My sister-in-law died two weeks ago. Joyce and I made the trek back to Seattle to bury her and comfort the family. Janet was a tortured soul. She spent most of her adult life dealing with drugs and alcohol. When she discovered crack cocaine she descended into hell. Her three kids (one a mentally handicapped child who is now an adult) had a difficult childhood at best. Joyce and I bailed Janet out more times than we can remember. There were times we wanted to wash our hands of the whole mess. Most of her family and friends avoided her like the plague. Janet was not only a user of drugs, she was a user of people who would enable her to continue her downward spiral into destruction. Crack is so seductive. A person will sell out family and future for another hit. While she was in prison, she found new life in Jesus. It's not like everything changed overnight. When you have destroyed your life, the consequences don't go away just because you had a spiritual transformation. The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.
The last two or three years Janet was invalid. She ballooned to more than 300 pounds, her lungs were shot, she travelled in a motorized wheelchair, and packed oxygen tanks. She ended up in an assisted living home which wharehoused all the demented and sick rejects of society. She was often discouraged and fearful. She especially feared death. She couldn't believe that God's grace could really cover all the sins and misdeeds of her wasted years. She felt unattractive and useless. Sometimes she would call Joyce five or six times a day, often in the early hours of the morning. She was awash in tears and regret. It seemed that nothing we could say would encourage her.
We held a memorial service for Janet last Monday evening. I was sure that only a small handful of people would show up. I was shocked to see the room fill with people. For the most part, they weren't the kind of folks I hang out with. These were sick old people. Mentally handicapped folks. Broken and wounded people. Overweight women in tight polyester pants, and stuttering old men with the minds of children. People who barely eek by on pitifully-small welfare checks. One by one, they came to the mike to eulogize Janet. Homeless kids that she had taken into her apartment for a meal. Unwed mothers who she had encouraged during the last two or three years of her life. Unchurched and unwashed people who had heard about the gospel of Jesus from Janet. The testimonials were eloquent in their heartfelt simplicity. I wept as I listened. I only hope that the same things could be said of this so-called "man of God."
As I listened, I thought of the words of Jesus. "I was a stranger and you took me in." "I was hungry and you fed me." "I was in prison and you visited me." Most of her life, Janet wasted. She stumbled and fell often in the race of life. But she finished well. And she turned the afflictions of her ending into the beginning of an eternity won. She would be embarrassed to hear all this. She would say, "I was a poor sinner, saved by grace. It was the work of Jesus on the cross that redeemed me for heaven."
Solomon wrote in the book of Ecclesiastes, "It is better to go to the house of mourning than the house of laughter." In other words, it is better to go to a funeral than the comedy club. At a funeral we remember that we will all die one day. I only hope that, when they bury me, they will say the things they said about Janet. Janet, you ended well baby. I look forward to seeing you in heaven one day. | 
