The following was preached last week at the funeral of one of my
members, a lady well into her 80's.
Pr Bell
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1 John 1:8,9
11 January 2013
It has become very popular in recent years to look upon funerals as
a time for “celebrating the life” of the person who has died.
This thinking is understandable. After all, who among us doesn’t
want to remember our loved ones?
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But this thinking can become problematic. Why? Because to
celebrate the “life” of a person who has died means that we must
celebrate sin. What do I mean by that? Simply this – our lives are
lives of sin. From beginning to end this is the case. And for
Christians sin is the last thing we want to celebrate.
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Remember what the psalmist writes? “Behold, I was brought forth
in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.” In other words,
we are sinful – “full of sin” – from the moment we were
conceived. In another place the psalmist writes, “there is none who
does good, not even one.” All goodness – all ‘sinlessness’
– is excluded. Later, as he writes to the church in Rome, St Paul
will quote those words of the psalmist approvingly. You see,
sinfulness – and by the way, “sinful” simply means “full of
sin” – sinfulness is not simply an Old Testament problem, it
transcends time. The writer of Ecclesiastes puts the matter in just
slightly different words. “Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher,
vanity of vanities! All is vanity.”
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So, if we don’t want to celebrate sin, what do we do? Well,
perhaps instead of celebrating the life of a sinner, we could
celebrate the life of Jesus.
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When Jesus presented Himself to John the Baptist to be baptized,
John didn’t think much of the idea. He said, “I need to be
baptized by you, and do you come to me?” Jesus replied, “Let it be
so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.”
“Fulfill all righteousness.” That’s an interesting term. It
means “fill up all righteousness.”
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Now, if Jesus “fills up all righteousness,” for whom does He do
it? For Himself? No. Jesus is in Himself righteousness. He needs
nothing more. There’s only one alternative. Jesus “fills up all
righteousness” for sinners. For Dorothy. For you. What does that
mean? It means He gives you the gift of forgiveness. Jesus takes you,
the sinner, and makes you righteous.
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Dorothy understood this, even if she perhaps wouldn’t have put the
matter in those words. Week after week she came to church. And, week
after week she made her confession. “I, a poor miserable sinner,
confess unto Thee all my sins and inequities.” “I confess.”
That present tense language, isn’t it. It’s present tense in the
same way that “sinner” is present tense. It isn’t that once we
were a sinner, but no longer. It isn’t that I might be a sinner
sometime in the future, but not now. It isn’t that I could be a
sinner, but I have decided not to be. No. We are simply sinners. And
thus our confession of sinfulness is always present tense.
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But then, after Dorothy made her confession – God made His
confession concerning her. Speaking through the very human mouth of
her pastor God always answered, “I forgive you all your sins.”
You see, more present tense language. In the face of our confession,
forgiveness is never reserved for some future time. It is always ours
right now.
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One more example of how this works. Every Sunday Dorothy would
receive the Lord’s Supper. First she would receive the host – the
Body of Jesus. Then, in anticipation of receiving the cup she would
look me in the eye as I told her what she was about to be given.
“The Blood of Christ, shed for you.” And then, having heard what
she was receiving, and why, she would drink. More present tense
language. The Body of our Lord Jesus is always given into death for
us presently. His blood is always shed for us. Jesus always stands
before His Father in heaven as our sacrifice for sin. That’s the
food of faith. That One – Jesus – who first met you in the water
of Holy Baptism now preaches to you and gives Himself to you. Unites
Himself to you. And always it is present tense. Always it is now.
And always it is for your forgiveness.
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No. We do not celebrate sin. We do not celebrate the life of one
who has died. Rather, we celebrate the life of Jesus. We celebrate
the life that frees from sin. Frees eternally.
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If we say we have no sin we are liars. Even worse, we make a God a
liar. But, if we confess our sins, Jesus is faithful and just to
forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
There’s the life we celebrate. The life of Jesus. The life that
takes away sin and bestows in its place eternal life.
Amen
+Soli Deo Gloria+
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