Patrick is now with the Lord. The apostle Paul, that Pharisee of the Pharisees who became a disciple of Jesus, wrote to the Gentile Thessalonians, the people he would have in his previous life regarded as dogs,  that through Jesus God will bring with him those who have died.  Elsewhere he wrote to the Corinthian Christian Gentiles: “We shall not all sleep but we shall all be changed In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump”. What are we to make of this?

My own understanding, and there will be others, is that in using the term sleep, Paul was indicating that our experience at death will be the same as when we fall asleep after an exhausting day, and the very next thing we know the clock alarm goes off and it is time to get up.

I suggest that we think of someone’s passing to eternal life with Christ like that.  In their consciousness the next thing they know after they die is resurrection day and the return of Christ and all other believers will be there with them.  There have been many testimonies throughout history of people who have seen Jesus at the point of death. Just think of Stephen, the first Christian martyr whose last words were “Look, I see heaven opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God”.

So what a joyous day it will be for Patrick. All those to whom through the support of thousands of others he has been able bring comfort, encouragement and help will be there with him – and us.

The expressions of gratitude for that help have already begun. Today we have heard only a few of them.

It is appropriate to draw on the Bible in remembering Patrick. He was first of all an evangelist, Bible teacher and church planter. He and Rosemary planted a number of new churches from In Contact Ministries in Plaistow, East London.

He wrote a book of devotional studies reflecting on the Scripture, entitled With The Eye of Faith. It can be sourced free from the Oxford Centre for Religion and Public Life website along with Lenten Meditations on the Lords Prayer and  two of his other books.

Our passage from Jesus’ final conversation with his disciples the night before his own death also speaks of the experience of death. He said: In My Father’s house are many ^[a]mansions; if it were not so, ^[b]I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. ³ And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.

Thomas, who founded the Eastern Churches who are represented here today, asked the obvious question “Lord, we do not know where You are going, and how can we know the way?”

⁶ Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.”

Patrick came to understand and commit himself to Jesus as the way, the truth and the life in his late teens. He also took very seriously what Jesus told the disciples to do while they waited for him in the meanwhile. “Where I am going, you cannot come,’ so now I say to you. ³⁴ A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. ³⁵ By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”

Patrick with Rosemary took Jesus at his word – they sought to love other disciples of Jesus, especially those for whom following Jesus, meeting publicly or even in secret for worship, teaching and fellowship meant risking their lives, loss of loved ones and loss of homes and property.

But they also, with those persecuted Christians, also had and have the promise of Jesus. ²⁷ Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.” Perhaps it was that promise that enabled Patrick to be so forthright, outspoken and brave in his work for the persecuted church.

This is why he could write in his meditation on the Beatitudes: “The Blessing described in the Beatitudes is gained during our time on earth – which is an in-between time, We have left Egypt, the land of oppression and bondage, and crossed the Red Sea, our conversion and baptism, but we have not yet entered the Promised Land, heaven. We are in the wilderness, a place of wandering, a dangerous place fraught with conflict, with gruelling hardships and suffering, and with many doubts and temptations.  But if we view the negative experiences with the eye of faith, we make them positives.  We discover like John Bunyan’s Christian in his Pilgrim’s Progress that the lions are chained. We realise like  Bunyan’s Mr Valiant for Truth that our scars are badges of honour, a precious witness to the spiritual battles we have fought in the wilderness, through which our faith has been strengthened and purified. We come to understand that the struggles of our wilderness journey are a blessing that enable us to grow in the knowledge of God and to still our restless hearts: thus they can, indeed bring us the bliss of the Beatitudes”.

And we have already read the words of Jesus: “Blessed are they that mourn – for they will be comforted.”

Amen

Canon Dr Chris Sugden Acting Chair of Trustees of the Oxford Centre for Religion and Public Life