophets they had worked with their whole life. Ezra and Nehemiah were heroes and villains in their own time – butting up against other members of God’s people who they did not think had the right pedigree to be part of the exilic community. Jesus most of all is documented as fighting against some of the most important people in the religious community of his day. He opposed scribes, pharisees, and sadducees. These groups were not inherently evil, he did not oppose them out of principle, but because of what they so often let themselves become.

Scribes were the literate in society, and held power as legal recorders and lawyers. Pharisees were the pastors of their day, giving God’s word to the people and instructing them in daily life. Sadducees were tied to the Temple, and they provided a moderating presence – ensuring the Torah was respected and clung tightly too. Yet, in each of these positions, with power and influence on the line, people would often begin to sin simply by investing importance in themselves and their way of being and doing that ultimately only served their own interests. Pride snuck in, pride made them self-interested, and pride led them to destroy their community.

Jesus talks about the scribes in particular in our passage. He says they wear long robes – why does that matter? What do you think a long robe indicates? Besides having a lot of fabric, therefore being expensive to make – long robes make it impractical to do manual labor. To wear one in public makes it clear that you are not someone who has to dirty their hands. Long sleeves added to this affect, and it is widely believed that the “coat of many colors,” which Jospeh wore was meant to show his brothers that Joseph was too good for the maula labor they were made to do out in the fields.[1]

Scribes are also described as praying long prayers in public, seated with the best people in worship and at parties. This is a criticism levied at the Pharisees as well, who are also described as wearing large phylacteries known as tefillin. These boxes containing scripture tied to the wrists and forehead.[2] Jesus is not saying it is a sin to pray, or to dress in robes, or to wear outward signs of faith like the tefillin. The sin came in doing these things for the sake of appearances rather than faith. If you ask me, the average offender probably didn’t realize when the things they had done changed from something they were doing for God and what they were doing for themselves.

As Christians today, we often read these warnings with a quiet nod. We know what its like to meet those overblown, holier-than-thou types. They’re insufferable! There’s no way we would ever do anything like what they do… Unless, we already do it without thinking. Unless we’ve become so accustomed to our faith being a badge we wear to congratulate ourselves rather than a way of life we embody, that changes and challenges us.

Think though, of what Christian culture is so often about. We wear hats on our heads, bracelets on our wrist, loud and proud declarations of our faith. T-shirts convey messages that let people know that we are Good Christian folk. Everything we see on Facebook that tells us we need to share it or else we’re secretly ashamed of God has to be shared! We have to let people know we’re Christian and that we’re not like all those other people in the world! We’re better through our faith, we’re more proper and we believe exactly what we should.

Is it wrong to wear a Christian slogan on a hat, or a bracelet, or a shirt? No, of course not. As long as it’s an actual good sentiment and not something antagonistic or improper. Is it wrong to share a prayer you read on Facebook that moves you? Absolutely not. Like the Pharisees of old, a Christian who shows their faith publicly is doing exactly what they should… Until they switch to showing off to people and not showing up for God. The shift from one to the other can be simple, slow, and yet it consumes us entirely.

How do we prevent that? How do we know which box we fall into? Firstly, I would say that self-awareness is always the first step to proper action. If we are willing to ask ourselves why we do the things we do, we will have a good answer. I’ve written out long posts on Facebook about my strong conviction as a person of faith… and then deleted them. Sermons likewise that I’ve thrown out, because I realized that I was not writing them for the good of God, but out of some strange sense of pride. I wear very plain clothes, only breaking out my clergy outfit when it matters that people know who I am.

True faith, true piety, true holiness that a person can be rightly proud of is self-evident. Prayer in public that comes from a natural belief God listens to our prayers and acts on them will be different than something we do to let the people know at the other tables around us that we’re good Christian folk. Sharing our faith for the purpose of glorifying God will look different than chasing down people and beating them with scripture.

Finally, I think that anything that truly inconveniences us bears the mark of an action that is hard to do out of selfish pride. If you have to give of yourself, and in ways that you truly find unpleasant, but you persist out of love of God and neighbor than it is hard to do that work out of pride. Christ humbled himself to the point of dying on the cross, and did so while actively dreading the terror ahead of him. While we do not face a cross, when we give till it hurts, that is a mark of our true faith.

The widow is at the close of this story, not to give us an excuse to give less to initiatives the Church is working on, but to remind us that there is a proportionality in faith. The widow gives very little to the offering, but to her that offering was a huge part of her livelihood. She felt that coin dropping in the plate, it was a real sacrifice that meant she had to go without. The rich who gave lavishly still had plenty to live off of, they didn’t feel a thing when they cut the cheque. How often are we willing to give till it hurts? Of money, of time, of resources. To do that is to humble ourselves, and to establish that we are doing the kind of work that is without pride, that is rooted in what God would have us do.

Thankless and difficult, that is often what the work that God calls us to do looks like. It does not demand others to look and laud us for it. It is quiet and humble, it does not insist upon itself. While others may see it and praise it, true pious action is often kept quiet. Seek to live a life that is full of God, full of actions that you can be proud of. Yet, do not let your hand slip from the pulse of your work, the authenticity of it, the true reason why you are embarking upon it. Let your piety be true, let your heart be humble, and do away with the parts of you that demands the approval of others. You will find Christ closer than ever in this. – Amen.

[1]

[2]

Sermon 12/17/2023 – The Start of the Kingdom

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

John 1:6-8,19-28

There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light.

This is the testimony given by John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” He confessed and did not deny it, but he confessed, “I am not the Messiah.” And they asked him, “What then? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “Are you the prophet?” He answered, “No.” Then they said to him, “Who are you? Let us have an answer for those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?” He said,

“I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’ ” as the prophet Isaiah said.

Now they had been sent from the Pharisees. They asked him, “Why, then, are you baptizing if you are neither the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the prophet?” John answered them, “I baptize with water. Among you stands one whom you do not know, the one who is coming after me; I am not worthy to untie the strap of his sandal.” This took place in Bethany across the Jordan where John was baptizing.

Sermon Text

As we have made our way through Advent, we have looked at the endings that Advent points to. There is an end to Pain in this world, even an end to the World as we know. However, Advent would not mean much if it was just a season of negation. We do not look forward to the End of all Things, but to the Rebirth of Creation. Advent is a season of looking forward to a new beginning, not a meditation on endings.

The Gospels all attest to the ministry of Jesus beginning with someone else baptizing on the banks of the Jordan. John the Baptist, a cousin of Jesus through Mary’s relative Elizabeth, took on a prophetic ministry on the banks of the Jordan. There he proclaimed that God’s Kingdom was coming soon, and that another would rise up to lead God’s people into this new world. To mark this coming kingdom, John began to use the muddy water of the Jordan. In being washed in that water, people received as special kind of grace – they made a statement of their faith, but more than that God met them on the banks of that river and affirmed their choice.

Baptism is a complicated ritual to trace to its beginning. Many faiths throughout history have included ritual washings in their practices. At some point, a form of baptism entered Judaism as a way for converts to join the faith, but this developed at some point in the first century.[1] Greek mystery religions also developed a practice of ritual washing to show a person being born into a new life in the protection of their patron deity.[2] Yet, on the whole, these rituals are seen as being contemporaneous with the Christian ritual of Baptism. More than that, the person who first preached about being washed in water as a singular statement of one’s intention to be born again, is almost always said to be John the Baptist.[3]

Baptism comes from the Greek word βαπτιζω (baptizo,) meaning “to dip,” “to immerse,” or “to drown.” From the beginning of the Church it was practiced primarily by two means – the first was full immersion in water, the second by the pouring of water over a person’s head or “affusion.” A final method, sprinkling, is not attested to in early documents of the Church, but carries equal validity in the development of the ritual throughout history. All methods of Baptism are equally valid, and all methods work to the same goal – initiating people into the new work that God is doing. It is a powerful sacrament, given to a person only once in their life, as a testament to God’s grace that brought them to faith.

When John began to baptize on the Jordan, he was changing how the world understood God’s grace forever. The call of Isaiah we discussed last week, to make a way in the wilderness for God was fulfilled in this ministry of repentance. The people called out to the banks of the Jordan were as different from one another as could be. Sinners and Saints both came to the water and asked to be washed clean. When Pharisees and Sadducees, enemies of one another and critics of John, came to the waters – even they were allowed to take part in this new movement of the Spirit. This was not a new start for only one kind of person, it was opened up for all people to take part in and to see God’s grace at work.

The Kingdom of God has always been expanding in its scope. What began only as a thing shared by two people, Adam and Eve in the beginning of time, became a covenant to all flesh under Noah. God’s redemptive mission to the broken creation was then focused in on Abraham and his descendants, and then through prophet after prophet, expanded to reclaim the diverse people who had been born from the expansion of humanity across the Earth. God’s Kingdom, it seems, was shaped like an hourglass. It became its most restrictive in the days of Ezra and Nehemiah, and has since then been growing outward with great speed, reaching out into infinity.

The Start of the Kingdom of God could have been restricted to just a few people, the best of the best, but it was not. God opened the Kingdom to all people and was sure to make it clear again and again. Among the first to proclaim Jesus’s divinity were Priests from a distant land. The first person we are told was baptized by the Apostle’s was a native Judean, but an Ethiopian. Peter was told again and again that all things were being reconciled to God, and Paul’s ministry to the Gentiles proved this once and for all.

The start of earthly Kingdoms are almost always born out of violence and exclusion. An army forms and pushes the existing power structures out of the way for another to take their place. The Kingdom of God, in opposition to this pattern of the world, began with something far more powerful. God, seeking to redeem all things, called for all people to willingly join into the work God was beginning. Rather than excluding, God’s work asked even the most wicked people to change their ways and take part in the coming salvation of the world. Baptism, a gift of God, marked the moment that a person jumped into this new life – a life focused on God, on the good of others, and on the Kingdom that has no end.

Today, may all of us remember our Baptisms, and may those of us who have not been washed in the waters of baptism consider seriously taking that step. It is not a thing to be taken lightly, but it is a gift that begins a whole new world within our souls. Praise God for the gift of a new start, and for the waters that freely allows grace to pour over us all. – Amen.

[1] The Mishnah ‛Eduyyoth describes the disagreement between bet Hillel and bet Shammai about how to handle proselytes; how long one is to fast before immersion and circumcision, how much water to be used, etc.

[2] Ferguson. “Washings for Purification in Greco-Roman Paganism” in Baptism in the Early Church. Location 1045

[3] Kaufmann Kohler & Samuel Krauss“Baptism” in The Jewish Encyclopedia ed. Isidore Singer. (London: Funk & Wagnalls 1916) accessed by: http://jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/2456-baptism

Sermon 12/10/2023 – The End of Pain

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

There are few things in human life more universal than pain. From our birthing cry to our final breath, we are surrounded by things that are painful. We pray every week for all those in our lives who are in trouble. That wouldn’t be necessary if we were not surrounded by pain. The Psalms are constantly crying out in pain to God, because they trust that God is listening and ready to act. In a world that is broken, in a world that is harmful to seemingly everything within them, how do we survive?

Jesus put forward an interesting solution to the despair we feel at life’s pain. Jesus looks out into the world around us and asks us to counter despair with simplicity. Why be afraid of where food will come from? God feeds the sparrows and they don’t work for their food. Why worry about where your clothing will come from? Flowers are better dressed than any person, and yet they never have to work to make their clothing. Place any part of natural into this equation and the same answer comes out – God provides, and that is often sufficient.

The response that many people have to this teaching is simple. What do birds have to do with my problems? How is it remotely helpful for me to look at flowers when I’m cold at night? In the midst of all our problems, just looking at something else thriving does not magically make us feel better about our circumstances. In fact, the seeming protection and care that God shows every part of creation can make it seem like our own struggles are even more of an aberration. God has cared for everything, and yet I am here in the midst of trouble and pain! Rather than taking these words and finding peace in them, we instead build up a case against ourselves. The darkness of the world that we sit in bleeds into a positive image like this, and poisons it – creating a new way for us to criticize our own hearts.

This is not something unique to this one teaching, or any other aspect of our faith. Paul speaks about how God’s good gift of Torah on Sinai are turned into a curse by our own understanding. When we know what we should not do, we are sometimes more likely to do it. Unless the lesson imparted by a rule or teaching is internalized inside us, we will find loopholes and ways to violate the spirit of a thing even if we do not violate the words of the text themselves. Negativity births negativity. No matter how nice a thing is, putting it in the midst of something bad seldom makes the bad thing seem better, just the nice thing seem worse. I do not enjoy okra anymore because it is breaded and fried.

For someone in the midst of trouble, platitudes, even divinely inspired ones, are not what are needed. This is why scripture so often gives multiple answers to the same question. For the person who is fretting about what might be, the simple things of life can be a way to remember that God’s goodness is not just for one season. However, for the person in the valley of death, that same lesson will probably not accomplish the same thing. There is a rightness of speech to every situation, and the same cure is not meant for every disease. Not every teaching will land in fertile soil in our hearts and produce fruit given the place we are in.

Our scripture we have read together this morning, where Isaiah promises that God is coming to bring peace to God’s people, is written for people in the midst of troubles. Rather than calling for the people to take up songs of praise and to cheer despite pain, the Prophet establishes a pattern.

The Prophet proclaims that the people have suffered, before The Prophet proclaims their deliverance. When we acknowledge the pain that we have faced and hear that acknowledgment reflected in the people who care for us – a lot more healing can happen than would come from denial. God calls out, “Comfort, O Comfort, my people!” Because that is the first thing that the people need, is comfort.

God then moves quickly into a promise of what is to come, a restoration but more than that a setting aside of what was for something new. The call of the Prophet begins, asking us to make a pathway in the wilderness, to clear a way through the uncertainty and danger of the world and see a highway to deliverance for all people. The Prophet’s hymn about God’s control over life and death in the midst of this passage may seem a departure from the theme, but it carries something heartening within it. God, the God who brings life and death, is the God who loves us and cares for us. The hope of our redemption is present in God’s ability to overcome obstacles we find impossible – even obstacles as large as death are nothing to God.

The proclamation of the Prophet, “Here is your God!” Flows into God’s taking up of the title of Shepherd. Throughout scripture God’s care is described in pastoral terms, as an attendant to those in need and as a protector from the troubles of the world around. The acknowledgement of our pain naturally has matured into a promise of our deliverance and the realization of that deliverance in God’s hands.

Advent is a season that celebrates Christ’s coming into the world long ago to set this world on the course it needed to be, a moment when the work began to make a way in the wilderness. Advent is also an acknowledgement that we wait for the day when Christ returns and, as a shepherd, puts an End to all Pain that we might face. For the Church that waits for Christ, we are caught in a space where pain and the end of pain are smashed together in strange juxtaposition. We know from where our deliverance comes, but we do not know when it might be here.

For some of us, the words of hope and promise may seem bitter, our broken hearts, breaking even joy into something lesser. To those of us in this place, let the first part of Isaiah’s prophecy rest in your heart. “Comfort, O Comfort, my people,” is God’s word to all who struggle, to rest in the care of God and of God’s people. For others, the words of God’s promise should fill us with an excitement we’re not used to feeling.

There is an end to trouble, Glory to God that we will get to see it! Faith sustains us in the midst of brokenness, because we know that we have a good shepherd, and that shepherd is actively working in this world and the next to make things right. For all of us, the words of the Prophet make our job in the meantime clear, “Prepare the way of the Lord.” Clear the wilderness of all obstacles to the people who are seeking rest, and God bless the work as we embark upon it. – Amen.

Sermon 11/05/2023 – A Glimpse of Heaven

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

The light of Heaven bursts out all around us. Hard as it can be to see it, there are remnants of it in every drop of atmosphere and every word which we utter in love to one another. It might seem quaint, even trite, to say that the everyday things around us carry such divine revelations, but I don’t mind being either of those things if it means I am telling the truth. We began this morning with one of my favorite songs, “Morning has Broken,” and while that hymn is most famous for Yusuf Islam’s version, I know it from a little show called Pushing Daisies. In that show, the aunt of one of the characters sings the song when something changes within them, the long pent up fears about life melt away, and in the light of a new day that are reborn to go out and pursue what they have long written off as impossible.

Heaven, the realm in which God resides, is something we have talked about a lot this year. Visions of Heaven and what Heaven is actually like and the universal desire of people to know about Heaven… These topics keep coming up to me and out from this pulpit. We are people who are always wondering, always seeking, and so it is no great wonder that our eventual place of residence is a major concern to us. Yet, even our understanding of Heaven as it is is incomplete, because we are not yet in a place where Heaven has taken its final form.

Our scripture asserts that someday we will all be gathered together with a great crowd of people, too numerous to count. There we will join together in praising God before the Heavenly throne. The people there will speak all languages, worship in all styles, have a lifetime’s worth of customs and ideas that all coalesce before that majestic throne. The great enormity of the people of God becomes clear, the distinctions we make between ourselves fall apart, and all at once there is a great display of God’s grace made manifest – the body of Christ, gathered together once and for all.

Yet, this vision is not of the final home for the blessed. No, this is still before the world has been reborn later in the text of Revelation. We are still in the current heaven and the current earth. There is something better still in the works. God will take a great wrecking ball to the metaphysical walls of existence. Heaven will come crashing into Earth and Earth will come crashing into Heaven. There will be a great rushing of reality, like when a dam is suddenly opened and water spills through it. There will no longer be rails and screen keeping what is sacred from what is holy, not in any part of this world, for all will be sacred once again.

The celebration of All Saints’ Day is an ancient feature of the Church. It has not always sat on November 1st, nor has it universally been practiced for one day alone. Yet, from the moment that the people of God saw those around them passing from this life into death, from eternity into eternity, they began to take intentional time to remember their legacy. In South America this merged with local customs to become Dia de los Muertos, a celebration of the deceased through memorial offerings. In the United Kingdom, various traditions came together to form what we now call Halloween, again an acknowledgement of the veil between life and death thinning, and intention moments were set aside to remember those we dearly miss.

This year, we gather to celebrate during a time of great unrest in the world. Ongoing conflicts continue to take lives of innocent people. The Israel-Hamas war has claimed the lives of over 8,000 Palestinians and nearly 2,000 Israelis. The Ukraine War has seen an estimated 10,000 civilians killed in the conflict. In our own nation, the innocent suffer from shooting and from poverty, from preventable diseases and so many other terrible truths of this world. We are in a world that is far from Heaven, and yet we as people of faith assert that Heaven is reaching out to us. There are footholds in this world where God has made the mundane Divine, and we must enhance their efficacy whenever we can.

We are all, as people of faith, Temples to God. The Holy Spirit rests within you, testifying to God and to your own Soul the truth of the Gospel. That truth is a comfort in times of trouble, not because we are promised any of it will suddenly disappear, but because we are told it has its end. This present world, the order of things that always ends in tragedy and pain, it will not stand forever. God is at work, God is pushing back against the overwhelming darkness, and it will someday be conquered. We are a people who trust that Christ is not done with the world, as often and as easy as it is to write it off as long gone. There is still hope, a light still burns in the darkness and the darkness has not, cannot, and will not overcome it.

Today is a day of remembrance. We will name the people we know and who we miss. Let us also turn our hearts to those who are in mourning that we do not know. There are people across this world who are hurting today. Some the pain is new, others long and drawn out. Yet, for all of us there is hope. There is a God who brings about resurrection and redemption. Death is not the end for those who believe, nor is the world to come something to be afraid of. There is, in this life, a dim feeling of hope that permeates all things – that in the hereafter becomes a blazing light that no one can deny.

Today when we take communion, drink deeply from your cup, because it is a reminder of what Christ has done to make this hope possible. When you take the bread in your hand, remember that you hold a piece of the Body of Christ – not just in that mouthful but in your entire being. When we take the two together, we will do so with all who believe, across space and time, and we will assert proudly that there is hope in this dim and dismal world. Let us love, let us hope, let us pray, so that everyone who sees us gets a glimpse of Heaven. More than that, let the someone who needs to be reminded, be you. Let God renew your heart, that you may be made secure against all the torrents of sadness that define our world. – Amen.