Funeral homily for Bernice Holland Jones

I am humbled and privileged to say these words as we gather to celebrate Bernice’s life. Although I am the one who has the privilege of speaking, many of us will tell similar stories of Bernice’s impact on our lives. She taught all of us, whether you are a St. Mary’s girl, whether you are a friend, she taught all of us. All of us know that in these last years, she wondered to herself and aloud at her purpose for continuing on this earth, she was somewhat impatient to get started on the next part. Today, I get to tell you what she taught me. I hope you will share with each other what she taught you.

I was called here to Rapid City to lead this congregation of St. Andrew’s. But it was Bernice who really taught me what it means to be priest. It is Bernice who blessed me. Each Wednesday Bernice would stand at these steps after taking the bread and the wine, and wait for prayers of healing. As I made the sign of the cross on her forward, and laid my hands on her head, I wondered what healing meant when you are 99 years old. I would say, Lord God, we ask for healing and for wholeness, and especially Lord for the power of your Holy Spirit, in whom we are made new creations, in whom we are born again, and by whom we are being made in your image. Each time I prayed these words, I saw Bernice’s beauty, I saw Bernice who I believe looks as much like God’s image as I can imagine. I would stand before Bernice and I would be blessed by her. Many believe it’s the other way around, that I bless them. But as Bernice stood before me, I was blessed by her, over and over again.

Bernice taught me about learning. There is always something new to be learned. Her attendance at Bible Study until quite recently attests to that, most would suggest that they’d been there done that got the tee shirt. But not Bernice, scripture always had something new to teach; each time we approach scripture there is something new for us to learn. I bet that’s why she was such a good teacher herself for so many years, I imagine she approached her students with the hope of learning something new, and that always results in transformation.

But I think what is most important to me and has formed me as a priest, is Bernice’s graciousness toward all people. It wasn’t just about kind words, Bernice had the ability to embrace people and encounter them as I think Jesus would have. At least she did with me. She and I didn’t see eye-to-eye, probably true with many of you as well, you see this isn’t about right and wrong, or agreeing and disagreeing, it‘s about seeing into someone’s soul and respecting the dignity of that creation. Bernice could do that, and that actually sounds a lot like living out our baptismal promises. Bernice helps me do that.

All of us have heard Bernice’s stories I hope. Stories of the Episcopal Church in South Dakota, stories of St. Mary’s girls, stories of Thunderhead Episcopal Camp, and of Camp Remington, Bernice was not just at these places, many of them wouldn’t be around if it hadn’t been for her and Emmitt. I to have been blessed by these stories.

So today we celebrate a life well lived. We celebrate the hope in the promise of new life that God gives and that is shown to us in the death and resurrection of Jesus, that death and resurrection that is so beautifully illustrated by the butterfly that Bernice loved so much.

One of the most difficult things I do as your priest is to accompany people on life’s journey to death. It is also one of the privileges of my work, because life’s journey to death is a sacred journey. God came into this world, into our midst, to show us that death does not have dominion, that the material demise of our bodies is not the ultimate story. The ultimate story is the story of resurrection.

This is the celebration of Bernice’s life, and it attests to the hope we have in the new life that is given by God through Jesus Christ. What God brings to us is change. Death is the penultimate change, resurrection is the ultimate change, and that is what we celebrate today. As we celebrate this life well lived, we are sad, and in the midst of the sadness, the good news remains. We hear scripture today full of good news. The good news is about the absolutely new life that God gives to us in Jesus.

Our hope rests in new creation. Our hope rests in the story that the work Jesus does on the cross matters. And what Jesus does on the cross is to collect all of the pain and suffering of this world, and take it and hold it so that the stream of pain or sadness or hurt will flow no farther. Jesus takes in all of our pain and our suffering and Jesus contains it. Jesus’ life and death says to our world, it all stops here. It all stops with me.

Jesus doesn’t take away pain and sorrow. You and I both know that reality. To be human is to feel, to feel pain, to feel joy, to feel fear, to feel intimacy. Being human means being born to die, and only a God who is willing to share that can actually help us face our own mortality and that of those we love. Only by facing death, our most primal fear, can we move ahead to embrace life with the great “nevertheless” that is God’s gracious word to a broken world.

Death is real and grief hurts and sometimes we just have to sit in the silence and cry and wait. What Jesus accomplishes is to let the pain and suffering wreak its fury upon him, to negate its power and take it out of the world with him. Jesus didn’t defeat pain and suffering by resisting it; but by absorbing it and removing it through the power of love.

And Jesus is the reason we rejoice today. It is this truth of what God in Jesus does in life, and on the cross, and in the resurrection that we celebrate Bernice’s life today. It is the truth that God lived and died as one of us, that connects us to each other, and gives us the strength and courage to love one another in our sadness and in our joy. God came to be with us, so that we may be new creations. God came to be with us, so that our pain and suffering, and joys and celebrations are made absolutely new.

Alleluia, Christ is risen. The Lord is risen indeed, Alleluia!