I officiated at the Memorial of a friend last weekend. The service was lovely, and healing for me. My friend had died back in March. We had waited to do the service until we felt we could safely gather in person. It was a good, goodbye.

One of the persons who spoke was a lifelong friend. He shared a piece of spiritual advice that he had learned from my friend back when they were in high school together: an attitude about how to deal with the world, “Amazement and Amusement.”

Many experiences demand the amazement response. More than just the obviously, overwhelmingly, amazing parts of life, it’s spiritually healthy to notice how amazing even so many of the small moments of life truly are. Amazing connects us to wonder, and gratitude, and to beauty and joy. That’s all good. And amusement is the spiritually healthy response to the experiences that don’t go the way we want. Instead of getting angry or disappointed or defeated, we can get amused. Sometimes anger is the right response, but instead of always jumping directly to anger, instead of getting mad at the world or mad at ourselves, my friend’s attitude was to try amusement.

I never knew that about my friend. Even after he’s gone he’s still teaching me lessons. As we reflect in worship this Sunday about the people who have died before us, and what gifts of their’s continue to live in us, I’ll be thinking of my friend, with amazement and amusement.