The Reading
Romans 14. 7 - 12
The life and death of each of us has its influence on others; if we live, we live for the Lord; and if we die, we die for the Lord, so that alive or dead we belong to the Lord. This explains why Christ both died and came to life, it was so that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.
We shall all have to stand before the judgement seat of God; as scripture says: By my life – it is the Lord who speaks – every knee shall bend before me, and every tongue shall praise God. It is to God, therefore, that each of us must give an account of themselves.
Taken from The Jerusalem Bible, published and copyright 1966,1967 and 1968 by Darton, Longman & Todd Ltd and Doubleday and Co. Inc, and used by permission of the publishers.
The Sermon
By Kath, Reader St Mary's.
Losing people we love or are close to is sadly inevitable at some stage, especially as we ourselves grow older; it’s part of our human existence. Such loss is hard enough to bear when a death is expected or even “timely” but so much harder when it is sudden or traumatic or untimely. How do we deal with such loss? The simple answer; although it isn’t a simple process to go through, is that we grieve. How we grieve is unique to us as individuals and to our relationship with the person we have lost, and it is something that develops and changes over time. This is as it should be because there is no “one way” that works for everyone for all time.
To illustrate what I mean I’ll share some of my own experiences of loss. I loved my mum and dad dearly and we were very close. We worked together for many years and saw each other socially a lot, so perhaps you can imagine how guilty and bad I felt when I couldn’t cry when they died. That is still the case to this day and I lost my dad seventeen years ago and my mum six years ago. How could it be that we were so close and yet I couldn’t cry? At first all sorts of awful thoughts went through my head. Had I become hard-hearted or unfeeling I wondered, genuinely fearfully. But I had to tell myself no, because I continue to love and miss my parents. One of the biggest things that has helped me deal with these uncomfortable feelings is the realisation that I actually did a lot of my grieving for them while they were still alive and this in turn reminded me of one of the most meaningful lectures I’ve ever heard. It was given by the then chaplain at the Northern General Hospital, Revd. David Equeall, when I was a student nurse back in the 1970s. Up to the time I heard his lecture I had always thought of grieving only in relation to death but he explained how we can grieve for many other kinds of loss too, and indeed I saw this in many of the patients I went on to care for.
My dad lived for ten years after receiving a terminal diagnosis and during that time I watched him gradually lose many of his skills and abilities, his strength, his privacy and dignity, his freedom to go about his life as he once had. He never really complained much and was endlessly practical in finding ways round his difficulties but I know each loss hurt him. He had always been the one to fix things for others and now he was the one needing to be helped. It didn’t sit well or easily with him and I grieved those losses with and for him. Towards the end of his life he was in a lot of pain and when he died, if I’m completely honest it was a relief that he was no longer suffering.
The illness that took my mum from us was Alzheimer’s disease and it was truly heartbreaking to see her gradually robbed her ability to enjoy her life and to look after herself, her dignity and autonomy and worst of all her wonderful personality and her voice. She had always been unfailingly kind and compassionate and loved talking to people so it was cruel to see her grow quieter and quieter until she barely spoke at all. Again I grieved this and felt angry as it was happening and then relief when she was finally released from what this awful disease had done to her. But much as I loved and miss both my mum and dad I couldn’t have wished to hold onto them or to wish them back unless it was without the suffering they endured.
As preachers we seldom get a choice of readings for the services we preach at but this one is different. At first I struggled to find one that really spoke to me but when I found the one from Romans; and it is a slightly unusual version, I knew it was the one and it was the first sentence in this particular translation that I found so powerful.
“The life and death of each of us has its influence on others;” The very fact that you’re here at this service tells me that you have been through your own unique journey or journeys of loss and perhaps, like me, you have a whole host of mixed feelings and emotions about your relationship with your own loved one and the way you lost them. But wouldn’t it be saddest of all if it was the ending of their lives that was our overriding memory of them. When the time is right for us it’s good to remember all the different aspects of our time with them. We don’t have to pretend that all was perfect because that’s seldom how life really is but hopefully there will be positive, happy and uplifting memories to cherish that will help to sustain us as we move on with our own lives because move on we must. Grief, when it is raw, can be all consuming and allowing it to soften can feel like betrayal but think about it another way. If we were the ones who had died, would we want those we left behind to be in pain forever? I’m pretty sure the answer to that is no.
Thinking of what our loved ones have been to us, perhaps we should also consider who and what we are to others. Do we support and inspire and encourage them to live good lives as we have been inspired. I will be forever grateful for the love and support and life lessons I have received from the people I have lost and I hope in turn that I’m doing the same for the people I still have.
God gave us his own beloved Son that we might have life. Should we not take this gift of life and value it as it deserves in gratitude to the one who gave it, even in the midst of our sadness. Surely the answer this time is yes.
Amen.
The Prayers
God our Father, hear us when we pray to you in faith.
We give you thanks for the lives of those who we have loved and lost.
For all that we were to each other and all that we shared together.
Hear us, risen Lord,
our resurrection and our life.
Comfort us in our times of grief and help us to help each other in our sadness.
Hear us, risen Lord,
our resurrection and our life.
Guide and uphold us through the loneliness and darkness of loss, especially when it feels like our pain will never come to an end.
Hear us, risen Lord,
our resurrection and our life.
But when the time is right, Lord give us the courage to live again, for our own sake and for those who love and need us, secure in the knowledge that those we have lost, rest in peace with you.
Hear us, risen Lord,
our resurrection and our life.
May God in his infinite love and mercy bring the whole Church,
Living and departed in the Lord Jesus, to a joyful resurrection and the fulfilment of his eternal kingdom.
Amen.