Lutheran Church of the Resurrection

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On this Sunday every year, were read the names of all those who were members of this congregation when they died. Many of you cannot put a face to these names. You never knew them. Some we knew quite well. These are fathers and mothers, husbands and wives and even the sons of some among us this morning. Time has passed and the anguish of the grave has faded. Death has lost the sting that it once had. And we give thanks to God for that.

But why do we do this? Why do we name our dead before the Lord? Why do we place flowers at the foot of altar with the names of our loved ones on our lips and in our hearts?

We name our living before the Lord every Sunday in our prayers asking for the Lord’s to take care of their body that is ill or injured. We certainly don’t need to do the same for the dead. Their bodies are in the grave awaiting the resurrection of all flesh. Their souls are in heaven and they have everything they need and more than they could ever imagine.

So why has the Church been naming its dead before the Lord since the 4th century? The answer is, we are counting the spoils of victory. For Christ our Lord has done battle with the devil and has won the victory. And the spoils of His victory are the names we that we have just read aloud and spoken in our heart. This is the feast of victory for our God. Alleluia.

The devil held those whom we named captive to sin and death. Jesus described the strategy for battle like this. “When a strong man fully armed, guards his own house, his possessions are safe. But when someone stronger attacks and overpowers him, he takes away the armor in which the man trusted and divides up the spoils.” (Luke 11:21-22). The devil is a strong man. “No strength of ours can match his might. We would be lost, rejected.” The devil held every man and woman born of a mother and father captive to sin, death and his deathly power over them.

“But now a champion comes to fight, whom God himself elected. You ask who this may be. The Lord of Hosts is He - Christ Jesus, mighty Lord, God’s only Son adored. He holds the field victorious.” The strong man has been overpowered by a stronger man, the God/Man, Jesus Christ.

He has disarmed the devil of the devil’s only weapon - the guilt of sin that separates us from God and that leads to death. By His blood, shed for the sin of the world, Jesus has atoned for our sin, taken away our guilt, united us to God the Father and nullified our death.

I. The Multitude St. John sees the plunder that Christ has taken from the devil and describes it like this, “Behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages…” Even though this multitude of captives set free cannot be numbered, still we can single out a few who we know by name. There is Sylvia and Dick, Brendan, Elizabeth, Cliff and Olive, Aarne and Bertha.

We’re not talking in vague generalities here. We can name several of those present before the throne, like Hedi and Eva and Franklin, Virginia, Herman Robert and Gerald.

Standing before the Lamb of God, along with the angels, archangels, shoulder to shoulder with all the company of heaven are Gerda, James and Lynn, Ralph and Emma. All of these are the just a few of the uncountable multitude of the spoils of Christ’s victory over the devil.

II. White Robes

They are “Standing before the throne and before the Lamb clothed in white robes.”

In the beginning, the man and the woman stood naked before God and felt no shame. Where there is no sin there is no shame and we God as He is. Later, they couldn’t bear to let God see them bare. They were naked and felt great shame. They couldn’t stand to see God as He is, just as they were terrified that God would see them as they were.

They tried hiding from God but that didn’t work. They tried to cover themselves with leaves. That didn’t work either. Guilt and shame is not easy to cover up. Yet, even to this day, we still try to hide from God because we’re afraid of what He might see in us. Even to this day, we try to cover up our guilt and shame with excuses and by blaming others, there’s a lot we don’t want others to see in us let alone God.

“So the Lord God made for Adam and his wife garments of skins and clothed them.” (Genesis 3:22). If you want to hide your guilt and shame, God’s got just the covering for you. Interestingly, it’s God Himself who provides the covering for your guilt and shame. The official record doesn’t say what kind of skin it was that God made to cover Adam and Eve’s guilt and shame, but I’m going to take a wild guess that they were lambskin.

The eternal Word of God took on human skin so that He might cloth guilty men and women with Himself, so that they might not hide from God but stand before the throne of God and the Lamb without fear or shame.

What we’re saying here is that we are not honoring these men and women whom we have named because they were perfect. Time may well have erased some of the painful memories and the things we would really just as soon forget. They were human, descendants of Adam and Eve, just like we are. This is no place for funeral parlor talk. “He was always such a good man.” “He was the perfect husband.” “She never did anything wrong.”

Nor do we need to engage in such false pretenses. These clothes that they wear are given to them for the sole purpose of covering up all the filthy rags that they wore when they still walked among us. They have taken off their prison clothes and put on the white robes of Christ’s righteousness in their baptism. And as long as they remain clothed in them, they stand before God without shame. They see Him as He is.

III. Palm Branches

“And with palm branches in their hands, they were crying out with a loud voice, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb!’”

Remember that this is St. John recording what sees. John’s the detail man. He catches all the little details that others miss. All four gospel writers record the episode that occurred on the day that Jesus entered into Jerusalem on a donkey. But only John notes the palm branches in their hands. “So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying out ‘Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord…” (John 12:13).

They were like captives cheering their liberator as He advanced to do battle against their ruthless master. “Fear not, daughter of Zion: behold your king is coming to you…”

Now, as John sees the daughter of Zion in heaven, he notices that they are all still holding onto those palm branches that they were waiving along the roadside on Palm Sunday. Now, praising the one who came in the name of the Lord and who, by His cross and tomb has conquered the old evil foe.

An old funeral custom that has sadly passed out of use was to place a palm branch in the hand of the deceased in the coffin. A vivid reminder that this one shall be one of the “great multitude that no one could number.” One of victory’s spoils.

IV. All the Company of Heaven

“And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God.”

The prophet Isaiah had once found himself before the throne of God and it caused him to come undone. “Woe is me! For I am undone, for I am a man of unclean lips and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.” (Is.6:4-5)

But now, John sees men and women standing before the King, the Lord of hosts, singing His praise, every lip sterilized by that which comes from the altar - hot coals for Isaiah lips - bread and wine for yours. And what wonderful speech comes from those sanctified lips. ‘Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.”

The angels, the elders and the four living creatures. A multitude too great to number. Victory’s spoils every one of them. In just a few moments, we will claim our place in that multitude. We will join our lips with the ‘angels and archangels and all the company of heaven, and laud and magnify’ the glorious name of this God around whose throne we gather. All saints, the saints in heaven along with the saints on earth. All one, holy Christian and Apostolic Church. Separated only by the thin, fragile veil of time and space. They see Him face to face. We see Him under bread and wine.

“O blest communion, fellowship divine! We feebly struggle, they in glory shine; yet all are one in Thee, for all are Thine. Alleluia!”

And so we name our dead before the Lord. Not because we believe that they were good or worthy of such honor. But because we believe that the Word and promises of God are true and sure and certain. Just as true and sure and certain as the death of Christ on the cross that atoned for all of their sin and ours. Just as true and sure and certain as the resurrection of Jesus on the third day that set the prisoners free. Free from sin, death and the devil. Free to love and serve God with our whole heart and mind and soul and our neighbor as ourselves.

As we name our dead before the Lord, we should also be reminded that this is our destiny too, and that one day our name will appear on this list. We too will be called out of this great tribulation and will come before the Lamb on His throne, clothed in the white robes we received in our baptism, holding a palm branch in our hands, one of that vast multitude of victory’s spoils, and the only name that we name is the name that is above every other.

“The golden evening brightens in the west; soon, soon, to faithful warriors cometh rest; sweet is the calm of paradise the blest.”

“They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them by day nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd and he will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away ever tear from their eyes.” Alleluia!

Related Entries:

» Sermon - “Victory’s Spoils” - Revelation 7:9-17
» Sermon Index - Lutheran - LCMS
» Sermon - All Saints - “Saints - Holy Fools” - Matthew 5:2-11 - 11/4/07
» Sermon - Easter Sunday - “Sing Ye Saints The Victory Song” - Mark 16:1-8 - 4/16/06
» On Facing Our Death - Philippians 1:21-23
» The Feint Retreat - Luke 14:31-32

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