Sunday Worship Youth & Family Music Milestones Stephen Ministry The Way
This Month Archive
St. Mark's Lutheran Church

 

  2014

 Sermons



Dez 28 - Outsiders

Dez 28 - The Costly Gift

Dez 24 - In the Flesh in Particular

Dez 21 - More "Rejoice" than "Hello"

Dez 14 - Word in the Darkness

Dez 7 - Life in a Construction Zone

Dez 2 - Accountability

Nov 30 - Rend the Heavens

Nov 23 - The Shepherd-King

Nov 16 - Everything he had

Nov 9 - Preparations

Nov 2 - Is Now and Ever Will Be

Okt 25 - Free?

Okt 19 - It is about faith and love

Okt 12 - Trouble at the Banquet

Okt 5 - Trouble in the Vineyard

Sep 28 - At the edge

Sep 21 - At the Right Time

Sep 14 - We Proclaim Christ Crucified

Sep 7 - Responsibility

Aug 31 - Extreme Living

Aug 27 - One Who Cares

Aug 24 - A Nobody, but God's Somebody

Aug 17 - Faithful God

Aug 8 - With singing

Aug 3 - Extravagant Gifts of God

Aug 2 - Yes and No

Jul 27 - A treasure indeed

Jul 27 - God's Love and Care

Jul 20 - Life in a Messy Garden

Jul 13 - Waste and Grace

Jun 8 - The Conversation

Jun 1 - For the Times In-between

Mai 25 - Joining the Conversation

Mai 18 - Living Stones

Mai 11 - Become the Gospel!

Mai 6 - Wilderness Food

Mai 4 - Freedom

Apr 27 - Faith despite our self-made handicaps

Apr 20 - New

Apr 19 - Blessed be God

Apr 18 - Jesus and the Soldiers

Apr 18 - Who is in charge?

Apr 17 - For You!

Apr 13 - Kenosis

Apr 9 - Mark 6: Opposition Mounts

Apr 6 - Dry Bones?

Apr 2 - Mark 5: Trading Fear for Faith

Mrz 30 - Choosing the Little One

Mrz 26 - The Life of Following Jesus

Mrz 23 - Surprise!

Mrz 19 - Mark 3: The Life of Following Jesus

Mrz 16 - Darkness and Light

Mrz 12 - Mark 2: Calling All Sinners

Mrz 10 - Where are the demons?

Mrz 9 - Sin or not sin

Mrz 8 - Remembering

Mrz 5 - Mark 1: Good News in a Troubled World

Mrz 3 - For the Love of God

Feb 28 - Fresh Every Morning

Feb 27 - Using Time Well

Feb 23 - Worrying

Feb 16 - Even more offensive

Feb 9 - Salt and Light

Feb 2 - Presenting Samuel, Jesus, and Ourselves

Jan 26 - Catching or being caught

Jan 19 - Strengthened by the Word

Jan 12 - Who are you?

Jan 9 - Because God....

Jan 5 - By another way


2015 Sermons         
2013 Sermons

Remembering

 
Jane Strous Funeral - March 8, 2014

The Rev. Kenneth R. Elkin

 

It would be a cruel thing for us to be robbed of the gift of memory.

That would  disrupt relationships,

isolate us from each other,

and destroy the basis for communication among us.

 

That is why it was so important for the family to share so many memories yesterday before we went to the graveside.

It helps to bind the generations together.

 

But there is more to be said than this.

Our words may be confused, our memories become garbled, our efforts of communication stymied...

but there is one who can speak clearly, who has pledged to speak for us,

to pick up where we cannot go any further.

 

Imagine a courtroom scene, where the sum of our life is being weighed.

Here is a list of all of the words and deeds that one of us has spoken and done across the years.

And Satan, the accuser, points out all of the failings, things said that should not have been said, and vice versa.

There is this and that and the next thing.

Finally Satan rests his case, confident that this person deserves to be condemned, thrown out, discarded.

Then Jesus stands and speaks as a friend of the court, and says that he could come up with a list of wonderful things that Jane has said and done, but he is not going to bother doing it.

Instead he is going to say but three words: “You are forgiven.”

And the Father agrees, and the Spirit breathes those words into our hearts burdened with the weight of time and anguish. 

“You are forgiven, for Jesus sake, at his request, because he numbers each one whom he calls in the kingdom of God.”

As Paul says it in today's lesson: Who will bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies; who is to condemn?  Christ Jesus...intercedes for us.

And just a few paragraphs earlier, Paul also pointed out that

...we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words...for the saints according to the will of God.

What wonderful news this is!

Someone to speak when we dare not or cannot.

Someone with a good word, a lasting and enduring word for us and on our behalf;

the Gospel for Jane and for us.

 

Nothing shall separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord,  Paul exclaims.

Nothing that will break the communication we share with him because of his gift of life and faith to us.

 

Looking at it from God's side, the most wonderful sermon, the most profound observation, the tenderest expression of love and affection are but baby-talk.

 

We know well how children do things:

--often making very poor judgments

--insisting on doing things for which they are not yet ready,

--speaking inaccurately and inappropriately.

Even as adults, we haven't gotten much farther along.

There comes the time when God needs to get the message to us to stop squirming and listen:
Be still and know that I am God!

         as the Psalmist reminds us.

Be quiet, and listen!

We have One to speak to us,

         and for us (on our behalf)!

What wonderful news,

         that God will get through to us, even sometimes when we think it cannot.

That was especially important to remember last week when Jane was slipping away from us, even though the family members kept constant vigil with her.

Even in her increasing silence, the Spirit has promised to be with her and uphold her.

 

I remember vividly the first time that happened in my presence.

It was in my first months of service  in the parish I was serving in Harrisburg.

I visited a dear elderly lady in a nursing home.

She sat in a wheelchair and had that vacant stare.

The conversation was awkward on my part and nonexistent on hers.

Very soon I decided to offer her Holy Communion, but without much expectation.

I spoke both my part and her part of the service, and she sat impassively until we came to the Great Thanksgiving.

When I said “The body of Christ, given for you.” this silent woman repeated “for you, for you.”

And she got most of the words of the Lord's Prayer which followed immediately, before lapsing into silence again.

In her prison of silence, somehow the Word made a connection and was able to come to expression, even if haltingly.

I learned not to underestimate the power of God's Word to break through barriers one might think are impassable.

Lord, speak to us, speak with us and through us; do not leave us alone, do not abandon us.

 

The Good News of the day is that although our memories falter, God's does not.

The Father can say, “Yes, I remember making a promise to Jane many years back when she was baptized, for Jesus' sake, who invited her, through the Spirit who breathed her to life.

I distinctly remember that, and will not forget it,” the Father insists.

She is wearing the invitation to the great banquet, engraved as the sign of the cross upon her.

She is welcomed in.

She has place at the table of the Great Banquet, on the opposite side from the rest of this assembly, but it is the same table which we approach this day in Holy Communion.

The Lord will give his Holy Spirit, the Gospel reminds us today.

 

And so we give thanks for the gift of memory in several different ways:

First of all for the memories we share of Jane, her work, and activities:

--her loving connections with spouse, children and grandchildren,

--the number of lives she touched in her many years of school-teaching,

--her enjoyment of travel and games with friends and relatives,

--her staunch work and support of the Good News through St. Mark's Church,

--and all the rest that this assembly remembers today and for which it gives thanks to God.

 

And now we lay alongside that another kind of remembering.

We're also remembering the future,

         not only naming our connections with Jane and with the Lord Jesus from the past, but also anticipating what God will yet do with Jane and with us.

We can joyfully do this kind of remembering of the future, because of yet  a third kind remembering, the very most important remembering of all;

--that God remembers Jane, and us.

With humility and yet with confidence, we echo the words of the thief on the cross:

Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingly power.

And Jesus' reply: Today, you will be with me in Paradise.

With those three kinds of remembering, and especially with that promise from the Lord Jesus, we go from this gathering, and live!  Amen.

 

Please note: The preceding sermon is provided as a resource for the thought, prayer, and meditation of the members and friends of St. Mark's. It is the residue of a verbal event, and thus it does not have academic footnotes and other details that would be expected in a written document. The writer gladly acknowledges the prior thought and work of many Christians before him.