20 November 2020
Text: John 10:27-29 (Job 19:23-27a, Rom 8:28-39)
In the name of + Jesus. Amen.
Dear Bryon, Cory, Bryon, family, friends, brothers and sisters in Christ, and honored guests: Peace be with you! These were the first words that Jesus spoke to His disciples after His resurrection. This wasn’t just a polite greeting. For the disciples were mourning His death. They were suffering. Jesus gave them peace because He conquered death and rose again.
You are also suffering, dear friends. Death is painful to us because it separates us from our loved ones. The death of a wife and mother is especially painful, because in marriage, two of us become one flesh. To lose a spouse is to lose part of oneself. And likewise our mothers. There is no love like that of a mother. And so we grieve, dear friends.
Well-intentioned people try to comfort us by appealing to our memories. But we don’t want memories. We want Linda back. The world tells us that death is natural and normal and a solution to problems. No, it isn’t. We Christians know better than that. God did not create us to die. Death is our condition because we live in a fallen world. We are all sinners. We are all broken.
And this is why the peace of Christ is our hope and our refuge. Jesus came into our broken world to heal it, to heal us, to forgive our sins, to raise us from the dead. This is not a myth or a metaphor. In our Old Testament reading, Job, in the midst of intense suffering, expresses faith in God: “I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last, He will stand upon the earth.” He knew that Jesus, yet to be born, would come in the flesh. Job says, “And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God.” Again, the world deceives us by making us think the afterlife is about spirits floating around in the sky. Scripture teaches us that there will be a bodily resurrection. We Christians confess in the Apostles Creed that we believe in the “resurrection of the body and the life everlasting.
Just as the disciples saw the risen Jesus in the flesh, you will see the risen Linda in the flesh. For that’s how we were meant to exist: in the body. But in a body made perfect, freed from aging and suffering. You will embrace her again. You will look into her eyes again. You will laugh together again. That’s what Jesus meant when He said, “Peace be with you.”
For us Christians, death is a temporary separation. Listen to the words of St. Paul: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?... For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation , will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” In Christ, Linda is more than a conqueror, for death has been defeated by her Redeemer.
And so we wait, dear friends. We wait to be reunited. We wait for the resurrection of the body. But meanwhile, we have work to do here. Whatever your calling is, continue to carry it out with excellence. We work to serve one another: in our families, in our churches, and in our jobs. We bring the love of God to others by these callings, just as Linda did with all of you in her life on this side of glory.
The Lord pledged to take care of Linda at her baptism, when she became one of the beloved lambs of the Good Shepherd. Jesus said, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.”
Our Lord came into our fallen world for this very purpose. His death was payment for our sins, and His death is the means by which we are saved from eternal death. He does this out of love. And of course, we are taught this from the Scriptures. But we are also taught about love by experiencing love: the love of a spouse, the love of a mother, a grandmother, a colleague, a friend. Linda’s love for you is a reflection of the love of Jesus, who died for you and for Linda. And as hard as it is to believe, the love of God is even more intense than Linda’s. She is safely with God the Father who created her and loves her, because of God the Son who died for her, called by God the Holy Spirit who protects her and has kept her in the faith.
We know what it is to suffer because of death. There is nothing worse. It is our bitter enemy, but it is a conquered enemy. We know what it is to be loved. And not even the grave stops the love of a wife and mother, a grandmother, and a dear beloved friend. Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. And so we wait for our joyful reunion, dear friends, and we wait with the peace of Christ, the peace he gave to us at His own bodily resurrection.
Peace be with you!
Amen.
In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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