"Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died." (John 11:32)

"It will be said on that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, so that God might save us. This is the Lord for whom we have waited; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation." (Isaiah 25:6-9)

Imagine for a moment, being in the center of a circle. Picture the people closest to you, those that automatically find themselves in the circle of your caring. Then try to extend that "God-line" of caring out to the various spheres of your life. Extend the line of caring out through the many people on the outskirts, people you don't know, and harder yet, people you do know, but would rather you didn't.

This morning we gather to celebrate All Saint's Sunday, a day to remember those who's line of caring extending in some way through out lives and touched us, making us more of what we were meant to be. We also celebrate those saints who were able to expand their lines of caring to touch lives far beyond their immediate circle. The saints of our lives are the ones that teach us the truth. They are the ones that remind us of the truth of these words from the musical, Les Miserables: "to love another person is to see the face of God.

We are surrounded by saints … look around you at one another … people of God; saints in your midst. However on this All Saint's Day, we come for a more difficult task: to remember those saints of our lives who have died. One January 28, 1986 President Ronald Reagan broadcast to the nation words of comfort to a nation that mourned the loss of the space shuttle Challenger crew. He concluded his speech with these words: "We will never forget them this morning as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and slipped the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God." He quoted in that speech part of a sonnet written by John Gillespie Magee, a pilot with the Royal Canadian Air Force in World War II. Magee was killed at the age of 19 on December 11th, 1941 while on a training flight in England. Earlier he had sent a letter to his parents with the words of a poem penned on the back.. He said to them: I am enclosing a verse I wrote the other day. It started at 30,000 feet, and was finished soon after I landed."

Here is part of that poem:

"Oh I Have Slipped
The Surly Bonds of Earth…
Put Out My Hand
And Touched the Face of God"
(Nigel Rees 1992, "The Quote . . . Unquote Newsletter")

In celebrating All Saints it seems to me that we inhabit a bittersweet oasis. We have truly seen the face of God in the love we have known in the saints we remember today. We celebrate their touching the face of God as they slipped those surly bonds of earth. And yet … we might also find ourselves with Mary, her words of accusation simply stated: "Lord, if you had been here …" Close friends of Jesus, a family loss?and words that only one intimate with Jesus would utter–in effect wondering where in the world he had been when he was needed most.

At our most honest, even as we come to celebrate those we name this morning, we still cry out like Mary: "where were you, God?" We do not yet know the reality of those beautiful words of Isaiah that talk of completion. Again, we live in that in-between place of loss and promise. Our list of saints this morning include a tiny little girl, who never got to draw in a breath of air, for Sydney Ann died in her mother's womb. As I held her in the hospital I found myself asking, where are you God? Our list includes young people: Greg who lost the fight with the demons of his life; William Strother killed in a plane crash–again, Lord, where were you? Our list also includes those whose deaths rest a bit easier for us–those whose lives unfolded according to plan, yet their loss is no less painful to bear. As we remember these saints, thank God we have Mary to teach us. To teach us to cry out in our pain and questioning and dare to ask–are you there God? I believe that to ask such questions are acts of hope–for in their asking, we claim, however feebly, that we believe there is a God who will answer us in some way, shape or form.

And as we cry out with Mary, we also know the hope of promise, and completion: Those words do not make our sense of loss any less; but they do hold out hope of a better day, no matter how trite that sounds on paper. They help us to see the big picture of God's love. A love given over and over again, one we know in the saving love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. It is that big picture that keeps us putting one foot in front of the other during the darkest nights of our grieving and gives us the courage to reach out anew–to touch the face of God in the love of another person. At the same time it is what helps us to celebrate the new life that our saints have in God–for they have slipped the surly bonds of earth and touched the face of God in ways we do not yet know. And it is the big picture that leads us to lives that are hope-filled and joyous, knowing that we are held and kept in the loving hands of God, and will one day know the reality of Lazarus, unbound by the love of God."

"And God will destroy on the mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations. God will swallow up death forever. Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces?.This is the Lord for whom we have waited, let us be glad and rejoice in God's salvation." (Isaiah 25)