This has been a season of many deaths. A former student called and weeped when his dad died. The mother of a former student contacted me because her daughter was dying and died just before I got there. One of the church fathers died, a man who created a sense of home wherever he was because of the love of God in him. There have been so many more – precious people loved by God – to join Him where their celebration can be unbounded by the limits of this world.

I realized that it is time for me to prepare for my own death as my mother had before she died. She planned everything, taking the burden and confusion from us, her children. I created a document, one that would cover everything necessary for my family to go forward.

Most of the work was straight forward: who gets what, who makes the decisions, where are the important records, how to pay the bills, what songs in the funeral, and the list goes on. That’s when I hit the snag. I have spent a lifetime loving my family and being loved by them. How can a practical list of what to do, when and how, ever address that? Not just my family, but all the others the Lord has put in my life.

I began to realize that my funeral plans were upside down. People come to celebrate the life of the one who has died. What about the guy, me, who has died. What if I want to say something to them? I want to reverse my funeral and make it about celebrating all the love God has poured out in my direction through all those amazing saints He brought into my life. I could never thank my family and these saints enough for being God’s emissaries.

There are Bible verses about abiding in the vine, established and firmly attached to Jesus. A vine gets its nutrients as long as it is attached, causing it to grow, stretch out, enjoy the sun and the rain, and live. No attachment means no nutrients, means death of the vine. 

So — how do the nutrients come to keep the vine alive? They come through all those wonderful people who are alive in Jesus. There is another verse about so great a cloud of witnesses. Jesus has filled my life through those beautiful people. Books of testimonies could be written, I could write, about what they have done – just for me, not including all the others they have touched. Now is a time of funeral. I want them to know how much they made a difference, how much of Jesus I saw because of their lives.

Now I hit the wall. As a man who has lived through the words I have, I have none. There is no adequate way to thank the people who God has blessed with His gifts and blessed me with their lives. I wish they could see themselves through my eyes, and they would never have a sad day again. They would see that Jesus has moved and is moving in and through them. They would not be disappointed in any of their failures because they would see that those failures became love and successes in the Lord’s hands. If there was any sorrow in them, it would be like I find now, not enough words to express the joy, the love, the thanksgiving I have for who the Lord is and who they are in the Lord.