Then we moved to All Saints Sunday, a feast transferred, a time in which we celebrated the famous faithful, the faithful but unknown, all saints-living and dead. The circle widened and the symbols multiplied. We poured wine into the chalice but also water into the baptismal font. Bread was still held up to heaven, but brand new Christians rose from the water ready to receive it.

A healing liturgy and Eucharist was offered in the Meditation Chapel Wednesday morning while hundreds of Acadmey children and adults gathered for Chapel in the church. Thursday afternoon the school was emptied of students and vendors pulled their trucks up to the doors to fill Saint James with furniture, silver, paintings, antiques and toys. The Patrons Christmas Shoppe began with a feast for the vendors and what seemed like a hundred volunteers moving as one. A hundred hearts worked together to benefit our mission of not only educating children but forming them into Christian human beings who are learning to love the Lord and to serve others.

Friday afternoon a call came to the parish office. Arrangements were made for a grave-side liturgy next Wednesday for Polly Riggs. Bulletins were printed a wedding, a funeral and this morning's three services of Communion. The halls of the Academy were filled with hundreds of chatting shoppers while the parish library hosted a retreat for those who have been participating in our Alpha program.

The office staff waded through the crowds in the lobby and went home as candles were lit for the wedding rehearsal in the church over which I presided at four. The rehearsal dinner was in White Marsh by which time your other clergy were attending a gathering in Parkton to celebrate the arrival of new grandchild at a parishioner's home.

Yesterday we buried Birdie Partridge who had received communion at this rail more times than we could count or remember. Each Advent he would stand with Mary, and work with others, raising garlands and hanging wreaths. The greening of the church will still go on. But Birdie's quiet smile and faithful hands will be missed inside the church. While he will no longer steady the ladder under this roof, Birdie has become one with the saints and angels that surround the church and firm up the foundations of our faith and remind us of whom we are meant to become.

In the proper preface at Birdie's funeral we were reminded that "For to your faithful people, O Lord, life is changed, not ended; and when our mortal body lies in death, there is prepared for us a dwelling place eternal in the heavens." That was the message of Christian hope at eleven in the morning yesterday at Saint James.

At four in the afternoon a long white limousine arrived in the church parking lot. Then the bride, and her party, including the limousine driver, stood in a circle in the Narthex, holding hands. We bowed our heads to give thanks, to replace anxiety with anticipation and to offer ourselves to God's grace. Rings were blessed, the couple joined, trumpets on the organ sang out "Joyful, Joyful" propelling the celebration out through the doors of the church; moving the congregation from the altar to the dining tables of the reception and out onto the dance floor as the music changed. We had prayed at the service that God would give Mary Beth and Richard "such fulfillment of their mutual affection that they may reach out in love and concern for others." And there was, George, the father of the bride dancing with his daughter and friends and family were filled with love for one another as they danced into the night. Affection, fulfillment and love filled the room like light, moved our hearts like music, and the dance went on and on.

Can we not see the presence of the spirit in these activities? Is there any doubt that God is with us in our living and our dying, in our grieving and our celebration? From the water poured on our foreheads to the dirt thrown on our coffins, the words and sacraments point to that which now we can see only dimly but will one day see face to face.

Do not worry about the details but lift your hearts to God. Let us not be like the Saducees who ridiculed what they could not see, and diminished that which they could not fully explain. We do not need to construct a puzzle for God that speak of seven brothers and challenge what Christ wants to tell us about heaven. We do not need a map to go to the place that God is preparing for us. We simply need to fill the font, bread the bread, hear the music coming from the throne of God, and dance 'til we get back home. Water and wine, love and hope will carry where we could not otherwise go. We do not need a map, but a dancing master. Christ is the Lord of the Dance.

Our God is not the God of the dead, but of the living, and in Christ all are alive- All Souls, All Saints, Birdie, Polly, Mary Beth and her wedding guests, the limo chauffer, and you and me. So let us give thanks, and dance. AMEN.