St. Andrew’s, Pictou, May 8^th 2005; Mother’s Day, 60^th Anniversary of VE Day; Ascension Sunday

 

Unending Change

 

Acts 1:6-14

1 Peter 4:12-14, 5:6-11

John 17:1-11

 

Sixty years ago today was a day of great change that gave rise to relief and spontaneous celebration: the hellish five years of war in Europe were now over. The Nazi threat under Adolf Hitler was now over: Hitler was dead, his armies defeated, his navy and air force destroyed as a fighting force; Germany had surrendered. There was world-wide relief and jubilation with Nazi defeat. Killing and slaughter in Europe had finally stopped.

 

Evidence of what had started it all: Hitler’s sickness, is found in his suicide note where he says that he died in “joy” at all of the accomplishments that the German people had done.

 

Victory was celebrated, but at such a cost! The world would never be the same again:

-50-61-100 Million people slaughtered for what purpose?

-6 million of them Jews, exterminated for being Jewish,

-families mortally wounded, or obliterated,

-millions maimed physically and psychologically for the rest of their lives,

-painful memories to be carried daily,

-beautiful art and architecture, cities, towns, villages, and homes destroyed for ever.

 

Who could ever measure the degree of change the Western World had endured?

 

I saw a German woman on TV recently telling about her mother being raped 25 -35 times a day as the Russian troops marched towards Berlin. “She was never the same again,” her daughter said. Could anyone even measure the suffering that this one innocent woman endured for the sake of Hitler’s madness?

 

The Globe & Mail has carried the number of dead and wounded each day as the war in Europe concluded on the front page, just as it was tallied 60 years ago. Every day we also hear the daily number of dead and wounded 60 years later in Iraq from suicide bombers, as the insane madness of humanity continues.

 

In contrast to human lust that seeks to destroy, we commemorate on this day, Mothers, for their care, the gift of life that was created and the life we have received.

 

We also have the word of God that seeks to create; we have passages of scripture that are full of change:

-the reading from the book of Acts tells of Jesus ascension to heaven,

-the reading from 1 Peter tells of the changes and suffering the people endured as the faith matured and spread,

-the reading from John gives us the words of comfort that Jesus gave to his followers knowing that he was to depart; the loss of his leadership is another huge change they must endure.

 

There is a theme emerging here: we all have to deal with constant change: sickness, death, job loss, political instability, threats to reduce the ferry service, 60 years ago there was huge changes to deal with, 2,000 years ago, Jesus and his disciples were dealing with all kinds of changes.

 

Folks, the process of life and living our lives means that, from cradle to grave, historically, now and forever, we human beings are to deal with unending change.

 

And if we in the process of living, in the past, the present and predictably in the future, have to deal with unending change, then if we are going to live well, the result will be totally dependant on how, or if, we deal with change.

 

We have to learn how to cope with change. In short: our lives are determined by the fact of whether we have coping skills or not.

 

We are not in control of these changes any more than that German woman mentioned who had to face the vengeful rage of the Russian troops raping her on their way to Berlin.

 

We don’t have any control over these changes any more than she did, but there is one area where we do have control: we have control over our responses!

 

We have control over how we respond to the changes, even if we don’t have control over the changes that happen to us.

 

We don’t have any control over what people think of us or say about us, but we have control over how we react to what they say. (Remember that we don’t know what they think!) We have a choice not to get upset. We have a choice over whether to be bothered by them or not.

 

As a wise person once made a statement to me I found helpful: “What other people think of you is none of your business!”

 

We don’t have any control over someone’s death, but we can respond to their death. We can honour their memory. We can grieve their loss. We can remember them with love and affection. We can talk about how they impacted our lives. We can do things that honour what they stood for in order to continue their legacy. And… we can let them go.

 

Now it is a natural and normal thing to hold on. Our lives depend on our ability to hold on, but here is a time to let go, every bit as much as there is a time to hold on.

 

As the unending changes of life impact and sometimes even assault us, all of our lives are like a continual dance where we either hold on… or let go.

 

The discourse that we read from the book of John has Jesus trying to help his disciples to know when to hold on and when to let go, when the changes of life take place.

 

He prays to God for help; a good place to start for ourselves when we need help with the changes.

 

But there is a theme in his prayer. Jesus keeps talking about God’s glory; Jesus living and our living have the express purpose of glorifying God.

 

The glory of Hitler’s 1,000 year Reich lasted 12 years, and was drenched with innocent blood.

 

Jesus’ advice to his disciples was about relationships between God and people that were to give us life and God glory; a much better system. Jesus’ idea was one of a communion of love and unity; a spiritual connection between God and humanity.

 

While it is true that human life is a series of ending changes, we have to say that there are also things that never change:

-we need to be loved,

-love is a power that heals,

-God keeps creating,

-God is love which lives and can never die,

-we need food, water, and shelter,

-we need each other,

-and then sadly and realistically, there are people and circumstances that will threaten our well-being.

 

The bottom line is that we need to be under girded with our faith in the unchanging love of God to deal with the unending list of changes that will assault our lives.

 

We need to be supported by what is “unchanging” to deal with the changes we will face.

 

60 years ago last Christmas Eve, my grandmother Laura Stewart went into hospital with diphtheria. She finally came home to 302 Fitzroy Street in Charlottetown, PEI. 60 years ago yesterday, she told her children that something special was going to happen tomorrow. (She was to come downstairs for the first time.)

 

60 years ago today there was a Victory parade in Charlottetown. My ten year old Uncle Charles fell off a float with an effigy of Hitler on it, was run over and killed. My 17 year old father was there and identified his brother. My 13 year old Aunt Audrey was in another area. I just found out this week, that my 11 year old Aunt Eleanor on my mother’s side was even there when it happened. The Stewarts and the Storey’s did not know each other at the time. My mother wrote her father in Halifax telling him about the accident, not knowing that she was talking about her brother in law to be.

 

This tragic accident changed our family forever.

 

My Father’s sister, Aunt Pearl who was working in Washington DC for the British government, quit her job and came back to PEI. Her first son was called, “Charles” after our uncle.

 

Today in Trinity United Church in Charlottetown, I placed a large basket of flowers in his memory: “beloved son of Laura and Cecil Stewart…, brother…”

 

My mother will be there with her Aunt Mary, no relation to Charles, his sister Audrey will be there with my cousins, Sharon and Irene.

 

Hitler’s madness has no bounds. The knife of evil cuts deep, and then there are the stories of all the families represented by the people on that plaque on the wall and on all the memorials and cemeteries all around the world.

 

Our minds cannot comprehend it all! We can never address it, but there is one thing for certain, and that is we must go on living ourselves; it is our duty to ourselves and our duty to them who died that we must go on and live in freedom, as best we can.

 

We can respond to Hitler’s madness by continuing to love and care for each other.

We can respond by believing in truth and freedom.

We can respond by forgiving each other when we need to do so.

We can respond for standing for what is right.

We can respond by teaching our children the stories.

We can tend the graves, remember them, tell their stories, and honour the lost.

 

With all of the unending changes we will and must face…

You may feel that there is noting that you can do, but we can still send flowers.

 

AMEN              Rev. Alan Stewart