Scripture text: John 14:1-6
It is said that “only the good die young,” implying that people who reach great age in life may have an ornery streak or two. I don’t believe that and the reason why I don’t believe that is because I got to know Vale Welsh. Vale was a good person in every way that can mean, and at 90 years old, she’d had a lot of times to go a different way and she never did..
My favorite story of Vale is probably my first real encounter with her as her pastor. Rewind to four years ago. I had just started here at Canadochly and many of you may recall that it was an interesting few months. The first Sunday I was here, for instance, the air conditioning system in the building broke down. So we had our worship services in the fellowship hall. We got the AC fixed, moved back into this sanctuary, and I’d bet it was the first or second Sunday we were back in here when Vale took a fainting spell in the middle of my Sunday sermon.
We stopped the service, got the paramedics here, and got Vale taken care of. Here I am, all nervous and worried, “Is she going to be alright? I should have noticed sooner that something was wrong.” But Vale, as she was being wheeled out the door, looked at me. “Don’t worry. This happens all the time. I’ll be fine.” in her typically nonchalant way of talking.
Little did I know that she was absolutely right. That was just her way. Life would send Vale a rough patch and she’d just sort of laugh it off. “Happens all the time. I’ll be fine.”
Vale, her family, and I have been through a lot together. I buried Paul, her beloved husband, a few years back. I remember when she fell and broke her hip some months ago. After each setback, she’d pop back into church with a smile on her face. She had the prettiest smile. She just glowed and would just fill the room with her light. Everywhere she went she just brought this aura of positivity. “Things’ll be alright. I’ll be fine.” She made you believe it.
I know I did. I never really worried about Vale when something would go wrong. She was strong. She was spunky. She would bounce back. She always did.
Things didn’t seem so fine when I went into the ER to see Vale two weeks ago. We knew she was very sick. A couple surgeries later and she was still sick. But I think all of us still sort of believed in Vale and her optimism. “She’ll be fine. She’ll pull through. She always does.”
It was a punch in the gut to all of us when she didn’t this time.
The brightness of the world has dimmed considerably, because one of its lights has gone out. I will miss her smile. I will miss her spunky attitude. I will miss her positivity. I will miss how she could make you feel, no matter how bad things might seem, that things were going to work out.
I know I’m not alone in these thoughts and feelings. Many, if not most, of you knew her better than I. You got to experience the person she was as mother or friend in far greater capacity. Now she’s gone and it hurts. It hurts a lot.
One of my favorite verses from Scripture is from Hebrews. We had it in one of our lessons just a few weeks ago, although I did not preach on the text. It goes like this. “Do not hesitate to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing so, you may have entertained angels unawares.” It always reminds me that angels, God’s messengers of grace, do not always appear the way we think they should.
In a very real sense, Vale was an angel in our midst. Not some supernatural being, I don’t mean this quite so literally, but as a messenger of God’s holy grace. What is the core lesson we can take away from our Scripture texts today? God loves us. God will take care of us. Not even death will truly harm us because God has claimed us as his own.
We have the dedication and the love of a God who went to die on a cross for our sakes. We have the promise of the empty tomb that where Jesus has risen again so too shall we. You’ve heard these promises in our funeral proceedings today. You’ve heard them from this and many other pulpits throughout your lives. And I would argue that you have heard them and seen them lived out in the life of Vale Welsh.
“No big deal. Happens all the time. I’ll be fine.” Do you hear the confidence in that? Do you hear the strength? The faith? Can you hear it still in the midst of this dark time? Because I believe in my heart of hearts that if Vale could speak to us all here, one last time, that’s precisely what she’d say. And she’d say it with a big grin on her face because she knows the promises are fulfilled. Everything God had told her has come to pass.
And not only is she going to be fine, but so are we. Because those promises weren’t just for her alone, they’re for all of us. Everyone here has a God that has offered you the salvation of the cross and empty tomb. Everyone of us has a God who loves us so much that he’d rather die than be without us. Everyone here has a God who has declared “I have put death underfoot. It cannot harm you.” and I have done this because I LOVE YOU so much that it spans this universe and beyond.
Vale lived those promises. Vale proclaimed those promises to everyone she encountered. Another favorite quote of mine is attributed to St. Francis, “Preach the Gospel always. If necessary, use words.” That was Vale. She proclaimed the Gospel with a smile. In her own way, she taught each one of us truth of a loving god who seeks to save his own.
Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. Thank you, Vale, for that constant reminder. And thanks be to God that because of his cross and empty tomb, we will, in fact, be just fine. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment