A Good Funeral

I love a good funeral.

My aunt Libby would have loved her funeral on August 5^th and she should have, since she planned most of it. She was 95 and had lived a long full life. She was ready to go and Libby enjoyed a good sendoff.

For years she told me she wanted me to “do” her funeral, and we discussed it during one of my last visits at her assisted living room at Brookridge Retirement Community in Winston-Salem. She wanted it to be in the beautiful sanctuary of her church, First Baptist in Winston-Salem, and for the organist to play.

Two years ago, she mailed her cousin John a copy of the hymn that she wanted him to sing, an old one they had sung as children called Why Should He Love Me So? She also told her niece Lynda that she wanted her to speak, and they planned it out, emphasizing Libby’s passion for bridge and for building bridges for people to find Jesus. She often combined both, taking mission projects for her friends to work on when they were on their yearly beach/bridge trip.

I love a funeral with lots of stories about the person being remembered and we had plenty of those at Libby’s service. Her pastor, Emily McGill, talked about the pile of computer-generated cards she had kept from Libby, who loved making the individualized cards and sent them for every holiday, birthday and life event. Her sons about went broke keeping her in printer cartridges, paper, and stamps.

Her associate pastor, Amy McClure, remembered the times Libby would show up at the church and say, “We’re going visiting,” and Amy was expected to drop whatever she was doing and go along. Years before she became a resident of Brookridge herself, Libby was leading a senior singing group that performed there. She made sure Amy knew who to visit and where to go.

I got to share stories from her three surviving sons, Steve, Len, and Mike, about how their mother had impacted their lives. She kept the household going while teaching school, keeping food on the table, and staying active in church. She often found creative ways to play interference between them and their father’s strong discipline. She was a steel magnolia in many ways, a small woman who kept her head up during the difficult times of her life, including losing her oldest son Larry to strokes related to cancer he had as a young man. Yet she always kept her sense of humor.

Libby’s funeral was one where I left feeling inspired to go out and be a better person. She had a heart for ministering to others and did not let old age stop her. In her 70’s, she was going on mission trips to the Dominican Republic and teaching the women there how to sew. Well into her 90’s, she continued to knit hats for homeless people and for stillborn babies, even after several strokes made it hard for her to hold the needles. After moving to the assisted living unit, she got together with her church and the Brookridge staff to set up a television in the sitting area outside her room so that members of her church could gather to watch the church service each Sunday. Even when she was confined to a wheelchair, she was there arranging the chairs on Sunday mornings and looking forward to seeing her friends.  

Libby was an advocate for women in ministry and I believe if she had been born at a different time she would have been a minister. In her obituary, which she wrote, she listed as highlights of her life being nominated as the first woman deacon at Union Grove Baptist Church in Kernersville and later serving for many years as a deacon at First Baptist .  I know she loved the fact that at her service all the ministers were women, including myself. She was always my biggest cheerleader.

As I looked out over the people who had come to wish her good-bye on that hot August morning, I imagined her sitting in the balcony with her husband Gabe, son Larry and daughter-in-law Kay, my parents and sister, and the host of family and friends gathered with her in heaven. She would be bursting with pride to see the pews packed with her sons and daughters-in-law, and her good-looking grandchildren and their spouses.

I left that good funeral, thankful for having had her in my life.