Pastor's Corner

This Sunday is All Saints’, when we speak aloud the names of those who have died in the past year. One by one, we say their names, and after each name, a bell rings. It is a simple act, yet one of the most powerful moments we share as a congregation. The ringing of that bell on All Saints' carries memories, loss, and hope. It reminds us that our story is tied up in something much larger than the years of our earthly life.

There is an old maritime tradition that captures this beautifully. When a baby was born onboard a ship at sea, far from any church or home port, the crew would baptize the child using the ship’s bell. The bell, commonly used to mark the hours of the workday, signal a change of watch, or summon sailors to their duties, would be turned upside down and filled with water. For that moment, the bell stopped being ordinary. It cradled a child, held the waters of "regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit" (Titus 3:5), and became the vessel through which the Triune name--Father, Son, and Holy Spirit--was spoken over a new child of God (Matthew 28:19).

Afterward, the bell was dried and returned to its everyday purposes. It once again rang to mark ordinary time: morning and evening, beginning and ending, birth and death. But everyone who heard it would remember that baptismal water, baptismal name, and baptismal promise.

In the same way, when we ring the bell on All Saints’ Sunday, it marks time for us. Not the hours of the day, but the years of our life together. Each ring acknowledges that one of our own has passed from death to life. The bell does not remove our grief, but it speaks through it. It says: This person is not lost to us. They are with Christ, and we are still connected to them in Him.

We ring the bell to remember and proclaim. To proclaim that the baptized belong to God. To proclaim that death is not the final word. To proclaim that the communion of saints is real and unbroken. The sound lingers in the sanctuary just long enough to remind us that the lives we name continue in Christ, just beyond our sight.

So, when we gather this Sunday and the bell rings, we will stand in that holy space where memory meets promise, where grief meets hope, where earth meets heaven. We will say their names and give thanks. We will hear the sound that tells us, once more, that we are part of the great company of saints, those who rest in Christ and those who still walk by faith.

Thanks be to God, who gathers us all!