This woman is a Christian but her family is not.
Funeral Sermon for Merlin Brinson
If you have not been trained in the Lutheran Church, or if you
have fallen away from it, you might wonder why I stipulated that I be the
only person who plays an active role at this funeral. In this inclusive age
of self-expression, why would any pastor insist that no one sing a solo or
read a poem or offer a eulogy during a funeral at which he officiates?
The answer is simple, really. You are human beings. You have human
thoughts and human feelings and human words that express the things you
think and feel. The problem with human words is that they exert no real and
lasting power.
· Yes, poets and lyricists have the power to move your emotions, but
how long have you ever been able to make one single emotion last? Most
emotions-whether joy or sorrow, pleasure or anger-most emotions are like
gusts of wind: they rise strong but then quickly pass. The emotional power
of even the best poets cannot endure.
· Yes, people have used thoughts and words to create huge movements
in history. Just think about the power exerted, and the devastations that
resulted, from the words of people like Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, and
Vladimir Lenin. But human thoughts and words such as theirs can only exert
one kind of power-the power of death. Not one word, not one expression or
sentiment or philosophical opinion in entire realm of human thought is able
to bring life. This is why I say that human words exert no real and lasting
power. They are only transient puffs exhaled into the abyss.
Right now, you are probably thinking, "What is this nut talking about? He is
human, too! If my thoughts and words have no power, then his thoughts and
words have no power, either. If that is the case (which it is), then he
destroys his own argument for not wanting anyone else to play an active role
at this funeral."
You are correct that my words have no power. My words are as
lifeless as your words. Like your thoughts, your words, and your opinions,
my thoughts and words and opinions will lead me only to death.
Please do not misunderstand why I visited your mother's bedside. I did not
visit her in order to speak my words to her. I visited Merlin Brinson so
that I may stir up for her the divine and miraculous and life-giving Words
that God Himself spoke to her at her Baptism and in so many worship services
since she was baptized. I came to the hospital in order to uproot and pull
whatever weeds might have grown up around the living seed of Merlin's
Baptism. I did this so that the evergreen power of God's Words might
continue to exert themselves for your mother in her last hours. I came to
bring Merlin the cross of her Lord Jesus Christ, whose death washed away her
sins and whose resurrection opened the way to her eternal life. Not my
words: I came with the "Word of the cross [which] is folly to those who are
perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God" (1
Corinthians 1:18).
I regret that I could not bring God's living and powerful Words to
Merlin before she became unconscious. I do not regret this for my sake,
because I have confidence in the miracle and power of God's Words in His
Bible. If God's living Words can make the unborn John leap in Elizabeth's
womb (Luke 1:44) and if these Words can restore life again to the dead man
Lazarus (John 11:43-44), then these same Words are more than able to comfort
and sustain a woman who is unconscious. For your sake I regret that I could
not bring God's Words to Merlin before she became unconscious. It would have
been good for you to hear Merlin speak her "Amen" and her "I believe" and
her "Our Father who art in heaven." It would have been good for you to hear
these Words of God on Merlin's lips so that you could have increased
comforts and overflowing assurances for your grief.
Not that the Word of God spoken to Merlin is in any way
insufficient! In those rote, seemingly-lifeless lines of the Apostles' Creed
that were prayed by her bedside, the crucified and risen Christ was again
delivering the benefits of His cross to your mother. In the underutilized
petitions of the Lord's Prayer, Christ was again manifesting Himself to her
and to you, "the power of God and the wisdom of God." The psalms, the
Gospels, the Epistles: these are not irrelevant and outmoded texts of a
bygone world. Only the arrogant and the perishing think that way. To some
people, the Scriptures of God appear foolish, weak, and even despicable. It
is much easier to hate the Word than it is to repent and believe.
But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what
is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised
in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are,
so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.
No, the Word of God spoken to Merlin is not in any way
insufficient. I only wish that you could have heard her speak her "Amen" to
this Word, or that you could have felt the way she squeezed my hand when I
spoke God's Benediction to her. Then you could have had further certainties
and greater assurances that your mother has an unshakable place in the
foolishness and weakness of the cross.
The Word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are
being saved it is the power of God. . Since, in the wisdom of God, the world
did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we
preach to save those who believe.
Power. The power of Words. That is why I stipulated that I be the
only person who plays an active role at this funeral. Times such as the
burial of the Christian dead are much too important to be delegated to human
thoughts and human words. Emotions pass. Opinions amount to nothing.
Philosophies run aground. Funerals are a good time for us to look around and
to ask, "Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the
debater of this age?" All of these will be found dead in a grave, never to
rise again. Only those who have God's living and powerful Words-the foolish
words of the cross of Christ-shall live. And they shall live eternally.
The Word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are
being saved it is the power of God. . He is the source of your life in
Christ Jesus, whom God made our wisdom and our righteousness and
sanctification and redemption.
The peace of God which passes all understanding guard your hearts
and minds through Christ Jesus. Amen.
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