Theresa Jeffries

Order of Service

Song Go rest High

Obit/Scripture

Song- In His time

Message

Prayer

Song- Go Rest High

Obit

Theresa Jeffries, 71, of Rusk, passed away on August 22, 2022 at Nacogdoches Medical Center.

Theresa was born January 13, 1951 in Nacogdoches to Lester and Glendolyn (Ballard) Owens.

She graduated from Rusk High School in the class of 1969. Later she met Michael Jeffries. They were married March 17, 1972.

He passed in 2015.

They had a son Steven.

She worked in medical records at the Rusk State Hospital for over 30 years. Theresa was a member of Craft Baptist Church. She loved traveling and especially going on cruises. Theresa was preceded in death by her husband; Michael, parents; Lester and Glendolyn Owens, brother; Gary Owens, and mother-in-law; Barbara McDonald. She is survived by her son; Steven Jeffries and his wife Martha of Cushing, granddaughter; Jade Montgomery and her spouse Darian of Sherwood, AR , grandson; Allen Jeffries of Cushing, granddaughter; Amy Jeffries of Ft. Hood, great-granddaughter; Korbyn Montgomery, sister-in-law; Jan Brown of St. Louis, MO, Dora Owens of White Oak, TX, neighbor sister; Lynn Padgett, many cousins, nieces, and nephews.

Does anyone have any memories of Theresa you would like to share?

Song: In His TIme

Message

Several thoughts come to mind when I think of Theresa.

Theresa was a force to be reckoned with!

a. She had a joyful heart

Always a laugh and smile and entertaining others

Proverbs 17:22 ESV

A joyful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.

b. Generous

2 Corinthians 9:7 ESV

Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

Our family was blessed personally by her generous giving. She let us stay in Branson and the Hill country using her time at the resort.

c. Loved the Word

Demonstrated by always having questions.

Kept me on my toes.

took to heart:

2 Timothy 2:15 ESV

Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.

She wanted to know and handle the word of GOD well

Acts 17:10–11 ESV

The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived they went into the Jewish synagogue. Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so.

She also taught the word, when working the GMAs. She sought to instill a love of God to the girls of the church.

1 Thessalonians 4:13–18 ESV

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 of 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.

What I want to share with you in these few thoughts this evening is quite personal. The Bible reading we heard a few moments ago is one that is special to me. As we have lost friends and family from this world, it has taken on new meaning.

The theme I want to take from it is ‘Grieving with Hope’.

Let me introduce it this way.

At the risk of over-simplifying things, I notice two main trends when I visit a bereaved family to arrange a funeral.

One is the distraught family, overcome with grief.

The other is the family that says something like this: ‘Dad wouldn’t want us to be sad. We want the funeral to be a celebration of his life.’

One family majors on sorrow, the other on joy. One is focused on grief, the other on hope.

Paul says,

Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest, who have no hope. (Verse 13)

He doesn’t say, ‘do not grieve’: he says, ‘do not grieve like [those] who have no hope’.

In other words, we can grieve with hope. Grief and hope. Sorrow and joy. Grief, but not hopeless. Sorrow, but not despairing.

1 Paul is real about the grief and sorrow that death brings.

It isn’t for nothing that elsewhere he calls death ‘the last enemy’. Death is an enemy. We recognise that in our language. When someone dies after a protracted illness, we often say they ‘lost their battle’ with the disease. You battle an enemy.

And death is an enemy.

It takes away from us people we love dearly.

They can never be replaced. We can never be the same. Our lives take on a new shape over a period of time, but we all miss them.

In the face of an enemy’s action, our grief is not selfish. It is normal. We grieve, because we love.

The one we love is no longer here for us to love.

Our hearts ache with the pain, and we grieve. Anything less is unnatural.

So let us be real about grief. Let us own it.

We don’t get anywhere without being honest about reality. And the reality of death leads us to grief.

2 However, says Paul, we grieve with hope.

Let’s go back to that language of death being about ‘losing a battle’.

Often we may also say – although not necessarily in connection with death – that someone has ‘lost the battle, but won the war’.

Essentially, that’s what Christians say about death, and why we grieve with hope. We may ‘lose the battle’ in death, but in the long run we ‘win the war’.

How can we say that?

It’s because of the next thing Paul says:

We believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. (Verse 14)

‘We believe that Jesus died and rose again.’

That’s the key. Jesus didn’t merely die. He rose from the dead.

That may seem a fantastic and ridiculous claim in an age when atheist scientists claim to reduce religious belief to a delusion, but I believe there is ample historical evidence for the resurrection of Jesus.

I don’t have time to go into it now,

. However, since I believe Jesus is risen, I believe he shows the way to hope. I believe his resurrection is the winning of the war that trumps the losing of the battle in death.

It’s by trusting our lives into Jesus’ hands and committing to follow him that we share this hope. He wants to share it with everyone. But it’s a gift that needs to be received.

Let me tell you a story I once heard:

. When I was young, my Dad tried to explain the Christian hope in the face of death to me. Dad worked in banking, and he asked me to imagine that NatWest had ordered him to take a new post with them in Australia. How would we feel?

Well, I would be upset not to see him, I said. Much as I loved Mum and my sister, I would not want to be parted from him.

Yes, he said, of course you would feel like that. But while we remained behind in England, he would not only be working but preparing a new home and new life for us. Then, one day when that was ready, we would move to Australia and be reunited.

For the follower of Jesus, death is like that temporary parting.

While it lasts, it is full of anguish. But one day it will end, and there will be a joyful reunion.

This is the grieving with hope that is Jesus’ gift to all who put their faith in him.

Jesus made a similar promise as that Dad

John 14:1–4 ESV

“Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.”

Jesus said later, I am the way the truth and the life...

Theresa knew and lived with this hope. In fact, her hope was on display as she said, “When God is finished with my mansion, He’ll call me home.”

God put the finishing touches on it and brought her home!

Just as He will for all who call on His name in faith and repentance.

Romans 10:10–13 ESV

For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. For the Scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”