Introduction.

For us, this is a day of remembering. The ability to recall what has been in the present moment and link it with what will be is a real gift. It keep us from having to repeat everything, but just as importantly it provides us with a sense of connection with all those who are part of our lives. We live in the moment, but we are not limited by it. The gift to see beyond the moment is one we grow into. A mother and her five-year-old daughter often walked through an old cemetery to reach the local playground. One day the 5-year-old saw someone push a rod into the soil near a gravestone and hang a wreath on it. "Why did that man put a wreath there?" she asked. "He wanted to remember the person who died," the mother replied. "Will someone do that for me when I die?" "I'm sure they will," the mother said, mentally preparing herself for the next question. They walked in silence for a moment. Then the little girl turned to her mother and said, "It won't be fair. All I'll see is the stick."

This gift, can be a challenge for us. When we are young we are constantly being told to remember. When we are in school one of our greatest fears is that we won’t remember. We read and reread, take notes, rehearse, and cram in the effort to remember. Then we stew until we get the test back to see if we did remember. In life’s big moments, some one is constantly asking, “Let me see if I’ve got this right…” or “What am I to do/say again?” We don’t want to get it wrong or do something silly. We want to remember.

When we get older, remembering can become quite an effort. Two of the church’s more “seasoned” members were discussing the problems of growing older. One commented, "The worst thing is when your memory starts to go. I've known you all my life, and I can't think of your name. What is it?" The second member thought for a moment and said, "Do you need an answer right now?" We worry that we will forget. And in forgetting, that something essential will be lost.

Something new

            Our brains are wired to remember. It is an amazing survival skill. A smell, a sound, a song, a taste, a touch, a color, a view can all evoke a memory. Sometimes so strongly, it’s almost as if we are carried back in time. Emotions and the other senses relive the moment with all its joys or all its pains. It is a gift that can become a trap. When the memory displaces the present and the past erases the future, the gift becomes a curse. Instead of giving us landmarks to guide our movement through life, our memories become anchors that tie us down to a particular moment and life moves on without us. God does not intend us to be people who life leaves behind. Rather God intends us to live life fully, to be part of the future as well as the present and the past. It’s interesting to note God’s resistance to our shaping our lives around what has been to the exclusion of what will be. As God reminds Israel through the prophet Isaiah who q is and who they are as q’s redeemed people by recalling the events of the Exodus, God gives the instructions: “Do not remember the former things, or consider the things of old. I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?[1] The past is to be what focuses us on the future – God’s future.
            As Peter, James & John witnessed the Mt. of the Transfiguration the past, present, & future all coming together & Peter wanted to build a memorial there so they could capture the memory, if not the moment, the word was “no.” This was not to be a moment to anchor people to, but a gate to the future God was unfolding.
            In today’s’ reading as John gives his word of hope to an oppressed church, it is a word that speaks of recreation rather than a return to the good-old-days. In the future that springs from our past, all that makes the present difficult and painful will be transformed. Every tear will be wiped away. Death will be no more. Mourning and crying and pain will be no more.

What a gift that is when you realize that some of our memories take life from us. The pain can poison our outlook to the point that bitterness and resent become the hallmarks of the lives we live, will be no more. Our memories that become nightmares we relive to the point life is too painful to endure and all we want is for it to stop, will be no more. What we wouldn’t give for a healing touch to erase or at least contain those memories. The word of grace is that God has chosen to walk among us. To reach out with a healing touch for our hearts, our minds, our souls; to take the pieces of our lives and reweave into something new.

Conclusion.

God has shared some incredible memories in the lives of the people we will name today along with all the others we hold in our hearts. Those memories are a gateway to the future God is unfolding in our lives. We remember, not to avoid what is or even what will be. We remember so we can face life with all the grace, dignity, and courage with which our memories bless us.

We don’t do this alone. As Eugene H. Peterson writes in The Message: “I heard a voice thunder from the Throne: “Look! Look! God has moved into the neighborhood, making his home with men and women! They’re his people, he’s their God.” God is in the neighborhood shaping & reshaping our lives into some thing new. Some thing that will take all of our past & transform it into God’s future.

Today we remember so that we might recognize this new thing that God is doing.
[8:30 – move to communion]
[10:45 – hymn: “This is a Day of New Beginnings”]