Davison's Doodle

a Living Memorial

Last Sunday I was gifted the trust of the pulpit, digital pulpit that is, at First Christian Church in Stroud. It was a digital pulpit because I recorded my sermon at my home, and shared the file with their artist that knits the service together for broadcast on the congregation’s Facebook page. They are a “tape delay worship service” that enables the congregation to have many members participate in the leading of worship. My thanks to Rev. Paul for the opportunity to preach. Check out their worship services and Paul’s excellent “children’s messages” by visiting them online.

Since it was Memorial Day weekend, I thought it would be good to address Memorial Day in conjunction with the Lectionary gospel reading from a couple of weeks ago: John 14:15-26. This is an edited version of my words.

---

We come to worship seeking to hear and experience the good news:
that the Lord’s mercies never cease;
that the Lord’s mercies are new every morning;
and the Lord’s faithfulness extends beyond our ability to see in a mirror dimly, or recognize the image of God in others as well as in our own face.

Please join me in prayer.
Open our ears and our hearts, O God, that our meditations, words, and living are a reflection of our faith in You, who creates, who redeems, and who sustains our lives. Amen.

I don’t know about you, but this coronavirus separation has felt like equal parts of the movies Groundhog Day and The Day the Earth Stood Still (the original). Some days are a time travelers maze.

How long ago was Easter?

Pentecost, that day when we celebrate that people heard about the good news of God in their own language, Pentecost is just over the horizon. 

It is important to remember the distance we have traveled to get to this Sunday. Remember back where the story began with waiting, Angelic choirs, a manger and shepherds returning to the fields giving thanks to God for all that they had seen and heard as it had been told to them. Mary pondered it all in her heart.

The Ashes that mark Lent. Long dusty roads littered with parable after parable all leading toward Jerusalem.

A parade through the city gates to shouts of Hosanna and palm waving crowds. A quiet room around a table with bread and cup, then betrayal, denial, and crucifixion. 

Days later we were shocked by the proclamation of Mary Magdalene, “I’ve seen the risen Lord.”

We heard that two people met Jesus when they were on there way to Emmaus and knew it was him when he broke bread with them that evening. Someone told the story about Thomas seeing Jesus, and that helped me with my own doubt.

Today, the gospel of John reminds us that if we love Jesus, we will keep his commandments. We’ve heard beatitudes, parables and seen miracles. What commandments are we supposed to keep? Jesus responds, “They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me.”

We’ve heard Jesus’ commandments distilled in at least two ways.
“Love God and love your neighbor as yourself.” AND “Love one another just as Jesus has loved us.” Like all of us, the disciples must look confused, so Jesus responds, ‘Those who love me will keep my word and God will make a home in them.’

That sounds like a living memorial.

It all began with a group of women decorating the graves of soldiers during the Civil War. Decoration Day was institutionalized by President Johnson in 1966, and became a recognized Federal holiday by order of Congress in the “National Holiday Act of 1971.” We know it as “Memorial Day.” It is a day of remembering the many that have died when diplomacy failed and ushered in the violence of war. It is a day of honoring the many whose military service lead to their the last full measure of devotion on behalf of the person next to them and a grateful Nation.

For many, Memorial Day is a reminder about the opening of pools, the beginning of summer, a weekend at the lake, discounts on this and that, or an excuse for people of faith to bring civic religion into their places of worship. In this coronavirus separation we have to measure our response: flight, fight, or freeze. And no matter where you consumer your news, or the politicians you think are telling the truth, or ideology you support, there is still that pesky peasant from Galilee saying, “They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me.”

This is one of those moments when we need to be leaders rather than participants in our culture. It is one of those times when we need an “Advocate,” and we need to “ad-vo-cate,” for living memorials that turn the other cheek, carry a pack another mile, give a coat when someone asks for a dollar, or pray for our enemies. Ad-Vo-Cate for a common good based in my neighbor as myself.

Maybe it would help to remember that a memorial “is something designed to preserve the memory of a person or event.”Memorial. Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com Unabridged. Random House, Inc. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Memorial (accessed: May 22, 2014).

Hear some familiar memorial words from Psalm 46:

“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change, though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea; though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble with tumult.”New Revised Standard Version

Memorials help us hear the voices of people that can no longer cry out, that can no longer laugh, or be what God created them to be.
Memorials can shame behavior.
Memorials can shout warning! 
Memorials can whisper wisdom.
Memorials rise up and out of the ashes of human history as reminders:

Yad Vashem
World War II Memorial
Hiroshima Peace Memorial
Korean War Memorial
Vietnam War Memorial
Berlin Wall Memorial
Oklahoma City National Memorial 
MLK Memorial
Arlington National Cemetery
9/11 Memorial

Some memorials are small crosses with flowers along the side of a road. Stained glass windows dot sanctuaries.  Some memorials are scrapbooks, photos, a tool or heirloom passed down, a candle lit on a holiday, or china used on the dinner table.

In houses of worship around the world people of diverse faith traditions ask questions.  People of no particular faith ask them too. You know, those questions that begin with “W”. Why?

Why, do bad things to happen?  Why God?
When? When will war cease and our friends and loved come home?
When will justice be done? When God? 
What? What does this mean?  What God?

It doesn’t matter what your first language is. It doesn’t matter if you ask in the quick cadence of a northerner, the slow drawl of a southerner, or in street slang. Grief and fear, like the cry of new life, are universal sounds.  Sounds that bring you to your knees, punch you in the stomach, take your breath away or let loose a river of tears and thoughts and words.

It is hard to think of our neighbor, or keep the commandments of Jesus, or be a living memorial when you cannot hear the universal sounds or choose to tune them out.

Have you visited a memorial?  Do you have a memorial in your home or one that you carry with you?

These words are etched in the stone on my favorite memorial.

“With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all Nations.”(2)Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address, March 4, 1865.

Some memorials are meant to inspire us to the possibilities of our existence. Even in the hard times. Even in coronavirus times, we are reminded what others lived through.  Some call us to go and do likewise; and do even greater things. Maybe if we can hear the universal sounds, we can advocate for the melody of peace, advocate for our neighbor, and in keeping Jesus’ commandments the words “they will know we are Christians by our love” will be etched on our hearts.

When we do this, we are living memorials not of the Empire, then or now, nor of the violence of the cross.

We are living memorials of the one that taught be salt and light;
the one who fed a multitude with a couple of fish and some bread; 
and who commanded, “love one another just as I’ve loved you.”

Disciples gather around a table each week.  It is a memorial marker and meal. We share and hear the words, “Do this in remembrance of me.” Remember, if you love Jesus you will keep his commandments and the spirit of Truth will abide in you. Sigh. That’s the hard part.  Keep his commandments. This coronavirus is the latest challenge making that a hard thing to do: keep Jesus’ commandments. 

But you can do it. 

Remember, you are a living memorial in your journey of faith?