I'll Never See Life the Same Again: I'll Never See Funerals the Same
 

Pastor Burcham’s Sermon

 Sunday, March 30, 2008

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Earlier this year in the theaters, there was a movie called Vantage Point out. Basic storyline was the President of the United States was giving a speech in a foreign country and he’s shot. One of the secret service men who is assigned to his security detail then wants to find out who the shooter is. Now the unusual part of this movie that sets it apart from others is the fact that you saw the same sequence of events but you saw them from different vantage points, from the perspective of different characters in the movie.

So the movie begins and it is sort of played out in front of you. You see the president get up, he gives his speech, he’s shot, there’s the ensuing kind of chaos that happens afterwards and the film literally stops and it rewinds and now, from a different vantage point, a different perspective, a different character, you go through the same sequence of events. It stops, it rewinds and it keeps doing that from all these different vantage points until you get to the final vantage point. And from this final vantage point as you’re watching it, all of a sudden, all the other perspectives make sense. All of a sudden, the film comes together and you got it. You know who the shooter is.

My friends, the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the final vantage point for us Christians. Once you’ve had an Easter moment, once you’ve seen the resurrected Lord, all of a sudden, things come into clarity in your life. All of a sudden, all these different perspectives now make sense because, once you look through the perspective of the resurrection, you never see life the same again.

This weekend, as we start a series of messages talking about how the resurrection changes our viewpoint on life, we begin literally at the end. We begin with funerals and see how the vantage point of the resurrection changes our view of funerals. Now I know it sounds kind of like a depressing topic, especially right after Easter, because that’s normally how we think about funerals, right? There is lots of grief. There is lots of sadness. It’s not something that we look forward to but what would happen if we saw funerals from a different vantage point? What if we saw funerals through the vantage point of the resurrection?

Through the vantage point of the resurrection, all of a sudden, funerals are about winning, not about losing. Now that’s the direct opposite of what we usually think of. Because from our normal vantage point, that is, the vantage point of living in this world, when we attend the funeral of someone we love or a friend of ours, we don’t think about this as a winning situation. This is a loss. This is a defeat and so it is for us. That’s why we dress in black. Our heads are hung low. There’s crying. There’s mourning. There’s this emptiness in the heart. And I’m not suggesting that it should be any different than that because, from our vantage point, still being in this world, it is a great loss. We can think of all the things that we’ll be missing. We won’t see this person again. We won’t be able to talk to this person. We can’t call them up and ask for advice. We can’t be warmed by their smile. We could have a whole list of things that we have lost as we attend that funeral. In fact, we even look at the departed one as losing, do we not? We say that he or she lost his life or they lost the battle with cancer. We’ll quote scripture and we’ll say, “He fought the good fight,” but what we mean by that is he eventually lost. He suffered a defeat. And that’s why, from our vantage point, the younger the person is who has died, the more stinging a defeat it is because we start enumerating all of the events and all of the experiences that they’ll never have, all the things they’re missing out on. So from our vantage point, funerals are about a loss. Funerals are about a defeat. That’s why there’s all the sorrow, all the grief, all the emptiness. And I think it’s important that we acknowledge that.

But this morning, can I invite you to look at that same scene from a different vantage point? Rewind, if you will, and now come into the funeral from the vantage point of the resurrection. From the vantage point of the resurrection, funerals are about winning, not about losing. Funerals are about victory, not about defeat. St. Paul understood that when he wrote to Timothy. He’s talking about his upcoming death and, if you will, he’s talking about his own funeral that’s coming up and now he’s looking at it from the vantage point of the resurrected Savior and that’s why he writes this, “The time of my death is near. I have fought a good fight. I have finished the race. I have remained faithful and now the prize awaits me, the crown of righteousness.” The prize awaits me, the crown of righteousness. This man is talking about his own death. He’s talking about his own funeral and he certainly doesn’t sound like a person who is preparing for a great loss. He’s not preparing for a great defeat. He uses the analogy of a runner running a race and finishing that race and, not only just finishing it, but winning the race. In Paul’s day, if you won a major race, they made a crown out of leaves and they placed it upon your head. So for Paul, approaching his death, approaching his own funeral, he’s approaching it like a victory march because it’s going to be a win for him. Now that doesn’t mean he wants to hasten his death. No, he hangs onto the life God has given him here but he certainly doesn’t dread it and he certainly doesn’t view it as a defeat. It’s a victory because Paul knows that the funeral is not the end. It’s the beginning. It’s the beginning of a life in heaven. He’s looking at it from the vantage point of the resurrection.

You see, I know that because Paul wrote a letter to the Church at Corinth and he talks about death and he talks about funerals and this is what he says, “And if we have a hope in Christ only for this life, we’re the most miserable people in the world but the fact is that Christ has been raised from the dead. He has become the first of a great harvest of those who will be raised from the dead.” He’s looking at it from the viewpoint since Christ has been raised from the dead, He is the first of all believers that will also be raised from the dead. He says if our hope is only for this world, that’s too shortsighted. Christ gives us more than just a hope for our time in this life but He gives us hope for an eternity. And just as Christ was raised from the dead, so all believers will be raised from the dead. So for him, it’s a victory. He concludes this section by saying, “How we thank God who gives us victory over sin and death through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Victory over sin and death. The resurrection of Jesus says that He has defeated sin. For you and I, that means the punishment we deserve for our sin, we’ll never have to make payment on it. We’ll never have to go through that because Jesus has won the victory over sin. He’s won the victory over death.

Now that doesn’t mean our life in this world won’t end. It does. But that’s not the ultimate end because He has the victory over death. That’s why Jesus said that we pass over from death to life, life everlasting. As Jesus rose from the grave, as He declared His victory over sin and death, He gives that victory to us. Funerals are about winning when you look at them from the vantage point of the resurrection.

And funerals, my friends, are about heaven, not about earth. We have to change our perspective on this. Funerals are about heaven, not about earth. Our normal perspective, our normal vantage point, since we’re still living in this world, is the vantage point of the earth, of this world. That’s why when we talk about a person, all the things they’re going to miss now that they’ve gone, all the experiences they won’t have, we’re talking just as much about the experiences and events that we won’t have with them because we’re looking at it from our vantage point.

Even in describing heaven, don’t we think about heaven and picture heaven from our vantage point? We put it in earthly terms. We see clouds and angels and harps and streets of gold and mansions. When we think about heaven, we try to imagine the most wonderful place in the world but all of our experience has been in this world. Scripture doesn’t even help us out a whole lot in this because scripture doesn’t talk a lot about what’s going to be in heaven. So the descriptions of heaven, we find out there are going to be choirs of angels surrounding the throne of God and singing to Him 24/7. Doesn’t that sound kind of boring? I mean, let’s be honest. After a day, day and a half of singing, can we get a volleyball game going or something? That’s because we’re looking at it from our vantage point. We’re trying to describe heaven from an earthly point of view.

Funerals are about heaven, not earth. So let’s change our perspective on heaven. Instead of trying to think about all the things that will be in heaven, how about all the things that will not be in heaven? We talk about all the things our loved ones will be missing out on. What are some of the things that they’re going to be missing out on? What are some of the things that will not be in heaven? There will be no pain in heaven. There will be no sickness in heaven. Scripture tells us that we’re going to trade in these mortal bodies for immortal bodies. We’re going to trade them in on new and perfect bodies. That means there’s no sickness. There’s no disease. There’s no cancer. There’s no appendectomies. There’s no gall bladder surgery. There’s no broken bones. There is no sickness or pain in heaven.

There’s no crying in heaven. Scripture says that God will dry our tears. There will be no sorrow. So as much as there is no physical pain, there’s no emotional pain. That means there’s no dementia. There’s no anxiety, no stress, no depression, no psychological disorders. There is no sorrow in heaven.

There’s no death in heaven. So the pain we’ve had to go through when we’ve lost a loved one and the aching we have in our heart, that’s no more because there is no death in heaven. There’s no sin in heaven. Now let that one sink in for a moment. How much pain, suffering and sickness is in this world because of our own sinfulness and the sinfulness of others? And there is no sin in heaven. There are no affairs in heaven. There’s no adultery in heaven. There’s no gossiping in heaven. There’s no stealing. There’s no embezzling. There’s no rap music. There’s no sin in heaven.

Heaven is just as much about what’s not going to be there than what is going to be there because what’s not in heaven is what makes it heaven. And funerals are about heaven. It’s seeing it from a different vantage point, from the vantage point of the resurrection. Now to be sure, funerals will still be a time of sadness. And please do not misunderstand me and say you shouldn’t be crying and mourning the death of a loved one. We will. We should because we suffered a loss from our vantage point. But if we can also see the other vantage point, if we can see it through the vantage point of the resurrection, all of a sudden, we see it differently. Funerals are about winning, not losing, the final victory being given over to the believer.

And funerals are about heaven, all the things that won’t be there. From the vantage point of the resurrection, you’ll never see funerals the same again. Amen.

Copyright 2008 Gloria Dei Lutheran Church