1 Timothy 3:1-13 / Luke 7:11-17 (2019)
If there is a gospel that I would not use at a funeral service, it would be the gospel passage which we have just heard.
More so if the deceased is a young person or a child.
After all, parents should not be burying their children; it is usually the other way round.
But when parents have to bury their children, then it's because of something tragic.
It could be a disease that slowly ate away that young life. Or it could be a fatal accident that tore a young person from the parents.
Whatever it is, the grief is certainly doubled or tripled.
So does today's gospel passage have anything to offer?
We human beings can do a lot, but we certainly can't bring the dead back to life.
Yes we admit that we can't do anything about death; but at Naim, God showed He can.
In the face of death, God breaks the hopelessness and opens new possibilities.
At Naim, it was physical death. In our day, it may be the death of a marriage upon divorce, or the death of a job when it is lost, or the death of a relationship when a quarrel or hurt cuts in.
Yet in the face of death, of grief, of pain, of sorrow, God is telling us that He has the last say.
Because in the midst of these situations, God will visit His broken people and raise them to a new life