Funerals from Hell – Where Have All the Graveyards Gone? is a helpful and challenging article written by Craig Parton and published on the Modern Reformation site.
(Parton has experienced issues of death and funerals himself. This does not add or subtract from the truth of what he says, but he is empathetic to the trials of these circumstances.)
Some quotes:
‘If we are anything, we are a culture of entertainment and denial that has sanitized dying and death and put it in a world hopefully far, far away. Sadness, if prolonged or of a disturbing depth, is to be diagnosed and medicated. Even sadness that might, God forbid, lead to repentance.
And entertainment is the mother’s milk from which today’s evangelical celebrations gladly feed. We want our funerals to mirror our church services and our church services to mirror our virtual lives–fun, interesting, enlightening, moving, and upbeat. Whether it is faithful to Christ and his Word is, well, nice if you can actually pull that off and stay cool, but it is not obligatory. If your religious life is fun, interesting, enlightening, moving, and upbeat, then it is clearly faithful to Christ and his Word.’
‘The gospel is harmed when we fail to deal seriously with death. The goal of celebrations (and their stepchild, the “memorial service”) is not to proclaim Christ and him crucified and risen again for our justification. Instead, the celebration of life is designed to magnify all the good qualities of the one memorialized and to maybe tack on Jesus at the end as a nice helper in one’s corner in tough times who saw this really good man over the river.
Where are the funerals with a good, solid, gospel-driven liturgy that centers on Christ and on all his strong words about his victory over sin, death, and the devil? Where are the funerals that are testimonials to him? Where are the funerals that talk about grief and sadness? Where are the funerals that are not embarrassed to have a body present?’
Although my practice differs from some of Parton’s recommendations, pretty much everything he writes resonates positively with what I think about funerals.
(I still actually like the idea of a graveside committal and then a witness to the resurrection/thanksgiving at the church afterward.)
HT: White Horse Inn blog.
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