by Kim Thoday.

I was recently involved in a funeral service for a three and a half year old boy who had been accidentally struck down by a motorist and killed. As would be expected the funeral was emotionally charged and the collective convulsive shock came when the little white coffin was wheeled in through the big glass doors at the back of the ‘chapel’ of the crematorium. But nothing, not the white, white, antiseptic white care of White Lady Funerals, nor the soft strains of CD music, nor the warm carpeted, well lit, choreographed atmosphere, nor the scrolling family snaps of the boy on a screen at the front (carefully included in the funeral costs), could hide the tragedy. At the end of the service, while most of the mourners filed into a side room for the standard fare of light refreshments, I went to stand outside under a shady oak tree just to process my thoughts and feelings. I thought I was hallucinating at first. A young couple floated into view. I hadn’t noticed them before amongst the mourners. They were a married couple to whom I had previously ministered. There was mutual pleasure in seeing one another especially because of the circumstances. I didn’t realise you guys knew the family. We don’t came the reply. Our little boy is the same age. And we just had to be here, when we heard about it, we don’t live far away from where the family live.

Before I could get my head around this, three other women joined us. To my astonishment it was the deceased boy’s mother and her mother and a sister. The sister and mother stood on either side of her holding her gently. She stood still, like the stillness of an old statue. Her gaze simply fixed upon my friends. At first there was just silence. Sometimes its just a good idea to shut up I thought to myself. I’ve obviously missed something here. The statue suddenly began to speak and with much emotion. She overflowed with gratitude; it was sincere and measured without sentimentality. She said to my friends, you were the people who put the anonymous sympathy notice in the paper. And the flowers you sent the next day with the card it was just wonderful. Then she looked down at the large framed picture she clasped tightly in her hands. But as I looked more closely it wasn’t a picture, the glass reflected white puffy clouds and some blue sky. And this, she said smiling now at my friends. I just can’t believe this, the attendants handed it to me before and they said it was from you. A poem for my boy! You wrote this? They nodded. It’s beautiful, just ……. The tears flowed for us all. Thank you, just thank you. Her sister spoke. We can’t believe you did this. Its just so lovely … thankyou … there are really good people in this world. The boy’s mother again, but why, why would you do this for us, you don’t even know us? My friend replied trying to find his words, we have a little boy too and we just … I don’t know if I can really explain, we just … wanted to somehow express our sympathies and well … just to let you know how much we care. I … I was just unsure about it all, I didn’t want to intrude on your pain, but … and somehow, I don’t know how to say this … but somehow we just felt some kind of connection with you.

There were few more things said, just a collage of words, sounds, expressions of understanding between human beings caught in a moment of divine grace. The mother of the boy stepped forward and hugged my two friends so tightly, I thought she wouldn’t let go. Finally an exchange of phone numbers and some gentle prolonged words of thanks and I was left again standing with my two friends. I had witnessed a profound God moment. On the way back to the car park, one of my friends said to me, Kim I have to know that that there is a heaven. I’ve never realised the importance of knowing that before. There has to be a heaven. If there isn’t well … Listen my friend, I said without really thinking, from what I have just experienced I am convinced again that there is … and we all experienced it a little, just then. You know what I really believe mate, Jesus just came to that mother in the form of a couple of strangers.

When we really care about someone we open ourselves up to the possibilities of being hurt or misunderstood, but living a life that has had its deep hurts is better than never experiencing unconditional love. Australian author, Tim Winton, says: “In reality there’s only love and death – everything else is just shopping.” If only we can teach our kids the craft of treating each other with extravagant generosity, mutual vulnerability and radical honesty – in short, in a manner, that none of us really deserve. Unconditional love is given and received not because the giver or the receiver deserve to give or receive, but rather because real love can only be experienced to the extent to which it is offered and embraced with no conditions. A successful life, in a distinctively Christian sense, is a life that has been transformed by the unconditional love of God, through Christ. But such success comes with great price, sacrifice and risk. For it is not too often that the love we give unconditionally will be returned in kind. Yet when we do receive that love, those strands of unspeakable joy amongst the webs of deceit, those glimpses of God’s mercy and care in a shadowy world, we have become more human, more the creations of an ever-loving God. May we continue to remember and experience the unconditional love of God most essentially expressed in the life of his only Son, Jesus Christ, who risked everything to for our salvation.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. He who believes in him is not condemned; he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God” (John 3:16-18, RSV).

Blessings in Jesus’ name,

KIM THODAY, HEWETT COMMUNITY CHURCH, SOUTH AUSTRALIA

http://www.hewett.org.au