Funeral Sermon Dec 2021

St. Matthew’s Lutheran Church Cornwall

John 11:23-27, Ecclesiastes 3:1-9

Weeping and Waiting

Grace and peace to you in the name of the God who weeps for the dead.

I don’t know how many of you are churchgoers, but I always wonder during the time of a funeral or memorial service what people must think of God when the loss that they’re feeling is still fresh, I wonder this no matter whether they are faithful church attenders or atheists. I wonder this about myself sometimes. When the pain is too real. When the loss is too recent, and then we come into a church to supposedly hear the Words of the God who rules over all... what do we think of such a God? What is He like if He lets these things happen? Who is this God? But in all the mess, in the loss and the hurt, it becomes all too easy to forget to ask what God thinks about these things that happen. We can so easily succumb to the temptation to put God, the supposedly all powerful, all knowing, supposedly all God Lord of all things who holds life and death in his hands on trial when one of our own is taken too soon (and it always is too soon), but we seem to never listen to what He has to say, putting in our own two cents as to what the answer must be. God works in mysterious ways perhaps we say, God is good perhaps we say, sin and death are own doing and a result of our free will perhaps we say. These sayings may even be true but you know what is most surprising in all of this is that God doesn’t bother to respond in those ways. What then is His answer? Let me take you back to John chapter 11; as we just heard read, when Martha, Lazarus’ sister puts Jesus on trial herself for this very thing. V. 21 “Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” Not soon after, her sister Mary joined in on this court trial; V. 32 “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” What is His defense?

V. 33; When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. 34 He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” 35 Jesus began to weep.”

Jesus Wept. That is the answer. And while that certainly does not seem very festive, and it isn’t, that is exactly what the message of Christmas is. That God became one of us to join us in this mess of suffering and pain. The message of Christmas is that Jesus wept. He cried, He struggled, He suffered, He wept, not just like us but with us. That has always been the message of Christmas, that God is with us. Gott mitt uns, as the Germans would say.

Near the end of her life, Eviline was always talking about time. The time that she enjoyed, the time she grew up in, the time she was baptized and confirmed, when she lived in Europe, when she moved here, the time that she married Peter, we talked a lot about time. It’s a beautiful thing isn’t it, as I look back on those conversations about time, especially knowing that she then requested the reading of Ecclesiastes 3 to be read today. All about time.

Everything has its time. A time to do this and a time to do that, you heard the reading, right? There is a time to lay down in green pastures, there is a time to sit beside still waters, and to be restored and to walk the path of safety and comfort, there is a time to have those with us who we love, to have them as mother, sister, wife, as friend... but there is also the time, to be led through the valley of the shadow of death. There is a time to suffer loss. This may very well be that time. But know this. That there awaits yet another time,

John 11:23, “Jesus said to her, your brother will rise again.”

There is a time to have our loved ones, there is a time to lose our loved ones, but in the midst of it all we know that at some point all of time will be rolled up like a scroll, all of time will be burned up and the new will begin. There is a time when all that has died will be resurrected, when there will be no moreweeping, no mourning, no suffering, no pain or crying anymore for the old will have passed away, and the new, the new will have finally come.

In her last days, in nearly every visit that I had with her since I had arrived here in the early fall, Eviline would bring up the topic of the last days, the end of time, the book of Revelation, as I said, she really liked to talk about time. For many of us these things instill in us feelings of fear and urgency. “time.” It’s of the essence, its running out, its man’s worst enemy. But for Eviline, who knew that she was passing, that she was at the end, and that it was only a matter of when, a matter of “time,” these things brought herhope as she walked through the valley of the shadow death. Because where she was, from her vantage point, she was already in the thick of it. The time in the darkness was almost over. The struggle was drawing to a close. Victory, victory, was near. And so we sit here now, bidding not a last goodbye, but a see you later, in our own valley of sorrow as we mourn our losing of her (for now); and in that valleythings can seem dark. But know this. That there is a time to weep and a time to mourn

Have this time. Weep. Cry. Mourn. Feel the pain that is in your heart, - even Jesus did that when his friend Lazarus died. But do this knowing that everything has it’s time, and this too will come to an end, for on the other side of this there will yet again be atime to laugh, to smile, to be joyful, a time to dance, and to embrace, a time to be reunited with loved ones lost long ago... there is a time to be alive, a time to die, and a time to be resurrected. So once again, I remind you, Jesus wept. But He did so knowing that Lazarus would rise again. He did so knowing that Lazarus was just a call away. He wept knowing that it would not be long until that time, when Lazarus would beckon Jesus’ call to rise and get up out of his tomb. So I say to you, as the messenger of the Christ who calls and who resurrects, Eviline will rise again. For whoever believes in Him, though they die, yet will they live.Eviline will rise again. But for now, there is a time to grieve. There is a time when you will see your wife, your mother, your Eviline again, but for now, there is a time to simply believe that this isso.

Amen.