In the name of the one who is Alpha and Omega: Jesus Christ. Amen.
By now, you all know that I think that All Souls is one of the most sacred days we mark as Christians. We live in a world that doesn’t know what to do with grief and that avoids talking about death at all costs. Death, and the grief and fear associated with it, is something that none of us can escape. Either we confront the reality of death and find the way through it, or we shall be consumed by the dread and fear of it. This is precisely what All Souls helps us to do – to be counter-cultural in the fact that we name that death is painful and that grief does not go away with time, and to, at the same time, profess our hope in the love of God which is more enduring and everlasting than the grave.
This
evening’s Epistle comes from chapter 15 of First Corinthians – it’s a chapter in
which St. Paul plunges into the depths of what the Resurrection of Jesus means.
Where the reading begins, he tells us that he is setting before us a mystery.
On All Souls, we bear in mind that we are speaking about mysteries that we do
not fully understand. We are in a fog and see through the looking glass dimly. As
I’ve quoted often, “Death is a horizon and a horizon is nothing but the limits
of our sight.” From where we stand, we don’t what is beyond the horizon of the
grave. Yes, we catch glimpses of Resurrection light dawning from beyond the
horizon, but we don’t know what it is like to be on that other shore. One
theologian has said that a mystery is not something beyond our understanding,
it is something which we can endlessly understand. A mystery is not something inaccessible
to us, rather it is something that we can always go deeper into. On All Souls,
we plumb the depths of this mystery of our Resurrection hope.
St.
Paul writes about the transformation that will happen – he says that this perishable
body must put on imperishability. Now, what exactly this means, we can’t pin
down. But his language suggests that imperishability is something that we put
on, as we would put on a jacket on a chilly evening. Resurrection is something
that adds to creation, not something that negates it.
Put
another way, the transformation that happens in death is not without continuity.
Some people imagine, and fear, that in death they will lose themselves – that they
will somehow be subsumed into the greater whole, and, in the process, will
cease to be an individual person. While it’s true that part of the vision is heaven
includes a unity that we can only begin to imagine, our personhood is not nullified
in death. This is why, in the Creed, we profess that we believe in the “resurrection
of the body” – it’s a way of saying that what shall be stands in continuity with
what is. And, on All Souls, this is reassuring because it means that all those
whom we love but see no longer will, one day, be seen again. In other words,
death is a horizon, not an oblivion.
This
belief is central to not only thinking about death, but life. St. Paul is saying
that our present existence will not be annihilated, rather we will be given a
new and more glorious physicality. It’s the vision that CS Lewis offers at the
conclusion of his Narnia series. When the characters find themselves in
heaven, they experience Resurrection life as being even more real and tangible
than what we would call life. They describe it as going “further up and further
in.” This means the love that we experience here and now is but a glimpse of
what shall be. When Jesus tells us that he is going on ahead of us to prepare a
place for us, this is what he is gesturing towards. A greater glory awaits us
all.
A
Christian view of death and Resurrection tells us that our mortal bodies are
not a problem to be overcome. Death is not about the sloughing off of the flesh
in favor of a purer spirit essence – that’s Gnosticism, not Christianity. Our
lives and bodies will not be abolished in death, rather they are encompassed
and perfected by Resurrection life. The fullness of what were created to be
will be realized.
We, therefore, are not
biding time until we all draw our last breaths. No, if our bodies will be raised,
then what we do in our bodies matters and will also be perfected. The Resurrection
is not a climatic answer for the dead, it is a dynamic answer for the living.
The Resurrection tells us that in God, nothing is wasted, nothing is disposable,
nothing is meaningless. It’s why Jesus says that even those who give a cup of
water to someone who is thirsty will receive an eternal reward. How we treat
one another matters, how we use our bodies matters, how we pursue love matters
and all of these things will be gathered up and perfected in the love of God on
the far side of the horizon. And this includes our relationships with parents,
siblings, spouses, and friends who have gone ahead of us beyond that horizon.
When we say that “all shall be well,” we really mean “all.” In the Resurrection,
all that death corrupts will be perfected.
For
St. Paul, this truth overflows into exuberant gratitude. It leads him to proclaim
that “Death has been swallowed up in victory… Thanks be to God who gives us the
victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” And his use of the word “us” is significant.
This victory is not only for those who have died, but it is a victory for the living
as well. Death, even if it is a horizon, is still real and challenging. Death takes
our loved ones from us for the remainder of our lives. Death interrupts our
plans. Death comes with sorrow. But the victory is ours. Death has no final victory
over us.
We do not grieve as those
without hope. Facing death, we find comfort and hope for what lies beyond the limits
of our sight. Even grief can be a holy response to death as opposed to denial,
anger, or resignation. And this victory is grounded in this mystery of faith – that
God does not forget or destroy anything that has been made, but rather the God
who made all things in love will make all things new by that very same love.
This is our comfort and our hope on All Souls. Thanks be to God who gives us
this victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
