A Day Not Promised to You

This afternoon I will stand in a cemetery alongside a friend as we remember and celebrate and bury her grandmother. It is a moment, I think, not just to remember the person who has passed away, but to reflect on our own lives as well. Here is something of what I will share this afternoon…

Before he retired, a friend of mine used to call me up periodically to say,
“Remember, today is a day that was not promised to you, but it is a day so full of promise.”
And that is what I want to say to you today.
Today is a day that was not promised to you, but a day so full of promise.
I am hardly one to speak, because I sometimes look too far ahead and worry too much about what just happened, but the truth is the only moment that we have is the moment right now.
Where you are.
With the people around you.
I am not telling you anything that you don’t already know.
But on a day like today…
At a moment like this…
Life moves a bit deeper or a bit more into focus than we sometimes allow it.
And so I encourage you to remember…
Today is a day that was not promised to you, but a day so full of promise.

The second thing I would like to say to you is this…
When I was young I had this picture of God as being somewhere up in the sky looking down to see whether what I was doing was good or bad.  Now I think God is more about compassion and kindness and forgiveness and peace than about rules or about good and bad. And, I think of God as that which connects us to each other and to the world in which we live.  An abiding presence with us all the time; inspiring us and guiding us.  Our lives are a mixture of joys and sorrows, successes and failures, laughter and tears.  And it is not that God is with us sometimes…when life is good or we are good. And not there sometimes…when life is hard or we are struggling to find our way. That which we know and name as God is present in all those moments of our lives, and is present even now.