Funeral Sermon of Danny Kuykendall 2.9.13.a

Entice: We have heard a word from family. There have been hugs. We have borne witness to both laughter and tears. We’ve heard from friends and shared stories and experiences. Now we need a word from God.

Engage: During the most trying times of life when things are most difficult, when our way leads through cloudy circumstances, we want to hear the comforting voices of friends and to be surrounded with family and community.  As “life goes back to normal”, and those familiar voices fade we need to hear words from God. In these moments I hope to help you to listen to Him as His word addresses your grief.

Expand: We come to God in times like this because He has been here before, He has been here often. We approach God in our pain because He made us, and we rightly expect Him to understand us. All that we see and experience—even the sting of death is altered by knowing Him.

Solomon wrote these words

Ecclesiastes 3:11 ESV

11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.

They are less an explanation of God, or an excuse from Him, than an introduction to Him. Here at the funeral home, we don’t need information—we need a relationship bigger than our pain.

Explore: Where human comfort ends, we can find comfort and grace in our God.

Expand: God provides 3 comforts

Body of Sermon: First, He provides

  1 Beauty—in its Time.

         1.1 Beauty must be understood and experienced in and through life. The blaze of God’s presence all around us in creation reminds us that the beauty all around us, even the beauty we see in small, familiar things Is a testimony to His love for us.

         1.2 Our lives are a part of that created beauty. We are His workmanship…The best thing God ever made. We are His adornment—His poetry designed to reflect Himself.

Ephesians 2:10 ESV

10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

  1.3 The hurt and emotion of this day must not darken the beauty, the love, the life we have shared with our father, brother, son, husband, friend.

Ultimately the fading beauty of life is linked to

2 Eternity—in our hearts.

         2.1 We are designed to long for the eternal presence of God. Our longing for the Father’s eternal presence is redeemable because Jesus Himself has made the eternity we ponder in our hearts real

Mark 16:6 ESV

6 And he said to them, “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here…

2.2 Jesus invites and includes us in His own conquest of death.  Jesus transforms our musings of heaven into a reality

Romans 6:5 ESV

5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.

Last of all, at this hard time we are reminded of 

 3 Mystery—in God’s deeds.

         3.1 God is at the beginning. He is present at the end. The true mystery for us—the challenge, is making sure in our own lives that we keep Him in the middle.

         3.2 The two most profound mysteries of all are:

Colossians 1:27 ESV

(27 To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are) the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.

1 Corinthians 15:51 ESV

51 Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,

Christ in you…

Christ with you…

Shut Down

     God reminds us today that He is here among us amid our grief. Without Him all beauty fades, Eternity is a dream, and all mysteries are hopeless.

     At the cross beauty, eternity, and mystery are all found in Jesus; God with us.

     At the Cross, At the Cross...