Funeral/Prayer Service for Mary Paul
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Hey everyone, thanks for being here to celebrate and reflect on the life of Mary Paul and to encourage each other during these times. Lot of you don’t know me, so a brief introduction may be needed. I’m Pastor Mike, I’m the associate Pastor at First Baptist Howard City. I hope to say that I’m a good friend of Travis and Chloe, as I hope they say the same of me. We were asked thru them to do a small prayer service on behalf on Mary Paul.
I confess that I never met Mary, but what I hear of her makes me wish I had. I have 5 kids of my own and sometimes wonder who they are gonna survive each other in my sometimes chaotic home, that’s what makes it all the more impressive for Mary. Surviving the home life of being one of 18 other siblings. And yet, not one of you would likely say that she was just a number. She was special.
Here are just some of the things that people have shared about how special she was. Southern thru and thru, with a great accent. Tough as nails. Some described here as a fighter in a good sense, standing up for what she believed is right. Apparently still was able to instill fear in her grandchildren… hahah. She is Hilarious I’m told.... always brightening up the room and making people laugh.
Generous. I was told that she left her home in Virginia, moved to Michigan all in the desire to help her oldest sister raise her growing family. Clearly she had a desire to love on people and her family.
Speaking of which, her family’s love for her speaks to her love for them. I often heard Travis talk often about going to Grandmas to help her out or calling to check on Grandma. To me it sounds as if she didn’t force their affection neither was their checking up on her nearly obligation but she has earned their affection through her generous love.
I’m sure there are many memories and words that could be shared about Mary Paul.
If there would be a couple people that would want to share a quick thing about her, we will make it brief, but just raise a quick hand and share that memory or thought about here
Today we would encourage you to take the time and share those memories with each other. It honors her and encourages those that are working through the lose.
I wanna take the next few minutes here to share a couple a small thoughts. People often ask, what next. Now what... when considering life after someone passes. I want to begin by sharing a poem I once read.
Poem:
“She is Gone”
You can shed tears that she is gone or you can smile because she lived. You can close your eyes and pray that she will come back, or you can open you eyes and see all that she has left. Your heart can be empty because you can’t see her, or you can be full of the love that you shared. You can turn your back on tomorrow and live yesterday, or you can be happy for tomorrow because of yesterday. You can remember her and only that she is gone, or you can cherish her memory and let it live on. You can cry and close your mind, be empty and turn your back, or you can do what she would want: smile, open you eyes, love, and go on.
This poem is well written. It helps us understand the importance of the people in our lives. It helps us see the investment they have contributed to us. Their physical being with us may be no more, but their influence and their memories live on in us to this day. They have helped make us who we are, just like those that have gone before them did the same. This is acceptable. This is right. This is the way we were created. At the end of our lives, possessions really don’t matter that much, but our relationships with others matter the most. Our relationships with others and our relationship with God. That’s really all that we can take with us, that’s really all that we have.
So I want to challenge you to use these moments wisely that you have today, the Bible speaks of life being like a vapor, here today and gone the next. I’m sure Mary would tell that time flies. Life even to the fullest of age comes quickly to an end. sooo what should we do today, cherish the moments you’ve had and continue to do as Mary as done for you. Invest, love, give, and fight for what is good. Your impact on the lives of others is a big part of why you exist. Make the most of it.
Second, and in this same line of thinking. A day like today does causes us to consider death. It’s a reality that no one can escape. Many have tried, but no one has ever evaded it. It’s a hard fact of life that we often don’t like to consider, but we need to.
Why does death exist. I’m sure some in our grief have asked this question. Why did so and so have to die. I have been part of funeral services where families have lost their 10 year old and their newborns, and that has definitely been a questions they wrestled with.
The Bible doesn’t shy away from giving us answers to this question. Much is written about death in it’s pages.
It tells us why it occurs and where it originated.
For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
The word wages is another word for payment. Because of sin, actions needed to be taken. Justice needs to be dealt. And a Holy God needs to right wrong. That all started in the beginning.
Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned—
God created mankind to live in a perfect world, where no evil existed. He gave them everything that was good, and only gave them one thing to avoid, one rule to test their loyalty and love for Him. A choice. If they didn’t have a choice, it would be hard for them to show their genuine love for Him. So God put a tree with a fruit they were forbidden to eat, they could’ve continued to enjoy God’s perfection on their lives and all the good He intends to give them but they chose something else. They distrusted God and sought their own good. They didn’t believe Him about the rule and commited many sins that day by taking and eating the forbidden fruit. It instancely destroyed them. And from that moment one, husband would turn against wife, kids would fight and bitter, (the first 2 brothers fought and murder resulted) and all kinds of sin continues to this very day.)
A holy God cannot be near this evil, he cannot tolerate it. His character is just through and through so he must cast judgement upon sin, we must do what is right and fair, so his punishment for sin is death. Physically we all now die because of sin. But we also die spiritually speaking. We all believe in some form or fashion that even though our bodies lay here lifeless, our spirits go on to something greater. Not so for many people, God’s holiness again cannot be near evil and many in this life did like the very first humans did. They didn’t chose God, but continued to live in their sin and chose their own way instead of God’s.
So God does not along those souls into heaven.
The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all law-breakers, and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
You may think this is cruel, but a lifetime of sin, of pride, of greed of lust, of rejection of God, is deserving of this kind of punishment.
You might also think this all to bizare.
But consider the alternative. If what they Bible says isn’t true. Then death has no purpose, then you’re life is an accident, what you do doesn’t really matter, and there is nothing after death. You either accept what the Bible says as true or you belief the opposite.
You say why would I want to believe the Bible with that kind of negative look.
The Bible doesn’t end with only describing death and why we deserve it. Believe me, if that’s all it has to say, I would not be wasting my time here saying all this stuff. But why I stand here and speak is because the Bible offers hope and lots of it.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
Jesus is that hope.
For as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous.
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
God sent in love His son Jesus to save and rescue us from our desperate situation. He paid the penalty that we deserved. He did no wrong but was the innocent sacrifice on our behalf. So that now through his sacrifice many can be made alive, freed from sin and given a new home in heaven. God sees Christ’s righteousness on us and that qualifies us for an eternal home in heaven.
But it’s a gift and just like any gift, there is a choice. Do we accept the gift, do we chose to receive the gift.
Romans 10:9-10 tells us how to receive that gift.
because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.
It takes both heart and mouth. An inward belief and an outward expression of that belief. That believe involves agreeing with God that you are a sinner, that you are in need of His rescue and cannot save yourself, and that you belief that He did indeed die for your sins.
None of it is by your good works.
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
If you do that, you will be and are saved. I’m here to share that I cannot for sure tell you who is saved and who is not. Only God knows people’s hearts. It was told to me that at Mary’s final moments, she accepted Jesus as her Savior. And if that is true, you can indeed belief that she is rejoicing joyfully in perfection with her Savior.
But what about you. You have this choice as well. It’s a gift. Will you also this moment, receive this grace. If Mary did truly receive this grace, she would most certainly want you to have it too.
I’m gonna close in prayer, and ask the Lord for his blessing.