August 15, 2003

Revelation 11:19-12:6 + 1 Corinthians 15:20-27 + Luke 1:39-56

The people who gather on this day in churches throughout this land are a people pregnant with God. Count yourself among them. We are a people filled with life, possibility, and promise. God is acting and living in us. God is anxious and ready to break out and declare that the Kingdom has come. Now is the time.

We are also a people who feel empty sometimes, who know bitterness, aching and longing. There are days when we barely feel God within us, and times when we must simply take it on faith that there really is life and wholeness and forgiveness. Yet today we remember that God has chosen us, sealed us with the sign of the cross and so we are joined to God forever.

Hope, Healing, Service, Forgiveness, Acceptance are ours to give and more besides, because these things have been given to us.

We call this day “Assumption.” We reflect on Mary, the Mother of God, the one the Church has since the fourth century called: “Theotokos.” “God bearer.”

The people who gather on this day in the churches throughout this land know also that this day is about them. For they too are, by her grace, and her acceptance, “God-bearers.” If we do not become so, the work of God will have ceased, and the Kingdom shall never come.

This day unites us to heaven, to heaven’s work, and to heaven’s queen. This day we rejoice and are blessed. For those who gather in this church today remember that God has done great things for them, and Holy is God’s Name.