In light we see; in light we are seen.  The flames dance and our lives are full.  But as night follows day, the candle of our life burns down and gutters.  There is an end to the flames.  We see no more and are no more seen.  Yet we do not despair, for we are more than a memory slowly fading into the darkness.  With our lives we give life.  Something of us can never die: we move in the eternal cycle of darkness and death, of light and life.

Strength for Those Who Mourn
In nature's ebb and flow, Your eternal law abides.  As You are our support in the struggles of life, so also, are You are hope in death.  In Your care, O God, are the souls of all the living and the spirits of all flesh.  Your power gives us strength; Your love comforts us.  O Life of our life, Soul of our soul, cause Your light to shine into our hearts.  Fill us with trust in Your, and turn us again to the tasks of life.  And may the memory of our loved ones inspire us to continue their work for the coming of Your sovereign rule.

However brief may be our time on earth, O God, You endow our fleeting days with abiding worth.  We now recall the loved ones whom death has recently takes from us ... And as we remember those who died at this season in years past, we take them into our hearts with our own ... In this moment of memory, our griefs and sympathies are mingles.  Loving God, we praise Your name.

In Recent Grief
When cherished ties are broken, and the chain of love is shattered, only trust and the strength of faith can lighten the heaviness of the heart.  At times, the pain of separation seems more than we can bear; but love and understanding can help us pass through the darkness toward the light.

Out of affliction the Psalmist learned the law of God.  And in truth, grief is a great teacher, when it sends us back to serve and bless the living.  We learn how to counsel and comfort those who, like ourselves, are bowed with sorrow.  We learn when to keep silence in their presence, and when a word will assure them of our love and concern.

Thus, even when they are gone, the departed are with us, moving us to live as, in their higher moments, they themselves wished to live.   We remember them now; they live in our hearts they are abiding blessing.

The Blessing of Memory
It is hard to sing of oneness when our world is not complete, when those who once brought wholeness to our life have gone, and naught but memory can fill the emptiness their passing leaves behind.

But memory can tell us only what we were, in company with those we loved; it cannot help us find what each of us, alone, must now become.  Yet no one is really alone; those who live no more, echo still within our thoughts and words, and what they did is part of what we have become.

We do best homage to our dead when we live our lives most fully, even in the shadow of our loss.  For each of our lives is worth the life of the whole world; in each one is the breath of the Ultimate One.  In affirming the One, we affirm the worth of each one whose life, now ended, brought us closer to the Source of life, in whose unity no one is alone and every life finds purpose.