Anonymous. I am the Road, the Truth and Life, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=59756 [retrieved November 18, 2024]. Original source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Vasakyrkan,_close-up_external_art1.JPG.

The Eucharist of the Resurrection
Romans 8:14-19, 34-35, and 37-39; Psalm 23; Saint John 14:1-6

We have gathered together to pray for the soul of Shirley, and to give thanks to God for every remembrance we have of her, who lives now, as she always has, in the hands of a loving and merciful Creator.

Her departure may seem bewildering and confusing if you do not know the Communion of Saints. And so, I want to do some reminding, reminding all of us what it means to live in that Communion.

Most importantly, living in that Communion means that God loves us. God made us and gave us the gift of life. God sent his Son to redeem us, in this life as well as in the next.

It is redemption in the world to come that Jesus speaks about in the Gospel today. He tells us that in his Father’s house, there are many dwelling places. I believe there is a dwelling place for every kind of human being there is, which is Jesus’ way of saying that no one will be out of place there. All of us will fit in. We shall be comfortable there and with one another, especially if we have been uncomfortable here. These many dwelling places are God’s way of taking care of us.

We also know that since God loves us and takes care of us, God wants us to be in relationship with him. God wants us to be his and his only. We know this. We have been told this all of our lives. We hear this in every service and see it upon every page of the Bible. And we heard it in Jesus’ words in the Gospel when he said, “Believe in God, believe also in me.”[1]

By believing in God, we accept his love and his loving purposes for us in this life and in the life to come. By believing in God, we declare ourselves to be God’s and God’s alone. By believing in God, we accept God’s love for Shirley, whom we pray for today.

And so, as we remember her, I want to ask you to do something. Put the confusion and bewilderment out of your mind. Put the sorrow you feel out of your mind. And think about one thing and one thing only: the love that God has for all of us, he has also for Shirley. She is in a better place, a dwelling place perfectly suited to her, and it was God’s will all along to take her there. And it is God’s will for each of us as well.

As you think about this, I invite you to say aloud with me, for I know you know it by heart, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”[2]

---

[1] Saint John 14:1b.

[2] Saint John 3:16.