Remembering those who have Gone Before Us 5/23/03
1 Peter 1:22-25
I can remember when I was a kid growing up receiving a pen with the invisible ink. You would write something and within a minute, it would fade away. But I also discovered that, watch what you write because when you hold the paper up to the light it you can still read the impression.
That reminds me of our lives. We are just here for a short time on this earth and when we leave here, all that’s left is the impression that we leave behind.
Today I want to talk about a few deaths that I have experienced and the impression that they left behind.
Righteous People
I’ve had two close relatives who have gone on to be with the Lord who were Preachers, my Grandpa and my Uncle Frank. My bloodline has a long line of preachers. I am the forth generation preacher in the Meadows blood line. But I can remember as a child when we would go visit Grandpa that it didn’t take long before my Dad and Grandpa would start discussing God. Both my Uncle and Grandpa loved the Lord. My Dad would tell me about times that Grandpa would preach as many as five times on any one given Sunday. He had a station wagon and he would load up Grandma and the eight kids and preach from one church to another. My Uncle started a church in his house. I can remember being there and getting out the folding chairs to prepare for a service. Both loved the Lord and I know when they got to Heaven, Jesus said, well done thy good and faithful servant for the sacrifices that they made while on this earth.
Isn’t that how you would like to be remembered? Someone who loved and worked for the Lord.
Back Sliden and then Restored
I had a best friend growing up. I met Chris when I was six years old. His family attended the church where my Dad went to pastor. I remember the first time I saw him, I thought he was the ugliest kid that I had ever seen. They didn’t have wire rims then, and this boy’s face was covered with freckles and he had these big thick black glasses. I had gone with my Dad as he went to visit Chris’s parents as the new pastor and I was asked to spend the night. From then on, I had a best friend. We were insupportable all through school. You didn’t see one without the other being to far away. But then something happened. We both went to work doing construction and I found out Chris was really lazy. Every time a load of sheet rock would come or any hard manual labor, Chris would have to go on a long nature call, if you know what I mean. This would cause me to have to do more than my share of the work. Our friendship began to suffer over it, especially after I tipped the porta potty over with him in it. The best friend that was inseparable from me growing up was growing apart from me. He ended up joining the Coast Guard and I went my own way also, and we went years without even seeing each other.
Chris at the young age of 30 discovered that he had developed Colin cancer. He received a medical discharge from the service and moved him and his family back home. We restored our relationship and I’m so glad that God allowed me to get my best buddy back again. And three years later, I carried his body to the graveside, but I knew that it would be a short separation till I saw my buddy again.
That reminds me of how we can be as Christians. We enter into this wonderful relationship with our Lord and Savior and then we lose fellowship with Him. Maybe because we are like Chris. We are lazy. We think after we accept Christ then that’s all we have to do. Salvation is that simple, but in James 2:26, God tells us that faith without works is dead.
For whatever reason you might have lost fellowship with the Lord, you too can restore that relationship with Him.
No Guaranty
One of the saddest funerals that I’ve ever been to was of a one-year-old baby of a friend of mine. This beautiful baby girl on her six-month check up was diagnosed with a rare cancer. The parents on her first birthday decided to turn off the life support. Why would God choice to take this little baby we tend to think. I don’t know, but this is what happened. After talking to the doctors about their decision, they came out into the waiting room to tell the family. They told the Grandfather he better go and tell his granddaughter goodbye, because he was not a Christian. And unless he would have a change of heart, he would never see his granddaughter again.
If you are here today and you have a loved one who has went on to be with the Lord, you can have that peace that if you have accepted Christ, you will see them again.
One of my fondest memories and blessings of a funeral that I’ve attended was the one I recently attended of Maxie Butler. Almost 102 years old, and what a blessing her time on this earth was. This poem that she wrote describes it best.
I’m just a little star.
I can’t do much to make the dark world bright.
But I’m part of Gods Great Plan
And I’ll cheerfully do the best I can.
That was Maxie, and she did more then she ever thought to make this world bright.
But here we have a little baby and then a wonderful lady whom God choice to bless us with almost 102 years. This shows us that death is not a respecter of time. Ecclesiates 2:2 tells us there is a time to be born and a time to die. It’s the how much in-between we don’t know. If you are here today and things are not right between you and your maker, don’t wait. You don’t know how much time that you have to get it that way.
Hell
When my family moved into this area, I went to the second grade and was the new kid in school. Being the new kid, and having a set of big blue eyes, I was receiving a lot of attention. Ace was in my class and you can say he owned the 2nd grade, because it was his third time taking it. He was much bigger then the rest of the class and he didn’t appreciate the attention that I was receiving. One day he let me know that by coming up to me and grabbing me and literally lifting my feet off the ground. The one mistake that he made though was he forgot to look at what was in my hand. Back then we had metal lunch pails with heavy metal thermoses. When he did that, I began swinging my arms with that lunch pale in my hand, and I nearly beat him silly. Now the truth known, I was trying to run away, but in his eyes and everyone else’s, I stood up to him.
We then became somewhat friends. I figured it was easier and healthier that way. Ace and I went through most of school together and eventually everyone else (except me) caught up with him in size. Ace had a rough home life and when he turned 16, he dropped out of school. We lost touch and he spent a year or two in prison. But the summer after I graduated I heard that Ace had gotten out. One day Ace and four other people I knew went out parting. Ace had a little Chevy Chevette and after he got high he went spending on this narrow road in Blue Creek. Little did he know that would be his last trip. He ran head on into a big four wheel drive truck with a lift kit and it literally ripped his head off decapitating him and killing all the rest. They said there was body parts everywhere and they had to get flat head shovels to scrap up the bodies. And when I found out, I have been haunted by it ever sense. You see I can see Ace standing in Hell, screaming at me saying, “Dean, why didn’t you tell me about this place; you were suppose to be my friend; You went to church, your Dad was a preacher; Why didn’t you warn me?”
We all have our Ace’s in our life. People that we know and have not shared Jesus with. And if you are here today and have never accepted Christ then you have been warned.
Let’s get busy wining others to Christ and if you are here today and have never received Christ, you don’t know how much time you have left. Please receive Him today.
We all will be judged one day, so let’s get ready for the Judge.
