Sun, Nov 01, 2020
Commemoration and Change
1 John 3:1-3 by Craig de Vos
Sermon for 'All Saints Day'
Series: Sermons

‘Commemorate’—

it’s an interesting word.

It’s derived from the Latin, literally, ‘to remember together’.

One dictionary that I consulted suggested meanings of… 

‘to mark or celebrate’…

‘recall or show respect for’…

while my thesaurus suggested ‘pay homage to’…

‘memorialise’…

or ‘remember’.

But is that what we really do when we celebrate?

 

When we commemorate someone’s birthday we’re not recalling––

let alone remembering––

their actual birth.

Not literally.

We’re acknowledging and rejoicing in that person being alive and part of our lives.

But what about when we commemorate an event––

like an historical event?

Unless it’s an event that first happened in our own lifetime, then…

in a sense…

we’re not actually recalling it.

We’re memorialising or paying homage.

And that starts to get a bit tricky.

What are we actually paying homage to?

What, precisely, are we showing respect for?

When, as a community, we commemorate Australia Day…

most of us would say that we’re paying homage to this country…

and all those who contributed to it, to make it what it is.

But, in so doing, we’re recalling and paying homage to only a very small part.

The Twenty-Sixth of January is the anniversary of the arrival of the First Fleet.

And it was the beginning of the colonisation and dispossession of the Aboriginal peoples.

Think about any number of other historical events that we commemorate.

What are we actually recalling?

What are we actually paying homage to?

 

Over the course of time… 

what inevitably happens is… 

that our commemoration of the event becomes somewhat disconnected from the event itself.

We may create meanings that were never intended.

We may distort the symbols and rites that were initially associated with it.

As I suggested in my most recent Pastoral in ‘Highlights’…

that’s happened with events like Christmas, Easter, and even Halloween.

Something similar has also happened with All Saints’ Day.

Within Protestant tradition––

at least within those branches of the Protestant church that observe it––

All Saints’ Day has become conflated with All Souls’ Day––

technically, the day after All Saints’ Day––

which was meant to be a day for remembering all of the ‘faithful departed’.

It became a day when churches would remember their members who had died in the past year…

because, in Protestant tradition, we are all saints.

But, originally, All Saints’ Day was observed to remember those who had been beatified;

that is…

those who had been elevated to special significance because of their righteous life and deeds…

and miracles…

and who…

it was believed… 

were able to offer special prayerful help to those left on earth.

It was all tied up with the notion of the ‘communion of saints’.

And I don’t know about you…

but that whole ‘communion of saints’ thing––

that the righteous and venerable…

dwelling in heaven in the presence of God…

are constantly looking down upon us…

observing…

like an audience at the theatre or a football match…

and interceding on our behalf––

it kind of creeps me out!

In part, it seems voyeuristic.

In part, it seems sinister—

like we’re being watched by a cosmic KGB.

The whole notion smacks of a primitive cosmology…

and a primitive theology.

And, to be honest, when it comes to matters cosmological…

and eternal…

I’m cautious and sceptical…

even agnostic.

We have no clear sense––

either from a so-called ‘plain sense’ reading of Scripture…

or even from a critically interpretive one––

with which to say with any certainty.

So much of what the New Testament authors say about “heaven”…

and life after death…

is shrouded in myth and metaphor…

image and innuendo…

symbol and speculation.

Then there are the bits––

like this morning’s brief reading from the so-called First Letter of John––

that actively reinforce this sense of agnostic caution.

Reflecting on eternity and the fate of humankind…

the best that the author can offer is: 

Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed”.

 

In a sense, I think that the author says two very significant things here.

First, his emphasis is actually on the here and now.

Here and now, we are God’s children.

Here and now, we are invited to know ourselves as loved––

completely loved.

We are invited to see ourselves as living in…

and urged to foster…

a filial relationship with God.

And, to that end, he urges us to live a life of purity.

Admittedly, the author doesn’t spell out what that means in any detail…

but the short answer is… 

surely… 

a life of love––

one that is modelled upon and that manifests, the loving life of Christ…

into whose likeness, he claims, that we are growing.

As beloved children of God…

we are urged to reflect the nature of our divine Parent…

responding in love––

extravagantly…

expansively…

inclusively…

unreservedly

without qualification or condition.

And we are called to show that sort of love towards God… 

and self…

family and neighbour…

even ‘the other’, and the seemingly unlovable.

That is what it means to be a child of God.

That, too, is what it means to be a ‘saint’––

living a life fully and thoroughly infused with love.

 

And yet… 

the author also suggests that who we are is presently incomplete.

We are in the process of becoming.

We are, in a sense, evolving.

Who we will be is yet to be fulfilled;

and it is something that we can neither perceive nor imagine––

in the same way that we cannot grasp who Christ has now become…

fully and totally.

After all, few of us can imagine what it means to be completely, unreservedly, unconditionally loved––

because we never really experience it.

Not really.

And few of us can imagine loving like that ourselves.

It would, by necessity, change us.

But it’s impossible to comprehend.

 

So we are, here and now, children of God––

loved and called to love––

but we are in a state of flux and change…

moving towards God’s purpose and intention for us…

that we would become more loving…

more Christ-like…

ever-more fully reflecting the image of God.

That is the future––

the hope––

that the author…

and, indeed, All Saints’ Day itself… 

holds out for us.

Because, in the end, that’s what it means to be a ‘saint’.

It means being, and living, fully in the present…

seeking to live a life of love––

in its most pure form––

but living like that in the light of God’s promised and intended future;

the hope that, in the end, we would know and manifest the love of God completely. 

 

And, so it is that we commemorate All Saints’ Day––

and we remember those who have gone before us––

not because they crudely watch over us…

or intercede for us…

or even because we need to keep their memories alive…

in the hope, someday, to be reunited with them.

We commemorate All Saints’ Day––

and we remember those who have gone before us––

to remind ourselves that God is with us:

in life…

in death…

in life beyond death;

inviting us into a life of love that never ends;

inviting us into a life of love that will… 

one day… 

be made full and complete and perfect––

as we grow to become who God intends us to be.