April 6, 2022

My father grew up in Bayford, Virginia on the Eastern Shore, where his family ran The Bayford Oyster Company. When my father was a small child, a man who worked for my grandfather took my dad down to the Bayford dock, tied a rope around him and tossed him in the water. That’s how my dad learned to swim!

Last week – roughly 85 years later - we spread my father’s ashes off that same dock, in that same water. The psalmist says, “O Lord, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting I am!” (Psalm 39:4) Trite but true: each day is a gift.

Also true: the greatest gift is your name written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.

“Merciful God, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who is the Resurrection and the Life: Raise us, we humbly pray, from the death of sin to the life of righteousness; that when we depart this life we may rest in him, and at the resurrection receive the blessing which your well-beloved Son shall then pronounce: ‘Come, you blessed of my Father, receive the kingdom prepared for you from the beginning of the world.’ Grant this, O merciful Father, through Jesus Christ, our Mediator and Redeemer. Amen.” (Burial Service – BCP p. 505)