"They Are Like Angels!"

"They Are Like Angels!"
Isaiah 25:6-9, Luke 20:27-38
Barbara D. Rowe
November 7, 2004

This election week, our Gospel story of the Sadducees and their challenge of Jesus sounded vaguely like the political speeches and questions we have been hearing for months. They didn’t really want an answer to their absurd riddle, but hoped to bait Jesus, to shame him into being confused or saying something that supported their anti-resurrection viewpoint. It is not much different than the questions to John Kerry, “You voted for the war in Iraq but now you say your are against the war. Don’t you support our troops? Can’t you make up your mind?” Or the question to George Bush, “We have found no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and no connection with Bin Laden, so do you still think the war was the right thing to do?” The questions are rhetorical. The speaker doesn’t expect an answer that is any different than they have heard before. After a series of seven brothers as husbands, all having died before her, whose wife would the woman be after her own death? Who would she belong to in the afterlife, if there is such a thing?

We can almost hear the snicker from the Sadducees as they posed the question to Jesus but he surprised them in his response. Jesus explained that life is new and different after physical death. There is no marriage, as we know it. Resurrection is not merely a continuation of life the way it is here on earth. We can’t define it by taking the best of this world we know and multiplying it one hundredfold, by thinking of it as an extension of our current existence only better. It is nothing that we mortals can imagine. People won’t marry but will be like angels of God. They will be transformed into something very different.

For some of us, it is easier to believe as the Sadducees did. A priestly class, aristocratic and wealthy, the idea of another life after death didn’t make sense to them. The concept wasn’t logical. There was no way to prove it. Their sacred texts were the Five Books of Moses exclusively and there was no assurance of resurrection in those writings. The Pharisees, on the other hand, did believe that there was something more beyond physical death. They studied the Hebrew Scriptures but they also respected the oral tradition that offered a basis for the idea of resurrection. It was an issue of debate during Jesus’ time. Of those who believed in the reality of life beyond death, some thought it happened immediately after physical death. Others thought it would happen at the end time, when all people would experience the resurrection at one time. The hopeful assurance that Jesus offered to his followers and to those who challenged him was that “God is God not of the dead, but of the living; for to God ALL of them are alive.” In that, he asks us to stretch our imaginations and to consider the idea that God is with us and God is also with those whose physical bodies have died, those who have been transformed into something new, into angels, perhaps. It is something we can’t fully understand until it is our time to experience our own transformation.

This week, in addition to the presidential election, we Presbyterians also remember All Saints Day on November 1, and All Soul’s Day on November 2. Established by the early church, these special holy days give us the opportunity to remember and give thanks for our inspirational faith ancestors. The dates also provide us with the chance to remember our loved ones, those closest to us who have died. As we come to the Lord’s Table today, we welcome them to be here with us, to share the meal and to sit side by side with us. They are the cloud of witnesses that have gone before us. Today we remember their stories and thank them for their lives that encourage and motivate us. For those who were an intimate part of our daily lives, we set aside especially this day to remember and thank God for their love and presence with us.

First, we remember just a few people whose faithful lives have sought justice and have touched and influenced members of this community. Several hundred years ago, Hermano Pedro Betancourt, gave his life to the poor of Guatemala providing an orphanage and medical care for children and adults in need. He established the center where our teams serve each year. More recently, Presbyterian Maggie Kuhn saw a need as she entered her retirement years and began a new career establishing the Grey Panthers in support of older adults. The beloved priest Oscar Romero was murdered in his church sanctuary as he cared for and defended the indigenous people of El Salvador. We all know of the ministry of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. who died fighting for civil rights, human rights, and workers rights. And lastly, Sojourner Truth, in the early nineteenth century, was the first African-American woman to speak out against slavery preaching in many places and taking her message all the way to President Abraham Lincoln. Near the end of her life, she said to a loved one, “I’m not going to die, honey; I’m going home like a shooting star.” What a transformation! I invite you now to take a moment to remember those people of faith through history whose passion for justice and life and love of God have influenced your own life. When one comes to mind, I invite you to speak their name aloud, help us welcome their presence here with us today.

There are some precious people within our own congregational family that have been transformed in the past few years. Two weeks ago both Milt Stannard and Sarah Coryell died and we celebrated their lives here in this sanctuary. It is hard to imagine them not sitting in their places in the pews. Milt had a twinkle in his eye and loved to greet people and help them feel welcome. Sarah was dedicated to the pre-school children, weekly assisting in the classroom. For church potlucks, Sarah always brought warm homemade rolls, hundreds of them for all of us. Last year, April Buckle died of cancer at a much too young age. She loved to gather people together in the home she built with Tom or organize a dinner for the Grunch Bunch, the Mom’s of Teens, down at The Cantina or Jenny Lows. We miss Lillian Verhalen who greeted every child who came through the door and Sarah Todd who developed the Spirituality program at Westminster. We miss our inspirational Pastor Emeritus William Perdue, who led his congregations in the fight for human rights and justice through the Sixties and Seventies. And we will never forget our beloved Dottie Nordstrand who played the organ in stocking feet and snuck her dog into the sanctuary. She blessed us with her incredible ability to play any musical piece in any key. She kept us dancing! I invite you to take a moment and remember beloved ones from this community or your own earlier church life experience. Lets bring them into this room by speaking their names.

Lastly, but most importantly, are the people who have been an intimate part of our own lives. The people that we love though they have been transformed into another way of being, they are still alive in us. They are a part of us. We share memories with them. We can be going about our daily routines and suddenly we smell a smell or see a view or hear a voice and out of the blue they are with us again. They are unexpectedly there, resurrected into our consciousness. There are ones who died when we least expected it and their loss is a hole in our lives that continues to be a part of who we are. There are others that we cared for as they aged or as they battled a long illness and we had the gift to be with them as they transitioned into death and beyond. You know who those people are, those whose spirit continues to be an important presence for your life. I invite you to use the yellow slip in your bulletin. If you would like to, write down the name of a loved one who has come to your mind this morning.

In a few moments as we move towards the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, you will have the opportunity to place the yellow slip in the basket and to light a candle in remembrance of your loved one. At this time, I invite you to say their name aloud so that we can celebrate their lives, as we are all welcomed at the Table.

Our passage this morning from the Prophet Isaiah promises that God will make for all peoples a feast of rich food and well-aged wines and will wipe away the tears from all faces. There is no denying the reality of physical death. It will happen to each of us and to those we love. There is no denying the existence of tears. They are a part of human life and love. Isaiah doesn’t say that God will eliminate them but will wipe them away when they come. God’s promise is to be present with us in the reality of the tears, to help us know God’s compassion and love. On this day that we celebrate All Saints and All Soul’s Days, may we remember our loved ones as God’s angels, children of the resurrection, fully alive in God’s world.

Let us pray….