I have not been a very faithful blogger these past weeks, have I?! Getting back into the swing of things after the Christmas season, coupled with extra responsibilities and commitments, two weeks in Chicago, and two deaths in the Hilmar community have taken my time and attention away from being able to write.

I still don't have the time or focus right now to write on a couple of very interesting and challenging topics related to the Church and ministry today. Instead, I am going to post the sermon that I gave last Saturday at the memorial service for my dear friend, Delton Nyman, who died while I was in Chicago. Before he passed away, Delton told his wife that he wanted me to do his service, and so the day after I returned from the Midwest, I had the great privilege of officiating at his memorial service. I must admit that this kind of ministry responsibility is WAY out of my comfort zone! On top of that, there were nearly 600 people in attendance, packed into our Hilmar Covenant sanctuary that only holds 290! I can do music in front of lots of people, lead various parts of worship in front of people, even pray very easily in front of people (something most people are totally terrified of doing). But handling an entire service, with preaching--and a memorial service at that...well, let's just say I thought I was gonna throw up when, a full half hour before the service was to begin, the sanctuary was already packed and more and more people kept coming in and we were scrambling to find chairs and places to put everyone! We even used the choir loft for seating.

I am posting my sermon because it has deeply touched many people throughout our community, and also because it is a testimony to something I experienced at the death of my dad more than 36 years ago. It also rings with hope and truth; that there is a reality bigger than the everyday experience we are living in right now.
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Ezekiel 21:26 - “Remove the turban and take off the crown. Things shall not remain as they are.”

We all know that nothing ever stays the same. Change is inherent to our lives. From the time we are conceived, changes happen to us. As we grow from fetus to baby to child to adolescent to adult to senior citizen, changes occur to us, within us, and through us as we interact with the world. I often wonder why it is, when change is indeed inherent to us as humans, that we resist it so much! If change is in our DNA--and in the whole wide world around us--why do we push against it? Why do we settle into comfortable patterns and routines and try so hard to maintain a status quo existence? As we heard in the reading from Revelation, Jesus Himself said, “Behold, I am making all things new!” If our Savior and Lord proclaimed such a message, should we not embrace it joyfully and accept with excitement those new things--those changes--that Jesus said will inevitably come into our lives? Yet, when changes occur, we usually resist them, defend ourselves against them, even buy insurance to protect ourselves from whatever “new thing” might pop up to disrupt our carefully constructed lives and force us into directions and situations that, frankly, terrify us.

So how do you feel when you hear these words from the prophet, Ezekiel: “Remove the turban and take off the crown. Things shall not remain as they are.”? I first learned of this verse from Ezekiel 21 in a frightfully disturbing way, one September Sunday in 1974, two days before my dad died of cancer. The verse was in the church bulletin as the “Thought For Worship” that day. And when my dad did pass away on Tuesday, after battling cancer for two years, this word of Scripture came rushing back, knocking the wind out of me with a force of truth that sank deep into my heart and soul. It was crystal clear that things in my life would not be as they had been--not ever! My dad was gone, another brave soul who had lost his battle with this devastating disease. My mom and brothers and I, along with the rest of his relatives, friends, and co-workers, now faced new changes and challenges in our lives, living without our husband, father, and friend. It was terrifying. It was totally unsettling. Life as we had known it would never--could never--be the same. A huge chasm had opened up and now existed in our lives. How in the world would we ever be able to adjust to such a dark, empty, all-consuming void in the midst of our everyday lives? Talk about change! It was beyond overwhelming. The ramifications of my dad’s death were numerous, unimagineable, affecting every aspect of our lives. How does anyone deal with such a deeply emotional, tragic, gut-wrenching reality: the reality of death?

It was precisely at this point of immeasureable grief that the reality of my faith--or more precisely, my relationship with my Savior, Jesus--took a giant leap forward; a transformative turn into a deeper dimension I had never known or experienced before. In the midst of the chasm of my grief, out of nowhere, it seemed, I suddenly perceived a firm, sustaining, transcendent strength welling up within me. It erupted in a flash, flooding out of all the things I’d learned from my many years growing up in a Christian family and in my church. In the ensuing hours and days after I received the news of my dad’s death, the words of Scripture, the tenets of faith learned in Sunday School and Confirmation, the inspirational insights from pastors and professors--all of the elements that were the building blocks of my faith--came alive with fresh vitality, infused with new clarity and energy that I’d never realized before. Now I knew, beyond a shadow of doubt: “it’s all TRUE!” Everything I had accepted and claimed in an intellectual way for 21 years: it really is the TRUTH!”

It was totally amazing; shocking even: in the midst of searing loss, I received a rock-solid conviction about everything I believed, and I discovered something thrilling: a joy, a confidence, and, indeed, the reality of Phil. 4:7: a “peace that passes all understanding.” The words of Scripture were not just ink on a page or verses in a sermon. Now they were alive, as never before! Three dimensional! Infused with freshness and meaning that enlivened my relationship with the Lord as never before--and of all places, right in the middle of my sadness. I totally knew that my Savior was right there with me, in the chasm of my grief; that He knew everything I was feeling and going through, and despite the uncertainties swirling around me, He was completely trustworthy! Scriptures flooded my mind, pulsing with new meaning for me: “The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of who shall I be afraid?” “I am with you always, to the end of the age.” “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” “We do not grieve as others do, who have no hope.” “I will not leave you comfortless.” “Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord, that they may rest from their labors.” (After seeing my dad struggle for so many weeks against the cancer spreading throughout his body, this verse was especially meaningful to me. Maybe it can be the same for you too, Kathy.) “If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things?” “In all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.”

All of this was certainly a change--change unsought, change unexpected, change I at first resisted. Yet it was also change that uplifted, soothed, strengthened, and brought wonderfully rich perspective and depth of insight that sustained me through the many weeks and months following my dad’s permanent absence from our lives. Which is not to say that all this made my dad’s death OK, or easy, or acceptable. Not at all--because death is not what God ever intended for any of us in the first place. Death is the result of willful, human sin coming into our world, infecting all of creation and impacting every living thing. God created all that is with a very differnt purpose in mind. The hurt and sadness and evil that haunts our experience today is our own doing, and will be part of this earthly experience till Jesus comes again.

However, the gospel of our Lord Jesus--the “good news” that He brought to us--is that sin and evil, death and the devil himself do not have victory over us! Though we still live with the devastating effects of these realities, they have already been undone, dismantled, and destroyed through what God Himself accomplished in Jesus’ death and resurrection 2000 years ago.

This “good news” is not just a bunch of religious dogma, theological debate, or a matter of personal belief either. The truth of Jesus Christ is the true reality that undergirds and permeates our existence. He is the truth that every restless soul on this earth is seeking; the truth behind humanity’s never-ending search for God; the truth that fills the God-shaped vacuum in the heart of every person (as Pascal put it); the myth that became real and true (as C.S.Lewis put it). The truth of Jesus Christ is the reason so many religions exist, as humanity has tried, in so many imperfect ways, to make sense of the world, seeking the true Deity that all of us intuitively know exists--and Who is seeking us all the time!


This “good news” of Jesus is the truth that Delton embraced many years ago when he committed himself and his life to his Savior. It is the truth that enabled him to bravely face the difficult, daunting challenges of the past 18 months battling with cancer, yet knowing there is so much more than the everyday reality of our present lives. The truth of Jesus Christ gives all of us who know Him a fuller perspective on life; that life is much bigger, grander, and far more multi-dimensional than the time-and-space existence we now inhabit. It is the truth that brings meaning, perspective, and the ability to deal with the grief and sadness over Delton’s death that will certainly continue to wash over us in waves in the days to come. If the truth of Christ is something you have not embraced for yourself, I know that nothing would make Delton happier than for you to use this occasion of his memorial service to embrace the same Savior he knew, and to start your own journey of faith with Jesus, making His truth your own. And for those of you who have committed your lives to Jesus, I pray that in the days and weeks ahead you might have a similar experience to mine, where the things you’ve read and heard and believed for, perhaps, many years would leap off the page and into your hearts in ways that will take you deep into a more intimate and honest way than ever with your Savior. Remember that Jesus IS “the way, the truth, and the life.” Ponder this, and discover the real Truth that we are blessed to have in our Christian faith. For when it comes alive in you, it is the source of immeasureable joy, confidence, comfort, strength, hope, and peace.

C.S. Lewis used a different word than change to describe the basis of reality. He said: “The basis of things is not rational, but tragic.” We know this; Delton’s death is a terrible tragedy; devastating for us who knew him, lived with him, and loved him. Lewis continues: “When you enter the domain of suffering and sorrow you find that reason and logic can only be your guide amongst things as they are, but nothing more. Is it rational that I should be born with an heredity over which I have no control? Is it rational that nations that are nominally Christian should go to war? The basis of things is tragic, and the only way out is through redemption.”


Redemption. The very thing that Christ offers everyone who believes in Him and who desires to follow Him. The very thing that Delton received long ago from his Savior, Jesus, and that he is now experiencing in all of its fullness in heaven, face to face with the One he served all the years that he lived on earth: Jesus, his Savior, God’s only Son. Redemption - the very thing we are all seeking in one way or another throughout our lives. Redemption itself is about change; changing one way of living for another, one way of thinking for another, one reality (based on the things of this world) for another ultimate, eternal reality that puts one into a loving relationship with the God of the universe. This is where our security, our hope, our freedom from the fears and anxieties that continually nag us truly lies. Take the Lord at His word, just as Delton did. Let these words of Scripture be your comfort and confirmation in the Lord: “For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels or rulers, nor things present or 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 that is in Christ Jesus, our Lord.” Amen.