When The Saints Come MArching in
J.C. Ryle, wrote in his commentaries, ”What do you think of Christ?" What do we think of His person, and His offices? What do we think of His life, and what of His death for us on the cross? What do we think of His resurrection, ascension, and intercession at the right hand of God? Have we tasted that He is gracious? Have we laid hold on Him by faith? Have we found by experience that He is precious to our souls? Can we truly say He is my Redeemer, and my Savior, my Shepherd, and my Friend? These are serious inquiries. May we never rest until we can give a satisfactory answer to them. It will not profit us to read about Christ, if we are not joined to Him by living faith."
— J.C. Ryle (J.C. Ryle's Commentaries on the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John)
Today we are recognizing All Saints Day, or All Saints Sunday. All Saints Day was November 1st, and we recognize it on the first Sunday in November generally. All Saints Day is a Day that we remember those who have died and gone before us into heaven. It is a day that we pause and remember, acknowledge their lives and their contributions to our lives and our journeys. Some Saints have their own special days that we set aside to honor just them, but today we honor all collectively.
We are each here on this earth and have our own journey, but one thing that we are all going to do; the one thing that we all share in common, is at some point we are all going to die. And it is not generally something we like to think about, but I think it is worth spending more time than we are comfortable with thinking about it as it is coming to us all
Just what is it that you believe about life and death?
What is it that you believe about the resurrection?
Each week we stand up and recite a creed that we say attests to our beliefs. Some believe it all, some believe maybe some parts of it, some of us may believe it all whole-heartedly, and there are those who believe very little of it. We are all on our individual faith journeys, and believing it all is not a test of your faith, but it times past it may have been a test of your orthodoxy. The creeds were formed to summarize our faith so that we could share our faith and what we believed with others by reciting the Nicene Creed or the Apostles Creed to those around us. They were a way to formalize and sum up what we believe in our Christian faith. Part of what we attest to each week is that “We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come.”
The beginning of our burial services begin with the words,
I am the Resurrection and I am the Life, says the Lord. Whoever has faith in me shall have life, even though he die. And everyone who has life, and has committed himself to me in faith, shall not die for ever.
I love our burial service. When you are grieving and it is your loved one, I am not sure how much of the service you are able to absorb, but our burial service summarizes our faith, provides hope and clearly shares our belief in a resurrected life in the life hereafter.
Our Gospel passage today, is a very strange account - it sounds strange, odd, and archaic to our ears. It is important to understand a few things in order to put the text in context for your hearing,
2. The law that they reference is called the levirate law, or levirate marriage, from the Latin levir (“brother-in-law”). It comes from Deuteronomy 25:5-10 and it seeks to insure the preservation of a family name by stipulating that a man should marry the childless widow of his brother. It was also a way to provide for the widow, that she would not become destitute. The question the Sadducees pose is meant to take the ancient practice to the extreme and show that the whole idea of resurrection was foolish.
Jesus does not become bogged down in their foolishness. He replies to their inquiry by showing that they didn’t understand the resurrection at all. The resurrected life has nothing to do with the life here and now. It does not operate by the same rules and understanding of life here on earth. The resurrected life that Jesus speaks of is fundamentally different than life here and now. It will no longer be defined by relationships as we experience them.
What will the resurrection be like? No one knows exactly, but we do know that it will be in some way fundamentally different than the life we have now.
We often say when someone dies, they have “gone to be in the nearer presence” of the Lord. This is a way of saying that while we believe we are in some way in God’s presence now; we will one day be in God’s presence in a different way.
I took a yoga class this past week. I enjoyed the class but at the end of the class, during the part where you are calming down, the Savanna, where you are meant to release, heal, and rejuvenate, the instructor started saying what I am sure she thought were calming thoughts. I couldn’t help but actually pay attention to what she was actually saying and I thought, I fundamentally disagree with most everything she said. I don’t remember everything she said but she was speaking of how our spirits choose a time to be born into this world based on when we were ready, based on some illusive healing our spirit that take places through the generations; it echoed Hinduism and belief in our spirits being reborn and improving with each rebirth. But what struck me as most curious was we were in a church practicing this and I wondered to myself if anyone was paying any attention to what she was saying. While it does not bother me, (she is entitled to her beliefs) what she was saying was in direct contradiction to the resurrectional theology of the church where this class was held, and I found myself wondering if anyone else thought anything of what she was saying.
I will definitely go to this class again and I am not disparaging her. I was just aware that she and I share fundamental disagreements about where we come from and where we are going. This is okay, it does not prohibit me from enjoying what she has to offer. We do not need to agree on resurrectional theology for my body to benefit from her practice.
But as a priest, I hope that you, as my congregation, think through some on your own, your own resurrectional theology.
The promise is for each of us is that we are children of the resurrection.
As children of the resurrection, we know that resurrected life means a different quality of life. There is the promise that whatever we don’t understand about life eternal, there is a promise of something better, something to come. I am not waiting to be reborn in the sense that my yoga instructor was saying. I have been reborn as a new creation in Christ, and I look for the resurrection to come, but I am not getting another shot at this. This is the life I have been given to live. This one.
And no whatever hardships I may face here, I am aware that there is a better time coming.
One that I don’t fully grasp right now but I anticipate.
In response to Jesus’ response - the Sadducees and scribes replied, “Teacher you have spoken well.” “And they no longer asked him any questions.” Jesus reframed the resurrection life for them. Different from life here on earth, this temporal life we live now.
We will one day join with the Saints who have gone before, but our relationships with them will be different than relationships that we have enjoyed here on earth.
In the words of Job, (19:23-27a)
“For I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the last he will stand upon the earth; and after my skin has been thus destroyed, then in my flesh I shall see God.”
I don’t know what you believe about the resurrection, but I hope that you can exclaim with Job, “I know that my Redeemer lives.”
That is the good news here. That is the hope. And to that, I say,
Amen. And Amen.
— J.C. Ryle (J.C. Ryle's Commentaries on the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John)
Today we are recognizing All Saints Day, or All Saints Sunday. All Saints Day was November 1st, and we recognize it on the first Sunday in November generally. All Saints Day is a Day that we remember those who have died and gone before us into heaven. It is a day that we pause and remember, acknowledge their lives and their contributions to our lives and our journeys. Some Saints have their own special days that we set aside to honor just them, but today we honor all collectively.
We are each here on this earth and have our own journey, but one thing that we are all going to do; the one thing that we all share in common, is at some point we are all going to die. And it is not generally something we like to think about, but I think it is worth spending more time than we are comfortable with thinking about it as it is coming to us all
Just what is it that you believe about life and death?
What is it that you believe about the resurrection?
Each week we stand up and recite a creed that we say attests to our beliefs. Some believe it all, some believe maybe some parts of it, some of us may believe it all whole-heartedly, and there are those who believe very little of it. We are all on our individual faith journeys, and believing it all is not a test of your faith, but it times past it may have been a test of your orthodoxy. The creeds were formed to summarize our faith so that we could share our faith and what we believed with others by reciting the Nicene Creed or the Apostles Creed to those around us. They were a way to formalize and sum up what we believe in our Christian faith. Part of what we attest to each week is that “We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come.”
The beginning of our burial services begin with the words,
I am the Resurrection and I am the Life, says the Lord. Whoever has faith in me shall have life, even though he die. And everyone who has life, and has committed himself to me in faith, shall not die for ever.
I love our burial service. When you are grieving and it is your loved one, I am not sure how much of the service you are able to absorb, but our burial service summarizes our faith, provides hope and clearly shares our belief in a resurrected life in the life hereafter.
Our Gospel passage today, is a very strange account - it sounds strange, odd, and archaic to our ears. It is important to understand a few things in order to put the text in context for your hearing,
- The Sadducees were a religious group whose primary authority was over the Temple. They recognized only the original five books of Moses, as fully authoritative and therefore did not believe in the resurrection of the dead (as that is not referenced in the first five books). There was no love lost between the Sadducees and the Pharisees as two distinct Jewish religious groups in Ancient Israel. They put aside their differences with the Pharisees it seems in this text in order to discredit Jesus - but also maybe to embarrass the Pharisees a bit as they too did hold to a resurrection.
2. The law that they reference is called the levirate law, or levirate marriage, from the Latin levir (“brother-in-law”). It comes from Deuteronomy 25:5-10 and it seeks to insure the preservation of a family name by stipulating that a man should marry the childless widow of his brother. It was also a way to provide for the widow, that she would not become destitute. The question the Sadducees pose is meant to take the ancient practice to the extreme and show that the whole idea of resurrection was foolish.
Jesus does not become bogged down in their foolishness. He replies to their inquiry by showing that they didn’t understand the resurrection at all. The resurrected life has nothing to do with the life here and now. It does not operate by the same rules and understanding of life here on earth. The resurrected life that Jesus speaks of is fundamentally different than life here and now. It will no longer be defined by relationships as we experience them.
What will the resurrection be like? No one knows exactly, but we do know that it will be in some way fundamentally different than the life we have now.
We often say when someone dies, they have “gone to be in the nearer presence” of the Lord. This is a way of saying that while we believe we are in some way in God’s presence now; we will one day be in God’s presence in a different way.
I took a yoga class this past week. I enjoyed the class but at the end of the class, during the part where you are calming down, the Savanna, where you are meant to release, heal, and rejuvenate, the instructor started saying what I am sure she thought were calming thoughts. I couldn’t help but actually pay attention to what she was actually saying and I thought, I fundamentally disagree with most everything she said. I don’t remember everything she said but she was speaking of how our spirits choose a time to be born into this world based on when we were ready, based on some illusive healing our spirit that take places through the generations; it echoed Hinduism and belief in our spirits being reborn and improving with each rebirth. But what struck me as most curious was we were in a church practicing this and I wondered to myself if anyone was paying any attention to what she was saying. While it does not bother me, (she is entitled to her beliefs) what she was saying was in direct contradiction to the resurrectional theology of the church where this class was held, and I found myself wondering if anyone else thought anything of what she was saying.
I will definitely go to this class again and I am not disparaging her. I was just aware that she and I share fundamental disagreements about where we come from and where we are going. This is okay, it does not prohibit me from enjoying what she has to offer. We do not need to agree on resurrectional theology for my body to benefit from her practice.
But as a priest, I hope that you, as my congregation, think through some on your own, your own resurrectional theology.
The promise is for each of us is that we are children of the resurrection.
As children of the resurrection, we know that resurrected life means a different quality of life. There is the promise that whatever we don’t understand about life eternal, there is a promise of something better, something to come. I am not waiting to be reborn in the sense that my yoga instructor was saying. I have been reborn as a new creation in Christ, and I look for the resurrection to come, but I am not getting another shot at this. This is the life I have been given to live. This one.
And no whatever hardships I may face here, I am aware that there is a better time coming.
One that I don’t fully grasp right now but I anticipate.
In response to Jesus’ response - the Sadducees and scribes replied, “Teacher you have spoken well.” “And they no longer asked him any questions.” Jesus reframed the resurrection life for them. Different from life here on earth, this temporal life we live now.
We will one day join with the Saints who have gone before, but our relationships with them will be different than relationships that we have enjoyed here on earth.
In the words of Job, (19:23-27a)
“For I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the last he will stand upon the earth; and after my skin has been thus destroyed, then in my flesh I shall see God.”
I don’t know what you believe about the resurrection, but I hope that you can exclaim with Job, “I know that my Redeemer lives.”
That is the good news here. That is the hope. And to that, I say,
Amen. And Amen.