Death is Nothing at All

PROPERS:          BURIAL OF THE DEAD                

PREACHED AT CHURCH OF THE RESURRECTION, STARKVILLE, ON FRIDAY, JANUARY 9, 2026 (Stuart Vance’s funeral)             

 

ONE SENTENCE:        Death is not an eternal loss; our friends are very close.

 

            We have all sustained a loss – a meaningful loss.

 

            Perhaps. Death may deceive.

 

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            I first came to know Stuart 33 years ago.

 

            He was a member of the early church crowd – a devoted group of early Sunday service worshippers here at Church of the Resurrection.

 

            As the new rector, I was invited into their fellowship.  After the early service on Sunday, we would regather at the old McDonald’s on Highway 12.  We called our gathering “McWorship”.

 

            It was a remarkable group. Stuart and Mike Vance. Sam and Jane Polk. Walt and Bettye Hillen. Bill and Sherley Richter. Vera and Fred Wiles. Ernie and Allison Russell. Tommy and Jeanne Wakeman. We would even see Jerry Clower there on some Sundays.

 

            Today we remember Stuart’s energy, vision, leadership, passion, and vitality.

 

            With the loss of Stuart, only Jeanne Wakeman survives. All were remarkable saints.

 

            Where have they gone?

 

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            A couple of years ago, I had the chance to speak by telephone with my friend and former Mississippi priest Tim Jones, who now serves a diocese overseas – in Wales.

 

            Tim had made some interesting comments on Facebook about life after death.  It is a subject each of us has speculated about – the specifics of a remarkable aspect of the Christian faith. I suspect that those of us who cling to Christianity have important images of the life beyond in mind.

 

            Tim had an interesting perspective.  His point of view is that we have misdefined death, and likewise, we have constricted our understanding of life. His point was this: death is not clinical death – such as lack of brain activity, cessation of heartbeat and respiration. Life – in some dimension beyond our ability to grasp – can continue beyond that state.

 

            One-hundred-fifty years ago there was a theologian at Christ College in Oxford, England – a position not easily attained. His name was Henry Scott-Holland. He was a profound thinker, steeped in the Christian faith. He, too, wrestled with the mystical life beyond this veil of tears.

 

            His reflections reached their fruition in a poem Death is Nothing at All.

 

            I encourage you to think of our friend Stuart – and all our other departed saints – as I read this poem:

 

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Death is nothing at all. 

It does not count.

 
I have only slipped away into the next room. 

Nothing has happened. 

Everything remains exactly as it was. 

I am I, and you are you, and the old life that we lived so fondly together is untouched, unchanged. 

Whatever we were to each other, that we are still. 

Call me by the old familiar name. 

Speak of me in the easy way which you always used. 

Put no difference into your tone. 

Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow. 

Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes that we enjoyed together. 

 

Play, smile, think of me, pray for me. 

Let my name be ever the household word that it always was. 

Let it be spoken without an effort, without the ghost of a shadow upon it. Life means all that it ever meant. 

It is the same as it ever was. 

There is absolute and unbroken continuity. 

What is this death but a negligible accident 

Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight 

I am but waiting for you, for an interval, somewhere very near, just round the corner. 

All is well. 

Nothing is hurt; nothing is lost. 

One brief moment and all will be as it was before. 

How we shall laugh at the trouble of parting when we meet again!

 

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            Until later, my friend.

 

  

The Long and Winding Road

PROPERS:          BURIAL OF THE DEAD                

PREACHED AT ST. PAUL’S CHAPEL, MAGNOLIA SPRINGS, ON SATURDAY, DECEMBER 13, 2025. (At Ronnie Miller’s funeral)

 

ONE SENTENCE:        Regardless of where life leads us, we can always “return home”.

 

            My first recollection of Ronnie is from 1970. I was a student at Meridian Junior College, and he was on faculty.

 

            I was a lowly freshman, and he was on the Fine Arts faculty.  He was also a Golden Gloves boxing champion. I wanted to stay out of his way.  I knew of him only from a distance.

 

            Little did I know what I would learn from him in the decades to come.

 

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            As I noted, Ronnie was on faculty – teaching classes, directing plays.

 

            On the other hand, I was a student – getting by on as little as I could.

 

            While Ronnie was being an adult faculty member, teaching classes and directing plays, one of my activities was serving as an announcer on our college radio station. It was not much of a radio station; it was limited to the cable system in Meridian. I was known as DJ the DJ – a moniker which has long-since died (may it rest in peace).

 

            It was 1970.  The Beatles were still around, though barely. One song that I repeatedly played on the station was “The Long and Winding Road” – written by Paul McCartney in 1968. It is a song he will not sing today. It is too emotional for him. It was the story of the challenges of getting to his love.

 

            But it had metaphorical meaning – then and now.

 

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            The Long and Winding Road. An appropriate image for today. For Ronnie. For you. For me.

 

            It is a profoundly biblical image, too. The travels of Abraham and patriarchs Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph – from the Tigres-Euphrates Valley in modern day Iraq, to modern-day Israel.  The wandering of the Israelites through the wilderness of Egypt, Jordan, and finally to Canaan for 40 years.  The exile of the Jews in Babylon. Jesus’ travels by foot through Galilee, Samaria, and ultimately into Jerusalem.  And, of course, Paul’s journeys through the known Mediterranean world.

 

            A long and winding road, indeed. None of it was easy. But God’s call was relentless.

 

            Ronnie had already begun his long and winding road. A native of south Tennessee, he had entered Mississippi College. He aspired to be a Baptist pastor – but life had other plans for him.  The riches of his life and wisdom would shape many others.

 

            The Long and Winding Road was just that for him – with many unanticipated turns. Classes to be taught. Plays to be directed. The death of a young spouse. Children to be nurtured. Matches to be boxed. New love and a new marriage.

 

            Yet, he stayed the course. Faithfully.

 

            Our lives would connect repeatedly as the road wound through the years. My life had taken a unique turn, but Ronnie continued a faithful path – traveling, teaching, molding, bearing witness.

 

            I would later encounter him when he had become active in the Episcopal Church.  The Church of the Mediator and St. Paul’s Church in Meridian, and later, St. Paul’s Chapel here in Magnolia Springs.  He had married Judy – whom I had known as a high school classmate.

 

            Our pathways would continually cross.  He had been faithful to the journey.  He was a rock – steady in his faith.  He would not veer.

 

            And here we are. Ronnie has been true to the long and winding road. We give thanks for his life, his steadfastness, his example. Ronnie taught us by example.

 

            Despite what life threw in front of him, he continued his journey.  It tells us a deep truth – no matter where life leads us, we can come home.  The road may be long and winding, but, if we allow it, it can lead us home – to the place where Ronnie has journeyed.

 

            Life can throw us many curves. Or Ronnie might say left hooks. But if we stay the course, or turn to the course to which God calls us, we can find home.  

Looking Toward Change

PROPERS:          PROPER 19, YEAR C 

TEXT:                1 TIMOTHY 1:12-17

PREACHED AT ST. PAUL’S, MOBILE, ON SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 2025. (My last Sunday at St. Paul’s, Mobile)

 

ONE SENTENCE:        Life’s direction can always be changed – to “The Road Less Travelled”.

 

            My first Sunday to preach here, last November, I began with a “point of personal privilege” to welcome my two grandsons, Wilt and Harris – who incidentally are here today.

            

            My reason is different today… especially since my daughter has observed that this may be my last Sunday to preach. That sounds ominous, doesn’t it?

            But here are my observations.

 

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            For most of my 38 years of ordained ministry, I have dealt with solving problems. Attendance… clergy behavior… budget issues… clergy placement… parish vacancies. I guess you could say that I came to view ministry with somewhat of a jaundiced eye.

 

            And then I came to St. Paul’s.  I had always been a bit skeptical of large churches. Bloated… privileged… spoiled… under functioning – those were some of the words I would use to describe large parishes.

 

            Then I was blessed to come to St. Paul’s – and those adjectives disappeared into the mists.  

 

            It has been my pleasure to see, especially, the many aspects of lay-led ministry.  I’ve watched as people organized meaningful efforts to touch people’s lives. I’ve seen the weekly ministry to deliver flowers to those challenged by life. The regular activities of Eucharists in homes, hospitals, and personal care facilities. I’ve witnessed the ministry of the Cracked Plates. I’ve seen the dedication of Daily Bread and Meals on Wheels.

 

            Gospel ministry, we could call it.  And that was just a sliver of volunteer ministry in this congregation.

 

            Then, the staff. The clergy staff, Jody and Brad, are like Joe DiMaggio – they make the hard ones look easy. Peggy and the choir make our worship sing in ways we wouldn’t otherwise. The lay office staff has been a pleasure to work with.

 

            And my thanks to a wonderful group of octogenarians who have welcomed Nora and me into your midst.

 

            Not bad, I would say, for a swan song.

 

            Thank you.

 

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            Rob Nichols, a fellow Mississippian now a priest in this diocese, tells the story of a seminary classmate taking the final, comprehensive General Ordination Examination during his senior year at Virginia Seminary.

 

            The test was comprised of short answer, essay, and some objective criteria. Open book and closed book. Some single essays lasted all day. Much like a Bar or CPA exam. It was aimed at seeing how much the student had learned during three-years in graduate school. Wags called it God’s Own Exam.

 

            As Rob tells it, one question was this: Who was the mother of Augustine of Hippo?

 

            The answer was obvious – St. Monnica. We had learned that fact during our middler year.

 

            But Rob’s friend was flummoxed. He did not know. Who was the mother of Augustine of Hippo?

 

            Indeed. He did not know. He wrote his answer: Mrs. Hippo.

 

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            Monnica’s son was one of the great figures of the early church.  Some call Augustine the greatest of all theologians.

 

            But he was not always so. Augustine lived an early profligate life in North Africa.  This was the fourth century. He was very bright – schooled in rhetoric and philosophy. 

 

            He was spoiled. He had a succession of concubines, eschewing marriage.  He was an adherent to pagan beliefs, especially Manicheanism, which saw the world as either evil or good, with nothing in between.

            

            It was during this paganistic period that he uttered his insincere prayer: “Grant me chastity and continence, but not yet.”

 

            One afternoon, when he was 31 years old, Augustine was sitting in a courtyard, and he heard a child’s voice repeating, “Tolle legge, tolle legge” – take up and read, take up and read.

 

            He looked to his side, and there was a copy of Paul’s Letter to the Romans.

 

            He read it, and life and the church were never the same. 

 

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            Augustine’s life was like Paul’s – not simple, righteous, or one-dimensional.

            In the epistle today, Paul writes to his close friend Timothy: 

 

              “I am grateful to Christ Jesus our Lord, who has strengthened me, because he judged me faithful and appointed me to his service, even though I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence. But I received mercy because I had acted ignorantly in unbelief, and the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.” 

 

            Paul knew a truth that Augustine lived as well – the pathway of our lives is never set in stone – nor is it ever beyond redemption. No matter where we go, we can always change paths. The ability of God to change lives is remarkable. 

 

            My ordaining Bishop Duncan M. Gray, Jr., observed, “No one’s life is a complete loss.  They can always be a negative example in a sermon.”

 

            But it is much greater than that. We can be transformed.

 

            That is one reason the Twelve Step Programs are so important – people can change and lead new lives. Healing can take place. Wounds can be mended. Broken lives can find new direction. We can emerge from the pit.

            And more. Much more. Paul, Augustine, and countless others through centuries tell us we can change. We can be touched by the healing hand of God. We, too, can find – and take – The Road Less Traveled. 

Guideposts for Decisions

PROPERS:          PROPER 12, YEAR C 

TEXT:                COLOSSIANS 2:6-15, (16-19)

PREACHED AT ST. PAUL’S, MOBILE, ON SUNDAY, JULY 27, 2025.

 

ONE SENTENCE:        Our actions and teachings as Christians should be grounded in the teachings of Christ and virtues described by Paul, and not in transient, popular movements.     

 

            There is an oral tradition which circulates in this part of South Alabama that describes a somewhat cynical approach to human motivations.

 

            It is said that the late restauranteur Oliver Wintzell, founder of Wintzell’s Oyster Bar, once ran for sheriff of Mobile County.  It is said that his campaign slogan was “I’ll stand for whatever the people will fall for.”

 

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            Regardless of your theological orientation, I suspect you can identify with that philosophy being used by some folks – past or present. Various movements have claimed adherence to the truth, but there have been times when those movements were nothing more than theology du jour.

 

            When I first preached here last November, I mentioned a book, The Kingdom, the Power, and Glory, written by Tim Alberta. As well and thoroughly as anything I have read he describes the golden calf many congregations are worshiping today. I suspect, while they flourish today, they will pay an enormous price in the future.

 

            False gods turn to dust.

 

            Our patron saint, Paul, issues a warning to the church in very clear terms in the lesson from Colossians today: “See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ.”

 

            That’s good counsel.  And fair enough. But here’s the rub. One person’s treasure is another person’s trash. Sometimes there is a difference between which course should be taken.  Look back over history. Ample examples abound. Wherever two or three gather, there are four or five opinions.

 

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            But I am not a nihilist or a relativist.

 

            Our choices are not the equivalent of options at Morrison’s Cafeteria. We are not left to guess about what we should do.  There are guideposts along the way.

 

            First and foremost are the essential teachings of Christ, also known as the Summary of the Law – to love God, ourselves, and one another with all our being. We affirm that wisdom in our liturgy. It is the core Christian admonition. These are more than words in a prayer book.

 

            Secondly, we have the scripture.  There are motivations that are verboten for us. Our lesson from Galatians four weeks ago quotes Paul: “fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these.”

 

         That’s a pretty good start. But the church – over the centuries – has designated seven deadly sins: pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony, and sloth. 

 

            In addition, we Anglicans can draw on tradition, reason, and experience.

 

            Can we agree that – regardless of our perspective – these directions and prohibitions are significant?  That we can guide our ministry and lives on these directions and these barriers?  Does your life and philosophy align with these?

 

            If not, you better think again.  Or you may need to look in a mirror and do some personal moral accounting.  Not because I say so, but because Christ, Paul, and the church say so.

 

            On which side of that ephemeral moral line do you wish to reside?

 

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            But here’s the upshot: No matter how despicable a person’s approach to life is… no matter how much you disagree with that person’s philosophy… no matter how liberal or conservative they may be… that person is still a child of God.

 

            We are under Christ’s most explicit directive to love them and love ourselves. Not with pride or a sense of superiority… not with condescension or judgement… but with humility. Just as Christ loved and loves us. 

Reversing the Trend

PROPERS:          PENTECOST, YEAR C 

TEXT:                GENESIS 11:1-9; ACTS 2:1-12

PREACHED AT ST. PAUL’S, MOBILE, ON SUNDAY, JUNE 8, 2025.

 

ONE SENTENCE:        The Feast of Pentecost expands the reach of God’s covenant to world at large.

 

         Picture this vivid scene in your mind’s eye:

 

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            Thousands of people – masses of humanity, from many nations, with many languages – are crowding narrow streets.  The one-mile square walled city of Jerusalem – literally a fortress – is packed for the sacred feast day of Shavuot. The festival commemorates the divine gift of the Torah – the first five books of the Jewish scripture. The Books of Moses.

 

            It’s like Mardi Gras is taking place on the eight-foot wide, narrow, winding streets of Jerusalem.  So thick were the crowds on the tiny, steep streets, you couldn’t stir them with a stick.

 

            The day would also be called Pentecost, but no Christians were celebrating the festival. The small band of Jesus’ followers were cowering in a closed and locked room.  They had seen what had happened to their rabbi on the last festival – Passover – and they didn’t want to be the next group nailed to a Roman cross.

 

            They were afraid.  The doors were closed. They wanted no part of the festival in the streets.

 

            Then, it started.

 

            First, there was a breeze. Then a gust. Then a whirlwind like the one that had taken Elijah into heaven. Flames appeared and danced on the heads of the frightened disciples. Their fear was transformed. They grew bold. Their spines stiffened. They no longer cowered. The Spirit had come.

 

            They flung open the doors.  They walked out… into the crowded streets. They were not intimidated by the mixed multitude… the hordes of humanity.  Language barriers did not matter. They were united by the Spirit. They proclaimed what would be known as the Good News.

 

            The story of Jesus Christ was loosed into a diverse world.  The Tower of Babel collapsed. The story of God’s love was meant to unify. Instead of a covenant with a chosen people, the net was cast into the waters of all humanity. It’s all in our second lesson -- the second chapter of Acts.

 

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         Today we celebrate the Feast of Pentecost. Fifty days after Easter Day. One of the great feast days of the church year.  The birthday of the church.

 

            But we have a curious first lesson – completely at-odds with what this day means. Consider this:

 

            In our reading from Genesis, we are told the story of Babel – not the computer software, but the tower. The passage seeks to explain why the known world, which has its roots in a small number of human beings, devolved into a mixed multitude with many languages.

 

            The story is that the people – speaking one language – aspired to build a great city, with a tower into the heavens. Their plans, it seems, troubled God – because there would be no limit to their ambitions in such a case.

 

            God, we are told, said “Let US go down there,” scattered the people, provoked a variety of languages, and threw the multitudes into chaos.  All to divide… and to spoil their plans of omnipotence. Confusion reigned.

 

            It was the divine wish to scatter the people. Compare that divine action to scatter to the story from Acts of the first Christian Pentecost.

 

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            Archeologists tell us that the remains of the ancient tower associated with the story of Babel can be found today in the ruins of Babylon, some 90 miles from Bagdad, Iraq.  It is symbolic of the arrogance of humanity in a part of the world where so much division and violence have been sown.

 

            But that was not the last word.

 

            Just a short distance away, in another country and city, we are given the example of God’s ever-expanding mission. Not to divide people, but to unite them.

 

            Four weeks ago, we heard the words of John, written on the island of Patmos, from his ecstatic vision we call the Book of Revelation:

 

“I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands.” 

 

            As Jody reminded us last week, words matter.  They can divide or unite.

 

            Unity is the reason we are here today.  That is the reason the churches down the street and across town gather.  It is the reason we do what we do and why they do what they do. Because we are all one people.  We are all God’s children. All. Everyone. 

The Kingdom: Here and to Come

 

PROPERS:          FOURTH SUNDAY OF EASTER, YEAR C 

TEXT:                REVELATION 7:9-17

PREACHED AT ST. PAUL’S, MOBILE, ON SUNDAY, MAY 11, 2025.

 

ONE SENTENCE:        The Kingdom of God, as embraced by John, is at hand – both the now and the future.

 

            We tend to think of the Christian scriptures – the New Testament – as something that came to us whole, in one fell swoop. But, in reality, the canon of New Testament scripture – all the books – were not listed together until St. Athanasius’ Festal Letter in 367 A. D. – 330 years after Jesus’ earthly ministry.

 

            There had been much discussion as to which books would be included. Ultimately, there would be 27 books. The last books added were the Epistle to the Hebrews and the Revelation to John – a portion of which we heard today in our second lesson.

 

            In seminary we participated in rotating groups which designed the weeks’ services for the academic community.  Each team was called a “rota”.

 

            We were discussing the lessons for a community Eucharist during my middler year.  One wag posed a question about the assigned lesson from Revelation and asked, “Do we end the lesson with The Word of the Lord… Maybe?”

 

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            Our second lesson is, of course, from the last book of the Bible, the Revelation to John. It recounts his ecstatic vision of God’s kingdom.

 

            William Alexander Percy, the Greenville, Mississippi poet, lawyer, and author, described John, the youngest disciple, in Hymn 661: “Young John, who trimmed the flapping sail, homeless in Patmos died.”

 

            John had been sentenced by Rome to isolation on that small island in the Aegean Sea, hard between modern-day Turkey and Greece.  There he lived out his life of seclusion, where tradition holds that he died as the last of the disciples.

 

            Tradition also holds that one gospel, three epistles, and the Book of Revelation came from John’s hand. Scholars are not so sure. Some other writer may have had the name.

 

            But in the Revelation to John we have what Winston Churchill said of Russia – a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.  It is highly symbolic. For 2,000 years scholars have sought to decode its images. Books and movies have proliferated.

 

            It still remains to be fully understood.

 

            But we know this:  It is a polemic against the Roman Empire of that day, and a vivid description of a Kingdom of God, including a New Jerusalem.

 

            John was a solitary figure on the island of Patmos.  When one is alone for a long period of time, the mind can begin to play tricks.  Dreams become delusions. The solitary figure is open to visions. Like prophets of the past, God may speak. The land on which one stands becomes a thin place – a place very near to the Holy.

 

            John had such a vision, and we hear a portion of it today.  He points us toward the world to come – with angels, multitudes of faithful, and ultimately, a New Jerusalem.

 

            As we age and face our mortality, we take great comfort in John’s vision.  That is the reason that portions of the Revelation to John are included in our burial liturgy.  It gives us a glimpse of the next world as we stand at the foot of the grave of a loved one… or we face our own.

 

            But clearly the Kingdom of God is about much more.  As scripture says, the Kingdom is at hand.  It is near to us.  It is both here-and-now and in the reality we will ultimately face.

 

            It is not a choice. We will not be a Christian in one and not another.  We can and should embrace both. We can live into Christ’s teachings and ethical mandates to enrich the here-and-now.  Where we are at this moment. The world around us becomes a better place for all God’s people.

 

            And then, when we cross the Jordan for the last time, we can share in John’s vision.  We can be a part of the divine mystery in which there is neither suffering nor pain, neither sighing but life everlasting.