Anne Gardner
May 29, 2005 - Church of the Good Shepherd
Second Sunday of Pentecost

Deuteronomy 11:18-21, 26-28
Psalm 31:1-5, 19-24
Romans 3:21-25a, 28
Matthew 7:21-27
 
I offer my words in the name of God who creates us, saves us and strengthens us:

The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
 
It occurred to me, as I sat down to write this sermon, just how many times I have listened to this morning's readings. The wisdom of the man who builds on rock and the foolishness of the man who builds on sand are lessons deeply entrenched in my Christian memory. The exhortation of Paul to the Romans that it is their faith, and not their works, that will provide their salvific safety net is a doctrinal platform I would wager feels familiar to most of us. And the poignant laments of today's psalm are some of the Bible's most searing and memorable prose -
In you, O LORD, have I taken refuge;
let me never be put to shame; 


Be my strong rock, a castle to keep me safe,
for you are my crag and my stronghold;
 
Into your hands I commend my spirit,
for you have redeemed me.
 
But just when I thought there was nothing new under the lectionary sun I ran across a sentence that felt new again. Something I'd read a hundred times before that suddenly stood stark and naked before me. Ours is a denomination that believes that scripture is a living, breathing organism - that God is still speaking to us through these sacred texts. So it was as if pulled by a lease that my head snapped as I read the following words of Psalm 31...

Take me out of the net that they have secretly set for me

Many of you know that my father is a veteran of World War II. That he, alongside side many other young and vibrant men, strode across the beaches of Normandy in hopes of bringing an end to a brutal and costly military campaign. My father survived this initial launch but a few days later lost his right leg in a grenade skirmish. I never knew my father as a lithe and limber young man, only what remained of him after his Normandy experience. To this day, my father remains reticent to speak of his time in France. My brother and I, even as young children, knew to tread lightly on such delicate terrain. But secretly we always remained fascinated by this mysterious part of our father's life. I would look into his soft blue eyes and wonder what they witnessed some sixty years ago. What it felt like to be trapped in that bunker. To wonder how close the enemy was or when the rifle would find its target?
 
Take me out of the net that they have secretly set for me
 
Many years later I would go to Europe myself, to live and study and stride across the same ground as my father had. But I continued my journey much further eastward, to the concentration camps of Dachau, the place my father had only dreamed of reaching.

When I arrived at the camp I was startled by what lay in front of me. I surveyed a plot of land, now almost devoid of any trace of humanity. It was a desolate piece of ground, contained by a rusted wire fence and strangely absent of birds, or squirrels, or any life in which a heart beat. At one end of the camp was a large building fashioned from corrugated tin. It had been the central command post for the Nazis and now housed a museum. I walked through it purposefully, accosted by an endless collection of horrendous images. I had seen similar pictures before and although troubled, I exited the display relatively composed. At the back of the camp was a small cement hut, the location of the gas chambers and ovens. But in-between were rows of barracks, now with only their foundations remaining. Only two barracks were intact, left alone so that people like me could see what the living quarters were like when the camps were operational. I entered the first building, now barren of anything but a handful of empty wooden bunk beds. As soon as I saw them I began to weep for carved into the soft pine flesh of the bedposts were initials. A remembrance of those long gone whose only mark, whose only legacy, was their truncated name. Those letters made it real to me. In the gouging of their names I suddenly felt the pulse of the prisoner.
 
Take me out of the net that they have secretly set for me
 
I suspect all of us know something about what it feels like to be a prisoner. To be frustrated by our physical limitations, to be trapped by financial distress, to be seen through the lens of narrow mindedness, to be beholden to other's expectations. That is why today's psalm is so very powerful. For it speaks to a universal human condition - to the pain and to the fear that bubble to the surface when the walls begin to close in on us.
 
Historically Memorial Day has been seen as an opportunity to pay homage to those who made sacrifices on our behalf through their service in the armed forces. But of course it's much more than just that. It is a day of remembrance, for those we have lost, for those who we mourn, for all of the things now absent from our lives. I have often wondered what it is exactly that makes this reflection so painful. What is it that we miss so dearly?  As I grow older I think I have discovered my answer. We miss the way we used to feel.
 
We miss how it feels to have a young body, to move through the world with quickness and agility. We miss how our heart would swell when we recognized our parents' pride - that gaze of admiration that pierced us after hitting the pitch over the fence, or grasping our ribboned diploma. We miss how we'd choke with emotion when our lover came into sight, or when our children would run toward us with their arms outstretched. We miss those stalwart friends no longer in our lives, the ones who made us feel valuable and treasured and remarkably irreplaceable. Of course we miss what is no longer, but I wonder if what we miss most is the transformation all of those things and all of those people made possible in us.
 
The Christian tradition is, in its entirety, one of remembrance. We remember the words and actions of Jesus in our scripture readings, we model our lives on the legacy He left us, and we celebrate - in the Eucharist - the sacrifice and transformative possibility that God offers to each of us. So often we are trapped by what is in here (pointing to temple). We forget how infinite our lives and influence really are. Step out of the net that others have set for you, and I beg you, step out of the ones you have set for yourself. It is this freedom, this integrity, that will be remembered long after you are gone. On this Memorial Day, remember that others will recall how you made them feel - loved and treasured and remarkably irreplaceable. Ours is a tradition of remembrance. Let us not forget it...