At the funeral, I choke a bit on the words we sing:

Children of the heavenly Father…

From all evil things He spares them, 

In His mighty arms He bears them…

Isn’t this evil? Luther, taken so suddenly, and his wife, so sick, left behind? Trauma upon trauma, shocking, sudden grief on top of cancer? Is this not evil, and why wasn’t this family spared?

The choir loved him so deeply, and I am amazed that they can sing so well, even wounded as they are. If their voices are shaking, I can’t hear it. Perhaps they take turns, one shakes, and another upholds in strong song; the shared music stabilizes heart and voice once again.

The choir is a family within our church family. Lorraine tells me, when she came back from college for the first time, Luther’s words to her were “So? Have you found the young man that your parents will approve of?” followed by a booming laugh. The choir will insist on meeting (vetting) her boyfriend, and I love that.  We have a large, large family.

And our sister has been sick for a long time. She has been absent from our gatherings, weighed down by chemo and travel and endless uncertainty, and he has borne the weight with her.

I wonder, how often did Luther sing with a tremble? How often was the very act of singing, belting out words of faith, done in defiance of the darkness, the fear in his own heart?

When he sang the Lord’s prayer at the last funeral, , “Thy Kingdom come'' resonated strong in the sanctuary, and his song boldly declared the plea of all our hearts.

But when he sang “Thy Will be Done,” there was a catch, a voice crack.  It almost made me come undone as I thought of his wife and her creeping cancer. How hard it must be to sing and say and live those words.  

How hard it is. 

But we do not turn our eyes away from the hard, sharp edge of life. We bring his casket right into the sanctuary, and we gather around it together with our questions and our shattered hearts. And the white pall over it reminds us of our Baptisms, and of God who is making all things new.  This is true even when we do not understand His ways. 

God IS our refuge and strength. 

And the choir sings

And Dave’s trumpet blares out clear loud notes of stubborn joy.

So what if we need a minute to catch our breath?
We will not stop singing.