It always feels inadequate...

Today after worship, I led the funeral liturgy for one who passed from this life to life eternal last week.  These gatherings always feels inadequate - because, in fact, they are: there is no way to fully express the love shared between this man and this woman - this mother and her children and grandchildren - this saint and her church and the wider community.  No words can express the family's grief for the ravages of Alzheimer's either and how it continues to wound. No words can speak to the empty finality of it all. So no matter how hard I try, my words must necessarily sound inadequate to me - and others - even while attempting to share comfort, yes? Like St. Paul wrote in II Corinthians 4:

But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed—  always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.

One of the hard lessons of faith ways is trusting that this is true - my words or any of our words in times of pain and grief - can only be inadequate earthen vessels - jars of clay that point towards a greater love.  And all I can do in these moments is testify to that love and point towards it with the trust that God's presence is greater than my inadequacy. Not that I "phone it in," ok?  I've been to funerals where the celebrant tries to race through the prayers and get the whole damn thing over with all together. And I've been to those "rent-a-minister" affairs where the one presiding hasn't a clue about the deceased or his/her loved ones. No wonder there are many who are "spiritual, but not religious" given some of these ceremonies that only seem to make death worse!

These days I have to trust - and I consciously work at it - that if I do my part with integrity and faith God really has gone  on ahead and will do God's part, too.  And I think there is one thing more: I also have to encourage those who are grieving to stay connected to the community of faith.  To remain in conversation about the grief - and what follows - because we really can't bear such sadness well all by ourselves.  Yes, people do bear it by themselves, I see it all the time: but they rarely bear it well.  

No, to live into the encounter with grace that God works all things for God with those who love God and are called according to God's promises - and that NOTHING - neither death nor life, angels nor principalities, things present nor things to come, not powers, height nor depth nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God.... no, that takes a community of love who can become Christ for the other. Not just a pastor, mind you, but a community; a community of faith. Just imagine doing a funeral WITHOUT the resources of the community?  No hymns to open our hearts?  No time tested liturgies so you have to make it all up on the spot?  No sense that God's grace has been present in the suffering of others before us and will not let us go even when we feel like death is the final truth?

It feels - and is - inadequate, to be sure.  I think of what Kathleen Norris once wrote about her time in a monastery:  all the brothers were buried with the same liturgy.  No one, even the Abbot, was more elevated or important - in life or death - so the same words were prayed for everyone who died.  The same inadequate words that point to the blessing within the jars of clay.  In that, I take some solace even as I join my friends in their grief.

I prayed these words earlier - from the New Century Prayer Book - and they continue to resonate as I get ready to head out to jazz practice:

O God, whose days are without end and whose mercies cannot be counted, awaken us to the shortness and uncertainty of human life. By your Holy Spirit, lead us in faithfulness all our days. That when we have served you in our generation, we may be gathered with those who have gone before; having the testimony of a good conscience, in the communion of your holy church, in the confidence of a certain faith, in the comfort of a saving hope, in favor with you, our God, and at perfect peace with the world; through Jesus Christ our Redeemer. Amen.