Will There Be Any?

Today, we read a lengthy list of memorials of those who have gone before us into the new life.

Appropriately, today's Gospel reading was Luke 20:27-38,

Some Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection, came to him and asked him a question, ‘Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, leaving a wife but no children, the man shall marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. Now there were seven brothers; the first married, and died childless; then the second and the third married her, and so in the same way all seven died childless. Finally the woman also died. In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had married her.’


 Jesus said to them, ‘Those who belong to this age marry and are given in marriage; but those who are considered worthy of a place in that age and in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. Indeed they cannot die any more, because they are like angels and are children of God, being children of the resurrection. And the fact that the dead are raised Moses himself showed, in the story about the bush, where he speaks of the Lord as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Now he is God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive.’

Thinking of all my loved ones, I decided to focus more on this reading by doing a little lectio divina.

In practicing lectio, I noted that the words, "like angels" jumped out for me. During meditatio, these words helped me appreciate the mystery as well as the promise of resurrection, and helped me get past trying to figure out just what being like an angel will be like for those considered worthy. Oratio is the time to pray, and I found myself praying a prayer of thanks that God would grant us such a wonderful future.
Even so, my old mischievous self couldn't help but drag into conciousness the prayer found in an old Jerry Jeff Walker song from Walker's Collectibles, 1974.

Will There Be Any up in heaven
Will There Be Any I've got to know
Will There Be Any up in Heaven
Lord before I go I've got to know
Well, we're on our last legs as you can see Lord

so we're down to the bendin' end as they say
we just wanted to check out and find out
is everything gonna be in the middle
not too far, not too short, not too big,
not too early... right on time.
is everything gonna be right up... there.

Will There Be Any up in heaven
Will There Be Any I've got to know
Will There Be Any up in Heaven
Lord before I go I've got to know

I hope they were asking if there will be any Lone Star beer, but I kinda doubt that was what they were thinking.