Sermon Tone Analysis
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Welcome
Welcome, friends and family, to the funeral gathering to honor Nathan Emmanuel Hoarau.
Today is a day for grieving.
I want to begin today by giving you permission to grieve however you want.
There will be days ahead where you have to do all that stiff upper lip and faking till you make it stuff.
But not today.
Today, your grief can be loud or quite.
It can be stoic or demonstrative.
It can be soft or tearful.
It can be angry or sorrowful.
All I ask is that you let yourself be honest.
Because here’s what’s true about grief: it hurts.
Well, more accurate to say it’s a response to pain.
We’re all hurting right now.
Which means you’re not alone in your grief.
Grieving binds us together.
It reminds us that we’re not alone.
Grief is a good and natural human response to tragedy.
When we grieve, it’s because there’s been a disruption in the world.
We’re here to bury Nathan, a 21 year old who was full of joy and life.
Do I need to tell you that God did not create a world in which parents bury their children?
A world where such a bright light was extinguished so soon?
Of course not.
You know the truth deep in your bones.
And the disjuncture between those two things - the deep knowledge we have of the way the world should be and the crushing experience of loss that we have - this pain is what creates our grief.
So grieve today.
Tell the truth about our loss.
Nathan deserves at least that much.
And here’s the good news about our grief:
God agrees with us.
That means God grieves with us.
There’s a reason Scripture calls Death ‘the Final Enemy’.
So let’s begin today with a prayer:
Eternal God, grant to your servant Nathan and to us who surround him with our prayers your peace beyond understanding.
Give us faith, the comfort of your presence, and the words to say to one another and to you, as we gather in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord.
OBIT
Brian Itotia
Slideshow
Hymn
“It is Well With My Soul” by Horatio G Spafford, written after the loss of his four daughters.
This is not a song that ignores or trivializes grief.
It is a prayer, an insistence that the worst thing is not the last thing.
Viewing
Scriptures
You’re here because you love Nathan, because his life left an impact on you in some way.
He was your son, your brother.
Your cousin or your nephew or your dear friend.
Death is always a tragedy, but in cases like this, when the one we love dies so young, we can’t help but ask, “Why?!” Why would God let this happen?
It’s the most basic question in the world.
Here’s the thing though: so many of us feel guilty for asking the question.
Even in the depths of our pain, we hear those voices telling us, “Don’t question!
Just believe!
Everything happens for a reason!
God just needed another flower for his garden!” and all the other awful things you hear in spaces like this.
But you just heard the story of Lazarus.
Lazarus and his sisters, Mary and Martha were Jesus’ friends.
They didn’t follow him around the country like the disciples did.
No, they lived in Bethany, just outside Jerusalem, and Jesus stayed with them any time he came to visit the capitol.
They were his friends.
Now, I want you to imagine what sort of perks might come with being friends with the actual son of God.
At the very least, wouldn’t you think that the guy who went around curing diseases, the guy who made miraculous healings a centerpiece of his ministry, would spare some healing for his buds?
Maybe not seasonal allergies, but surely something serious - a broken limb?
And wouldn’t it go without question that if you got a fatal disease, you could count on him?
Apparently not.
Because when Lazarus got sick, Jesus didn’t come.
And when Lazarus died, Jesus didn’t come.
In fact, Jesus didn’t show up until his good friend Lazarus had been in the tomb for four days.
No wonder his sisters were angry.
I love that Martha didn’t even wait for Jesus to get to their house.
She marched out to meet him and said, “What’s the actual deal, Jesus?!
If you’d bothered to show up, my brother would still be alive!”
Now, I want to pause to observe that this is exactly how many of us were taught not to speak to God.
But Martha doesn’t care.
This is her friend, her Lord, and she’s going to tell him exactly what she thinks.
(Actually, I know a few of you here who are just like Martha.
I’m willing to bet you’ve already let God have a piece of your mind.)
And how did Jesus respond to Martha?
He didn’t condemn her.
He offered a promise: Martha, this isn’t the end.
Then Mary found Jesus, heading for the tomb.
And she said the same thing - why didn’t you show up sooner?
And then something truly miraculous happens: Jesus weeps.
He grieves with Martha and Mary and all Lazarus’ other friends.
Jesus knows how this story ends.
He knows he’s about to go and raise Lazarus from the tomb.
And yet that doesn’t stop his grief.
Even though he knows what is to come, he also knows what is happening now.
NOW, his good friends are devastated.
NOW, it seems as though nothing will ever be good or right or true again.
So Jesus weeps.
Do you hear that, friends?
Jesus is with us, weeping over the death of his good friend, Nathan.
We want to rage.
We want to kick and scream and ask, “Where were you, Lord?!
If you’d been here, wouldn’t he still be alive?”
In the face of our grief, Jesus does not punish us for questioning.
He doesn’t hide from us. he doesn’t ignore us.
In the face of our deep pain, Jesus grieves with us.
Here’s the honest truth friends: what we want to know in this moment is, “Why?”
Why did Nathan have to die so young?
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