Meditation for Mary Dekkema's Funeral Service
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In case you don’t know me, my name is Andrew and I’m married to Mary and Gerry’s prettiest daughter, who also happens to be the youngest, Kim. Now maybe it’s because Kim’s the prettiest, that of the three sisters, Kim and I have the cutest grandchildren. Now I know Garret and Klara are quite cute, and Porter and Paisley are very cute....but Max and Millie??? Now you might be thinking, “why is Andrew talking about how cute his grandkids are at the beginning of his mother-in-laws funeral sermon?” And that’s a good question.
Well, here’s why: When my mom and dad died, we all knew it was coming.... we had time to say our last goodbyes, we had time to wrap things up, we had time to share all the things we wanted to share. But not so with Kim’s parents, Mom and Dad suddenly and unexpectedly. When dad died, Kim and I had just purchased a new home in Burnaby, and we were starting a big renovation and dad was all excited for us. We wanted to see the construction plans, he wanted to give his input and advice…he was excited for us and he and mom had a trip planned to come and see us. Often over the last 10 years I’ve said to Kim, I wish you dad could have lived through these renovations with us, seen our home, seen the backyard we just finished…he loved that stuff and I never got to share it with him. And now with mom.... Kim and I just welcomed these delightful grandbabies into our family.... there was a trip planned for next month so mom could meet them, but now she’s gone. She would have been so happy to meet them. I’m sad she never did.
Part of what we do together in services like this bring all these emotions and experiences with us and bring them before God, and invite him to minister His comfort and strength to us. I hope we can all do that.
The Lord God is our Shepherd after all, he knows us and cares about us....
14 “I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me—15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father—and I lay down my life for the sheep. 16 I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd. 17 The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again. 18 No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.”
19 Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, 20 by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water.
1 Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2 I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4 ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” 5 He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” 6 He said to me: “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To the thirsty I will give water without cost from the spring of the water of life.
In my almost 40 years of knowing Mary Dekkema there were a number of things that I felt I learned from her....life lessons if you will. And I want to share 3 of them....
Be careful, Andrew, that’s my daughter your with.
[One of the first weekends that I stayed at Kim’s house…! ....so Kevin, if you’ve ever had some sense that your father in law is saying to you, hey be careful that’s my daughter you’re with....you can thank my mother in law.]
Some of God’s gifts should be enjoyed more fully.
[chocolate is made for eating]
Your family is our family.
[I had a very small extended family, at least in Canada....]
Share why we picked this passage to preach on....
Scripture Readings:
23 Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand. 24 You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. 25 Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. 26 My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. 27 Those who are far from you will perish; you destroy all who are unfaithful to you. 28 But as for me, it is good to be near God. I have made the Sovereign Lord my refuge; I will tell of all your deeds.
Now if you had your Bibles open to Psalm 73, you would notice a verse in that psalm that serves as an important turning point in the whole psalm.
The psalmist is struggling because he sees the wicked and it looks like their lives are flourishing…he considers his own hardships and struggles, and looks at those others and says, “they have no struggles”….as if to say, Lord, why is this happening to me?
But all that changes when we come to v. 17. There the psalmist says, all these questions and doubts changed when I entered the sanctuary of the Lord.
In the first half of this psalm the psalmist wrestles with some of the big questions that a lot of people ask themselves, even Christians. He wrestles with big questions on why some people suffer and others seem to live their life on Easy Street. Why is it that some of the kindest and most godly people have so much hardship, and the most selfish, wicked people just seem to cruise through life? That’s a paraphrase of course.
The psalmist says, they seem to be free of care, they go on amassing wealth, they don’t seem to have struggles, their bodies are healthy and strong…on and on he goes…. But as for me, he goes on to suggest, “surely in vain I have kept my heart pure…all day long I have been afflicted, and every morning brings new punishments.”
In fact, as you read the all of Psalm 73, you find that the experience of the psalmist is an experience that many of us can relate to at various times in our lives. It's the experience of trying to live your life faithfully before God and then seeing the lives of those who thumb their nose at God prosper and multiply. It's wondering why God seems to have prospered the lives of those who are far from him, when the lives of his own people suffer.
And you know we all experience the very same feelings at different times. Why does my loved one have to suffer with alzheimers or some other chronic illness. Why does this person die at 35 and that person live well into their 90’s? The psalmist brings many of these “why” questions to God.
Truth is, there are many things about the ways of the world, and about God's way with the world, that we just don't understand. Sometimes it causes us to wrestle with God, some, it seems leave the faith altogether, for others, it entrenches them even further in their atheism. The psalmist himself writes, "When I tried to understand all this, it was too oppressive for me”(v. 16)
Until.. and here’s the hinge point in the whole psalm...almost smack dab in the middle of the psalm, comes this all important "until". he writes.. . “until I entered the sanctuary of God.” It would seem that everything changes when a person truly enters the sanctuary of God.
In OT sanctuary was used to describe the place that God had chosen to meet with his people.. . tabernacle - tent that Israel carried with them in the desert. OR the physical Temple located in Jerusalem. Sanctuary was the place where the psalmist understood.
Understood that no matter what the lot in life of those who are far from God, no matter what the experiences are of those who are close to God.. .. One thing is absolutely certain.. . those who love the Lord, those who surrender their lives to Him, are always in his care.
"Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Those who are far from you will perish; you destroy all who are unfaithful to you. But as for me, it is good to be near God. I have made the Sovereign LORD my refuge; I will tell of all your deeds." (Ps 73:23-28)
It is in the sanctuary that the psalmist comes to the profound realization that earthly success and earthly prosperity in themselves are quite meaningless. In the sanctuary he becomes aware of his own weakness and pride—he says, “my heart was grieved, my spirit embittered, I was senseless and ignorant.”…. in the sanctuary he comes to understand that God's presence alone is the strength of his heart.
[Maybe connect to Kim’s sharing about mom’s FAITH]
In NT, the concept of "sanctuary" takes on a decidedly different nature. Jesus is the One who in John 1:14 became flesh and "tabernacled".. .and later in John he says that the physical temple could be destroyed and he would rebuild it in three days.. . referring to his suffering on the cross. Jesus presents himself as the one in whom God dwells with his people .... and he promises in Matt. 28 that surely he is with you to the very end of the age. In the NT sanctuary is not so much a physical place.. . it's where people who are united by the Spirit of Christ gather together. Today, where we are this afternoon in a very real sense is "sanctuary" because God is here among his people.
The Spirit of Jesus Christ is here.. .and that makes this a sanctuary of God. The psalmist found true rest in the presence of the Sovereign Lord. "I have made the sovereign Lord my refuge." A refuge is a place where we find rest and protection.
That’s why Jesus can and does say to us, "come to me all who are burdened, all who carry anxiety, all who are heavy labored, and I will give you rest.. . I will give you refuge.. . . In me you will find sanctuary."
You see the psalmist wants us to know this important truth....
Being in that place where the psalmist was in the first half of the psalm…in that place where one wrestles with many big “WHY” questions, and then being able to move to that place where one can say, “I have made the sovereign Lord my refuge”….only can happen when one “enters the sanctuary”.
You know, it is most often in the face of death, as we are here this afternoon, it is often in the face of death that we ask some of the big WHY questions. In my previous congregation I noticed over time that there was a woman in that church who came to every single funeral that took place in that church during my nine years there. In fact I came to find out that since her 17 year old son died of an unexplainable disease some 15 years earlier, she never missed a funeral. When her son died so tragically, huge WHY questions were introduced in her life. This boy truly loved the Lord, he was a godly young man that had so much life yet to live. And each funeral, when she entered the sanctuary, if you will, she came to be reminded of the deep assurance that in the face of her BIG questions and DEEP loss, “God was always with her, and held her by his right hand.”
This afternoon the psalmist calls us to enter the sanctuary. And that sanctuary is Jesus Christ. The Bible teaches us that through his death and resurrection, he became for us the Temple, the dwelling place, the sanctuary of the Living God….
It's in Christ that all of our searching, our wrestling, our probing the ways of this world and the ways of God, somehow gets sorted out. The BIG questions may not go away, but, as the psalmist says, “You guide me in your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory.” It's in Christ where all of our restlessness finds rest.
Dear friends, the powerful word of hope that comes from Christ’s resurrection is this: Jesus is alive! If you live in Christ.. .you will die in Christ, and with him you will be raised! "For none of us lives to himself alone and none of us dies to himself alone. If we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living." (Ro 14:7-9)
And that means that “My flesh and my heart my fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.” That was true for our sister Mary….and and I say to you this day…. To all who will submit their lives to the LIVING CHRIST, find in Him forgiveness, and REST, and power to live under His counsel….. it can be true for you as well.
Prayer