Sermon - 2019-11-03 - All Saints Sunday

Today is All Saints Sunday, we can enter into this place and feel a little letdown.  We are reminded of the moments and time that we shared with friends, families and loved ones.  People who meant so much to us on this journey of life and faith together. We have many of the same feelings that we did on the day of the funeral.  We come back here to a feeling of loss but also today, we celebrate the moments that they brought us to laughter, the lessons that they gave to us that we still live out, and truly are reminded more fully of how we still honor them even today.  

There is an ancient song that says, “You don’t know what you got, till it’s gone…” Oh, that feeling of longing rings more true as we reflect and long for that person to be back in our lives.  How we could share one more hug, one more meal, one more day of joy in their presence. However, we do not remain in despair. Our loved ones would not want us to remain in mourning or loss, they would want us to enjoy the life that we have been given and to truly take the lessons and love that they still share with us and use them until we are reunited once again.  They would want us to hear the promise of the resurrection that has been fully given to them. 

It is on this day that we hear a message that we need to hear, a calling for us to know and be united in striving for us to have a better place and community among us.  A message of warning of what it is we are doing within our life that would build up the Kingdom of God and building up one another and a message of caution for those of us who are so focused on ourselves that we would destroy the lives of others.  Yes, it is important for us that we honor the saints who have lived among us, to be inspired by their life, but we also need to be challenged and look at the calling that Jesus has for each and every one of us. That we would reflect upon the life we are living, especially knowing that we ourselves will one day join the ranks of saints who have gone before us.  

Yes, we started today thinking of others who have gone before but now we are also being called to action by their life and raising the question of how we are impacting others those who are still living.  We now begin to think of how we are treating others, how it is we are sharing this world, what is the impact that we have upon one another. This can be a humbling experience, a chance for us to measure our selves against the lives of others and more importantly God’s Calling for us.  A chance for us to honor a person but truly realize the connectedness that we have through God. That our faith and actions in God’s love are also uniting us together with loved ones who are no longer among us.  

However, this is something that we celebrate every single Sunday.  Every week, we come forward to the altar, the table of Jesus Christ.  We share in the meal, yet, we only gather on one side of the table. We make up the living side of the table.  A side that is still in this broken world, striving for justice and peace, and longing to return home. However, on the other side of the table, are all the saints who have gone before us.  It is not an empty side for us to fill, but rather aside for us to be reminded that loved ones who have shared this faith with us are gathered at the table of the Lord right there with us.  

It draws us back into the promise that Paul speaks of when he writes, “whether we are living or we are dying, we are the lord’s…”  It draws us back into the realization that the table of God has no end and that time, location or even death itself could separate us from God’s love and being united in God’s Promise.  

Yes, today we reflect and honor the saints that have gone before us whom we love, however, we are also being called to action to treat others in our life with the same love, grace, and mercy that God’s Own Son and our Savior and Lord treat you and me throughout all eternity.  Amen.