13 Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, "Who are these, robed in white, and where have they come from?" ¹⁴ I said to him, "Sir, you are the one that knows." Then he said to me, "These are they who have come out of the great ordeal; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. ¹⁵ For this reason they are before the throne of God, and worship him day and night within his temple, and the one who is seated on the throne will shelter them. ¹⁶ They will hunger no more, and thirst no more; the sun will not strike them, nor any scorching heat; ¹⁷ for the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of the water of life, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes."

No one wants to talk about death. Very few of us even want to really deal with it. We don’t say that our loved one is dead, we say they ‘passed away’; caskets have become appear to be the most comfortable bed that you have ever seen, so that when a viewing takes place (with all of the makeup appropriately affixed), it looks as if the person who has died is merely sleeping. How many of us have heard the line at a viewing in regards to someone who has died, that "they look so good"? For so many of us we view death as an ending, as a definitive ending. The way that we crafted those opening stages of the grieving process as they take place through the funeral, it feels like we are trying to prolong this stage of life.

That’s what makes this passage so interesting because it approaches death from a position of life. We hear that line, "Who are these (people), robed in white", and we don’t think about death. We don’t think about those robed people who are worshipping and celebrating God as having died. They are alive! We hear that they have been washed in the blood of the lamb, freed of all of their wounds, wanting for no earthly thing. They are whole. They have been freed. We don’t think of them as having died.

But they have. Those individuals of every tongue and every race, who are spoken of as so numerous that it is impossible to count them all, each of them has faced what we call death. Each of them has died. And yet now, here they are, described to us as alive, taking their place among the saints.

It is because of this passage, and others like it, that I feel absolutely compelled to preach about days like All Saints Day. Unfortunately, and maybe it’s always been this way, but it is certainly this way now, we tend to forget, misunderstand, lose sight of, (take your pick, because it depends on the individual) the fact that death is a part of life. Death is the moment when we transition from this existence (what the passage refers to as ‘the great ordeal’), to the time beyond time when we are able to stand before the throne, being made whole, freed to begin the next stage of life.

Too many of us live lives that exhibit the ethic that this temporal world is all that there is. Even those of us in the family of faith, we have a hard time trusting in the promises that have been made through the actions of Jesus Christ.

But the promises do exist, and so does the life eternal. This world, this life, is not everything. There is more! The Saints of God, those who are spoken of in our passage this morning as wearing those white robes, they understand that there is more. Those saints include our friends, our neighbors, our aunts and uncles, grandmothers and grandfathers, mothers and fathers, sons and daughters. These Saints of God, those who have gone through this life, including the facing of death, they stand together, alive, alive in a new way; alive in a way in which they are able to watch over us imploring us to trust, not only that they have been made well, but that the promises of God for a life after the transition of death are for us, our children, and our children’s children. In the midst of the loss that we feel, it can be so difficult to remember that promise, but the promise is there and the life spoken of in that promise is for each of us. Life includes death, but death does not end life.

My grandmother, whom I spoke of a few weeks ago, began the process of actively dying in my senior of college. The phone calls that I had with my parents carried centered around how she was doing until it got to the point that they said that I (and my brother who was in school in Wisconsin) needed to come, because it was time. I was able to get home, and actually had a very good (albeit short) conversation with her. She did not leave her bed. Death was coming. Everyone, including my grandmother, knew it.

After a day or so of just waiting, my parents told my brothers and I to get out of the house, head to the mall and go see a movie. We packed up, said our good byes to grandma and left. My parents then went upstairs to rest, listening to grandma through a portable monitor. At that point my grandma hadn’t spoken in almost two full days. Breathing was all she could do, and even that was labored.

Not long after laying down, both of my parents began to hear a rustling on the monitor. Then they heard a voice. It was my grandmother’s: strong and vibrant, "Lord, I’m ready". They rushed down the stairs to my grandmother’s bedroom. She had died, but she was not dead, she had instead joined the chorus of the saints, robed in white, beginning the life that continues on now and forevermore.

There have been a few other moments when my grandmother has reminded us of the fact that she is still alive, and each of those reminders strengthens my trust in the promise that death is not an ending, and while I do miss her, I know that there will come a time when we will be reunited in a new way. I hold on to that promise. I hold on to that truth. I hold on to the reality that through Jesus each and every one of us has the opportunity to be made well.

I hope that as you think of and remember those whom you have loved in your life who have died, that you are able to remember, know, and trust that through Jesus, they have been made well. As we hear in our passage, the number before the throne was so great that it was unable to be counted. Death is part of life: it does not end it. Believe in the saints who watch over us. Believe in the God who has made them well.

Holy and Gracious God, through the sacrifice of Your son, those who die have the opportunity to live, live in Your presence, for eternity. We thank You for this wonderful gift and ask that we might be granted the ability to not only hear that promise, but the faith to trust in it forevermore. God, death is not an ending for in You, it is merely the transition point to life eternal. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.