angels and heaven on earth

A day like today leaves me absolutely drained. Out-for-the-count-on-my-feet by the end of the day.

Mind, it was a good day, no mistake. A 'high' day in the annals of eternity.

Another day when God just seemed to camp out in our midst and make his presence wonderfully known. Another day when God, it seemed, took pains to stress the pleasure that he has in all his saints.

For the whole long day was taken up with just one theme. Our marking the end of a life well lived in the cause of Jesus Christ. Our thanking the Lord for his grace in his servant Ian.

Again it was an early start. Up and out by 6am, there was much that needed done.

Some final preparation on the message I would bring. The service sheets requiring to be checked through once again and then be printed off. A powerpoint presentation to be finalised, with all the 'animations' and the timings to be tinkered with and sorted out just right: then loading it and checking it and setting out clear guidelines for the person who'd be running it across there in the sanctuary later on.

It all takes time - and it's best not rushed. A day such as this is a gift from God and a day to be savoured throughout.

The girls were in early, too.

(Well, I think of them all as the 'girls', they've such eager and passionate hearts and stamina second to none: in fact, I often think they're really just angels in human guise!)

There's lots to be done for a day like this. But God honours our labours and always there's so much laughter and fun in the onerous tasks getting done.

Setting out the halls. Making everything just right. They always make the whole place look just wonderful and see to all the smallest little details in the most amazing way. I think they're all just total, utter stars. And that was them from early in the morning through to five at night without a break.

They really serve to make a day like this the next best thing to heaven here on earth.

And then there were the services. The crematorium first, with a larger crowd there than I'd thought there be. But a good clear word and a marvelous spirit of praise.

From there it was a case of a quick turn-around and back to the church for the service here at noon. The place was packed, with loads of folk from who knows where the half of them. I guess from all sorts of different walks of life - and some from years and years ago.

The grace-filled, gentle influence Ian had was thoroughly pervasive in the love he shared around.

What a glorious service of worship it proved to be! Uplifting, ennobling, heart-warming. And full of the Lord in so many different ways.

Ian's son, David, spoke as well. No easy thing to do. But this fine young man, he did it all so well. The things he said, the way he spoke. Ian himself would have been humbled and proud at his son standing there speaking thus.

The whole thing was simply so steeped in the presence and grace of the Lord. The sort of thing you can't put into words. But at times like that you need no words to know that God is good.

And then there was the lunch here in the halls. The whole place almost heaving with the volume of the people who stayed on. What marvelous times they are! A genuine celebration of a life so full of Christ - and not some weary wake, suffused with gloomy-faced distress.

It was great that the children were there as well. Ian's grandchildren. All eight of these lovely children (another one's due, literally any day now). They'd drawn a floral tribute to their Papa which we projected on the wall. It was simple and lovely and powerful indeed.

They were all so good and their all just simply being there in some ways made the day.

What fun we had! I remember when my own Dad died, my sons, they still remember with delight the funeral day.

The fun and games they had that day in the aftermath of all the formal services. My Dad's own older brother, he was there: and, just a child at heart himself, he was crawling under tables in the hotel dining room, and giving all the children there a ball!

And so, to this day, my sons have only very happy memories of their Grandpa's funeral day: even in death, the fun that they'd had while he was alive, remained to the very end.

I wanted it to be the same for all these lovely children here today. A day they'd remember with gladness and one which would still be so full of the fun that they'd known with their Papa.

Well, that was really all the afternoon by the time folk had left and the clearing up was done. And like I said at the start, the girls were just such stars. They always are.

They must have been exhausted by its end. But what a day they made it be for everyone.

It's hard to move on from a day like that. And the evening was hard in that way.

Other things to do. Other folk to see.

Another grieving family, gathering here from different parts, preparing for the service that there'll be tomorrow afternoon. And for them, of course, tomorrow will be just as hard and just as much a special day for them.

I think it's the business of pouring my heart into so many different homes that I find so very hard. It sometimes feels my heart is being stretched in about a thousand different ways.

For my heart was sore and broken with the passing of a friend. My heart's whole living energy was poured into the day that just had been. It felt as if there wasn't that much left!

And yet, and yet .. and yet there was this other family, too, needing not a formal sort of going through the motions, but needing the heart of the Lord being opened to them. Through me. I find that hard, to stretch my heart already stretched to breaking point and drained of all its strength.

But God gives grace. And I was glad of the chance to be with them and share the time with them as well. And see the Lord himself at work.

I hadn't met these folk before. And yet there's been an easy, warm rapport. And the newly widowed woman is now talking of perhaps in coming days being part of what we're doing here at lunchtimes through the week.

Who knows just where this sorrow in her life will lead her under God? Who knows just how he'll take up this great grief within her heart and work it all to good and open up a future for this woman that she'd never even countenanced before?

To share with the Lord in the work that he does is a wonderful, thrilling thing! It maybe sometimes stretches me to breaking point, but I love it! I always think, what a privilege it is that he gives, to share what he's doing with us.

A couple of visits later on, I was back at the halls to get down to the task of preparing tomorrow's address.

Never having met the man who died, the whole thing's very different from the way it's been with Ian. Harder, in a way, as well, of course. I'm mostly working blind.

But I felt that I got the bulk of it done: and called it a day at 10. Weary again. But happily so, in the knowledge that none of this work is ever in vain.

And tomorrow is more of the same! The sheer, pulsating thrill of being involved in what the Lord is daily doing in his world!