C. L. Meredith Funeral

C. L. Meredith Funeral

Introduction

Memory is a gift God has given to us. Over the past few days, we all have chosen to remember this great man. We have reflected on our lives with him. We have cried. We may have recounted some of his legendary fishing stories. We have laughed. We have thought about years gone by and wept with grief over our loss. And we will continue to. This is the most difficult part of the human experience. It is not fun.

As I thought about my father-in-law, a verse of Scripture came to mind that I want to share with you before we spend some time remembering C. L. a little more this afternoon. It is found in Micah 6:8. It reads, "He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?"

In this verse, God is telling His hearers and us that in the big scheme of things, what he really wants from us, and what makes a life worth living, and what makes the world a better place while we are here and after we are gone consists of three things. Many of you knew C. L. far longer than I did. I've only really known him for about 23 years. In those 23 years, I have seen the three things in this lived out and embodied in the life of C. L.

1. Doing Justice

Doing justice means doing what is right. It means doing what is right in relationships. It means that when someone sees something wrong in the world that they seek to make it right. It means when someone sees someone else that has been done wrong they take the initiative to do what they can to make sure that person's situation can change.

C. L. knew how to make lifelong friends who he made see themselves as family.

I think about the stories that he told about Alec and the photo that C. L. held not when Alec had been gone for decades. C. L. was a friend to the end.

Or Papi and Maoli. Papi, who drove a truck and helped Maxine change a tire one day. And then became forever-friends with C. L. and Maxine. You could not do something good for C. L. and he forget it.

Or Big John. They would fight and argue. But, come thanksgiving or if a need arose, C. L. was there. He was a faithful friend.

What about his group of friends, who after they got in a fight at the bar moved the poolroom to his house. C. L. was always making new friends and he was always seeking to do right by his relationships. If there were moments when things weren't right, he tried to make it right. It was always fun to see who else was coming to Thanksgiving or who was going with us on fishing trips.

He loved buffets. I remember him telling me, "If you don't get enough to eat, it's your own fault." At one Chinese buffet off of I-10, he met the cook, Chuck. The next thing you know, Chuck was going fishing with us, along with some managers or executives from the Q Sports Club. That was a fun fishing trip. It was the first time I had one of Maxine's famous fishing sandwiches and the first time I caught a fish. On the trip out I was nervous. Margaret and I had not yet married and I was with all new people. He went out of his way to include me and make sure that I knew that I was just as important to him as everyone else on the trip. Once we got home he had Maxine clean them and I think eventually she made Macaral patties out of them. He knew how to make total strangers into lifelong friends and friends into family.

A few years ago he had a time when he kept getting pneumonia. Finally, Dr. Aleem, on a guess picked at something he saw in C. L.'s lung during a procedure and it turned out that there was a cap in his lung. Dr. Aleem removed it. He said it was God who prompted him to find the cap and remove it. C. L. believed it, and he and Dr. Aleem became friends. Even though Dr. Aleem is a lung specialist and is not a primary care physician, he had one patient who he began to see all the time, C. L. Meredith. He knew how to make friends into lifelong friends and he would be there for you through the thick and the thin.

I first met C. L. when I was 16 years old. I came to his house one evening to take his daughter Margaret on our first date. She was 20. :-) I remember he had a dog at the time named Chip. Chip was a small poodle. Chip was old. I think by then Chip was blind. He spent most of his time behind. C. L.'s chair in the corner. C. L. cared for animals. He didn't discard Chip because he was old. I watched him do the same thing with his dog, Jake. He would feed him daily with a mixture of table scraps, dog food, and water along with supplements like Una de Gato. He took care of Jake. C. L.'s love for animals extended to the place where once his red Sebring convertible was destroyed and he almost lost his life trying to get the dog that was trapped in the middle of the highway to safety.