Read Joel 2:1-2 and 12-17
“Yet even now, says the Lord, return to me with all your heart.” (Joel 2:12)
*a portion of the following reflection appeared in the February church newsletter
They were full of questions. They wanted to know everything about the process: from the science and mechanics of embalmment and burial, to the kinds of conversations and decisions that take place when families arrive at the Chapel of the Roses. There was much humor amidst the somber atmosphere. Our tour guide, funeral home Director Cindy Nielsen told us how people sometimes like to be buried with things they found meaningful in their life. Last week, she prepared a body for burial alongside six cremated pets. She tells us how sometimes people like to be dressed in Hawaiian shirts or their sweatpants like they wore when their bodies were alive. Some want their golf clubs or fishing poles to accompany them in their caskets.
I and a group of students and parents from our church wander from the chapel out into offices and rooms behind the scenes. We examine a hearse in the garage and the students gasp as Cindy talks about the places where bodies come to lie as they await preparation. Later as we step into a room where families meet with the directors to select everything from urns and caskets to photo albums and grave markers, someone asks at the entryway, “Is this a gift shop?”
In a most surreal moment, our young Lutherans encounter the crematorium. They contemplate the bricks of the retort furnace and the brooms for sweeping out the ashes. Cindy encourages them to feel the sifted softness of cremains, which they do, with some nervousness.
Every other year, our confirmation group takes this tour. They acquaint themselves with death just as they do baptism, communion, and the Bible. They draw close to these mysteries as Martin Luther would have us do when he wrote, “We should familiarize ourselves with death during our lifetime, inviting death into our presence when it is still at a distance…” He encourages us in this way that the terror of death may have no power over us. Martin Luther believed that to flee death, to “abhor” it, was to flee God. If we practice this kind of contemplation, in our final hours we might be fully prepared to focus whole-heartedly on life, love, and grace, and the promise of the kingdom for we which we would have long ago left our fears behinds us. (see citation below)
I once contemplated my physical death for seven months. It was a project I undertook (well perhaps was assigned) as an intern chaplain. Maybe as a healthy twenty-something at that time, I could afford to consider who I would miss, what kind of funeral I wanted, what might happen to my body as it approached its last moments. And yet, I found myself surprised by the kinds of emotions that welled up over the course of those weeks. Next to a real vision of my death, all kinds of things began to feel unimportant. Other things became urgent. I tried to repair a damaged friendship and I spoke to my parents about their post-mortem wishes and presented them with mine. And I saw with a burning clarity the kind of life I wanted remembered of me.
“Remember that you are dust and to dust you will return.” On Ash Wednesday our tendency is to spiritualize our mortal deaths. We consider instead of the departure from our bodies, the death of relationships, or ways of being, or bad habits. These are good and necessary things on which we may focus. But what would happen if we did on this day, consider our physical deaths? How might we then live differently? It is our yearly invitation to be marked by a sign of our mortality. May we walk with courage to receive that sign in the full confidence of God’s love for us made known through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Reflection
What do those ashes mean to you?
When you hear the words “Remember you are dust…” what do you think, or remember, or feel?
What happens inside of you when you imagine the end of your earthly life?
Prayer
God of our beginnings and endings, guide our vision that we may see the world as it is and your promise of everlasting love and life as the hope or our lives. Amen
“Yet even now, says the Lord, return to me with all your heart.” (Joel 2:12)
*a portion of the following reflection appeared in the February church newsletter
They were full of questions. They wanted to know everything about the process: from the science and mechanics of embalmment and burial, to the kinds of conversations and decisions that take place when families arrive at the Chapel of the Roses. There was much humor amidst the somber atmosphere. Our tour guide, funeral home Director Cindy Nielsen told us how people sometimes like to be buried with things they found meaningful in their life. Last week, she prepared a body for burial alongside six cremated pets. She tells us how sometimes people like to be dressed in Hawaiian shirts or their sweatpants like they wore when their bodies were alive. Some want their golf clubs or fishing poles to accompany them in their caskets.
I and a group of students and parents from our church wander from the chapel out into offices and rooms behind the scenes. We examine a hearse in the garage and the students gasp as Cindy talks about the places where bodies come to lie as they await preparation. Later as we step into a room where families meet with the directors to select everything from urns and caskets to photo albums and grave markers, someone asks at the entryway, “Is this a gift shop?”
In a most surreal moment, our young Lutherans encounter the crematorium. They contemplate the bricks of the retort furnace and the brooms for sweeping out the ashes. Cindy encourages them to feel the sifted softness of cremains, which they do, with some nervousness.
Every other year, our confirmation group takes this tour. They acquaint themselves with death just as they do baptism, communion, and the Bible. They draw close to these mysteries as Martin Luther would have us do when he wrote, “We should familiarize ourselves with death during our lifetime, inviting death into our presence when it is still at a distance…” He encourages us in this way that the terror of death may have no power over us. Martin Luther believed that to flee death, to “abhor” it, was to flee God. If we practice this kind of contemplation, in our final hours we might be fully prepared to focus whole-heartedly on life, love, and grace, and the promise of the kingdom for we which we would have long ago left our fears behinds us. (see citation below)
I once contemplated my physical death for seven months. It was a project I undertook (well perhaps was assigned) as an intern chaplain. Maybe as a healthy twenty-something at that time, I could afford to consider who I would miss, what kind of funeral I wanted, what might happen to my body as it approached its last moments. And yet, I found myself surprised by the kinds of emotions that welled up over the course of those weeks. Next to a real vision of my death, all kinds of things began to feel unimportant. Other things became urgent. I tried to repair a damaged friendship and I spoke to my parents about their post-mortem wishes and presented them with mine. And I saw with a burning clarity the kind of life I wanted remembered of me.
“Remember that you are dust and to dust you will return.” On Ash Wednesday our tendency is to spiritualize our mortal deaths. We consider instead of the departure from our bodies, the death of relationships, or ways of being, or bad habits. These are good and necessary things on which we may focus. But what would happen if we did on this day, consider our physical deaths? How might we then live differently? It is our yearly invitation to be marked by a sign of our mortality. May we walk with courage to receive that sign in the full confidence of God’s love for us made known through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Reflection
What do those ashes mean to you?
When you hear the words “Remember you are dust…” what do you think, or remember, or feel?
What happens inside of you when you imagine the end of your earthly life?
Prayer
God of our beginnings and endings, guide our vision that we may see the world as it is and your promise of everlasting love and life as the hope or our lives. Amen
Martin Luther Quotion from: Luther, Martin. "A Sermon on Preparing to Die." Martin Luther's Basic Theological Writings. Ed. Timothy Lull. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1989. 640-41.
Again, as always, you feed my soul. I just today remembered to read your blog, and so I read all the entries including today's. It's not yet noon, and already I've been given food for thought to carry me throughout the day. Thanks a LOT Amy! :) I was anticipating an "escape" day, and now I'm challenged to examine my secret heart; put aside worries that come between me and my worship and love God; and contemplate my physical death. Whew! My senses are stirred and I'm unable to be complacent. You are GOOD! Love you! Janice
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