Remembrance
Hiking, bowling, going to a movie, playing mini-golf, swimming, camping… over the past 31 years, August 23 has been a day of escape from routine and for the most part, from other people, for my parents and me. August 23, 1994 was the day my family suffered the ripping away of my younger sister to her heavenly home. Some people use the word “passing” or try to use the euphemism of someone being “lost”, but I defiantly refuse to make her bike/car accident something so tranquil-sounding, and I know without a doubt in my heart where she is, so she couldn’t be lost. But every “anniversary” of her death, my parents and I set aside time to just be together and to do something in remembrance of her: something that she used to find pleasure in and would have enjoyed doing with us.
Tish Harrison Warren mentions how the sacrament of communion too is done “in remembrance of Jesus”, and she comments how it’s the most ordinary of acts. This resonated with me because it’s not just when that date rolls around on the calendar that I remember my sister and her life, it can also be the most regular thing that makes me think of her. While we were camping this past weekend, I made a couple boxes of macaroni and cheese for lunch, and it brought back video reels in my mind of Emily and me as we ate that countless times for lunch growing up.
One of her favorite things to play was “Sloppy Lady, Neat Lady”. One of us would be the prim and proper consumer of our delicacy of noodles and powdered cheese, wiping her mouth with a napkin politely after carefully putting a spoonful of two or three noodles into her mouth. She would glance up occasionally, aghast at her meal companion, who was shoveling in giant spoonfuls, some of it not necessarily making it into its destination. When you were the Sloppy Lady, all bets were off: you could talk with your mouth full, and you could consume your food with abandon. For me, when I tilt that blue Kraft macaroni and cheese box, inevitably a bundle of fond memories come tumbling out into my boiling pot of water along with those noodles.
I could share countless stories of ordinary, regular, silly, seemingly trivial instances over the past three decades where I find myself tearing up, sometimes bawling, or laughing about times we had together that bring to mind my beautiful, full-of-life sister. To make my connection to a spiritual element: Jesus chose something that each of us do every single day of our lives that should make us think about Him and His life and sacrifice - consuming bread and drinking a beverage. We don’t have to change our rhythms or perform a special ritual to be turning our hearts and minds toward our Savior. Just like when I turn my vehicle onto the street where my sister’s accident occurred, astonishingly and appropriately called “Remembrance”, thoughts of what happened “so long ago…” can instantly resurface. We need that same sort of “bring me back to that” kind of sensation in our Christian walk when we meet at the Communion table.
Let us take those Sunday morning moments seriously when we watch our pastor break the loaf of bread. Watch the crumbs fall and make a mess onto the pristine table. See the ordinary loaf of bread become a representation of our salvation as we hear those precious and sacred words echoing and watch those actions imitating Jesus Christ Himself. Watch as the pastor pours out the grape juice from the pitcher to the cup and think of His blood being poured out as a sacrifice for us: that ordinary liquid becomes our lifeline to reunification with our Heavenly Father. What a powerful and simultaneously everyday picture of the ultimate goal of Jesus’ incarnation here on earth!
