Funeral Template

Welcome

[GREETING] [NAME]. This is certainly a difficult day for the family and for all who have gathered, but this is also a day of celebration as we remember the hope that is found in the gospel of Jesus Christ, a hope that [NAME] held tightly to in her final days. Even in the midst of great hope, grief is real, and it is heavy, but because of the hope that we can heavy in Jesus, and as a result of His work, we can know that grief and sorrow is only temporary, and that we can meet [NAME] again in the presence of God where grief and sorrow are no more. With that, let’s pray.

Opening Prayer

Heavenly Father, would you wrap us tightly in your mercy and your grace this day. Lord, as we bear the weight of grief, would you also lift this burden with the hope that we have in you. Lord, as we reflect on your Word and as we remember Gloria, would the comfort of Your Holy Spirit be near and dear to us. May the peace that surpasses all understanding bring about a hope in us for the days to come. Lord, there is coming a day where you will return and death will be no more. There will be no more grief for us to bear, no more sorrow to weigh us down, and no more tears to fill our eyes. There is coming a day where we will all behold the glory of the Lord and those that have responded to the call to believe in Christ as Lord and Savior will be welcomed into Your Kingdom of glory. Lord, as we await that day, would you help us to be an encouragement and comfort to one another as we spur each other to press on toward the goal. Lord, thank you for seeing Your child through this life. Thank you for welcoming [GENDER] into Your presence with open arms. May we all look forward to the hope that is in the days to come, and may we rejoice in knowing that [NAME] now beholds the fullness of [GENDER] own hope in You face to face. Be our comfort, our strength and our hope this day. In the precious name of Jesus, amen.

Message of Comfort

I wish there were some magical word or verse that I could give you that could ease the pain of grief or make it go away, but the simple fact is that I can’t. Even with all the answers for life that Scripture gives us, there’s nothing to make this any easier. Our grief is real, no matter who it is for or how that grief came about. There is always grief and sorrow when we lose someone we love. While Scripture cannot make our grief any easier, it can lead us to a place where our grief is not grief for the sake of grief, but is grief with hope. Our grief still bears weight, yet we can also look forward to a future where that grief is no more. This is what Scripture tells us:

Psalm 34:18 The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.

1 Thess. 4:13-18 But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming o the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.

Revelation 21:1-5a Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.”

Message of Hope

And so the question for us today is how can we know that we have that hope like [NAME] knew [GENDER] had that hope? We need to know that we are sinners, separated from God, destined for wrath, and that the only way back is to live righteously. We need to know that we are limited in our ability to live righteously and that we need someone on our behalf to live righteously for us. We need to know Jesus as the only one who ever lived in perfect righteousness and that by His death on the cross and resurrection from the grave He has made a way to place His own righteousness on us and take the just penalty for our sin. And we need to know that the way to the Father is only through the person and work of Jesus Christ, the forgiveness of sin obtained through repentance, and the placing of our faith and trust in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. [NAME] knew these things because Scripture taught her these things.

Let us very briefly look at what the Apostle Paul writes to the church in Rome.

Romans 3:23–25 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.

Every single person here today, and every single person for all time, has committed sin against God and fallen short of His glory, His standard for how He has called and created us to live. As Paul teaches elsewhere, there is no work that we can do to pay back the wrong that we have done. Not a single “good person” is going to make it to heaven unless they know the only one who is good. You can’t love someone into heaven, you can’t work your way there - only Christ can bring you there. And because we have sinned, we find ourselves always reaching, yet always falling short. Unless, of course, a way is made for us.

And that is the beauty of the gospel message. All of our striving comes up empty. All of our work to be “good” is filthy rags. All of our effort to be our best selves is meaningless. And then enters grace. The free gift of God by which we are, even though we have been sinful, justified as righteous by the blood of Jesus poured out for sinners such as us. And by that free gift of grace we find redemption through Jesus Christ, who takes what was broken and lost and puts his own reputation on the line to bring us into His Father’s very house. And it was because God saw fit to give His Son Jesus, to absorb the wrath due us, putting His blood in place of ours, that by faith we might receive the riches of the kingdom of heaven. We may have fallen short, but God can lift us up. We are sinners. We need a savior. Jesus is the one and only Savior. We must place our faith and trust in Him. You are here because you loved [NAME]. If you don’t know much about this truth that [GENDER] loved, I encourage you to love [GENDER] well by seeking out this truth and understanding it for yourself. If you want to see [NAME] again, the way is only through Jesus.

Commital Prayer

Final respects