{"id":20340,"date":"2020-05-18T06:59:21","date_gmt":"2020-05-18T11:59:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/?p=20340"},"modified":"2020-05-18T07:16:41","modified_gmt":"2020-05-18T12:16:41","slug":"a-funny-thing-happened-on-the-way-to-the-cemetery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/a-funny-thing-happened-on-the-way-to-the-cemetery\/","title":{"rendered":"A funny thing happened on the way to the cemetery"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you’re ever sitting around with two or three preachers, ask for their funniest stories, the most memorable wedding or funeral they’ve done, something like that.\u00a0 Pull up a chair because you’ll be here for an hour.<\/em><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t have any funerals where the \u201chonored guest\u201d got up and walked out, or where the wrong person was discovered to be in the casket, or such foolishness as that. And for good reason.<\/p>\n

Funerals are highly structured affairs, regulated by state law and overseen by a whole battery of mortuary employees and family members.<\/p>\n

When we gather at the funeral home, the family has already been in conference with the mortician on how they want things done. The funeral directors stand nearby to make sure all goes according to plan. As a result, there is usually very little wiggle room there, space for the unexpected to occur.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s not all bad.<\/p>\n

I did this one funeral\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Where the man and his grandfather were buried together. The man was 34 and the grandfather was 64. If those numbers don\u2019t work for you, know that the grandpa had died a full decade earlier but the family had not held a funeral. When the grandson was found in his freezer with an axe in his head\u2013placed there by his wife\u2019s lesbian lover\u2013the family wanted a joint funeral for both. Those two women are serving life terms in the state penitentiary.<\/p>\n

Would you be surprised if I told you that this was all in New Orleans? Probably not.<\/p>\n

And the first time I held a funeral in one of New Orleans\u2019 above-ground cemeteries\u2026.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The day before the funeral, the daughter-in-law said, \u201cNow, pastor, tomorrow when we bury Roy\u2019s mother\u2026\u201d Yes? \u201cMy mother will also be in the casket with her.\u201d I said, \u201cExcuse me?\u201d She said, \u201cWe cremated my mother ten years ago and haven\u2019t known what to do with the ashes. We found out that it\u2019s legal, so just before the casket is sealed, we\u2019re going to slip the urn inside and put both their names on the marble slab.\u201d<\/p>\n

She got a little gleam in her eye and said, \u201cJust think\u2013my mother and my mother-in-law in the same casket.\u201d<\/p>\n

I said, \u201cDid they get along together in life?\u201d<\/p>\n

She said, \u201cIt really doesn\u2019t matter, does it?\u201d<\/p>\n

No, some things do not matter after death.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s interesting what people put inside the casket\u2026.<\/strong><\/p>\n

One lady whose funeral had a certain color combination to which she was devoted. The same shade of hair, clothing, and fingernail polish. Her husband looked all over town, he told me, and bought up several bottles of the fingernail polish\u2013\u201cIt\u2019s a rare color!\u201d\u2013which he placed inside the casket.<\/p>\n

Did he think she would be needing them in Heaven? Of course not. It was simply a sweet gesture, and who can fault him for that?<\/p>\n

When my dad was buried in 2007, a couple of his mischievous grandsons decided to drop a pack of playing cards into the grave. One went so far as to buy up 13 decks of cards and pull out all the aces. Then, he inserted all 52 of them into one of the card boxes and put that in the casket.<\/p>\n

Again, just a little fun thing. Pop would have gotten a kick out of it, and recognized it for what it was: pure love. Rummy was our family game, and still is. It’s harmless fun with lots of space for laughter, story-telling, and fellowship.\u00a0 I have a few CDs now of those rummy games when my wonderful Dad and some family members now in Heaven were playing rummy. They are prized possessions.<\/p>\n

Sometimes, funny things (or mistakes) get engraved on tombstones\u2026.<\/strong><\/p>\n

–Newspaper humorist Smiley Anders told of a woman whose recipe for potato salad was forever drawing inquiries. But she never let out her secret, saying, \u201cOver my dead body.\u201d When she died, there it was–the recipe for her wonderful potato salad engraved on the tombstone.<\/p>\n

–Some of my family members decided they would install their gravestone now while they\u2019re living to make sure it was done right. Everything except the final dates, of course, were engraved. And on the reverse side, they had a lengthy scripture carved into the marble, a text that evidently meant a lot to them.<\/p>\n

Except the engravers got it wrong. I was there one day visiting the graves of loved ones and spotted that engraving before I learned the story behind it. Standing there, reading that Scripture, I wondered, \u201cWhy in the world would they want that on their stone?\u201d Later, I found out. It was a mistake. Some miscommunication had taken place, and no one knows who was at fault. At any rate, the engraver had to grind off the mistake\u2013there were several lines of it!\u2013and put in the correct verses.<\/p>\n

It doesn\u2019t hurt to check and double-check these things before doing something so lasting (not to say expensive).<\/p>\n

My big brother Ron used to sell tombstones, so a couple of years before they would need it, Ron encouraged Mom and Dad to choose the one they wanted and he had it installed.\u00a0 So, here was my parents double tombstone sitting atop their assigned lots, but no one was inside.\u00a0 When the annual decoration day came and everyone laid flowers atop loved ones’ tombs, Mom insisted with my sisters that flowers should be put on hers and Pop’s grave too.\u00a0 “Mom,” they said, “it’s empty!”\u00a0 “No matter,” said she. “It would look like no one cared.”<\/p>\n

One thing we know for sure: My mama and daddy will never have to worry about no one caring. They were as loved–and still are–as it’s possible to be in this lifetime.<\/p>\n

Football scores at the graveside…<\/b><\/p>\n

<\/b>We’d had the funeral on Canal Street in New Orleans and the burial was several miles to the west.\u00a0 As the processional slowly made its way through the streets that Saturday afternoon, I did something I had never done: I turned on the car radio.\u00a0 It was a football game, one for the books.<\/p>\n

The game between LSU and Kentucky was almost over.\u00a0 Kentucky was ahead, just barely, and the Lexington fans were so excited they were crowding the field and beginning to tear down the goalposts.\u00a0 But wait.\u00a0 LSU still had a few seconds on the clock.\u00a0 And that’s when it happened.<\/p>\n

The LSU quarterback lofted what’s called a “Hail Mary” pass–all the way down the field, hoping someone will catch it.\u00a0 And they did.\u00a0 An LSU player caught the ball in the end zone and the referees signaled “Touchdown!”\u00a0 Instead of winning, Kentucky had just lost the game.\u00a0 As an LSU fan, I was ecstatic.\u00a0 But the problem is, I’m in a funeral procession and can’t tell anyone.<\/p>\n

I’m almost embarrassed to tell what I did.\u00a0 I rolled down the window looking for someone on the sidewalk to tell. And finding no one, I did the second best thing: I told about the win at the graveside.<\/p>\n

Being a preacher, I probably made a spiritual point with it, how that “it’s not over til it’s over,” or something.\u00a0 When we finished there, the son of the honoree (the deceased) said, “Mother would have loved that. She was a big LSU fan.”<\/p>\n

Whew.\u00a0 Close call there.<\/p>\n

Why pastors prefer funerals to weddings…<\/strong><\/p>\n

Funerals take no rehearsals, require no fancy clothing, and have no mother-of-the-bride hovering over to make sure everything is done just so.<\/p>\n

My friend Bryan Harris, student minister in two of my pastorates, once helped in a funeral of a lady in our church and got her name wrong.\u00a0 The funny part is that her first name was Troy and her husband’s name was Tommy.\u00a0 So, this was ready-made for confusion.<\/p>\n

Mrs. Johnson had handled the records each Sunday in the youth department’s Sunday School.\u00a0 Bryan always called her “Mrs. Tommy.”\u00a0 So, when the funeral was over, I couldn’t resist.\u00a0 “Bryan, you know her name was not Tommy.\u00a0 That was her husband’s name.\u00a0 Her first name was Troy.”\u00a0 He was stunned. “You are kidding!”\u00a0 I wasn’t.\u00a0 But no harm done.\u00a0 This was the sweetest lady on the planet and apparently her family was not quick to take offense.<\/p>\n

Sometimes we pastors get called upon by the funeral home to handle a service where the family has no minister.\u00a0 A time or two, I was in the middle of the service when it occurred to me I did not remember the name of the deceased. Thereafter, I always wrote it in big letters on my notes. Same for the bride and groom in weddings.\u00a0 Make that mistake once and you never forget it.<\/p>\n

When I die and the family has a funeral service…<\/strong><\/p>\n

It’s okay to laugh a lot.\u00a0 I’ve enjoyed laughing all my life and see no reason to stop now. Besides, I’ll be in the Land of Eternal Laughter (C. S. Lewis said “Joy is the business of Heaven”) and doing just fine.\u00a0 As my buddy Jerry Clower used to say, “There’s only one place in the universe where there is no laughter, and I’ve made arrangements to miss it.”<\/p>\n

When Margaret, my wife of 52 years died, we were all gathered around her bedside weeping.\u00a0 At one point I said, “Now, listen, one of these days it’s going to be Grandpa lying here. And I don’t want all this crying.”\u00a0 Granddaughter Abby said, “Why not?” I said, “Well, good night, I will be 95 years old and will have preached the previous Sunday. What’s to cry about?”\u00a0 And they all laughed.<\/p>\n

I love that little verse in Psalm 4. Thou hast put laughter in my heart, more than when their grain and new wine increased<\/em>.\u00a0 Three kinds of laughter:\u00a0 Grain<\/em> represents money, so it’s superficial joy.\u00a0 New wine<\/em> gives an artificial joy.\u00a0 And the joy of the Lord? Well, that’s the real stuff, the\u00a0 beneficial kind.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you’re ever sitting around with two or three preachers, ask for their funniest stories, the most memorable wedding or funeral they’ve done, something like that.\u00a0 Pull up a chair because you’ll be here for an hour. I don\u2019t have … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46,58,22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20340","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-death","category-humor","category-my-50-year-perspective-on-ministry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20340","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20340"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20340\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20373,"href":"https:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20340\/revisions\/20373"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20340"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20340"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20340"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}