The New England Church Pulpit New England Congregational Church UCC Aurora Illinois

We remember on All Saints Day those we revere for being good stewards of what ends up being the smallest but most important symbol on their gravestone. When they are living, we remember their birthday; when they die, we bookend that with their death date. But what we remember is the life they lived between those two dates.

At Louise Lane’s service this past Wednesday, a Sanskrit Proverb was read, a favorite that she requested for the day.
Look to this day, for it is life,
The very life of life.
In its brief course lies all
The realities and verities of existence,
The bliss of growth, The splendor of action, The glory of power—
For yesterday is but a dream
And tomorrow is only a vision
But today, well lived,
Makes every yesterday a dream of happiness
And every tomorrow a vision of hope.
Look well, therefore, to this day.

“When we are driving,” Thich Nhat Hanh remind us, “we tend to think of arriving, and we sacrifice the journey for the sake of the arrival. But life is to be found in the present moment, not in the future. In fact, we may suffer more after we arrive at our destination. If we have to talk of a destination, what about your final destination, the graveyard? We do not want to go in the direction of death; we want to go in the direction of life. But where is life? Life can be found only in the present moment. Therefore, each mile we drive, each step we take, has to bring us into the present moment. This is the practice of mindfulness.”

“When we see a red light or a stop sign, we can smile at it and thank it, because it helps us return to the present moment. The red light is a bell of mindfulness. We may have thought of it as an enemy, preventing us from achieving our goal. But now we know the red light is our friend, helping us resist rushing and calling us to return to the present moment where we can meet with life, joy, and peace.” (Present Moment, Wonderful Moment” from 365 Zen Daily Readings)

As we read the through the names of our necrology, we are astounded by the collective years of present moments represented by these people who stopped by in life to make this church what it is. Some touch sparks of joy and peace inside us because we knew something of the hyphen they lived between the dates on their tombstones. Others are just names because we did not know them. But as a whole, these are the lives that have given us this church. This building is the result of 145 years of names now fleeting who put blood, sweat and years into making this a holy space, giving us a tool for caring and loving beyond the walls of this community of faith.

In 1858, as this church was being organized, there is a small paragraph in the annals of our recorded history as the saints gathered to shape the body of Christ in this new place. It was voted by the membership “that all female members have the right to vote on all questions pertaining to the church.” The historian goes on to say that at this time in the world’s history women were held to be so inferior they were expected to heed Paul’s injunction “Let your women keep silence in the churches.” Be that as it may, the New England Church started out by putting itself on record as believing that everyone in the church needed everyone else, regardless of society’s divisions, and everyone was useless without the other. This is 1858, pre-civil war, 62 years before women were given the right to vote in our country, New England Church took up the banner against prejudice. That affirmative vote on a 16-word motion is a small dash in our church history, but it has had a profound and lasting influence on this church so that even today we are eschewing society’s labels that oppress by being the inclusive church that defines us. 1858 was the date the vote was taken, followed by the hyphen that brings us up to today 145 years later, but oh what a hyphen that was.

Not all of our moments are precious moments. There are some days we’d just as soon forget. There are days in the life on this congregation that threatened to undo it, and even today we stand at the crossroads of an important future. Can we measure up to the challenge that will allow the church 100 years from now to give thanks for our commitment, our sacrifice, our perseverence? And in our own personal lives, there are those days . The disappointments and the difficulties, the dreams upon which we’ve banked our life that are shattered can be debilitating and life-threatening, and the dash of life seems long and grueling. But know that within these events the still, small voice of God weaves the tapestry that redeems the shattered dreams and the difficult days and the challenges of the future for holy purpose.

In the introduction to Studs Turkel’s book ‘Will the Circle Be Unbroken?” he says that this book is about death, of course, but also about living to the full its long prelude, life. And he quotes an anonymous philosopher:
I would teach the old that death does not come with old age, but with forgetting...I would walk when others hold back,
I would wake when others sleep, I would listen when others talk, and how I would enjoy good chocolate ice cream.

When my grandmother and I would go to the basement for our little nip of cognac she once, in order to get to the bottle at the back of the shelf, take down a jar of her canned peaches and held them to the light and with great pride in her handiwork, commented on how pretty their were. In that brief moment, the joy and beauty of life converged in one holy communion with a saint who was a good steward of life and love.

As stewards of this good life, and the saints of tomorrow’s church, we are called to nourish the dance of life that goes on all around us and in us. Life is not defined by the dates that appear on the headstone but by the quality of the hyphen that is etched between. It is in the unexpected, in the undefined, in the moment, in each day, in the mystery of the incomplete. Life is in the hyphen. Amen.

–Gary L. McCann

Psalm 84

How Lovely is your dwelling place, O God. My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God. Even the sparrow has found a home and the swallow a nest for herself, a place near your altar. Blessed are those who dwell in your house; they are ever praising you.

Isaiah 25.6-8
On the mountain God Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine—the best of meats and the finest of wines. On this mountain God will destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations. God will swallow up death forever and the Sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears from all faces, removing the disgrace of his people from all the earth. In this day we shall say, ‘Sure this is our God’ we trued God and God indeed saved us.”

Copyright © 2003 by Gary L. McCann. All rights reserved.

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