Blessed Return to the Water and Land

I was honored last Sunday to preside at the internment of cremains of a couple married over sixty years who never had a fight that their family can remember. She died about five years ago and he just in April. Their middle son combined their cremains and we gathered to interr them in the rock garden he built overlooking the pond on his property, just as his father requested.

On a beautiful, sun-filled summer day the family gathered—sons and their wives and partners, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, cousins and in-laws of every sort. The golden retriever came carrying a big stick in his mouth chasing the yellow lab in and out of the pond. They shared memories and tended babies, cried and swapped stories about their aging parents. Everything was as it should be to honor the loves and lives which had passed from their midst.

We read some scripture too and prayed a bit…

"The days of man are but as grass; he flourishes like the flower of the field;. When the wind goes over it, it is gone: and its place will know it no more. But the merciful goodness of the Lord endures for ever and ever toward those that fear him. "
(Ps 103:15--17)

"As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? My tears have been my food day and night, while men say to me all day long, "Where is your God?" ….Deep calls to deep… By day the LORD directs his love, at night his song is with me—a prayer to the God of my life. " (Ps. 42:1-3, 7a, 8)

Almighty God, Creator and Sustainer of all that life, we come this beautiful day, in this gentle place of your creation, amid the warm embrace of family and friends to give you thanks, to mourn the loss and celebrate the life of A and to commit him and his beloved B to this earth of yours and to your eternal and tender care. It is at times like these and in places and gatherings like this that we feel strongly how small and fragile are lives truly are; but a hand full of dust and nothing more. But we come knowing that you love us even in our fragility, and in that love we rest secure.

Eternal One, you alone can alone can bring the sorrow and pain of our frail and fading hearts into beauty and compassion—flowering with new life. In these hours, turn hurting hearts once again toward you. In your Word may we know the beauty of this place, among the bonds of love shared here, before the awe and silence of death, speak to each heart gathered, the words of new life for which they long. In the face of death, re-kindle hope and love and bonds of family into the promise of new life. Lift us above all our distress into the beauty and joy and hope of your presence.

In the sure and certain hope of the resurrection and its promise of Living Water through Jesus Christ our Lord, in this place of water and earth, we give back to our God who created them, and us all from the dust of the earth, A and B. We give them back to the elements from which they were formed—ashes to ashes, dust to dust and trust them to the Living Water, entrusting them for all eternity to their Creator’s tender care. Today A and B rest from their labors. There good works follow them to the glory of God and in the lives and loves of all they leave behind. Amen.