Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Resolution of Respect

A couple of weeks ago, our good friend John died. He was in his fifties and left behind a wonderful wife and two young children. He was a pillar in our community who literally built most of our town. And we are all in mourning for him.

When I was growing up, our church had a wonderful tradition for times like this. Someone in the church was appointed to write a Resolution of Respect about the person who had died. It would be read with great solemnity before the congregation and then put into the official records of the church. Eventually it would be published in the church paper, as well.

The resolution was not a eulogy exactly. It started out with words that went something like this, "Insomuch as it has pleased our gracious Heavenly Father to call home to glory His faithful servant, John Emerson..." And it ended with something like this, "be it resolved that we will bow our knee in humble submission to His will."

And so the resolution was mostly about those of us who stayed behind. It was about us resolving in our hearts to treasure the memory and to honor the legacy of the one who had gone on. It was about bowing our will to God's - even when to do so broke our earthly hearts.

Be it so resolved.


3 comments:

  1. Oh gosh. This is so beautiful. And so timely. I'm going to link to it from my blog. Primitive Baptists have the BEST language for things.

    Seriously - so beautiful. It's us who need to be resolved.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks, Serenity. I needed to write this one for me.

    ReplyDelete
  3. This is absolutely beautiful! What a wonderful tradition!

    ReplyDelete