Wisdom 3:1-9
Revelation 21:1-6a
John 11:32-44

God be in my words and in my speaking; God be in our hearts and in our understanding. Amen.

This Sunday, November 1st, is the feast of All Saints. All Saints is one of the four liturgical days specifically designated as most appropriate for Baptisms (the other three being the Baptism of Our Lord, in Epiphany, the Easter Vigil, and Pentecost). We do occasionally have Baptisms at other times during the church year, since there are often good reasons — the availability of extended family members being an important factor. Today [at our 10 o’clock service] we will Baptize Andrew Chapley Fraser, and welcome him into the family of the church, into the fellowship of people the early church describes as ‘the saints’ (with a small s). It is, I think, particularly powerful that, on Friday, we buried Andy’s great-grandfather, Dan Fraser; we gave thanks for Dan’s wonderful, long life with all of us, and we celebrated his entrance into that group the church sometimes describes as ‘the saints in light,’ by which we mean those who have entered into eternal life with God; and in the juxtaposition of Dan’s entrance into the saints in light, and Andy’s becoming one of the saints in the church, we have a powerful reminder of the reminder of the communion of saints — both the living and the dead, the official Saints (with a capital ‘s’) and the quieter, private ones — which is part of what we celebrate in this liturgical expression.

In his meditation on the feast of All Saints, author Sam Potaro makes the point that the three fall celebrations, All Hallows, All Saints, and All Souls, which occur each year on October 31, November 1, and November 2, need to be looked at as three interrelated liturgical and theological events. In his book Brightest and Best: a Companion to the Lesser Feasts and Fasts, he writes:

“All Saints’ Day is the centerpiece of an autumn triduum. In the carnival celebrations of All Hallows’ Eve our ancestors used the most powerful weapon in the human arsenal, the power of humor and ridicule, to confront the power of death. The following day, in the commemoration of All Saints, we gave witness to the victory of incarnate goodness embodied in remarkable deeds and doers triumphing over the misanthropy of darkness and devils. And in the commemoration of All Souls we proclaimed the hope of common mortality expressed in our aspirations and expectations of a shared eternity.”

We don’t observe this particular set of liturgical celebrations as carefully or faithfully as Sam Potaro would recommend; for us — certainly for our culture — Halloween has become the most visible holiday, with All Saints being essentially ignored by the culture, and transferred to the Sunday following by most churches. All Souls gets very little notice — even by the church. We tend to roll All Saints and All Souls together, with our liturgical expression. We use white vestments, triumphant hymns, and so forth to emphasize All Saints, and in our prayers, we make an opportunity to name those of our parish family and known to us who have crossed the threshold into eternal life, which provides a reminder of the feast of All Souls.

The readings assigned by the Revised Common Lectionary for the feast of All Saints make an interesting collection. The passage from the Wisdom of Solomon reminds us that “the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment will ever touch them.” It reminds us of the assurances of our faith: that death is not the end; that we have the promise of eternal life with those who have gone before. And while the phrase, “the souls of the righteous” is often understood to refer to the dead, I found myself reflecting that all of our souls (living and dead) are in God’s hands, and God walks with us every step of our journey through this life, and beyond it.
The passage from the book of Revelation recounts the part of John’s mystical vision where he sees “a new heaven and a new earth … And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.” The book of Revelation is problematic for many of us. It is — at least in some theological traditions — read as a prediction of what will happen during the end times; but I think it is a mistake to try to literalize John’s mystical, metaphorical vision, or to limit it (in our minds) to an expression of something in the future. There is wonderful poetry in the book — theological imagery which has formed and shaped liturgical expression, hymnody, and sacred art — but there is also a lot of stuff that is just plain weird. One of my Scripture professors in seminary once remarked, “Remember, the book of Revelation is a dream; do your dreams always make sense, or make easily understandable correlations with your daily experiences?” For me, the passage we read today makes a powerful, theological statement about the Incarnation, if we read it as an expression of what it means to have Christ among us, now. “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them as their God; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them…” To me, this sounds like metaphors describing the kinds of healing and peace available to each one of us, when we make room for Christ in our lives, and pay attention to our relationship with God.

This brings us to the story of the raising of Lazarus, told in John’s Gospel. To me, this seems a strange choice for All Saints Day — true, the story deals with Resurrection, but most of us don’t imagine eternal life involves our loved ones (or us) emerging from our tombs wrapped in grave clothes. The dramatic and unsettling story of Lazarus seems more suited to Halloween than to this joyous celebration of the communion of saints. But perhaps, that is the point, after all. Lazarus’ story, in John’s Gospel, provides us with a tangible example of Jesus’ power over death; like much of John’s Gospel, the story of Lazarus is a theological statement, rather than an objective account of an historical event. This story expresses the transformative, unexpected power of Jesus; and it foreshadows Jesus’ own Resurrection. By relating this story, John makes the point that the powers that shape our existence are unimportant to Jesus. Mary laments, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died;” but by raising Lazarus, instead of healing him, Jesus demonstrates the power of God. And to make that point even more strongly, before Jesus calls Lazarus out of his tomb, he says that he is doing this “for the sake of the crowd…so that they may believe that you sent me.”

Our faith assures us that that death is not the all-powerful force it looks like; death is meaningless to God, and, ultimately, powerless over us. Christ calls us, again and again, out of our sins, out of the emotional and spiritual tombs we shut ourselves into, and invites us into freedom, into life, into relationship with him. Because Christ calls us, we are empowered to call others, to invite and welcome them into the family of the church — as we will shortly do with little Andrew. Through Baptism, in a concrete and public way, we accept on Andrew’s behalf, the invitation into relationship, which God constantly extends to everyone. Through Baptism, we welcome Andrew as the newest member of the parish family of St. Barnabas; and through Baptism, we celebrate his inclusion in the communion of saints — that great “cloud of witnesses” which incorporates all Saints and all souls.

It is my prayer for all of us, on this All Saints’ Day, that we will listen for the voice of Christ, which constantly calls us into life and freedom; and that as we hear and respond, we will find in ourselves the inspiration and will to invite others into relationship with the God who did create and does love each and every human being.

In the Name of Christ, AMEN.

Sermon preached by Beth Hilgartner
at St. Barnabas’, Norwich.