Musical Prelude and Service.

Psalm 145:1-5, 17-21 & Luke 20:27-38
Sometimes my commitment to the Revised Common Lectionary creates more challenges than usual.
Remembrance Sunday is one of those. While I see the need to address Remembrance Day in my
reflection, how do I connect that with the scriptures prescribed for this week? A story about an odd
question about a widow and the resurrection? That is a daunting challenge.
Well, let me begin with my view of Remembrance Day. This day, when we honour the men and
women who answered our country’s call to put their lives on the line in a time of war, is sacred.
It is set aside for something special and important. It may not meet the definition of being religious
or holy, but it is certainly worthy of awe and respect. It marks a moment to remember the sacrifice of
so many people to the call of our country over numerous generations. It is our opportunity as a
society to offer our gratitude for all that was done and what was given up; be it the lives of so many
thousands of service men and women, the wounds and scars carried by so many more, or the
heartbreak and grief suffered by so many families and loved ones.
But beyond that, we also make commitments on Remembrance Day. Or we should. We make a
commitment to carry the story forward. The story of how this country Canada has on many different
occasions made the decision to go to war; to participate in armed conflict around the world. And in
doing so, we have turned to our armed services and asked them over and over to take on the terrible
burden of going into battle, to kill and be killed, to risk their lives and their health on our behalf.
We have a responsibility to remember that and to ensure that the generations that come after ours
also remember this. We also have a responsibility to make sure we don’t take that sacrifice for
granted and that we only make that choice in the future after somber and respectful consideration.
That we don’t demand such sacrifice from our children for frivolous reasons.
Memories. The memories of our larger community and our commitment and gratitude as a society.
And also, the recognition that who we are and the stories we tell carries with it a sense of life,
even beyond death.
“Now he is God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive.”
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
In Flanders Fields.
This conversation between Jesus and a group of Sadducees can be incredibly vexing. Putting it in its
proper context is crucial in trying to make sense of it. This is late in Luke’s gospel. By this point,
Jesus has disrupted the courtyard of the Temple, turning over tables and driving out the money
changers. He has angered the temple authorities, many of whom would be Sadducees. This was a
Jewish sect committed to the first five books of scripture, also called the Pentateuch. The books we
are told that Moses wrote.
This was a group that saw Jewish identity tied closely to the work of the temple, and as it is pointed
out, they did not believe in resurrection. For them, when you die, you die. So this question about a
widow and who she would be married to after resurrection, is not a question based in genuine
curiosity, but a question intended to trap and discredit Jesus; who they are trying to silence and
embarrass. They are seeking to demonstrate the ridiculous notion of resurrection, not to better
understand it.
It also helps to keep in mind that the culture of the time saw it as vital for a man to pass his name
and his heritage on from one generation to the next. To die without an heir to carry on your name is
possibly the greatest tragedy that can befall a man. So this Mosaic law for a man’s brother to marry
this widow, to ensure an heir is part of meeting the need – for a sense of carrying on a memory and
a sense of immortality. The man remains alive in the sense that his name carries on.
It is critical that the woman; the widow, keeps getting married so that the dead man, or men, can
see their memory, their name carried forward since otherwise they are forgotten. Is that requirement
still there if there is a resurrection? That nuance is not important in the reasoning of the Sadducees.
The point of the debate is to discredit resurrection. I also don’t want to ignore this point any further.
In this conversation between Jesus and the Sadducees, the woman in question holds no agency
whatsoever. Her only purpose is to provide an heir. She is only the vehicle by which the man may
produce an heir and find that sense of immortality. But in Jesus response, the woman is a child of
Abraham, and she too is alive to God. Jesus’ response is that marriage is unimportant in the life to
come. Without getting into details, I read his response as essentially saying that the life to come after
death is not governed by the rules for our life here and now.
That passage of how God is God of the living not of the dead really strikes me. In the funeral liturgy,
I use the phrase God of the living and of the dead repeatedly. At first glance, these two statements
appear contradictory, except, that in God’s eyes all of us are alive. In life, in death, in life beyond
death, we are God’s, for all of us are alive.
In the conversations I have enjoyed this past week around this scripture, I have heard questions and
thoughts around how this speaks to those who have not been married, to those who wait to be
reunited with partners who have died; what it says to those who have married more than once.
Scripture offers very little insight into what resurrection or life beyond death might hold. What I hear
from Jesus in this scripture, is that the rules human beings have been established to govern our lives
in the here and now, do not follow us into the life to come. What follows us is God’s love.
We are not told to forget or deny the lives that went before. But we are told to live. We are alive.
We are called to live, to love, to connect with one another and the world God has provided for us.
To make the most of what we are gifted with here and now.
We are called to live lives of gratitude for all that God has provided, and for all that God has done
and continues to do for us. To praise God, to thank God, and to help our children and our children’s
children to remember who they are and we came to be here.
One of the readings I came upon while studying for this Sunday, notes that Psalm 145 is set out as
one that Jews in exile should repeat a few ties each day along with the Shema:
Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your might.
And love your neighbour as you love yourself.
Repeat this Psalm of expressing gratitude and to teach this to your children. Hold on to who you are
and how you came to be here. No matter they difficulties, the heartbreak, the oppression you may
experience.
Remember, share, express gratitude. And above all live and love and commit yourself to God and the
values of love, peace, hope, and justice. Amen
Rev. Warner Bloomfield

Music provided with permission through licensing with CCLI License number
2701258 and One License # A-731789