Ephesians 4:32 - Be kind to one
another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.
John 11:17-45 - 17 Now when Jesus
came, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. 18 Bethany
was near Jerusalem, about two miles[a] off, 19 and many of the Jews had come to
Martha and Mary to console them concerning their brother. 20 So when Martha heard that Jesus was coming,
she went and met him, but Mary remained seated in the house. 21 Martha said to
Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. 22 But even
now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you.” 23 Jesus said to
her, “Your brother will rise again.” 24
Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection
on the last day.” 25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life.[b]
Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, 26 and everyone who
lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” 27 She said to
him, “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is
coming into the world.”
28 When she had said this, she went
and called her sister Mary, saying in private, “The Teacher is here and is
calling for you.” 29 And when she heard it, she rose quickly and went to him.
30 Now Jesus had not yet come into the village, but was still in the place
where Martha had met him. 31 When the Jews who were with her in the house,
consoling her, saw Mary rise quickly and go out, they followed her, supposing
that she was going to the tomb to weep there. 32 Now when Mary came to where
Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet, saying to him, “Lord, if you had
been here, my brother would not have died.” 33 When Jesus saw her weeping, and
the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved[c] in his spirit
and greatly troubled. 34 And he said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to
him, “Lord, come and see.” 35 Jesus
wept. 36 So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” 37 But some of them said,
“Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man also have kept this man from
dying?”
38 Then Jesus, deeply moved again,
came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone lay against it. 39 Jesus said,
“Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, “Lord,
by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days.” 40 Jesus
said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory
of God?” 41 So they took away the stone. And Jesus lifted up his eyes and said,
“Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 42
I knew that you always hear me, but I said this on account of the people
standing around, that they may believe that you sent me.” 43 When he had said
these things, he cried out with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out.” 44 The man who had died came out, his hands and
feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to
them, “Unbind him, and let him go.”
1 Thessalonians 3:13-18 - 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.
Grace, Mercy and
Peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior, Jesus
Christ. Amen. Our text for this day comes from the epistle
lesson, especially these words, “For since we believe that Jesus died and rose
again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen
asleep.” Thus far our text.
Dear friends in
Christ, especially Bev, Donna, Jim and Jeff.
Today is a day of grieving. Today
is a day to mourn. It is not the first
day that we have mourned, and we know that it will not be the last. Eleanor, your mother, your grandmother is
asleep in the Lord. Her soul now dwells
before the throne of God, and her body is left in our safe keeping until the
glorious day of resurrection. And today,
tomorrow, and for years to come, we will miss her, and continue to grieve and
mourn.
We mourn because Eleanor’s
life wasn’t easy. Her mother died when
she was young, and she worked hard to care for her family and brothers. She had to ride her bike for miles to church
for confirmation. She worked hard every
day of her life, helping her own children, and gardening until finally she
could no longer do the things she wanted due to a damaged heart and
Alzheimer’s. We mourn for the
difficulties that Eleanor face in her life, and because we know that one day,
we too must face death – for we too are sinners. “For just as sin entered the world through one
man, and through sin death, so death came to all people, for all have sinned.”
But we have a bold
answer to the toils and tribulations of this world. We have an answer to sin. It doesn’t look inwardly to our self, but it
looks to our Lord Jesus. We have a great
hope in the Son of God who lived among us sinners for his whole life. For God took on human flesh, he was born in
the poor family of a carpenter. He spent
countless hours helping people, the sick, the weak, the broken hearted. He made the blind see, he gave the lame to
walk. He cared for people so much that
finally to take care of all sin, of all suffering and all pain, he himself
experienced agony at the hands of sinful men.
He was pierced for our iniquities, he was crushed for our sin. Jesus himself died to answer the problems of
suffering and pain that we daily face.
He died to give hope to all who trust in him. For he did not stay dead, but rose again as
he said that he would.
You have a hope
that your mother died in the faith, so she will not stay dead. You have a hope that because she believed and
was baptized, that she shall be saved, that even right now as we are gathered
here, she is experiencing the eternal bliss of paradise. In Jesus, and in Jesus alone, we have that
hope.
So what does this
mean? Should we stop grieving? Should we stop mourning? Afterall Jesus rose victorious and so too
will mom and all our loved ones who have died.
Don’t worry about it, just be happy right? Wrong.
Death’s sting still hurts, even if it carries no poison. Deaths loss is like being stabbed through our
heart, even if it can be healed. Dear
friends in Christ, it is good and right to hurt. Jesus himself in our Gospel lesson arrives at
the tomb of his dear friend Lazarus and weeps at the loss death brings, at the
pain sin delivers and at the woe that fills our lives. Jesus cries, even as he knows his friend will
rise again.
But that’s the key
isn’t it? Even as Jesus mourns, he
mourns with a hope. He mourns knowing
that through his own blood bought sacrifice that sin will be dealt with, that
life will be restored, and that death will not, I repeat will not be the victor in this battle. Because of the sacrifice of Golgotha, the
blood pouring out of Jesus side, we have a hope. So that when we mourn, we know that it is
temporary, it is not forever.
We do not want you
to be uninformed, dear friends, 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. Eleanor will come with Jesus through
death. You will come with Jesus through
death. All believers past and present
will come with Jesus through death. This
is our hope, this is our promise.
And so today, we
grieve our loss. We remember our mother
and the things we will miss and the lessons we learned from her. But we do not grieve without hope. We grieve with a savior, Jesus Christ, who
forsaking all else, went to suffer and die for our sin. You are forgiven in his name, you are granted
eternity in him. Grieve, but know that
Christ has won and death has lost.
Amen.
