How does the Gospel (There is one God who exists in three
persons; the second person of God became the man Jesus, died for sinners, rose
again to reconcile us to God, sent out the Word of God and the Holy Spirit) –
how does the Gospel work itself out in real life? Today I attended an
African American funeral, and saw and heard the principles of living that way on
display. Let me share what I witnessed.
In inner city Winston Salem, North Carolina, Bobby Ray
Crosby died at age 61 on January 30, 2016. He left behind a wife, a son, four
daughters, eighteen grandchildren, ten great grandchildren; as well as a
mother, two sisters and three brothers. The memorial service was today,
February 6, 2016.
• “Don’t worry about
living . . . Look at the birds in the sky. They never sow nor reap nor store
away in barns, and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them” (Matt 6:25-26).
A different three-some (electric guitarist, organ-keyboardist,
and lead singer) led us in gospel music at two points in the service. Before
playing, the first male guitarist (an older man) said, “Bobby and I were in the
hospital together. He got up from his room, went over to my bed, and said, ‘God
is still in control.’ This is a celebration time!” Then the guitarist vigorously
strummed his first chord.
The lead singer of the second group said, “They call me the
black Loretta Lynn. My husband died four years ago. We were married 42 years. I
thought, ‘I don’t know how I could make it on my own.’” Then she broke forth in
robust song from the Canton Spirituals, “Glad I’ve got Jesus in my heart.”
• “How do you know
what will happen even tomorrow? What, after all, is your life? It is like a
puff of smoke visible for a little while and then dissolving into thin air”
(James 4:14).
After the first gospel song, Bobby’s one brother and a
minister friend of mine, gave a prayer of meditation. In part, he said, “For
all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The
grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away [1 Pet 1:24]. Are we ready
to make this journey?”
Later one of Bobby’s daughters stood up and said, “It was sad
to watch my father die. But God gave me a poem”:
God
saw you getting tired and a cure was not to be.
So
He put His arms around you, and whispered, “Come to Me.”
With
tearful eyes we watched you, and saw you fade away.
Although
we loved your dearly, we could not make you stay.
A
golden heart stopped beating, hard working hands at rest.
God
broke our hearts to prove to us He only takes the best.
• “If I do not have
love, I am only a noisy gong or a crashing cymbal. . . . If I do not have love,
I am nothing. . . . If I do not have love, I gain nothing” (1 Cor 13:1-3).
A younger man and neighbor stood up and said, “We moved to
Clark Avenue right next door to Bobby. He welcomed us to his front porch and to
his table. He was soft-spoken, but he always had something to say if you had
the time to listen.”
Although Bobby served his country in the United States Navy,
he was a peaceful man. The service ended with a sermon. The preacher
hitch-hiked on this thought of peace and offered himself as the example. The
preacher said, “When I participated in a Martin Luther King Day march, I
brought my grandson along. The boy asked, ‘Why do you do this?’ And I said, ‘It’s
because, if someone does you wrong, you don’t use violence to get back at him. You
use peaceful non-violence to stand up for what’s right.”
• “Then the Lord God
took dust from the ground and formed a man from it. . . . The Lord God put the
man in the garden of Eden to care for it and work it. . . . [Later] the Lord
God called to the man and said, “Where are you?” (Gen 2:7, 15; 3:9)
The preacher asked us to think more broadly. Bobby had
responsibilities in life. (He worked for the United States Postal Service. He
had a wife and children. He coached little league baseball and basketball.) In the Bible God created the first man and gave him
the responsibility of caring for a garden and then gave him a wife and later on
children. The preacher asked, “You, too, have responsibilities in life. What
are you planting in your garden? Are you being a man not afraid to cry? Are you
being a man who gets down on his knees and prays? Are you being a man that says
no to drugs and drunkenness? Are you being a man who works at honest
employment and not 'street hustle'? Are you being a man who communicates with and appreciates his wife?
Are you being a man who shows his son how to live?”
Then he reminded us of the scene in Genesis chapter three. The
first man and woman had disobeyed God and had become sinners. God made a sound
in the garden to make them aware that he was there. The first human pair became
afraid because of their sin. So they ran and hid. God, still desiring a
relationship with them, called out, “Adam, where are you?” At just the right
time in history, God made a way that sinful humans could have a true relationship
with him. God the Father sent God the Son to become a human being, Jesus
Christ. Jesus died for our sins and rose again to invite us to stop being God's enemies
and to become God's people. Now the message goes forth, “Human being, where are you?
Come. Be forgiven of sin. Receive spiritual power. Have a restored relationship
with God through Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit.”
My friend, what are you planting in your garden?
