The Christian funeral rite takes us through the valley of the shadow but does not leave us there. It confronts us with death, with the seriousness of death, and with its reign over human flesh. But it moves us to Him who has answered death with His own life, planted in the ground as seed for three days before rising up triumphant. This Jesus Christ has power to draw unto Himself all who die in Him so that death may not keep them -- anymore than it could keep Him. He promises with His resurrection not a virtual life or an eternal memory or even a spiritual existence but a new and glorious flesh like His and a real life that has no end, where no tears are shed, where no illness threatens, where age and frailty can no longer steal strength and vigor, and where hearts know only perfect peace, contentment, and joy.
The great hymns of the faith offer us not simply a remembrance of the musical taste of the dead but the sung refreshment of this faith and hope. With music the words are sung into our ears and out our lips until they can find firmer place within our hearts and minds. And when we cannot find the voice to raise, those around us gladly loan us their hope by lifting up their own voices in song, singing back to the Lord the very hope He has sung to us in His Son, our Savior.
The whole rite takes place within the Lord's House, around the Word and Table of the Lord. There we are reminded not simply of the life of the dead but how that life was nurtured and nourished by the Lord through His Word read, marked, and inwardly digested and His flesh and blood given and shed for us and present in this bread and cup set apart by His Word for His purpose. We look to the familiar colors of stained glass, the images of the faith all around us, the crucifix (and cross) where the death that killed death is constantly before us, and the place where hope was born becomes the place where hope is refreshed in the face of death.
But most especially do we return to the House of the Lord after the funeral so that we may be as near to those whom we love as is possible until the great and grand reunion when Christ dawns His eternal day. For there, right there, in the Divine Service the voices heard around us and the voices of the saints join with angels and archangels until only one sound is heard -- Holy, Holy, Holy Lord, God of Sabaoth! Hosanna in the Highest! Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord! Hosanna evermore! There gathered, the church in time with the church no longer bound by its constraints are one. Part of it glimpsing the future and part of it knowing that future even better than mortal flesh can know. Part of it seated at the Marriage Supper of the Lamb without end and part of it happy to feast upon its foretaste. How can we not find comfort here!
So on this Day of the Holy Innocents when we recall the youngest and first martyrs of Christ, we remember that the cries were not without answer. God in His grace did not abandon the mothers and fathers of Bethlehem to a grief unanswered or to the misery of hopes and dreams left unfulfilled. Christ came for the martyred infants and toddlers just as He came for their parents and just as He has come for us. The grieving and those who mourn find more than the remembrance of the past to console but the promise of a real future, a blessed reunion without the pain of any more death. For those who die in Christ live evermore. They have a future and we have something to look forward to as we await that day when the dusk and twilight finally give way to the eternal day. The Holy Innocents are not forgotten but they are recalled with a more powerful memory than the story of their lives or their deaths. They are recalled in the Name of Christ who remembers the dead by raising them to everlasting life. It is this life that we ought to celebrate for without it we have only the past. In Christ we have today and tomorrow. God, help us believe this.
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