A 23rd Psalm Funeral
Jean Morphet was a very Godly woman and it’s no surprise (given that she and her husband Don raised sheep most of their lives) that the family told me that her favorite passage of Scripture was the 23rd Psalm. So I want to begin today’s eulogy by reading it:
“The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Ye, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever.”
Notice, the Psalm starts out: “The Lord is MY shepherd”. It doesn’t say He is “A” shepherd, or that He is “THE” shepherd. He is MY shepherd and I shall not want!
ILLUS: The story is told of a preacher who asked his church if anyone knew the 23rd Psalm. Almost immediately, a little 6-year-old girl was raised their hand. Now, the preacher didn’t think she really knew the Psalm by heart, so he asked her if she really knew the entire Psalm. The little girl nodded and said: “The Lord’s my shepherd… and that’s all I want.”
Believe it or not that is what the 23rd Psalm is all about. Whatever I could want, my shepherd is capable of supplying it, and Jean knew THAT shepherd. The Lord was HER shepherd and she did not want. She built her life around Jesus and Jean became the kind of woman that she was because she served the kind of Shepherd Jesus was. Jesus was her shepherd.
You saw that in every aspect of her life. The family told me she didn’t have any enemies. Jean would apparently say “hi” to just about anyone And she knew everyone, and she also knew just about everybody’s family tree. She was like a walking encyclopedia because people mattered to her. And she would talk on the phone with friends for hours, and laugh so much when others came over that it kept the kids up when they were younger.
It was like she didn’t have a care in the world. And that was – in part - because she had good husband, but mostly it was because she had Jesus. Jesus was the shepherd who would lead her beside still waters and restore her soul. If she was ever burdened and heavy-laden Jesus gave her rest.
So, people mattered to Jean - but her family mattered even more. She was always taking pictures… 100s and 100s of them. In fact, in the few pictures that the family had of her she always seemed to have a camera hanging around her neck. And it seems she was always there for her kids/grandkids/great grandkids. She was there for all their times at 4H and State Fairs, and at their sporting events and piano recitals. She knew that God bless had blessed her … with a wonderful family. She literally knew what it was to have “Goodness and mercy follow her all the days of her life.”
And, of course there was the promise she had that she would dwell in the house of the Lord forever. You know, she was such a nice person that some people might say: “If anybody should get into heaven … Jean should.” And she was a nice person – the kind of woman you could picture deserving to be with God forever. And that sounds good… but the Bible tells us that’s not how it works. The reason Jean was a nice person and lived such a nice life was because she followed her shepherd. The life she lived… she lived to please HIM! And that was why she lived like she did.
But being “nice” was not the way Jean would get into heaven. Jean was only going to get to heaven because she followed Jesus there. And that is the Only way you get to heaven - by following Jesus. NOT by doing good things. I mean – it’s not that God doesn’t like good deeds. It’s just THAT’S not what gets you through the gates.
The Bible says “ALL OF US have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Not one of us is righteous enough to claim a place in eternity. If that were possible then we could eventually do so much good that God couldn’t keep us out if He wanted to. We would deserve heaven because of our own personal “self-righteousness”… and most of us sense that doesn’t quite sound right.
ILLUS: I often share an illustration at funerals that explains this. Up around the casket here you’ll see numerous floral arrangements, and these floral displays use two different kinds of flowers. First there are the bouquets of cut flowers. And then there are planters. There’s generally more bouquets than planters because the florist can create a more impressive splash of color with those arrangements of cut flowers than they can with a planter. However, both of these floral arrangements (the bouquets and the planters) have beautiful flowers and both mean a lot to the family of the deceased. If you will, the fruit of their blossoms makes them appealing. But now, if the family were to tell me to go ahead and take a vase of cut flowers home with me, and I placed them in the window and kept them watered… what would they look like in about a month. They’d die. But if the offered for me to take a planter home, and I placed that in the window and kept it water, what would it look like after a month? It would grow and thrive? Why? Don’t they both have beautiful blossoms? Isn’t both of their “fruit” appealing to the eye? Of course they are. The difference isn’t in the fruit, it’s in the root. The cut flowers have no root, and so they die, but the planters have roots and live.
In the same way, the “fruit” of our good deeds IS pleasing to God, but it won’t be the fruit of our righteousness that will give us life. It’s the root – not the fruit – that gives life. And Eternal Life will only come from being rooted in Jesus.
Let me say it again, the only way you or I will get to heaven is if we follow the good shepherd – Jesus. As someone once said: “If you follow Jesus, you’ll go where He went. (PAUSE) if you don’t, you won’t. Jesus said: “MY SHEEP hear my voice… and they follow me. And Jean followed Jesus all the way throughout her life and she has now followed Him thru the valley of shadows into the region of death. And she wasn’t afraid to face death because her shepherd has already conquered the grave.
CLOSE: In a little while, we’re going to go to the cemetery, and there you’ll see the gravestone has a picture engraved on it. It’s a picture Jesus holding a lamb - and that how Jean and Don (her husband) saw Jesus’ love for them.
Jesus made Jean a promise (the same one He’s made to us) “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.” Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” John 14:1-6
OR AS I Corinthians 15 says: “Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: ‘Death is swallowed up in victory.’ ‘O death, where is your sting? O grave, where is your victory?’ The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
