Memorial Prayer for Craig Miller
June 28, 1999

God of All
No simple word with you will do at a time like this. When we are into the matter of death and dying, we are in too deep for words.
But we still need to have our crys come unto you, confusing as they are.
There is a fearsome cry, for death is such a final unknowable matter, and each time we face it in a friend, we are reminded that it will be ours some day.
There is anger; anger that such a gentle, thoughtful person like Craig should have to fight a long battle for life with pain and capacity-loss hounding every year. There is our cry of regret; things we wish we had said and done and not left unsaid and undone.
But most of all, hear our cry of loss! Our friend and loved one has been taken from us. Our grieving flows like a mighty river as our remembering tumbles from one event to another .

Dear God

How well we understand that the liturgy composed down the centuries for use at the time of death was called a "Requiem"; how deep, at a time of death is the cry for rest.

God, shallow rest is no help at all. We need the deep rest that will embrace our fear and anger, our regrets and grief. We need nothing less than your rest. Because we don't want all the confusion that is going on in our hearts to shut off our gratitude for Craig's life, but rather have all that is going on in our hearts swell them with gratitude for Craig's life.

Hear our cry for the rest that is in you!
With these crys receive the offering of our act of worship, for we greatly wish ours to be a fit memorial.

God, have we sounded like we are praying only for us? While we do wish to lift each other's prayers unto you, Craig is also very much on our hearts. We give thanks that, for him, the fever of life is past. We lift our cry to you that you will receive Craig into you rest. And we pray that you will keep us in living communion.

All this we ask in the name of Jesus, whose life and death reveal to us that your hold on us is greater than our hold on you.
Amen.

And now, as our Saviour has taught us, we say...