Today’s Daily Lesson comes from Revelation chapter 14 verse 13:
13 And I heard a voice from heaven saying, ‘Write this: Blessed are the dead who from now on die in the Lord.’ ‘Yes,’ says the Spirit, ‘they will rest from their labours, for their deeds follow them.’
On Sunday we will celebrate All Saints at Broadway and sing the magisterial hymn “For All the Saints”.
The lyrics were written by Anglican Bishop William Walsham How, who was featured in the famous Broadway play “The Elephant Man”.
The tune is by Ralph Vaughan Williams and is titled “Sine Nomine”, which means “without name”, perhaps a reference to all the Saints whose faithful deeds went largely unknown and unnoticed save to God and to us who were blessed by them.
These are the ones who taught us Sunday School or math, guided us in music, counseled us through hard times, met and folded clothes with us in the community center, raked the lawn to get ready for the Agape meal, paid our way to visit seminaries, cared sensitively and with compassion for the one everyone else called “the elephant man”.
Their names are largely unknown to the world. But not us. And not to God. And, as the Lesson says, their deeds follow them.
Their deeds follow them to heaven; and they guide us here on earth.
Thanks be to God.
Ryon Price is Senior Pastor of Broadway Baptist Church in Fort Worth, Texas.
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