Sermon, Proper 8, Year B 2024
We are an alleluia congregation.
Throughout the year, except during the season of Lent, the last word we share as we head out the door each week is “Alleluia!” Despite the directions of the prayer book and our bishops, who all remind us that alleluia is only to be added to the dismissal during the Season of Easter, our last word every Sunday is “Alleluia!” When Bishop Shannon visited us several years ago, I warned him ahead of time that we would be following our custom and that alleluia would be our last word. He looked taken aback, but then he laughed and gave our out of season alleluia his blessing. Because think about it! What bishop wouldn’t want every church in his or her diocese to be an alleluia congregation?
Although they hold within them the sorrows of the world, today’s readings remind us that resurrection waits after every ending, with the promise of new life to come. In the end, the alleluias win.
Today’s readings are full of people who suffer, but who can still hear, even in the worst of times, at least a faint alleluia.
They pay attention to what seems to be almost impossible to hear, like the faint song of a bird that you’ve been waiting for, and you’re pretty sure you might have just heard it over there deep in the woods, or the remembered voice of a loved one floating into your heart, or a snatch of melody of a song that never fails to carry you off to a different place. The people in today’s readings, who hear the loud voices of despair crying out from the depths of their hearts, choose to listen for those faint alleluias that they hear off in the distance, the alleluias that they aren’t even sure that they hear at all.
And so let these people be our companions today—a man speaking in the reading from Lamentations, living in a place like Gaza, a country brought to its knees by a military occupation, the cries of starving children and dying people surrounding him. This man sits in silence and hears, beyond all those sounds of suffering, a steadfast, faithful voice of love, whispering mercies that are to come.
In the psalm, King David is brought low, and all he can do is cry and wail (King David was good at that) and beg for mercy, but he too hears a hint of joy floating through his faithful despair.
In the gospel, a woman is sick with such an awful disease that even her community won’t have anything to do with her. She hasn’t found help anywhere, and yet, she has heard about this healer, Jesus, she has heard alleluia things about Jesus, and so she follows Jesus through a crowd, simply hoping to touch him, having the faith that simply touching him will make her well.
A desperate parent’s child is about to die, and the mourners are already gathering, but even in his immobilizing grief, this parent runs for help to the one who has brought healing to others.
When Jesus finally gets to the girl, who has died, the first thing he does is to ask the mourners why they are making such a loud commotion.
“Get out!” he tells them, “and take all your wailing and mourning with you.” He knew that their loud commotion could keep the others from hearing his voice. Once these loud people have left, Jesus, his three disciples and the parents of the girl can gather around her bed in silence.
In the quiet, they can hear hope over the thudding in their hearts, and when Jesus speaks to the girl in what I imagine was a gentle whisper that would not alarm a child, they can hear him say to her, “Little girl, get up.”
And then, I love this part, Jesus, always practical, tells them to give her something to eat when she gets up and starts walking around. This girl needed food to regain her strength and to start the new life that Jesus had so graciously and mercifully restored, AND to give her some food was a great assignment for these parents who were so completely overcome by amazement that I imagine that they were just standing there frozen. They must have invited Jesus to stay, and they sat down around the table and ate together in a joyous celebration.
Eating is almost always a part of any big celebration. Retirement banquets, Thanksgiving, Christmas, birthday parties, even tail gate parties at games—what would any great celebration be without food?
And so, in our faith tradition, we come to God’s table every Sunday to celebrate, to give thanks and praise, to join with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven so that we remind ourselves all over again that Jesus is already present in our midst.
And this is no typical celebration, for we are celebrating not just some special occasion in life, but we are celebrating life that death cannot end, life beyond this life, life beyond death. We are celebrating resurrection life, as we gather round the table not just with those of us here, but with all of those we’ve loved who have gone before us, those who are already seated at the table that God has prepared for us since the beginning of time.
Resurrection life, as you’ve heard me say many times, doesn’t start when we die. Resurrection life begins new every morning, thanks to God’s faithfulness to us. That fact, that weeping may spend the night, but joy comes in the morning, is what we celebrate every time we come to God’s table.
But God knows that especially here, at this table, sometimes we can barely hear the alleluias of the far off hymn that hails a new creation, as the old hymn puts it. And so God wants us to bring our weeping, if we are in a weeping time in our lives.
God invites us to bring our silent despair, bringing nothing but our tears, if despair is what we’ve got to bring to the table.
God hears our desperation, as we intercede at this table for someone we love, or as we pray with hope for our own healing.
God welcomes our sorrow for the things that we have done or left undone that have brought even more misery into the world.
God delights in our joy, when we can look back on our lives and see how God has brought us back from the edge of the grave, and we bring our joy and thanksgiving to the table.
Wrapped around everything we bring to this table is God’s mercy, and God’s steadfast love, and God’s faith in us. And so we come in faith. And we come in hope. We come to this table because it is at this table that we can always hear, if we listen, the music of alleluias, maybe faintly, maybe pulsing like the heartbeat thrumming through our bodies.
Alleluia. The cry of faith, the essence of hope, the sound of joy, the defiant shout even in the face of death—”All of us go down to the dust; yet even at the grave we make our song: Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.”
We are an alleluia congregation. This day of ending is also a day of resurrection, a day of new beginnings for all of us. No wonder this place echoes with alleluias, for alleluia is the word that that has rung down through the ages, whispered and spoken out and shouted in joy and in even in doubt by the faithful.
Alleluia, the word that is sung out in heaven.
Alleluia for all that has been, alleluia for all that is, alleluia for all that will be. Alleluia, alleluia, Go in peace to love and serve the Lord.
Thanks be to God. Alleluia, alleluia.