Loading...Sermon April 2, 2017
The Rev. Rebecca S. Myers, LSW
The Church of the Nativity and St. Stephen, Newport, PA
Jesus began to weep. John 11:35
Six months after my grandmother’s 90th birthday in November of 1999, she died. She had broken her hip and while she came through the surgery better than expected, she died a few days later. We had had a wonderful 90th birthday party for her with lots of family. She had thoroughly enjoyed herself.
She had been living in a nursing home for a number of years. At the time, I lived in Harrisburg, which was 300 miles away from her, so I’d only see her about once a year. My aunt who lived nearby visited every day. My parents who also lived in Central PA visited a couple of times each year. Various cousins also visited occasionally.
As the day of the funeral approached, I was feeling quite sad. I kept trying to convince myself… you know how we do… becoming so logical about grief… “she had a really long life.” “She was living in a nursing home anyway and couldn’t get out very often.” “She seemed to have a good life.”
Finally, the morning of the funeral, I realized why I was so bereft. My grandmother had been a second mother to me. My own mother had a chronic mental illness and for the first ten years of my life, the medications for her illness were mostly ones that made you into a zombie. My mother often ended up hospitalized and at the time, as a child, I was not allowed to visit her. On those occasions, my grandmother always came to take care of us. And because I had a double bed and was the only girl, she always stayed in my room.
My grief at my grandmother’s death was grief over losing someone who’d mothered me. As we lined up for the procession behind the coffin into the church, I was trying to “keep it together” like we so often do. I mean, I was in my early 40s after all. But I decided that I just needed to let out the depth of my feelings about my grandmother’s death, so I just grabbed on to my father’s arm and wailed the whole way down the aisle. That felt so good.
In our reading today from John, we hear the story of Lazarus’ death. And we hear what is known as one of the shortest verses in the Bible and a very important one at that: Jesus began to weep. Jesus began to weep over the death of his friend Lazarus and the impact of that death on so many Jesus loved, especially Mary and Martha. Jesus came to earth in human form to experience all that we experience. In this verse, we know that Jesus experienced grief.
Now I don’t know about you, but I really hate to grieve and be sad. I get so tired of the crying. And I’ve also learned, that grieving is really important…especially important to getting through and moving to another place. There’s no way to shortcut grieving…we just need to go through it.
And once again our faith provides wonderful examples of how to grieve…it is a practice called lament. There is a whole book in the Bible called Lamentations, which consists of a number of poems of lament about the destruction of Jerusalem. At least seven Psalms are considered to be communal laments. (44, 60, 74, 79, 80, 85, 90).
I know most of us probably want a weekly church service that is uplifting, yet we also need holy, sacred space to lament – to wail, to moan, to sob – about the things about which we feel passionate grief or sorrow. These things are not only the physical deaths of people we love, but also so many other circumstances in our lives.
We may feel grief about a relationship that has changed. We may feel grief about a dream that we’ve had to give up. We may feel grief because we can no longer do the things we once could. We may feel grief that some things in our lives didn’t turn out the way we would have liked. We may feel grief over our political and social situations. We may feel grief about the injustice in the world. All of these are issues we need to bring to God.
We may think God doesn’t need to hear our woes, but the truth is, we must express our grief and lament to God, because that is what helps us to move on.
In our Lenten Parlor People series on forgiveness, one of the components that is necessary for forgiveness is to tell our story of how we were harmed. And that is true when we are grieving…we must be able to tell our grief…to lament to God.
When I put this sermon online, I’ll also add a link to a 4-page worksheet to guide you through writing your own laments to God. I’ve made a few copies and they’re at the back of the church.
Here’s the process:
1. Cry out to God…address God.
2. Name your complaint or the heartache, sadness, or anger you need to discuss with God.
3. Then affirm your trust in God. Are there times when you’ve experienced God being “on your side” or experienced the divine love and presence of God? Name those….
4. Petition/Request – What do you want from God right now? Name it.
5. Is there anything else you want God to know about this situation – any additional argument about why God should intervene?
6. Rage against your enemies – Bring any things or people who feel like enemies to you to God.
7. Acknowledge that God is listening in this moment. Ask God for what you need to feel heard.
8. Offer a promise or praise to God right in this moment.
9. What are you grateful to God for right in this moment? What attribute of God are you grateful for?
It’s an interesting process isn’t it? It’s back and forth in a way. Lamenting to God about something that’s just not right in our world and then affirming that God hears or God has helped us in the past or that there are things about God that we love or about which we are grateful. It’s also bold, isn’t it? Asking God for what we absolutely want. I mean, when my grandmother died, I really wished she could have lived longer; I still miss her even today, but that really isn’t a practical request is it?
But lament is not practical, logical or rational…it comes from the heart and soul. Our laments tell us more about who we are and what we care about. They also remind us that God has helped us and is still with us.
What today is filling you with passionate sorrow? What today do you need to lament? As you do know that Jesus weeps with you.
Amen
The Practice of lament: //www.practicetribe.com/category/lament/
How to write your own lament: //www.practicetribe.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/How-to-write-your-own-lament-handout-draft-2.pdf
Lament Table Liturgy: //www.practicetribe.com/a-lament-table-liturgy/ and //www.practicetribe.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Lament-Table-Liturgy-for-WEB-PRINT-V3.pdf
