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The Rev. Paul J Cain
John 14: 1-14
A Place with Christ
Funeral Sermon for Clara Beffert
Saturday of Lent I, 19 March 2011
Immanuel Lutheran Church, Sheridan, WY
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
[Jesus said:] “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me.”
Those are comforting words on a day we remember and miss Clara Beffert. She believed these words. She has a place with Christ. In fact, Clara knew these comforting words of Christ from John 14 very well. How well? Since she retired, she read her Bible—all the way through—about every year, between twenty and thirty times. And she noticed something. She found a pattern in the Sunday Bible readings here at Church.
“Pastor, I have a question,” Clara said during a visit to the Beffert home. “When I retired I figured that I had better pay more attention to my Bible. I didn’t think I’d live much longer. After each Sunday service, I would go to my Bible and write the date next to the passages we heard.”
Clara had figured out on her own what no one had explained to her: we hear the same readings from the Bible on a three-year cycle. This is just one example of how she kept me and my predecessors on our toes. J
Her family shares: “Her favorite thing was to sit at the kitchen table and play games with her children and grandchildren. Any game. She almost always won – and she always seemed surprised. She even beat several of us in card games when she was in the hospital and at Westview.
“She never forgot a birthday or anniversary. It took her hours every January to transfer all the dates to a new calendar. Every grandchild received a check in the mail every month while they were in college.” Every child received a handmade afghan. And another once they got married. The pattern continued with the next generations, too!
Her children shared stories of how she taught all of them to type and all of them to play piano. She helped her Eagle Scouts and all the little girls she taught how to sew and cook through 4-H. All five of her children were college educated. These details are important, because it shows how her home was welcoming, well-organized, and a place with Christ for her husband and her children.
Jesus said: In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.” Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”
Jesus is preparing a place for all who trust in Him for life and salvation. In her own way, Clara prepared her home as a place where Christ was regularly heard, where family members could forgive one another, where a mother’s love and forgiveness, and that of a grandmother and a great-grandmother, showed in word and deed.
“The brothers always liked to wrestle. Clara always wondered why her plants were so hard to grow. Not until the boys all had left home did her plants flourish – and she discovered what a beating her plants had suffered.
“When she went to work at the Credit Union Jerry and Larry taught her how to drive – they remember the car jumping all over the neighborhood for weeks.
“When Larry went to Vietnam Clara began writing a weekly letter that went to every one of her children, every week. The letters were written on onionskin paper with carbon paper on a manual typewriter. When she was at Westview she would dictate letters to Jerry and Verne so that she could keep everyone informed of family events.”
Her good habits were formed early in life. “She walked 4 miles to teach school each day, one way. One time she went to town to buy supplies for school and for her and asked for a ride home with Hank and her Uncle Pete. When she arrived home she gave her last $5.00 to Uncle Pete for the ride.”
It is with Clara as Jesus said in Matthew 25: 21, “Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.”
Even so, Clara understood that her place with Christ in His Heaven wasn’t because of her doing. It was because of His Good Friday Cross and His empty Easter Sunday tomb. And because He rose, she will, too on the Last Day. In Christ, we have the fullness of God for us, for our benefit.
Back to John 14: Philip said to [Jesus] him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves.
“Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.
One can only imagine the thousands of quilts that she helped make through the church, including those given to orphans in Juarez. The work of the quilters continues here every Wednesday.
Her children shared, “Mom made her own bread and rolls until she went to the hospital in September – never bought a loaf of bread, cookies, cakes, pies, cinnamon rolls. She never ate snacks between meals. She never drank pop or alcohol.
“And she prepared her own tax returns every year except for this year.
“She never wanted to bother the kids – [They shared, ] if we could come and visit that was great, if we called she was happy, but she never expected anything from her kids. When any of the kids would pass through Sheridan with friends they were always welcomed with a home cooked meal.
Consider again the welcome of Christ Himself. Jesus said: In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.”
Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Him. Clara knew this, lived this, and believed this. When I visited her on Tuesday, she was very animated and kept saying, “Lift me up.” I asked the nurses for help, initially thinking that she had slid down in her inclined bed. When I got back, she shared more: “Lift me up, Jesus. Take me home now! I know you are here. I can see you.”
Wednesday morning, I prayed Matins with her, familiar from The Lutheran Hymnal on page 32 and now in LSB on 219. She heard Revelation 5 and the hymn, “Behold a Host Arrayed in White.” She was calm, breathed deeply, and had her hands folded in prayer.
Jesus said: In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.”
John 14 is well-summarized by one of Clara’s great-granddaughters: “Jesus came and took her to His home!”
By His work and His Gift, Clara has a place with Christ. And so do you. Amen.
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
