Monday, March 31, 2014

Sermon for 3/29/14 - funeral


This sermon seems to be floating around in my mind with a couple of titles. It was prepared for a funeral I conducted on 3/29/14.  I didn't preach in church on 3/30 and didn't get a good recording of my guest.


Just a little book – devotional book – a reading for each day, tells you a Bible passage to read, gives you a couple of chapters in the Bible that it suggests you also read, just a little thing.

Little kindnesses sometmes make great introductions.

brought me into contact with someone who loved the Lord and His Word.

not an easy life, not an easy history
lost relatives, health, appearance
didn’t lose Jesus, the bread of life

In our readings today from Isaiah 25 and 1 Corinthians 15 we saw that when God looks at life he sees it differently than we do.
eternity
real life that doesn’t end
hope
future
joy
peace
no turmoil in the end
supernatural food that doesn’t perish

That means something when you have lost family members, friends, even when you look at yourself in pictures and then look at yourself in a mirror and wonder if you’ve lost yourself.

Confronted by our own mortality, we pause and look to the immortal God.
Jesus, came to live and die for our sakes.
Jesus, true God and true man, able to do the God thing of taking our sin and giving us his righteousness.
Jesus, the one who suffered in every way as we do.
Jesus, the one who rose from the dead victorious.

One friend, a close friend, when confronted with death, said it was going to be a big trip. I wondered at first if he was going to Tahiti. No, a much bigger trip.

Don’t enter the trip without the big God, who has loved you and given himself for you.


Even as we lay our sister in Christ, Enid Winslow, to rest, we look to the one she trusted, the Lord who is able to keep her forever. It’s a big trip. The Lord is good. He knows her destination.

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