Answering roll call

During my brief stint as a kitchen manager at Henderson (Colo.) Elementary, I enjoyed penning the class rosters in preparation for the lunch line. It's a lost art now, as so many programs are computerized, but I found it immensely satisfying, seeing that neat column of alphabetized names, ready for the first meal service.

It didn't stay neat very long. Even early in the school year, the children moved, or changed classrooms. Soon enough, a thick black mark would strike out one name and at the bottom of the page, several new names, in no particular order, would appear.

I made a mess of many a teacher's class roster used to take roll call each morning in my day. It was unintentional on my part and each time I answered, "Here" for the first time in any given class, in any given school, I hoped I would be answering "here" in the same location on the last day of school as well. Frequent moves were part and parcel of my early years.

I wonder how many classroom rosters contained my name? I wonder how many times I answered "here" or "present" if that was the teacher's preference?

Roll call followed the Pledge of Allegiance as surely as day follows night. Every teacher. Every class. Morning by morning, young voices would respond as each name was read.

Our names. They contribute to our identity, and when we hear them, we listen up, we respond. They give us substance. First written on our birth certificate they are penned countless times throughout our lives, closing letters and financial deals. They are used to identify us even at our final resting place, evidence that we once were, once mattered, once answered, "here."

Many years ago, Mary Magdalene made her way to the final resting place of the young man who, in one day and every day afterward, turned her world upside down.

John tells us she came early on the first day of the week, her steps undoubtedly slow as the path, barely lit by dawn's early light, was further obscured by the tears that simply would not quit falling. She came to reflect, to remember, to mourn, and to honor the light that had come into her life and chased away all of the darkness that was within her.

(Her early morning sojourn to this as-yet unmarked grave gives reason for the cemeteries of today as well. For we, too, go to reflect, to remember, to mourn the life that once was a part of every day and is no more.)

Mary's morning for mourning changed in an instant and it only took one word.

"Mary."

Gone were her tears. Gone was her heartache. Gone were the very reasons she had come. The tomb was empty, but her heart was full. And fulfilled in this moment was the assurance that "my sheep know my voice."

The one who spoke her name was the one who had turned her darkness into light. He, who was dead, was dead no longer, but alive again, now and forevermore. And every day for the rest of her life, regardless of what each day held in store for her, Mary would again hear him say, "Mary."

I first heard him call my name from the cross, and in that single four-letter syllable, when he saw all that I was, all that I am or all that I ever shall be, when he saw the good, the bad and the ugly of me and loved me anyway, I answered as Thomas did when he saw the wounds, "My Lord and my God." And I answer still as he speaks my name at the close of each day and at each day's dawning, knowing his promise to never leave nor forsake me is as true today as it was when he first spoke it. And because of his promises, because of the cross, I will hear it spoken in the courts of heaven one day.

There is a roll being prepared in the courts of heaven and only those whose names are written there will enter into the courts of heaven. Only those who respond, "My Lord and my God," when the Son of God calls their name will have their names therein inscribed.

"Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion." Hebrews 3:15 (NIV)

Things you won't see in heaven: Strike outs